Road Runner

Oversupply Issues Plague Solar Manufacturers

MichaelAK, There is something else inaccurate about your statement. This article only points out how some of the weaker solar companies are closing US solar plants. But, the big, strong solar companies are planning on opening US manufacturing plants because the increase in US manufacturing cost is more than offset by lower shipping costs to their US customers. SunPower is one of these companies.

On Nov 06 05:20 PM MichaelAK wrote:

> So much for Green Tech Jobs even those are going overseas as a fast
> rate. We need corporate tax, regulator and labor laws reforms if
> we are ever going to rebuild our manufacturing base. Heck when the
> promise of the new Green Manufacturing Revolution goes overseas you
> have a domestic problem that needs fixing at the Macro Level to correct
> the inablances in cost.

Oversupply Issues Plague Solar Manufacturers

SunPower (SPWRA and SPWRB) does not have an oversupply problem. They will be capacity constrained for the first half of 2010 until new production comes online mid year.

Oversupply Issues Plague Solar Manufacturers

MichaelAK, You are missing a huge part of the labor in solar - the installation labor which is 35% plus of the price of an installed solar system. This work can not be outsourced.

Also, the US is still the number 1 manufacture in the world. The loss of US manufacturing has been far overstated. The news media loves to talk about job losses because it gets people to tune in.


On Nov 06 05:20 PM MichaelAK wrote:

> So much for Green Tech Jobs even those are going overseas as a fast
> rate. We need corporate tax, regulator and labor laws reforms if
> we are ever going to rebuild our manufacturing base. Heck when the
> promise of the new Green Manufacturing Revolution goes overseas you
> have a domestic problem that needs fixing at the Macro Level to correct
> the inablances in cost.

Motorola's Droid Comes in Peace - For Now

I don't trust Motorola to build a good phone. The Razor was all the rage a few years back, but I dumped mine after a week for an LG phone because the mic and speaker were poor, in my opinion.

Motorola is a poorly managed company, and has been that way for decades.

Ancestry.com: Finally, a Quality IPO

What? A123 Systems (AONE) was not a quality IPO?

Will Solar Crash the Smart Grid?

Another thing that may happen as electric grid instability increases as home solar increases is that building code may be changed to require a battery pack be installed with each new home solar system. With the right programming, this battery pack would smooth solar output for when clouds pass over, etc. The battery would also store power during peak solar hours, then discharge it a few hours later when energy use peaks for air conditioning.

Will Solar Crash the Smart Grid?

If electric utilities are unable to solve grid fluctuations issues, thus limiting many people from getting full use from their home solar systems, then there may by another solution for homeowners – go 90% + off the grid with their home and go 90% + from home electricity for their car. I say “may” above because the solution I am about to propose is not totally proven, but it looks to have good potential for success.

This almost totally “off the grid” and “out of the gas station” solution would use solar panels, home batteries, a natural gas cogeneration system, and an electric vehicle.

There are multiple companies developing natural gas cogeneration systems that generate electricity plus heat water and the house. Though they are in the development stage, they look promising with good efficiencies because the latent heat is used for other purposes instead of being lost as is the case with a utility scale natural gas fired plants.

Another “if” is battery development. But, good, steady progress is being made.

And, solar prices are dropping every year, and will continue to drop for several years until installing solar panels is a smart thing for economic reasons.

Note how these 4 pieces work together to create steady, reliable, 24/7 electricity (and home heat and hot water). When solar is at its peak, it is used to power the house, charge the house battery pack, and charge the car battery pack. When solar is down, the natural gas cogeneration system kicks in with assistance from the home battery to smooth power. The car battery can also be used to smooth power and minimize natural gas usage.

Smart utility metering could be added to the mix so that the electricity source for charging the car overnight is either from the electric grid or from the home cogeneration system, whichever is cheaper.

Will Solar Crash the Smart Grid?

This seems to be a messy problem with no clear, quick, "one size fits all" solution. There are many factors here including unpredictable human behavior (how will people program their smart appliances and smart energy storage devices to respond to hourly changes in incoming and outgoing utility electric rates on the smart grid?). There are multiple solutions to test (which takes time) such as how far can smart metering go in offsetting the energy fluctuations, how distributed and of what type should grid energy storage systems be?

This will take complex modeling, simulation, and testing. There are many modeling questions that need to be answered like “do we model and plan for weeks with little sun from 100 year weather conditions?”

Bottom line. This is going to take many years, much modeling, much testing, several pilot projects, much monitoring, many dollars spent in converting to a smart grid, many dollars spent on grid energy storage, much legislation changes affecting home owners. Look forward to many years (like decades) of expensive, political, technical, problem-ridden evolution.

I think of the early years of local networking where things like “data storms” used to shut down networks. It took 2 decades to get to the stable data networks of today.

Solar Stocks Break Down Yet Again

I agree with you that STP is a question mark. I don't know where this company is going. I'm just holding my shares to see what happens.

Solar Stocks Break Down Yet Again

Another thing about SunPower. They will be capacity constrained in the first half of 2010. If fact, they plan to use another solar company's panels for some of their big projects in 2010. It's hard to believe they will be capacity constrained in 2010 with the world-wide glut in solar panels lasting through 2010, but they emphasized that in the conference call.

Being capacity constrained means they will be getting the most out of capital expenditures and operating expenses. It may also help keep up margins, though I don’t have proof of this. It also gives me confidence that SunPower will emerge from the coming solar consolidation as one of the powerhouses. SunPower will be able to absorb other solar company’s best assets for good prices – think Cisco, Microsoft, Google, Oracle, etc. who regularly buy small and/or struggling companies that have some valued technology.

Solar Stocks Break Down Yet Again

I totally agree with your analysis.

SunPower (SPWRA and SPWRB) is one of the winners in this earnings cycle, though the stock price doesn't reflect it. Note that the big gain in sales and earnings this quarter came from the "components" business which is the home and small business market where financing is not as big of a deal. It's "systems" business did take a hit because financing is still an issue.

Good time to buy SunPower with its stock price lower than it should be. It's "components" business, where it has a big advantage because of it's high efficiency cells, will continue to grow at a brisk pace. I like the "components" business because it doesn't depend on big financing, building power lines, getting land permits, getting utility company corporation, etc. as the “systems” business does. In other words, there is no natural "throttling" on the speed of growth in the “components” business. It could “take off” when the world economy is fully recovered.

More Heads on the CNBC Chopping Block as Financial Media Landscape Shifts

Bloomberg is not as good as CNBC. Bloomberg interviews often get bogged down in meaningless talk. I like CNBC because they will cut off people that won't answer a question by rambling on to kill the clock.

More Heads on the CNBC Chopping Block as Financial Media Landscape Shifts

Where's mention of Fast Money. That's the most informative show on CNBC.

Market to Shine on Solar Industry Through 2011

I find it very difficult to believe that there is going to be an "eclipse" (leveling off) in the solar world market in 5 years as this article indicates in the statement "… agrees that the industry is set to resume its growth trajectory in 2010-2011, but warns about longer term challenges that could lead to an "eclipse" because of saturation in key markets.".

I don’t understand how places like southern California, Texas, Florida, Italy, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, etc, etc, etc, are going to all reach saturation in just 5 years. In 5 years, the “solar party” is just going to get started in many places. There are 600 million people (2x the population of the US) in India without electricity. Building an electric grid to these people would be much more expensive than using solar to generate electricity.

So, solar prices are not going to continue to drop, and cell efficiencies are not going to continue to increase? There are 10s of billions of dollars a year going into solar research. I regularly read about promising breakthroughs in solar research that are years from implementation.

So solar incentives are not going to increase around the world as global warming becomes more obvious? Sorry many of you non believers, but the world’s ice is melting.

Installation technology is improving, but has a long ways to go. Right now about a third of the cost of solar system is installation labor. In the future, I see do-it-yourself kits available at Home Depot and Lowes.

Inverter technology is advancing quickly, but has a ways to go. So solar system prices will continue to drop and be easier to install.

Oil is going to be over $100 a barrel, and maybe much more.

Battery technology is improving quickly making plug-in vehicles better and more affordable. Solar and plug-in vehicles go together like chocolate and peanut butter – lots of synergy.

The bottom line is there are several trends that are favorable for solar in 5 plus years, but these trends are hard to quantify. Maybe being difficult to quantify leads forecasters to “shoot low” with their predictions.

Market to Shine on Solar Industry Through 2011

The article states the obvious as if it's some revelation. Of course, as solar matures, there will be manufacturer consolidation. That's true for all emerging markets. Where's the rocket science?

The article also emphasized how silicon based solar will continue to dominate the market. Anyone following solar closely would know this as some of the Chinese manufactures like YGE and TSL drive down silicon solar module prices into the range of FSLR module prices. Warning to FSLR investors.

This is why investors should stick to the established silicon based solar manufacturers. The days of some upstart becoming a major player are over. I don’t see anything new in solar development that has the potential to be revolutionary in light of falling silicon solar prices.