Last Minute Lobbying To Try and Save US Solar Grant Program

A solar industry trade group is lobbying for a grant program by touting numbers to show that the United States exported more solar energy equipment than it imported in 2009.

The 11^th-hour lobbying effort continues from a solar trade group that wants Congress to extend a program created by the stimulus package that pay for 30 percent of the cost of installing solar power projects. The latest salvo came in the form of a report that touted the United States as a net exporter of solar energy equipment worth $723 million in 2009.

The largest exported product was polysilicon. Polysilicon makers shipped $1.14 billion worth of the material out of the United States while the country imported $84 million’s worth last year, according to a GTM Research report commissioned by the Solar Energy Industries Association and released Tuesday. The figures referred to polysilicon made for use for the solar market only.

The report looked at the manufacturing of solar panels, concentrating solar thermal equipment and solar water and pool heating systems. The largest sector belong to producers of components and final products for solar panels. Its release seemed late considering that 2010 is almost over. SEIA and GTM representatives said the report required a lot of time for gathering and analyzing data because they hadn't produced this kind of report before. 

Exports of silicon wafers for making solar cells accounted for $37 million in 2009, compared with $13 million in imports.

Solar cell and panel assembly presented a trade deficit, which isn’t surprising considering that the largest U.S. solar panel makers, First Solar and SunPower, have long set up a big part of their manufacturing operations in places such as Malaysia and the Philippines to take advantage of generous tax packages or proximity to their customers, or both. On the other hand, a growing number of manufacturers based in Europe and Asia have set up factories in the United States. These manufacturers include Sharp, SolarWorld, Sanyo and Schott Solar.

Many manufacturers set up operations in the United States because they expect the country to be the next big market. But manufacturing costs can be higher in the U.S. than in their home countries. China-based Suntech Power, for example, opened a 30-megawatt solar panel assembly plant in Arizona earlier this year. The manufacturing cost in the Arizona factory is about $0.10-$0.15 per watt more than what Suntech could do in China, said Steve Chan, head of Suntech’s American operations, during a conference call with analysts earlier this month.

The U.S. exported $115 million worth of solar cells and imported $119 million of them last year. The country exported about $1.01 billion worth of solar panels and brought in $1.24 billion of them.

If the global solar market is divided by countries, then Germany, the largest solar market, received most of the U.S.-made solar energy equipment. In fact, Germany imported $686 million of the U.S.-made goods that go into making solar panels. Japan got $409 million while China took in $280 million, the report said. The rest, or $939 million, were scattered among other countries around the world.

The United States imported most of its solar panel-related equipment from China ($430 million) and Mexico ($349 million). The list is followed by Germany ($182 million) Philippines ($172 million), Japan ($164 million) and others ($295 million).

The report and a SEIA press conference are part of an intensifying effort to persuade federal lawmakers to extend a program that can cover 30 percent of the cost of installing a solar energy generation project. The program came from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, and it’s set to sunset by the end of this month. Project developers can still qualify for the grant as long as they either start construction or spend 5 percent of their projects’ budget (on equipment such as racking systems, for example) before the year ends.

Last week, SEIA held a press conference after a Senate bill to extend the provision didn’t make it to a compromised tax bill. SEIA’s CEO, Rhone Resch, warned then that job losses would be likely if lawmakers didn’t continue the program.

Since then, the Senate managed to squeeze in a one-year extension of the program in the tax bill. The Senate hasn’t voted on the bill, which will still need the approval of the House. SEIA was hoping to get a 2-year extension.

GTM’s report also showed how much value the solar industry has created domestically. The number takes into account the dollars generated from manufacturing, designing and installing solar energy projects (including factors such as labor and site preparation), legal expenses and sales of equipment by distributors and retailers. In all, solar projects created $3.6 billion in value last year, and $2.6 billion of that stayed in the United States.

Source:   Renewable Energy World

Solar Jobs on the Rise

US solar energy companies such as GoSolarUSA and its competitors could be adding thousands of jobs over the next year when many industries remain stagnant, according to a solar jobs census conducted by non-profit research organization the Solar Foundation.

The report, entitled "National Solar Jobs Census 2010: A Review of the U.S. Solar Workforce," examined employment along the solar value chain, including installation, wholesale trade, manufacturing, utilities and all other fields and includes growth rates and job numbers for 31 separate occupations.

The analysis included data from more than 2,400 solar company survey respondents. According to the report, more than half the solar industry employers questioned said they plan to increase their workforce by an estimated 26 percent over the next year, representing nearly 24,000 net new jobs by August 2011.

"With the scarcity of fossil fuels continuing to rise, the growth of the solar energy industry is practically inevitable," said GoSolarUSA President and CEO Tyson Rohde.

"Employment numbers are a terrific indicator of our industry's health, and the Solar Foundation's report confirms what we already know: Demand for solar technology has not slowed."

According to the Solar Census, there were more than 16,700 solar employment sites and 93,000 solar energy-related jobs in the U.S. as of August.

Over the next 12 months, more than 50 percent of solar companies expect to add jobs, while only two percent expect to cut workers. The anticipated overall 12-month growth rate for the U.S. economy is only about two percent for the same period.

GoSolarUSA is doing its part to create new innovations in the solar energy sector by funding the development of technologies such as the PREEcharge, a protective skin that utilizes solar cells and wireless radio-frequency antennas to charge smartphones and tablet computers using renewable energy sources.

"Innovations such as the PREEcharge that make solar energy part of everyday power usage are what continue to drive the solar industry's growth," Rohde said.

Source:   Solar Foundation

U.S. Needs to Boost Spending for Energy R&D, Panel Tells Obama

The President's Council of Advisers on Science and Technology has released a report that is critical of the U.S. for not investing enough into energy R&D, recommending that spending more than triple from $5 billion to $16 billion (not that much when you compare it to the cost of other big expenditures). The U.S. lags many other country in energy R&D investments (see the chart below), and considering how much it spends on fossil fuels, any investments that reduce that consumption would more than pay for themselves in the long run.

The group's report suggests that the money could be found through new revenue sources, like a two-cent-per-gallon gasoline tax or a small "line charge" for the transmission of coal-fired electricity."These charges are well within the normal fluctuations in price seen by consumers and yet would provide a research fund that could materially lower future energy prices in a world conditioned by security and environmental concerns," it states. (source)

That might be difficult to do, though, as raising new taxes - even ones that make this much sense - is going to be tough in the current political climate. But people need to understand that there's a big difference between investing in research that has a good chance of having a high payoff (not only to create whole new industries, but also to reduce future energy costs and environmental costs) and raising taxes to pay for useless wars or whatever.
Via NYT

Spain Surpasses USA in installed Solar

When Spain's latest solar power plant came on-line this week it brought the county's total power generation from solar to 432Mw, surpassing that of the USA by 10Mw.
The latest Spanish plant known as La Florida, situated in Badajoz province, is a parabolic trough design covering 200Ha of land with an output of 50Mw, with a heat storage facility using moulten salt.

Spain is also reported to have around 20 other new solar power plants in an advanced stage of construction which will add a further 600Mw of capacity by the end of the year 

Solar leader sees bright future

Zhengrong Shi, an engineer turned entrepreneur, has become one of China’s richest citizens by betting heavily on the future of solar power. In a talk on Tuesday at MIT, he outlined his vision for how he believes solar energy will, by the end of the century, produce more than two-thirds of the world’s electricity.


Shi grew up in China but spent a decade in Australia pursuing his education and beginning his work in solar cell production. In 2000, he returned to his homeland and began setting up factories to take advantage of China’s low labor costs and other economy measures to produce solar panels at a lower cost than companies elsewhere could match. At the time, China had a negligible presence in the solar business, but now, thanks in large part to Shi’s pioneering work, it dominates the world’s solar industry.

Shi’s company, Suntech, is the clear leader. Except for one year during the economic downturn, the company’s output of solar panels has doubled annually, while production costs and sales prices continue to decline. Already, he said, for many locations (such as Italy) the panels his company produces can generate electricity at “grid parity,” meaning the cost is competitive with that from standard (primarily fossil-fuel) sources. Given present trends, the ever-falling prices should bring other locations, including Hawaii, California and Japan, to grid parity within the next five years, he said.


The incredible shrinking production cost

Shi, who has a doctorate in electrical engineering, described several technological approaches that he expects will help to drive up efficiency while lowering costs, including the incorporation of a layer of plasmonic nanostructures — which can help to distribute light so that more of it enters the solar cell and less gets scattered away — bonded onto the front of a silicon solar cell.

That is just one of many technologies being pursued by the company, which invests heavily in research and development and is exploring a variety of approaches to lowering costs, increasing the efficiency of the panels, and incorporating features that drastically lower the time needed for installation, which is a major part of overall system cost for the end users (whether individual homes or utility-scale solar farms).

The company is looking at ways to produce much narrower silver contacts on the solar cells’ front surface, which would increase efficiency by reducing shading (caused by barriers that keep sunlight from striking the surface of the cell). It is also working on “buried contact” cells, where the connections are under the silicon layer so they have no shading, and on ways of making thinner cells to reduce the cost of the silicon needed and the weight of the finished panels.

When Suntech started, the typical price for crystalline silicon solar cells was about $5 per watt, but Shi was able to produce them initially for less than $3. This year, the company has produced about 3 gigawatts’ (GW) worth of solar panels, and Shi said he expects to produce more than 5 GW next year. And thanks to stringent quality control, he said, the company is able to offer a 25-year warranty on the panels’ power output.

But that’s just the beginning, he stressed. “We’re not even a baby yet,” he said; solar technology today is “still an embryo.” For one thing, even as demand keeps growing, “solar is not ready yet” to meet that demand — “we don’t have the scale, we don’t have the supply chain to support” the growth that would otherwise be possible.

As a step toward what he sees as an electric power system that eventually will be dominated by solar, he suggests that hybrid systems — large solar installations paired with conventional fossil-fuel powerplants — could help to bridge the gap, providing steady power by switching to the fossil fuel whenever the sun doesn’t shine or the demand is too large.

Shi’s talk at MIT was sponsored by the MIT China Energy and Environment Research Group, the MIT Energy Initiative and the MIT Energy Club.


Source:  MIT News

Bulgarian Solar Power Industry May Attract €300 Million Investment in 2011

According to the Bulgarian Photovoltaic Association and the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Bulgaria's solar power segment could attract EUR 300 million in foreign and local direct investments, while installed photovoltaic capacity could reach 100 MW in 2011.

The forecasts of the entities are feasible provided that the new law on renewable energy resources erases some administrative hurdles to investors.

According to industry representatives, the country has only 15 MW of solar energy capacity, since the cumbersome procedures for hooking solar plants to the grid curbs some of the projects' development, according to data announced at an energy conference in Sofia.

The reason behind the segment's attractiveness is the fact that existing legislation requires power distributors to purchase green power at preferential rates, as well as the reduced costs of solar panels.

According to BPvA figures, prices of solar modules have dropped by an average 6% to 8% over the past years, going down by almost a third in 2009 alone.

Mr Nikola Gazdov chairman of BPvA said that "Of course, that will reduce the purchase price of electricity from new plants."

Currently, the tariff for solar power, fixed by the country's regulator, stands at BGL 0.82 per kWh for power stations rated up to 5 kW and BGL 0.76 for larger projects.

Under the country's clean energy development plan, which was sent by the Economy Ministry to the European Commission in the summer of 2010 without the necessary environment impact assessment and government approval, Bulgaria should develop 300 MW of solar plants by 2020.


Source:  Steel Guru

First Solar (FSLR) Supplying 15 MW in Solar Modules to ACME of India

First Solar (FSLR) announced earlier today that ACME of India will purchase 15MW in thin film solar modules for a solar plant in the state of Gujarat.  First Solar sees India as a potentially large solar market.  Delivery is expected in March 2011.

First Solar VP TK Kallenbach commented: “We see India as a land of immense opportunity and potential. We are pleased to collaborate with a leader like ACME to contribute to the country through the development of clean, affordable, sustainable solar electricity utilising our advanced, thin film technology and unparalleled experience in large-scale solar PV systems.”

Source:  First Solar