Follow this link to sign up for events!

Archive for Global

SLevy | February 6, 2013
3 comments

New Thin-Film Solar Cell May Provide Electricity at Grid Parity Using Gallium Arsenide Solar Cells

Global Photonic Energy Corp. (GPEC), has created a thin-film solar cell that has the ability to provide electricity at grid parity or the cost of traditionally provided electricity.
Gallium Arsenide (GaAs) is a better photovoltaic candidate than silicon reaching 30% or better efficiency. Problem with Gallium Arsenide cells is that they are very expensive to manufacture in large sizes. Instead these cells are used in concentrating solar PV arrays where the sun image is concentrated some 500 times focusing the light onto a small millimeter sized GaAs cell.

Dr. Stephen R. Forrest of the University of Michigan said the breakthrough, presented at the Fall Meeting of the Materials Research Society, is the result of substantially reduced production costs. It is based on a patent-pending invention that reuses the same Gallium Arsenide wafer multiple times to produce solar cells. This unlimited wafer reuse approach to conventional “epitaxial lift off” technology that typically leads to wafer damage, and hence only a very limited number (1 to 2) of wafer reuses, has the potential to reduce the cost of a typical Gallium Arsenide solar cell to below $1 per Watt (peak).

“This exciting development implies that ultra-high efficiency solar cells based on Gallium Arsenide can eventually produce electricity at or below grid parity.” Dr. Forrest stated. “Using integrated solar concentrators and our adhesive-free, cold-weld bonding technology to plastic substrates, we estimate electricity could be produced as low as $0.45 cents per Watt, compared to traditional grid parity of $1 per Watt.”

GPEC is excited by the discovery. With this new discovery, the cost structure is dramatically reduced and can be used in numerous applications. The high efficiency, light weight and flexible solar cells are deployed on roll up plastic sheets. GPEC anticipates their use in spot powering vehicles, mobile military equipment and satellites, and off-grid locations. The company has big plans and want to license its intellectual property in order to commercialize the technology. To date, GPEC has a total of 425 patents.

Category: Business / Economics, financing, Global, New items, PV Tech Newscast, Renewable Energy, Solar, Technology |
SLevy | January 25, 2013
No comments

Expect Solar Prices to Bottom Out and Begin to Rise Very Soon

The reason that solar panel prices are so low is because the supply of panels have exceeded the demand. The supply was projected on the historical growth of solar which had been rising at a spectacular rate, but governments around the world have fallen into a recession mode and have trimmed or eliminated the supports for the solar industry. Examples here are the elimination of the 1603 grant and the rising need to reduce solar set-asides in the renewable energy credits in many of our states. It started with Spain, then Italy and then Germany. China has cut back on the manufacturing of panels and many of their businesses as well as those around the world have seen their profit margins disappear. The spot price of polysilicon had reached a low of $13 per kilogram; way below the manufacturing cost of roughly $20. The smaller cell manufacturers and the panel makers have been failing narrowing down the supply of panels. The results are beginning to show up with the spot price of polysilicon rising to $16 on the spot market. With the rise in polysilicon prices will come an increase in the cost of cells and finally the cost of panels. So, if you can afford to buy panels, now is a good time. So, unless we increase the demand substantially, the price will remain static or rising until the scale of manufacturing expands significantly.

Category: Business / Economics, Call to Action, financing, Global, Grants and Incentives, jobs, National, Political, Renewable Energy, Solar, Tennessee |
SLevy | December 18, 2012
No comments

Renewable Energy REITs or MLPs Would Unlock Billions for Project Development

According to Richard Kauffman, Senior Advisor to Secretary of Energy Stephen Chu, making real estate investment trusts (REITs) or master limited partnerships (MLPs) available for renewable energy project financing is the key to advancing the industry.
In his DOE role he is trying to understand where market forces can be harnessed in order to unleash the flood of investment that is needed to bring about large renewable energy projects.
Kauffman explained what he sees as a disconnect between returns in renewable energy projects compared to returns in other investments. On the one hand, today, renewable energy projects are financed in what he called an “old-fashioned, archaic way” where for the most part, projects rely on private sector money that is looking for high rates of returns, typically around 12-14 percent. On the other hand, money managers, wary of the stock market and its risks, have returned to the bond markets, which offer more steady (but lower) rates of return, in the 5 or 6 percent range.
Kauffman explained that this “wall of money” that is looking for a stable rate of return, such as what can be found in the bond markets, could easily invest in renewable energy projects if only the financial vehicle existed that allowed it to. Renewable energy projects with signed power purchase agreements (PPAs) will deliver a healthy rate of return to their investors, one that will be stable for 20 years, exactly what the money managers are seeking.
According to Kauffman, REITs and MLPs, function like a bond and are currently used in more mature markets for project development. If they were available to renewable energy projects, said Kauffman, they would unlock loads of money for project development. Two separate bills have already been introduced in Congress seeking to allow renewable energy projects to be financed through REITs and MLPs but neither bill has come up for vote yet.

original article

Category: Business / Economics, Call to Action, financing, Global, jobs, National, Political, Renewable Energy, Solar |
SLevy | December 16, 2012
No comments

TSEA Welcomes Brazetek as our Latest Business Member

Brazetek.com is the largest internet distributor of solar water to air, brazed plate, and shell & tube heat exchangers. The website’s product selection, competitive pricing and free shipping option has made it an online destination of choice for residential, commercial, or industrial heat transfer solutions. This is our first solar thermal business member.

Category: Business / Economics, Global, New items, Renewable Energy, Solar, Technology, Uncategorized |
SLevy | December 10, 2012
No comments

A123 Goes to Wanxiang in $260M Bankruptcy Auction Bid

Congressman Bill Huizenga, a Michigan Republican, wrote on his Facebook page: “I have serious concerns over the Chinese firm Wanxiang Group Corp attempt to buy A123. I am concerned this transaction poses a threat to U.S. national security, America’s global innovation leadership and job creation.” According to Huizenga, A123′s contracts with the DOE involve power grids, advanced armor, unmanned vehicles and portable power systems.
I could not agree more. New technology that is inherent in our military applications is usually limited from export by what is know as ‘export control’ limitations imposed by the Federal Government. I know because I was an export control officer when I served at Fort Monmouth New Jersey. So limiting the technology developed in this country vital to the defense needs must be protected. I am not enough of an expert in batteries to say that A123 is the most vital battery technology available, but other experts at the Department of Energy supposedly are expert in assessing the technology of A123 as compared to what else is available here. The corporate world works on the rule of the fiduciary who acts at all times for the sole benefit and interest of the one who trusts (investors). Forget loyalty, social benefit, patriotism because all these are not the concern of the corporation who are ruled to serve the best interests of their investors, whomever they may be.

“This may be the closing chapter of A123 Systems as a U.S.-owned firm. According to news reports citing sources with knowledge of the matter, lithium-ion battery maker A123 is now owned by Wanxiang Group, China’s largest maker of auto parts and a major supplier to Ford and General Motors.

Wanxiang’s $260 million bid bested a joint offer from Johnson Controls and NEC for control of most of the assets of A123, including the automotive battery business that Johnson Controls had wanted to purchase, a representative of Lazard Freres, investment banker for A123, told Reuters. Germany’s Siemens was also a bidder, according to news reports.

Wanxiang’s apparent winning bid is sure to raise an outcry in Washington, D.C., however. A123 had received $250 million in U.S. Department of Energy grants and has spent about half of the funding to build its key battery plants in Michigan. The company is also developing battery storage technology for the U.S. military, an area that could raise national security concerns — although according to reports, A123′s government business will be sold separately to U.S.-based Navitas Systems for $2.25 million, which could assuage some concerns on that front.”
entire article

Category: Business / Economics, Call to Action, Energy Storage, financing, Global, Grants and Incentives, jobs, National, Political, Technology, Tennessee, Training |
SLevy | November 26, 2012
One comment

Ten Years Shows Silicon Solar Modules Maintain 97% Original Performance

Even after a decade, aleo solar modules show only minimal age-related performance reduction (degradation). MBJ Services, an independent service provider, assessed a 5.44-kilowatt system near Bremen (Germany) which had been in operation for nearly ten years. They measured each of the 34 aleo modules’ performance with the help of a flasher. The result: an average degradation level of 2.73%. Photovoltaic system planners generally presume performance losses of 0.5% per year – but the aleo modules only degraded by about half that much. Read More

Category: Business / Economics, financing, Global, Renewable Energy, Solar, Solar Performanc, Technology |
SLevy | November 20, 2012
One comment

Agenda for Affordable Solar Workshop December 7th

Date: December 7, 2012 Time: 9 a.m. until 4 p.m. Location: U.T. Conference Center, Knoxville TN
Corner of Locust St. and Clinch Ave.

Statement of the Problem to be Addressed: The average homeowner in the TVA region cannot afford the upfront cost of solar systems for their homes. Recent surveys of rural Tennessee show the strong support for solar but Tennesseans that contributes 60% of TVA’s income are on the average 20% below the typical U.S. income. So Tennesseans want solar but cannot afford solar in today’s economic climate. What can we do to make solar affordable without subsidies?

10 min – introductions TSEA/TREEDC

60 min – Main Speaker: S. David Freeman

120 min – morning breakout

Selecting members for each group and choosing a group discussion leader
What is expected from each group and discussing what is the purpose of each question to be addressed the subjects to be discussed

Group 1: Distributor Issues
a. Collection issues
b. Transfer to TVA mechanism
c. Compensated expenses
d. Future distribution upgrades
e. Location opportunities
i. Locally by distributor
ii. Regionally by TVA
iii. Rooftops

Group 2: Installer issues
a. Initial thoughts on what David said and the proposed program.
b. Preference for local distributors
i. Requirement for local labor?
ii. Could be a small business set aside
iii. Size limits depending on location

Group 3: TVA issues
a. Initial thoughts on what David said and the proposed program
b. Effects on rates
c. Collection issues
d. Accounting issues
e. Who makes the decision to location of array?
i. Distributors
ii. TVA
iii. County
iv. Local Government
f. Any charter issues?
g. Management of program
h. Locating and sizing installed solar farm
i. Expenses incurred for TVA infrastructure
i. Charging for energy storage (who pays and how is the released power priced?)
ii. Financing
iii. Manpower
iv. Other

1 hour – Lunch / Lunch Speaker: Professor Rupy Sawhney

120 min – afternoon breakout

1. Each group continues discussion
a. Arrive at consensus on each area
b. Prepare report back to general session

2. Report back to attendees
a. Distributors
b. Installers
c. TVA
Follow-up and Future Plans

Category: Business / Economics, Call to Action, financing, Global, jobs, Political, Renewable Energy, Solar, Technology, Tennessee |
SLevy | November 15, 2012
No comments

Climate Change and Solar Solutions: A Hurricane Sandy (Ongoing) Experience

Solar plus energy storage would be the answer to challenge freak storms

Raina Russo drives through the ravaged streets of her coastal neighborhood in New York, dodging downed trees and aware of the constant sirens that indicate emergency workers are responding to yet another fire. This is what she calls her “new normal” in her life post-Sandy. Reflecting on her own experience, Russo says she has come to realize our true dependence on power and how it affects our lives.

“You think of power and you think you’ve lost electricity in your home, refrigerator, heater, and so on. But it’s so much more than that. We lost power and cell service dropped; we were up against a gas shortage because the pipelines turn off during the storm and during loss of electricity,” Russo explains. “So you have no power, and all of a sudden you have no communication and no transportation – and you have no means of even operating generators that weren’t flooded because of the gas shortage. Its such a compounded situation, and it’s all about power.”

One part of Russo’s property that seems to have made it through the storm unscathed: her 10.4-kW rooftop solar system. Pending a full system check from Mercury Solar Solutions, her installer, Russo says it looks like her inverters are high enough to have avoided flood damage, and her panels withstood the Hurricane-force winds and remain intact.
Russo lost electricity because her system is tied to the grid; during outages most systems shut down to prevent power from feeding into power lines, which endangers workers that may be out for repairs. This got Russo thinking about storage solutions. She says she hadn’t thought about storage until Sandy, but after speaking to friends and neighbors who own top-of-the-line generators that were flooded and, ultimately, unusable, Russo thinks she should take her existing system to the next level.

“Storage is going to be my first priority in my [home] rebuild process. I need to consult with people on this because I’m not an expert, but why would I invest in a gas generator,” says Russo. “Our panels are on our roof, supposedly they are not damaged, the inverters are high enough that they are not getting damaged either, so if we had storage, that could act as our backup generator.”

The good news: Home solar arrays seemed to withstand Sandy’s furious winds. Sungevity says the company’s installations are designed to hold up to sustained winds of up to 100 miles per hour. Sandy’s gusts hit 90 mph at their peak.

Sunrun, another residential solar company, has about 6,500 customers in the Northeast, and hadn’t received any reports of damage by Wednesday afternoon, according to spokeswoman Susan Wise. John Steeves, a Sungevity customer in Woodstown, N.J., with 39 panels on his roof, says the storm flooded his basement, knocked out power, and toppled massive trees in his neighborhood—but left his solar arrays unscathed. He thinks having the panels above even helped protect the roof of his 47-year-old home. The entire article can be located here

Levy comments: So,if we had added storage to our solar systems for homes and businesses, we would have power. The missing link: the battery. They are expensive, today’s most popular batteries, lead-acid, have limited lives, some need maintenance on a constant basis, and the upcoming lithium batteries being used in autos are very expensive. There are novel chemistries that show promise, but unless you have an Angel investor willing to sink millions into a ‘maybe’ we will not realize an affordable energy store in the next ten years. There are novel chemistries out there who have sought government investments such as SBIRs, SunShot initiatives, but none can demonstrate a pathway to less than $150 per kilowatthour. That is what we need. I am personally aware of the struggles one energy storage company has gone through to find that one Angel investor or government (federal, state) that is willing to risk the money. China has had its ‘Great Leap’ and now the United States needs a similar ‘Great Leap’ in energy storage. The need is there, where are the risk takers?

Category: Business / Economics, Call to Action, Energy Storage, financing, Global, Grants and Incentives, jobs, National, Political, Renewable Energy, Solar |
SLevy | November 7, 2012
No comments

Wanted: Students to Participate in This Country’s Energy Future

Workers to make our energy future a reality

The power and energy industry’s success over the next decade depends on retaining existing knowledge holders and attracting new talent. Historically, that has been a challenge. In April 2009 the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Power & Energy Society (PES) section wrote a report that established six objectives designed to proactively respond to the need for innovative research and increase the number of promising engineering students who are committed to power and energy careers. Three of those objectives revolved around creating scholarships and internships to rapidly fill the pipeline with more undergraduate power engineering sudents and help ensure their career development. The other three objectives focused on rebuilding the ranks of universities’ power and energy faculty through centers for excellence and other resources.

The report helped drive the Department of Energy’s (DOEs) decision to use $100 million in stimulus funding for Smart Grid education. The DOE granted a total of 52 awards, which are being used to help rebuild programs targeted towards Smart Grid education. The awards have been given to support craft workers, engineers, community colleges, universities and other aspects of academia and industry. This diverse mix of stakeholders are helping to rebuild all of the elements of the educational portfolio that are of critical importance to smart grid’s success. Today, rising student interest and recent short-term infusions of research support are helping to rebuild universities’ power and energy educational programs.

As a result of these myriad efforts, we are seeing more students enter the power and energy field. The IEEE PES Scholarship Plus Initiative is helping to attract undergraduate electrical engineering students to the Smart Grid pipeline by providing three, one-year scholarships of $2,000, $2,000 and $3,000 in students’ sophomore, junior and senior years as long as they meet academic and student career experience requirements in the power and energy field.

One way to get students and others interested in Smart Grid is to attract students who are studying engineering, but remain uncertain about their specific career direction. The PES offers them a “home” and the means to connect with the industry and its professionals through actual hands-on experience and guidance.

Original article

Category: Business / Economics, Call to Action, Global, Grants and Incentives, jobs, National, Renewable Energy, Technology, Training |
SLevy | October 27, 2012
7 comments

Tennessee’s solar power industry stymied by red tape, extra fees

This is why the cost of local approval can add up.

“Bureaucrats, paperwork and the utility companies are our biggest problems,” said Steve Johnson, vice president of the Tennessee Solar Energy Industries Association and founder of Nashville-based LightWave Solar. While the power distributors in TVA’s seven-state region are mostly solar-friendly, there are cases where they push back against people who produce their own power and want to sell it to the utility.

For instance, the Johnson City (Tenn.) Power Board, the municipal electric utility, has just instituted a $950 up-front charge to allow a home or business solar system to send power to its system, and also adds a $10-a-month solar service charge to the customer’s bill.

“There is an expense involved with installing the meter” and setting up the solar service on the utility’s system, said Johnson City Power Board spokesman J.T. McSpadden. The $950 application/installation fee would be offset by the $1,000 that TVA provides the home or business to add a solar system, but then that money would not be available to help pay for the solar equipment itself, LightWave’s Johnson said.

Nashville Electric Service doesn’t charge fees for connecting a solar array to its system, but does have some requirements that cause permits to take two to three months to get approved, Johnson said. Among them: A solar permit from NES requires sign-offs by the utility’s chief executive officer, a member of the board of directors and the legal department. “Middle Tennessee Electric Membership Corp. is the easiest to deal with,” he said. “With them, we can get a permit approved in two weeks.”

more

Category: Business / Economics, Call to Action, financing, Global, jobs, National, Political, Solar |
« Older Entries   Recent Entries »