It is a rough time to be a startup in the Solar Photovoltaic sector. The financial crisis and deep recession has not only dried up capital, but has also hit demand for solar panels, which has lead to a global supply glut and a price collapse. In this very difficult environment startups must compete with much larger established global suppliers that have factories of hundreds of megawatts each, an established customer base and well developed brand names and sales channels. In this post we look at five promising CIGS thin film Solar PV startups based in the US and try to catalog their unique strengths and accomplishments.
Wind power is currently the fastest growing renewable energy source. Wind turbines are constantly getting taller because everyone knows the higher you get off the ground, the stronger the wind speeds and the more power that can be obtained. At higher altitudes, wind is also more constant. However, building big towers is not only very expensive, but also not possible due to the weight of the tower. This is where kites come into play.
The New York Power Authority (NYPA) released a request for proposals (RFP) for the development of offshore wind power projects in the New York State waters of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario. by Chris de Morsella, Green Economy Post In order to begin reducing New York State’s dependence on fossil fuel for electric generation and […]
General Electric (GE) one of the world’s largest manufacturers of wind turbines has landed a $1.4 billion contract to supply wind turbines and related services for Caithness Energy’s Shepherds Flat 845MW capacity wind farm. The Shepherds Flat project when completed will cover an area of 30 square miles, in Morrow County, in the Northeast portion of Oregon, near the town of Arlington and will feature 238 GE 2.5xl wind turbines to be installed in 2011-2012.
The manufacturers of the equipment and production lines that are needed to produce solar cells and modules are an important segment of the overall value chain in the solar PV sector as a whole. These companies are making a wide variety of equipment that finds use in the manufacture of solar cells, ranging from tradition semi-conductor manufacturing equipment that has grown out of the computer semi-conductor industry, to more exotic things like specialized inkjet printers and lasers. Who are these US based solar photovoltaic equipment manufacturers and how are they fairing in the global recession of 2009?
In this survey we are looking at the large US headquartered solar PV manufacturers with a view to examine how they are doing in this difficult economic climate. As basically anyone knows, who has not been cloistered away meditating in some cave, 2009 has been a very tough year for pretty much everyone.
California’s biggest utility PG&E is seeking approval from state regulators for a power purchase agreement with Solaren Corp., a Southern California company that has contracted to deliver 200 megawatts of clean, renewable power over a 15 year period, beginning in 2016. Power from out of this world, that is. Solaren says it plans to generate the power using solar panels in earth orbit, then convert it to radio frequency energy for transmission to a receiving station in Fresno County. From there, the energy will be converted to electricity and fed into PG&E’s power grid. UPDATE: The California Public Utilities Commission gave its approval yesterday to the project giving it the green light to proceed.
The recent announcement of billions of dollars of federal funding for smart grid demonstration projects is of particular interest to people who have been involved in thinking about how modernizing the electric grid can bring new benefits to consumers. Many projects awarded have a dynamic pricing option that gives customers access to an electric rate that varies across each day, and provides incentives to manage peak electric demand; and some projects feature a real-time pricing model based on the wholesale electricity market prices. For these projects to truly benefit consumers, it is essential to think about dynamic pricing from the consumer’s point of view.
Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E), one of the largest combination natural gas and electric utilities in the United States and based in San Fransisco, CA announced that it has contracted with Iberdrola Renewables, Inc., the U.S. arm of the world’s largest provider of wind power, to purchase and operate a major wind generating plant to be built in Southern California to serve the utility’s electric customers.
