JoeTaxpayer

The allusions to pork in every bill congress votes on often makes me want to swear off bacon for good. I’m sure that Friday’s bailout was no different. 451 pages? That right or was I reading an article that tried to make reference to Farenheight 451? One bit of tastey pork that someone slipped into the $700 Billion Bailout package was an extension of the solar energy credit. Back in June in my post Bad Energy Mojo, I complained that congress let the credits for wind and solar expire. Now it’s back and better than ever, a 30% credit with no limit. More details available from the SanFrancisco Business Times article Massive Solar credit Ok’d with Bailout.
I talked some numbers in April’s Waiting for the Sun, where I offered that a 1KW system would cost about $9500 installed, and give the user $360 worth of power each year. Now, with a 30% credit, the cost is down to $6650, and that $360 of electricity is a 5.4% return, an attractive rate given the alternatives. I remain optimistic that this snowballs into a competitive alternate energy source, ultimately offering the US energy independence.

Joe

written by JOE \\ tags: alternate energy, bailout package, congress, electricity, energy, energy independence, solar, Solar energy

My readers know that I have great optimism for the future of solar power. As the cost of solar cells drops, the challenge is to bridge the gap from sundown to sunrise. A recent article “‘Major Discovery’ Primed To Unleash Solar Revolution” suggests that “MIT researchers have overcome a major barrier to large-scale solar power: storing energy for use when the sun doesn’t shine.”

The article goes on to describe a low cost, low loss method used to split water into hydrogen and oxygen, in effect creating a household fuel cell. While this system may still be years away, it may provide the much needed storage solution once solar (and wind) power becomes economically viable.

Joe

written by JOE \\ tags: energy, fuel, power, solar, solar batteries, Solar cell, solar power, solar revolution

With all my discussion about Solar Energy and the rise in Gas prices, here’s a timely Mike Keefe cartoon from the Denver Post;

Enjoy the weekend!
Joe

written by JOE \\ tags: cartoon, denver post, energy, gas prices, mike keefe, solar, Solar energy

I just caught a story titled “McCain call for $300 million prize for car battery”. The prize is offered “for the development of a battery package that has the size, capacity, cost and power to leapfrog the commercially available plug-in hybrids or electric cars.” There’s a part of this that I think is great, regular reader know I am excited about solar power and the prospects for a 21st century electric car. I was encouraged to hear McCain interviewed on CNBC and state that the goal should be to create an electric car that combined a charged range of 240 miles along with a plug in fast recharge capability. If nothing else, this shows he ‘gets it’ and knows what the goal is.
Now, reading that he’d like to be able to offer this challenge, it appears at first blush to be a ‘put your money where your mouth is’ approach. I think the intention is good, but the number may not be so high to get any attention. We currently have the X Prize, a series of prizes that include one for this very goal, and with a $10 million prize.
I think that the $300M may be better spent promoting Solar Power in general along with storage technologies that may overlap the automotive use. Even if solar cells were free, there would be an issue of storage, and we have a crisis that goes beyond just the current high oil prices. Solar can solve multiple issues, but storage is key, without it, we are missing a vital link in the enegy chain.
Joe

written by JOE \\ tags: electric cars, money, plug in hybrids, solar, Solar cell, solar power, storage technologies

Some time ago, I read a book titled “Pop!: Why Bubbles Are Great For The Economy.” This is not a summary of that book, but I recommend it as it made for some interesting reading. Its premise was that bubbles leave in their wake some new infrastructure (telegraph lines or railroad tracks, as an example) or technology leap (as in the late 90’s ‘dot com’ boom leaving a huge amount of dark fiber and active bandwidth). Now, I put that book down wondering what the next bubble would bring, and perhaps I couldn’t see the forest through the trees. Regular readers know I’m excited about the prospects of alternative energy, specifically, solar energy. Sure enough, Harper’s recently ran an article titled “The next bubble: Priming the markets for tomorrow’s big crash.” In this article, Eric Janszen, the founder and president of iTulip, Inc. speculates that alternative energy may be the next bubble forming, and if his forecast is right, we have years ahead of us to take advantage of the opportunity this presents. This chart offers both historical numbers on Tech and Housing, as well as forecasts for the housing downturn and the Alternative energy bubble.

Joe

written by JOE \\ tags: Alternative Energy, electricity, Finance, gasoline, power, solar

A few weeks back, in the March 7 issue of The Week, I read an article titled “For energy, here comes the sun.” At first glance, it was good to see that I’m not the only one so enthusiastic, nor the only author of bad puns, having titled my first solar story “here comes the sun” back in October. I was happy to discover the article was about futurist Ray Kurzweil’s prediction that he is “confident that we are not that far away from a tipping point (my choice of words as well) where energy from solar will be [economically] competitive with fossil fuels. The longer story appeared on LifeScience.com and was titled, “Solar Power to Rule in 20 Years, Futurists Say“. Kurzweil makes reference to advances in solar power being similar to that of computer technology, but as one of my regular readers Augustine pointed out to me,”Integrated circuits fall in price because Moore said that it would be increasingly possible to shrink transistor sizes, therefore allowing to increase their number per area. And given that the cost of manufacturing integrated circuits relies heavily on the area, the more transistors per area, the cheaper the integrated circuit. Photo-voltaic cells are not made up by Silicon transistors, but by a Silicon film deposited on a surface. Therefore, its area cannot be reduced and its cost is not subject to Moore’s law.” This is true, and resets my expectations a bit. I’m still optimistic that 4 cent/KWH solar isn’t too far away.

Joe

written by JOE \\ tags: Business, Energy and Environment, Moore, Moore's Law, Renewable, solar, Solar cell, Solar energy