Fred W

Alternative Energy's Sunny Outlook

The fact that Geothermal now can claim a 30% ITC rather than a 10 year PTC is a game changing event for Ormat and other gt firms. The drilling boom is coming as soon.


On Mar 09 12:36 PM John Petersen wrote:

> In a recent essay on McKinsey & Company's What Matters website,
> Secretary Chu wrote:
>
> “It’s important to understand where we are now. Existing energy technologies
> won’t provide the scale or cost efficiency required to meet the world’s
> energy and climate challenges. Corn ethanol is not a sustainable
> or scalable solution. Solar energy generated from existing technologies
> remains much more expensive than energy from fossil fuels. While
> wind energy is becoming economically competitive and could account
> for 10 to 15 percent of the electricity generated in the United States
> by the year 2030 (up from less than 1 percent now, according to the
> US Energy Information Administration), it is an intermittent energy
> source. Better long-distance electricity transmission systems and
> cost-effective energy storage methods are needed before we can rely
> on such a source to supply roughly 25 percent or more of base-load
> electricity generation (the minimum amount of electrical power that
> must be made available). Geothermal energy, however, can be produced
> on demand. A recent Massachusetts Institute of Technology (seekingalpha.com/symbo...)
> report suggests that with the right R&D investments, it could
> supply 10 percent of US power needs by 2050 (up from about 0.5 percent
> now).”
>
> So at least the view from the Potomac is pretty clear.
>
> On balance, I would read Secretary Chu's remarks a bullish for geothermal
> energy, thermal solar and storage.

Alternative Energy Industry Outlook

Toxicity has nothing to do with First Solar's lack of use for residential applications. Its low efficiency does not lend itself well to the limited space of residential applications (you need much more unshaded space to produce the same amount of electricity that a Sunpower module (16-20%efficiency) or other high efficiency modules require. Also FSLR's cost advantage is much greater for large scale projects due to the fact that the solar modules are a larger portion of the cost of the system--for residential systems labor and interconnection work are much greater cost components.
There are more reasons but I don't have time to go into them here.


On Jan 15 07:57 PM dan-d wrote:

> Tc-1, I looked at First Solar and was going to buy it but the cadmium
> telleride utilized in their pvp manufacturing put me off. The panels
> did not gain a foothold in europe because of the strict environmental
> and human toxicity rules. By your statements it sounds as though
> the toxicity problem has been resolved. Is this so?? I thought
> that this toxicity was one of the reason First Solar has not been
> used in residential area up until ? now.
> I know haz-mat did not like them and there were concerns over disposal
> at end of usage have these added costs and enviro concerns been resolved
> as well for the first several years of the products production.

>
> Thanks for providing answere if possible to my concerns.