Is Solar Power Really too Expensive or Is that Just What Opponents Want You to Think

Example of a centralized solar plant model where everything would be controlled by the utility company - even price.

Recently I visited the west coast of the U.S. and being a resident of Florida for the past twenty-plus years I must say that I was totally exhilarated by what I saw in California, and totally disappointed with what I know to be the case in Florida. Over and over, I saw the rooftops of homes covered with solar panels. Compare that to what is the case in Florida where such a sight is barely nascent. The simple fact is that Florida (the Sunshine State) homeowners are virtually non-existent when it comes to distributive solar power or rooftop solar. How is this possible when you consider the following presumption… … Continue Reading

North America’s Largest Rooftop Solar Power Plant Formally Completed

The Riverside Project calls for the installation of 27528 photovoltaic rooftop solar - that's plenty of jobs created and energy being saved.

GLOUCESTER CITY, N.J., PRNewswire via COMTEX/ — U.S. Rep. Robert Andrews, D-N.J., today presented Gloucester Marine Terminal officials with an award letter announcing an $11 million federal tax credit rebate for the recently-completed groundbreaking new rooftop solar power plant project, the largest of its kind in North America. … Continue Reading

Winds of change blow through China as spending on renewable energy soars

China's Gobi Desert is becoming a home for its massive renewable energy transformation.

Jonathan Watts (guardian.co.uk) in Jiuquan – World’s biggest polluter spends £4bn a year on wind and solar power generation in single region as it aims to cut fossil fuel use

The remote, wind-blasted desert of northwestern Gansu could be the most unloved, environmentally abused corner of China. It is home to the country’s first oilfield and several of the coalmines and steel factories that have contributed to China’s notoriety as the planet’s biggest polluter and carbon dioxide emitter.

But in the past few years, the landscape has started to undergo a transformation as Gansu has moved to the frontline of government efforts to reinvent China’s economy with a massive investment in renewable energy. … Continue Reading

Cheap Solar Power at Night

Solar storage: The beads in these vials are made of two types of glass that can store heat up to 1,200°C. Halotechnics

Solar power has two main problems: it’s expensive, and it’s intermittent, since the output of a solar power plant depends on the time of day and cloud cover. Halotechnics, an early-stage solar-thermal startup, could help solve both problems.

The company has developed new heat-storage materials that promise to not only make solar-thermal power plants more efficient, but also reduce the cost of storing energy from the sun for use when it’s most needed. … Continue Reading

Solar Window Making Progress Thanks To Invisible Wiring

Solar Glass Generates Power Through Your Windows

An exciting technology is being developed by New Energy Technologies (NENE.OB) and the Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) – a window that can produce solar energy in both natural and artificial light.
An electricity-generating coating is sprayed onto a SolarWindow^TM enabling them to retain their transparency while generating energy. … Continue Reading

New Solar Panels Blossomed Despite a Tough Year for the Industry

Solar is becoming very affordable for buyers

By DIANE CARDWELL - Last year seemed like a dark one for the solar industry: Stiff competition from China drove American manufacturers to layoffs and even bankruptcy, while the low price of natural gas and the loss of a critical government subsidy weakened incentives for new solar developments. And then there was the long shadow of Solyndra, whose bankruptcy after receiving federal loans cast a pall over other green-energy endeavors. … Continue Reading

Australian Solar Light Helps 80,000 Pakistan Flood Refugees

The light inside a home in Pakistan

A cheap Australian-designed solar light is changing lives in developing nations, including 80,000 refugees in Pakistan still struggling to rebuild after the country suffered devastating floods a year ago. … Continue Reading

The War Against Oil is Being Won

by Dana Blankenhorn – With natural gas prices having tanked, and the President being given stick on the campaign trail over high gas prices and failed subsidies at Solyndra and elsewhere, it may be hard to see that the War Against Oil is being won.

But it is.

The War Against Oil is a long-term project, begun some years ago, meant to wean the market from its dependence on fossil fuels and create a new era of sustainable abundance. It is at the heart of today’s politics, oil interests having taken command of our politics 12 years ago and retaining an absolute stranglehold on the Republican Party. But this is, in the end, an economic struggle, and what ultimately matters is cost. … Continue Reading