Following up on a popular post one week ago, on Solar Mosaic’s unique community solar program, we shot the folks there some more questions asking for more details on a few things. Aside from a response in the comments of that post, I received the following email from a Solar … [continued]
Joining the ranks of 5 countries other than the U.S. that have hit the 1 gigawatt solar milestone (Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan, and the Czech Republic), California has now installed its 1st gigawatt (or 1,000th megawatt) of rooftop solar installed. To put that into perspective, 1GW of solar can … [continued]
Quick News: If you’re a resident of California, you’ve probably heard of Orchard Hardware — it has 89 hardware and garden retail stores across the state. News is, Orchard Hardware has now teamed up with SunPower to encourage more people to go solar. The “high efficiency solar power systems” are … [continued]
QUICK NEWS: If you haven’t heard yet, California’s cap-and-trade program is finally fully, fully approved. Here’s the quick summary from the LATimes:
California’s Antelope Valley is a 3,700 acre site, home to burrowing owls, coyotes, foxes, rabbits, and deer. It boasts a bright and colorful poppy preserve, and the natural views help make it a popular horseback riding and hiking sight. It also sees strong winds and a lot of sun, which makes it ideal for America’s biggest wind-solar hybrid farm yet. As Element Power’s Wildflower Renewable Energy Farm Project manager Nat Parker says, “The trees grow sideways and the sun burns bright.”
Nissan has announced its support for National Plug in Day to take place on October 16th and the theatrical release of Chris Paine’s new film Revenge of the Electric Car to be shown in NYC and LA on October 21. Other showings will follow.
Last December California Solar Initiative (CSI) funding for non-profits ran out too soon. Schools, churches, and other non-profits were using up their utility rebates for solar too fast. This week, Democratic Governor Jerry Brown signed into law a bill that pumps additional money into the program.
The CSI program has resulted in nearly 1 GW of rooftop solar, employed over 36,000 people and leveraged $4.5 billion in private capital. There are now more solar roofs in California than four other nations worldwide.
These roofs will pump out solar power for about 40 years, with the latter
We recently covered a solar industry report showing that solar power in Q2 of 2011 grew considerably and many jobs came with that, but there were more interesting points in that report as well. According to this report by the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) and GTM Research, New Jersey has surpassed California as the hottest and largest commercial solar market.
The Golden State has covered over 50,000 roofs with solar PV in the past decade, but could it also save 30% or more on its current solar costs? Renewable energy guru Paul Gipe wrote up a study last month that found that Californians pay much more per kilowatt-hour of solar power than Germans do (accounting for the difference in the solar resource). The following chart outlines the various ways Californians pay for solar, compared to the Germans (averaged over 20 years, per kilowatt-hour – kWh – produced).
A serialized version of ILSR’s new report, Democratizing the Electricity System, Part 1 of 5.
