alpha24seven

Game Changer in Solar Energy: PG&E Inks Deal

@ Doug Korthof Excellent observation lost on many.

Another thing that is never talked about. Instead of making your entire home solar powered, you could buy a solar powered device that either heats/cools or both. This way on extremely hot or cold days, this home based system in aggregate would shave peak demand. If it heats, it could really damage the price of heating oil in say the North East.

The other beauty to this is that it should be MUCH less expensive than an entire home PV installation.

Game Changer in Solar Energy: PG&E Inks Deal

Don't count your chickens. This entire deal is predicated on extension of the Fed tax credits. They've tried eight times to get it through with no success and there is absolutely ZERO/NO guarantee it will pass.

All these analysts/company people who casually announce "we expect it to pass in early..." as though it is a forgone conclusion. Right....

If it doesn't pass -- look out below!

Contradictions in the Solar Market

There will be a huge oversupply of everything from Si to finished panels. It is a fact. The "huge demand" someone above mentioned is predicated upon a government subsidy somewhere. Problem is the subsidies will only subsidize a portion of total output. The global subsidy spend is flat contrary to what the media and this industry would have you believe. There is not a new Germany out there to absorb the massive new flow of product. Solar is far too expensive to sell without a subsidy. So what of the excess product? Glut leads to margin compression leads to share collapse leads to company failures leads to no interest in external funding. Solar has always been boom and bust. This time it's the mother of all busts.

A few other considerations. Solar 2.0 (I termed that phrase) will include new technologies such as Nanosolar and other innovations that aren't that far off. They will orphan both Si and thin film and makes us say "remember those big ugly panels". Not today but not ten years from now either.

US Energy Bill: Solar Stocks Will Feel All the Heat

This piece is quite accurate. The solars will all get pounded but not before the "blow off top" which I would bet is what we are seeing here.

The irony is that what is left of the solar industry will be much stronger and be able to carry us to where we need to be. Of course much pain and lamenting until then. Ultimately the solar (surviving) companies will by then have learned how to function without subsidies which is in fact the real reason the solar industry has not been able to deliver a true consumer product. Subsidies are just like crack cocaine to this industry and breaking the addiction will be ugly. We are about to see it.

You don't recommend shorting any of these names but I sure as hell will. I know this industry very well and some serious shorting is in order to reel some of these cowboys in. Hint: Solar companies are not necessarily your friend...

And to Iconoclast421. You seriously have no idea how this industry works. It is clearly evident in your myopic, acerbic and distorted view of the solar industry viewed through the lens of the incredible (nearly Disney like proportions) projections on how this industry has 200 years of backlog and 3,000% yoy growth. It simply isn't true. When people like you are forced to deal with the economic realities of the solar industry, it is a quick and unintelligent leap over to the "if only George Bush were able to pull his ass out of the Bible and put down that liquor bottle. But not before he calls his Middle Eastern buddies to sell of a big chunk of America" preposterous camp.

Good piece. It is great to know others see the forest for the trees.

Signed, many year solar industry veteran.

Shadow Cast Over Solar Stocks

"could be a negative impact on solar-wafer producer MEMC Electronic Materials (WFR), pointing out that its largest customer, Suntech (STP), is “increasingly exposed” to the U.S. solar market."

All solar is exposed to the US market. It is fungible as we've seen in the last rush to ship all domestic product to Germany during their rush to subsidize. This is a fluid global market and their is no safe havens from market turn downs.