Panels on the Roof

Good news for solar energy:

President Barack Obama today announced that a US government agency is awarding nearly USD 2 billion from a stimulus package to two solar companies, as part of his drive to build a clean energy economy.

“Today” was July 3. We’re happy to see some of the stimulus money go this way – Obama has said he wants to encourage solar energy – but otherwise only mildly interested.

Solar power has some of the same issues as wind energy – it takes up vast expanses of land for intermittent electricity production – but it does have the capacity for delivering electricity on a very local basis. Think President Jimmy Carter’s solar panels on the White House roof - and the technology is still moving forward.

SoloPower, one of many companies vying to lower the cost of solar energy, introduced on Monday a line of flexible panels for commercial rooftops.

The company makes thin-film solar cells from a combination of copper, indium, gallium, and selenium (CIGS) which is placed on a flexible foil. Its first product line is a set of solar panels designed for the flat roofs of commercial buildings.

It’s light enough not to crumple the roof and although the technology lags behind the use of silicon – it converts about 20 percent of the sunlight that hits it into electricity while silicon can manage 29 percent – it is clearly advancing.

With demand cranking up to an all-time high for solar technology, the two types of panels will likely co-exist for years--especially considering the miniscule role solar plays now in generating electricity, according to various estimates, and that demand is expected to double by 2025. Solar accounts for less than 0.10 percent of the current total.

This isn’t exactly Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD – the issue of developing a standard hasn’t yet emerged. So the “winner” will be the technology that produces the most capacity at the lowest cost. It’ll make the sales and the other will wither away. Right now, silicon has the edge, but CIGS has a window to surpass it – the window being that solar energy hasn’t gained traction yet.

We admit that when we read about CIGS, we wondered if the business model, at least currently, is different than that of silicon – more about the White House roof than about a broad expanse of the desert. Such a focus has the dual benefits of good optics (nothing cluttering up a pristine landscape) and encouraging green-aware homeowners to adopt solar energy.

Maybe not.

[S]olar panels aren't as ugly as they used to be. PowerLight has come out with roof tiles with embedded silicon solar panels, which get installed when a house is built. A complete system can run around $8,000 to $13,000, according to Grupe Homes, which has included PowerLight panels in some homes in a few relatively new developments.

Looks like both are angling for the home market.

---

If we had anything negative to say here, it is not about solar power – a clean electricity generator that needs room to grow should have it - but the perception that it and wind power represent an alternative to nuclear energy. They don’t – the intermittency and subsequent loss of capacity ensure that their role is complementary. Nuclear energy doesn’t need wind and solar to backstop it; the reverse is not equally true. But we have a hunch most people get that – if they don’t, they’re being willful.

---

Like, for example, John O. Blackburn.

By the time any new nuclear power plants could be built, solar energy will be far less expensive, says John O. Blackburn, a retired professor who was a member of {Duke U]niversity's faculty from 1959 to 1980 and is a former chair of the economics department.

The goal of his report - Solar and Nuclear Costs: the Historic Crossover – is to show that nuclear energy is now more expensive that solar power per kilowatt hour. Having “proven” this, he wants to make sure his home state knows about it:

“North Carolina should be leading, not lagging, in the transition to clean energy," Mr. Blackburn said in a news release. "We call on Gov. [Beverly] Perdue and state agencies to see that a very important turning point has been reached, and act accordingly."

We were interested to see Dr. Blackburn has his resume on line. He’s written a couple of books since retirement – one on urban sprawl in Florida and one, published in 1986, called The Renewable Energy Alternative. So he’s been at this for awhile. You can find the whole report here. We found this a little amusing:

When solar generated electricity is added to a power grid with wind, hydroelectric, biomass and natural gas generation, along with existing storage capacity and “smart grid” technology, intermittency becomes a very manageable issue.

Natural gas often gets a pass when one doesn’t like nuclear energy, but Dr. Blackburn hits the daily double by merging that and the Chinese menu approach to electricity. You have to grant him enthusiasm and a futurist nature.

1977: President Jimmy Carter gives a press conference on the roof of the White House to show the solar panels he’s had installed there. President Ronald Reagan later took them down.