San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E) has filed two proposals with the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) that, if approved, may allow you to choose electricity generated by solar energy instead of fossil fuel-based energy, whether you own a home or not.

SDG&E is applying to begin two pilot programs. Information for each of them (and they’re worth checking out) is detailed below.

Share the Sun Solar Farms

The first program, called “Share the Sun,” would allow solar contractors to purchase and install their own “solar farms” on their own or purchased property. San Diego customers would then be able to purchase a portion of the electricity generated from the provider installations.

You would be able to choose the size of the portion you wish to acquire, and would receive credit on your electricity bill for the value of the solar energy generated. In effect, this program would be similar to group-buying or community solar gardens.

Get a percentage of solar energy through SunRate

The second pilot program, called “SunRate,” would indirectly allow customers to purchase solar electricity produced by SDG&E’s own solar projects. SDG&E would establish a “green” rate that would reflect the cost of the solar energy generated by these projects.

In a twist that puts the power right in your hands, you could choose to have 50 percent, 75 percent or 100 percent of your electricity at the new, green rate. Although you would have to agree to a year’s subscription, the price (and reduction in energy costs) would be guaranteed for the term of the contract.

Why are utilities going solar?

In California, a utility’s renewable energy portfolio must represent 20 percent of that utility’s total energy distribution by 2013, and 33 percent by 2020. SDG&E has been showing progress towards reaching those goals, with several solar farms of their own up and running–and with more planned.

Recently, however, SDG&E proposed that the CPUC allow them to demand a “network usage charge,” a $20 to $30 a monthly fee, on homeowners who own or lease residential solar photovoltaic (PV) systems. The CPUC struck down the proposal.

SDG&E provides service to 3.5 million customers in San Diego and Orange County. The company is a subsidiary of Sempra Energy. Recently, Sempra Energy stock hit a new 52-week high. Before applying to the CPUC for the two pilot programs, SDG&E met with solar providers, community leaders and policymakers for input.

SDG&E is also proposing that the CPUC oversee a series of workshops where interested parties would be able to help shape the pilot programs to ensure transparency. Homeowners in San Diego can already save quite a bit on solar costs due to rebates, incentives and the like.

Should the CPUC approve the two pilot programs, many residents in the area will have the opportunity to go solar without installing a home solar power system at their own homes. As solar energy produced by larger solar installations typically costs less, residents may have the chance to lock in cheaper rates for their electricity, proving, once again, that going green can add green to the wallet, too.

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The drive towards alternative energy continues at full steam in Ontario, Canada.

According to a report in the London Free Press, Ontario Liberals are pressing ahead with 25 wind and solar projects for the Southwestern region.

The announcement was made earlier this week. The projects will produce enough electricity to power a city the size of Windsor.

London will host the largest number of projects, or 200 solar farms and 180 wind turbines.

The Energy Minister Brad Duguid said in a release that the projects will “create more good jobs for Ontario families and provide new, clean power for local communities to grow and prosper. Our efforts are transforming our electricity system, attracting investment, creating thousands of jobs and building a better future for our children and grandchildren.”

The projects will attract about $3 billion in new private investment and will help the province create 50,000 green energy jobs by the end of 2012.

Article by Antonio Pasolini, a Brazilian writer and video art curator based in London, UK. He holds a BA in journalism and an MA in film and television.

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(Reuters) – When Mike Peterson jumped into a colleague’s single turboprop Pilatus and flew over the remote central California valley that he now hopes to turn into a solar plant, he saw sunshine, flat land that would require little grading and two big transmission lines to tap into. “Wow,” he remembers thinking at the time. “God made this to be a solar farm.”

But when Kim Williams looks out at that same land from her lowslung ranch house, she sees an area rich with wildlife that is helping support her grass-fed chicken farm, her neighbor’s cattle operations and her peaceful way of life. She supports solar energy on a small scale — the electric fence around her chicken coop is powered by solar — but says when she learned about the solar plant she felt shock and disbelief. Now, she’s suing to block it.

The push to create an alternative to carbon-based fuel has hit an unlikely snag: environmentalists.

The split between Peterson and Williams illustrates this awkward state of affairs. To a growing number of environmental advocates, the dozens of large solar plants that are springing up in vast areas of the western wilderness are more scourge than savior.

The upshot is that those who on paper seem to be perfect allies for solar are turning into its biggest enemies.

That includes the Sierra Club, which last week filed what senior attorney Gloria Smith says is its first suit against a solar plant, a giant 664-megawatt project called Calico that is slated to go up in the desert near Barstow, California. It would lie smack in the middle of habitat for rare plants and animals, in an area Smith calls “a very unfortunate site.”

The legal brawl comes as the U.S. is racing to adopt renewables. In the United States, renewable energy, including solar, makes up just 8 percent or so of electricity generation, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. That figure was expected to jump to 13 percent by 2035 — but that was before the Green vs. Green feud.

Even though Williams and her cohorts support the broad goal of reducing dependence on fossil fuels, they say it comes at too high a cost if it means building on undeveloped land. Helping their case: the proposed plants are often slated for areas with threatened or endangered animals, including kit foxes, kangaroo rats, rare lizards, and others.

Now, the groups have gone from complaining to litigating. That means solar companies must take funds and management time that would have been spent on developing their plants and spend them instead on fighting lawsuits. For some companies, the likely result is that plants won’t be built.

Let the Sun Shine
For the solar industry overall, the situation marks a fundamental shift in attitude. Where previously almost any bare patch of desert seemed like a prospective solar plant, now the reality is that much of the nation’s most fertile ground for alternative power and energy independence may well remain undeveloped.

And the backlash is likely to slow down the number of big plants developers will try to get through. Some 142 U.S. solar plants are under development, according to the Solar Energy Industry Association, up from just 28 two years ago. Many of these are well over 500 megawatts; a handful are over 1,000 megawatts, meaning they would cover hundreds of acres of land and power at least 300,000 homes each.

The big plants give the U.S. a chance to gain ground in the solar power industry, where it lags countries like Spain, which has around 30 large-scale solar plants in the construction phase. China, which dominates the solar panel business, is also racing ahead, with an aggressive renewable-energy policy and big loans to companies.

Solar energy is among the strategic industries in which China is considering investing up to $1.5 trillion over five years to cement its position as a provider of high-value technologies.

In one major project, China’s Shandong Penglai Electric Power Equipment Manufacturing Co. is working with Burbank, California-based eSolar to build a series of plants totaling 2,000 megawatts of electricity in the deserts of Northern China. Some 60 miles away, Tempe, Arizona-based First Solar is working on the first stage of its own China plan, a 2,000-megawatt project.

Analysts say the prevailing view in China is that the good done by solar plants outweighs any damage they may do to the environment, and concerns about plants and animals are minimal. Not so in the United States.

State of Solar
California lies at the center of the U.S. solar industry, thanks to a confluence of sunlit land and a legal requirement for 33 percent of its electricity to come from renewable sources by 2020. More than 40 solar utility plants are in development, according to the state’s public utilities commission. Almost all of them have or will run into problems with environmentalists or people who simply don’t want the plants in their backyard — plants like Peterson’s Solargen.

The company was born in 2006, as the government was bolstering its support for the solar sector through tax credits and loan-guarantee programs. Peterson, the company’s chief executive, was among those who bought in. Previously, he had advised high-net worth individuals at Goldman Sachs, and later founded and managed an alternative-energy investment firm.

But the Solargen executives weren’t the only ones who had spied opportunity. The Solargen team figured it could never compete with the hordes of developers focusing on the deserts, where too many projects were chasing too few power lines to carry all the electricity they would generate. Fewer companies were looking in central California.

When Peterson first saw Panoche in 2008, he said he felt he had hit the jackpot: a 20,000-acre valley with few inhabitants that seemingly no other developers had their eye on. While most other utility-scale plants are planned for government-owned property, this land was privately owned — which Peterson assumed would make the permitting process easier.

He quickly moved in, figuring out who owned the land he would need — both for the plant and a preserve to mitigate loss of habitat for animals and plants on the site — and enlisting local movers-and-shakers to help him get it. He recalls negotiating with one rancher who kept a shotgun at his side for the entire meeting; another unsuccessfully kept trying to ply Peterson, a Mormon who doesn’t drink, with spirits.

Meanwhile, he was trying to nail down funds. That’s been tough for almost all solar energy companies, particularly startups, in a climate where investor cash has slowed to a trickle. The more innovative the technology, the harder it has been to line up financing. Many companies are trying to tap into loan guarantees on offer from the U.S. Department of Energy, but the application process is lengthy and rigorous. Peterson says his application was turned down.

Trips to Silicon Valley’s fabled Sand Hill Road got him nowhere. Venture capital investment has declined overall, but clean technology has been particularly hard hit. Just $625 million was invested in the sector in the third quarter of 2010, the National Venture Capital Association says, compared to $1 billion two years ago.

Peterson’s then limited experience in solar energy didn’t help. And the founder of Solargen, Eric McAfee, had landed in hot water with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which found he had caused drilling company Verdisys to make misleading disclosures about its expenses and revenues. In 2006, McAfee agreed to pay a $25,000 civil penalty without admitting or denying the SEC’s allegations. Peterson calls McAfee, chairman and CEO of ethanol company AE Biofuels, “a leading thinker in renewable energy” who regularly addresses forums such as Milken Institute conferences, and adds that the SEC never filed any restrictions against McAfee.

Desperate for financing, Peterson finally dusted off the Mandarin he had learned as a Mormon missionary to Taiwan in the early 1980s, and went back for several visits. He can still rattle off the greeting with which he began each meeting — describing how much he enjoyed his time in Taiwan, how glad he was this project has brought him back, and how sorry he was about his rusty language skills.

One company he hit up was UMC, which had founded NexPower Technology Corp., a thin-film solar manufacturer. To seal the deal with its investment arm, Peterson agreed to buy some panels from NexPower for the plant as long as he can find a lender willing to finance a project using those panels.

The gambit worked. He won investments from UMC Capital, his largest backer, and Chinatrust Venture Capital, amounting to $6.5 million. Altogether, Solargen has raised close to $12 million, Peterson says. Building the plant will cost a total of $1.3 billion, he estimates.

While Peterson was lining up financing, however, some Panoche Valley residents were lining up against the plant, which they learned about in the summer of 2009 after a Pacific Gas & Electric representative mentioned it to Ron Garthwaite, a local dairy farmer.

“It was kind of hard to get our minds around,” says Williams, who moved to the Valley from San Francisco a few years ago after reading sustainable-agriculture bestseller “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” and deciding she too could raise chickens.

Solargen’s plans to put the plant on just a small portion of the valley, allow sheep to graze beneath the panels and buy property and easements to set aside 20,000 acres of land in and near the valley as nature reserves did nothing to alleviate her concerns.

She, Garthwaite and others like the Santa Clara chapter of the Audubon Society started organizing to fight it.

But where Williams was seeing red, the county was seeing green. Solargen has offered to pay a $1 million a year fee to the county for the life of its plant — a nice addition to a county where the annual operating budget runs around $40 million. And Solargen meant jobs — up to 200 during peak construction. The county approved the project.

“The majority of the population of my district supported it,” says Reb Monaco, the outgoing member of the board of supervisors who represents the rural southern part of the county, including the Panoche Valley.

In the Heat of Battle
Those who didn’t quickly dusted off a well-worn playbook: using environmental laws to fight a development project.

Lawyers say the moment state or local government approves an environmental plan offers the best opportunity to sue to block a plant, using the federal law known as the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) or state law such as the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) as grounds. Having threatened or endangered species of plants or animals on a site gives the suits far more heft, they say.

Save Panoche Valley, the organization Williams helped create, and its allies filed a lawsuit in November alleging that the county approved subpar environmental and water assessment reports and improperly canceled conservation agreements to keep the land in agricultural use. Threatened or endangered animals such as the San Joaquin kit fox, the giant kangaroo rat and the blunt-nosed leopard lizard receive special mention throughout the lawsuit. The county doesn’t comment on allegations in pending lawsuits, said assistant county counsel Barbara Thompson.

Getting the permits rescinded is the ultimate goal, the groups say. But almost as good is simply delaying the process. “A long drawn-out one would be a victory too,” says Garthwaite, who believes Solargen would simply run out of money and time to keep fighting.

If worst came to worst, Solargen could simply sell the project without developing it, says Christine Hersey, a solar analyst at Wedbush Securities who has been following environmental concerns closely. Because Solargen already has its land and most of its permits, the business has value, but would have more value if the company also had an agreement with a power company to purchase its electricity, something Peterson says he’s working on.

Right now, the battle is in the hands of the county, which is preparing a response to the lawsuit ahead of a hearing scheduled for March. Peterson says he’s worried the overhang will make it harder for him to raise his next round of funding — in particular, $7.5 million he needs to come up with by February as a deposit for a powerline-interconnection study required by the utilities that own the lines he hopes to connect to.

What’s Next?
Peterson’s fears are well placed, says Hersey, the solar analyst at Wedbush. “Investors who were performing their due diligence would want those (lawsuits) resolved before they committed any capital,” she says, speaking generally about the solar industry. And as more solar projects from a variety of companies wind their way through the approval process, litigation “will become a bigger issue,” she says.

Among the plants she considers at high risk is First Solar’s 300-megawatt Stateline project, which has high numbers of threatened desert tortoises.

Several other projects are already mired in legislation or under threat of it.

The Quechan Tribe, a Native American group centered around the border between Arizona and California, has sued the Bureau of Land Management over a 709-megawatt plant planned for its ancestral land in the Imperial Valley, citing animals such as the flat-tailed horned lizard. The tribe charges the BLM approval of the project didn’t follow appropriate procedures. Last month, it secured an injunction blocking the plant, under development by NTR plc’s Tessera Solar.

Just last week, La Cuna de Aztlan, a Native American advocacy group, and its co-plaintiffs filed a lawsuit over federal approval of six solar plants, citing the cultural environment, among other issues.

Among the six is the 370-megawatt Ivanpah plant in the Mojave Desert, for which BrightSource Energy broke ground in October. BrightSource already made some concessions after the Center for Biological Diversity, known for litigation on development it believes threatens the environment, raised concerns. The Tucson, Arizona-based group is keeping a close eye on other proposed solar projects, according to biologist Ileene Anderson.

In its suit filed last week in the Supreme Court of California, the Sierra Club sued the California Energy Commission over its approval of the Calico Solar Project. Among the Sierra Club’s worries: the plant is going in an area rich with desert tortoises, which are threatened under federal law and endangered under California law, and other species. CEC officials “look forward to defending our position in court,” said spokeswoman Sandy Louey. The developer, Tessera Solar, sold the project to New York-based K Road Power late last month.

Groups ranging from the Audubon Society to the Defenders of Wildlife to the Natural Resources Defense Council are also lobbing out objections against other projects.

About half of all plants in development now are having issues concerning plant and animal habitat, culture sites, or water demand, Hersey estimates. Many of those could end up in court. And just the threat of litigation seems likely to affect the scale of solar, analysts say. Developers could cut back the size of future proposed plants, and think more carefully about where they should go — and that’s the point, environmentalists counter.

Serious Solar
California has a handful of solar plants that date from the late 1980s, but the solar industry has only recently taken off in a big way. Fears over dependence on overseas fuel sources, a growing distaste for coal-powered electricity and generous government subsidies have all conspired to boost the industry.

Currently, the largest solar plant in the U.S. is just 160 megawatts — enough to power up to 50,000 homes. But BrightSource’s Ivanpah at 370 megawatts just upped the ante. A stream of proposed plants is following in its footsteps, including a pair of 550-megawatt plants slated to break ground next year in San Luis Obispo County and Riverside County, and a 1,000-megawatt plant under development in Riverside County.

Of course, savvy operators can try to stave off legal action. Until last week’s lawsuit by the Cuna de Aztlan, BrightSource had successfully taken this approach with Ivanpah.

One tactic is to go all out to protect plants and animals at risk. Solar companies can go above and beyond the requirements of the law, with extra-detailed studies of the species in question, extra-large purchases of land for use as preserves to offset ill effects at the site, and so on.

Solar Millennium is getting a lesson in going to great lengths with its proposed 250-megawatt Ridgecrest plant, mostly on private land in California’s Kern County. Officials are worried about the effect on the Mohave ground squirrel, so Solar Millennium is considering whether to fund a two-year study to evaluate the squirrel population in the area. Phil Leitner, the independent biologist leading the study, says if the study goes ahead, he plans to trap squirrels, put radio collars on them, and take tissue samples from their ears to determine their genetic makeup.

Back in the Panoche Valley, the environmental reports and the permitting process have eaten up almost two-thirds of the money Solargen has raised. Among the bills: paying for scat-sniffing dogs to run up and down the hills, looking for traces of the endangered San Joaquin kit fox.

But not all the valley’s residents are against the plant. “It’s good for making work,” says Mario Bencomo, 53, a ranch hand who says several unemployed friends are eager for jobs.

And naturally, many landowners want to see the plant go up, including San Benito County residents who live outside the Valley but own land there. Some have sold options on their property for the project — for prices of up to $2,600 an acre, according to a person familiar with the situation. Among them are Reprise Software vice president of operations Sallie Calhoun and her husband, Reprise chief executive Matt Christiano.

In addition to her Panoche Valley property, Calhoun also owns a ranch a few minutes’ drive from the valley in the hamlet of Paicines. She uses sustainable grazing techniques there, chairs the board of a group that works to restore grasslands, and generally considers herself a steward of the environment.

She sees no conflict between her position on the environment and her support of the solar project. “I am passionate about preserving open space,” she says, adding she believe the solar plant achieves that goal. “The idea that we’re going to protect every lizard, every drainage, seems counterproductive.”

Article by Sarah McBride; Edited by Claudia Parsons and Jim Impoco; Appearing courtesy Reuters.

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California may be doing more than any other US state so far to reduce dependence on fossil fuel energy and emissions. This week California yet again took great strides toward a low-carbon economy, cracking down on carbon emissions while also moving to ensure fossil fuels are replaced with renewable power sources. Last week, as I’ve written previously, the state Air Resources Board approved one of the first cap and trade programs for reducing carbon emissions in the United States. But state regulators also took an important step last week, when the California Energy Commission granted approval to two giant solar thermal power plant projects that would be sited in the desert.

Like other desert regions of the world, the Southwest United States is attracting attention as an ideal place to locate large solar projects. It’s an especially attractive location given nearby highly populated areas in California, and the California state government’s commitment to creating green jobs while shifting away from fossil fuel energy and emissions. As of this week a total of ten new solar projects capable of generating fifty megawatts or more have been approved for construction by the California Energy Commission. At least two more such projects are under review.

Taken together, these large solar farms represent Solar Power with a capital “S” and a capital “P.” If they are built, it will no longer be possible to regard solar energy as a cute but uncompetitive resource relegated to small clusters of photovoltaic cells fixed to the tops of buildings. The largest of the California desert proposals would be able to produce as much energy as a big coal plant. Nor will California’s solar future be put on hold by the flawed and misguided argument that “the lights will go out when the sun stops shining.” Earlier this year the state legislature passed a bill mandating that utilities pursue ways to store the solar energy they generate for long periods.

Of course there’s no guarantee every solar project approved by the California Energy Commission will finally be completed—or even that it should be completed. Many of the projects face additional hurdles they must overcome, and there are legitimate concerns about the locations of some. For example the Quechan Tribe of the Fort Yuma Indian Reservation has argued one big solar project may impact their tribal lands and the habitat of the imperiled flat-tailed horned lizard. These are factors that deserve serious consideration, and it may prove some projects now on the table turn out not to be viable.

Yet to quibble over the problems confronting individual large solar projects is to miss the bigger picture. The bottom line is California has become a hot spot for large solar farms that will create hundreds or thousands of jobs while reducing dependence on dirty energy and emissions. Some of these projects are going to be built—whether the final tally comes in at seven, ten, or twelve. Both the climate and California’s economy will be the better off for every low-carbon electron these plants inject into the grid.

Article by Nick Engelfried, appearing courtesy Justmeans.

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Canadian Solar Solutions, Inc. (Canadian Solar Solutions), has signed an agreement with Sky Power, Ltd. (Sky Power), to add 18.5 MW of solar capacity to Ontario’s green economy. The partners will build two new solar farms in Napanee and Thunder Bay that will collectively produce enough electricity to power nearly 33,000 homes and create potential careers for graduates of the province’s photovoltaic (PV) training courses.

Kitchener-based Canadian Solar Solutions is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Canadian Solar, Inc. (Canadian Solar), headquartered in the same city. The parent company operates globally, while Canadian Solar Solutions handles the domestic market. The companies specialize in “turnkey solar solutions for residential, commercial, and solar farm markets in Canada.” Toronto’s Sky Power owns renewable energy projects in Canada and across the globe. The company develops, manages, and finances projects “from the initial discovery stages through to commercial operation.” Sky Power has agreed to engineer and construct the two new projects and has arranged financing through Germany’s Deutsche Bank.

Canadian Solar Solutions and Sky Power expect to complete the two new installations by mid-2011. When finished, the Napanee and Thunder Bay projects will produce 10 MW and 8.5 MW of solar energy, respectively, per hour.

Alternative Energy Creates Industry, Careers in Ontario

Ontario has a vibrant and growing green economy that is energized by a feed-in tariff (FIT) program that pays producers of alternative energy premium rates for electricity they generate from sources such as solar, wind, and biomass. The program creates clean energy, careers, and inspires training opportunities such as Ontario Solar Academy’s ISPQ-accredited solar PV courses. Participating projects must meet minimum targets for domestic content for both materials and labour. This provision keeps FIT money in the province and helps to build a stable foundation for the industry so that it survives the eventual conclusion of the program.

Canadian Solar plans to open a solar module manufacturing facility in Guelph that will help the company and other solar PV businesses in Ontario stay on course and meet the FIT’s domestic content requirements. The company expects to complete the plant, which it estimates will employ about 500 people, by the middle of next year.

Special Discount: CleanTechies readers get $100 off any course offered by Solar Academy International. Simply use discount code ”CleanTechies100” when registering.

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Agris Solar Co-Operative, Inc. (Agris), held a meeting in Chatham in last month to inform farmers and municipal officials about recent progress towards its goal of installing a minimum of 1,000 ground-mounted solar installations on Southwestern Ontario farms.  More than 700 farmers have signed up with Agris to purchase the systems, at a cost of $70,000 each, and many will recoup the costs by taking part in Ontario’s progressive feed-in tariff (FIT) program.  The farm initiative will immediately create at least fifty green jobs in the area for graduates of Ontario’s PV training courses.

Agris is a division of Agris Co-Operative, Ltd., whose mission is to “enhance the profitability of (its) owners by employing Agriculture Innovation and Solutions.”  The solar co-op has signed an agreement with Oshawa’s Northwind Solutions (Northwind) to build the solar installations on Agris’ behalf.  Mississauga’s Hatch Engineering, Ltd. and Ontario’s Sparks Solar will also lend their expertise to the venture.

Northwind has already committed to hiring fifty new employees to help with the effort and hopes to hire more as the company picks up steam.  According to Northwind’s President, Greg Duke, the project will receive $55 million from Rabobank and the Farm Credit Corporation (FCC).  Agris’ Secretary, Jim Campbell, said that so far, the co-op has received $20 million in commitments of land and equity from 1,000 farmers.

Co-op, Industry, and FIT Create Green Jobs – Help Farmers Go Solar

Farmland provides the perfect medium for taking advantage of Ontario’s FIT program, which pays high prices to owners of approved renewable energy projects that tie into the province’s electrical grid.  The FIT has helped to build a whole industry that includes hundreds of green jobs, manufacturing facilities, and educational opportunities such as courses for solar designers and installers.

Ontario’s declining agricultural sector and abundance of land make the FIT’s incentives particularly appealing potential revenue streams for farmers.  Agris is stepping up to the plate with its new initiative by helping farmers get into the solar business and “green up” the province’s power supply.  As the company’s Chairman of the Board, David Mallot, enthusiastically puts it, “Today is the day the rubber hits the road.”  Ontarians can expect to see many more PV installations in the near future, as solar farms meet traditional farms on the province’s fields.

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EDF EN Canada has now begun construction on three photovoltaic solar projects that will produce 36 megawatts total and employ 350 solar installation and engineering professionals.  Originally initiated by the now-replaced Renewable Energy Standard Offer Program (RESOP), the three solar projects are expected to provide enough electricity to power 10,500 homes by the end of 2010 through Ontario’s Hydro One grid.

The Ontario government has stimulated renewable energy investment in these types of projects through its Green Energy Act (GEA), award-winning feed-in-tariff (FIT) program, and streamlined project approval processes.

The first two sites of the three-part solar project will involve installation of SunTech solar panels near Lombardy in the Township of Rideau Lakes.  Termed the Elmsley Solar Project, these two sites will produce 12 megawatts each.  The third site, the St Isidore Project, will produce another 12 megawatts through the installation of First Solar panels near the town of St. Isidore in the Municipality of the Nation.  EDF EN Canada was also involved in the Arnprior Solar Project in Ottawa in 2009.

Solar Installation Projects Pop up As Ontario Invests in Renewable Energy

Another solar installation project, the “Amherstburg Solar Park” will be one of Canada’s biggest solar farms to date.  Immediate construction will begin on two installation sites in Amherstburg in Essex County, Ontario.  In addition, California-based SunPower Corp. will complete its 20 megawatt, $130M solar project by June of 2011.  This large solar installation was also stimulated by Ontario’s old renewable energy investment program, RESOP, under which SunPower secured a 20-year contract with the Ontario Power Authority (OPA).  Macquarie Power & Infrastructure Income Fund in conjunction with international lenders will buy the solar project to be designed, built, and operated by SunPower.  According to a June 2010 press release, the installation is expected to create about 100 jobs.

Other solar projects near Lake Erie, Ontario include large solar farms to be installed by First Solar Development Canada and Toronto-based Helios Energy Inc.

Korean firm, Youil Ensys, has also demonstrated interest in the region, with plans to launch a 6.9 megawatt solar project in the near future.

Believing that these solar projects are “great news,” Amherstburg’s mayor, Wayne Hurst, hopes the slew of new investments will attract potential buyers for the bankrupt General Chemical property in his area.  The development could also create new solar installation employment opportunities to replace jobs lost in a long string of plant closures.

In the greater Toronto area, SunEdison and LaSalle Investment Management are slated to handle a number of large industrial and retail rooftop solar installations.  Under the province’s feed-in-tariff program, the OPA will purchase the expected 2.1 megawatts of solar photovoltaic energy produced.  Eight rooftop PV systems will be installed starting in late summer 2010, with the majority completed by the end of the year.

David Gower, Associate Director of Ontario Solar Academy, believes that this wave of solar investment will play a critical role in the province’s economic recovery.  “Not only is Ontario attracting investment in large scale installations and renewable energy manufacturing, but just as important, the province will also realize green job growth from the many small and mid-size installers of these systems which will require new skills, training, and expertise.”  He adds, “The Green Energy Act results have thus far been incredibly encouraging.”

photo: bkusler

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Good news from the Buckeye State! The legislature passed important tax reform that drops the tax burden for solar farms from upwards of $100,000 per MW to a flat fee of $7,000 per MW. The bill (SB232) – which is expected to be signed by the Governor any day now – removes a major barrier to large-scale solar development in the state.

Existing Ohio tax law added these unreasonably high costs to the price of developing solar and other renewables. In early 2010 Governor Strickland sounded the call for change as part of his state of the state address. That set the stage for legislative action. February saw the introduction of SB232 by Senator Widener (R), a bill that proposed a flat fee in lieu of the onerous taxes. After hefty negotiations (and support voiced by Vote Solar members in the state!), SB 232 passed both Houses in the wee hours last Friday.

This special tax exemption applies to clean energy projects built between now and 2011, a great incentive to hasten solar development in the state. Additionally, projects with a nameplate capacity of less than 250KW are now permanently exempt from the personal property taxation.

SB232 also contained language that expands last year’s passage of PACE enabling legislation to include energy efficient improvements along with solar. This PACE victory comes with strong concerns from energy efficiency advocates since utilities have access to the efficiency credits gained through PACE.

All in all, great progress made in setting up the kind of policy infrastructure that Ohio needs to be able to meet its solar goals. Thanks to all our Ohio members who emailed their legislators in support of SB232.

Vote Solar is a non-profit grassroots organization working to fight climate change and foster economic opportunity by bringing solar energy into the mainstream.

photo: Lauren Manning

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U.S. investors have invested $129.4 million in a promising solar technology that uses plastic lenses to concentrate sunlight onto small but highly efficient solar cells.

The so-called multijunction cells, developed by California-based Amonix, generate more electricity than conventional photovoltaic panels and require fewer costly semiconducting materials, such as silicon.

The company has successfully tested the technology at small solar farms in Spain and the United States.While numerous companies are trying to capitalize on the growing solar market — and the desire for utilities to meet renewable energy targets — analysts say concentrated photovoltaic technology has a possible edge over other solar technologies because it is more efficient and requires less land for utility-scale projects.

Article appearing courtesy Yale Environment 360.

photo: Eleaf

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Since diving into the deep end when it comes to energy issues, almost every day sees new concepts, approaches, and technologies — fascinating, exciting, even hope-inspiring at times. And, to top it all off, so many of these are truly Energy COOL as well.

Innovative combinations of rather straightforward, well-in-hand technologies can offer real solutions to problems while creating new opportunities.

Several weeks ago, a group of researchers published an article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences documenting how relatively low-powered solar systems offer the potential to increase food supplies in impoverished arid regions while reducing demands for fertilizers and other costly (in fiscal and other terms)additives.

Solar-powered drip irrigation enhances food security in the Sudano–Sahel documents a field research project which found that:

Solar-powered drip irrigation significantly augments both household income and nutritional intake, particularly during the dry season, and is cost effective compared to alternative technologies

Over the decades, irrigation has been shown to greatly increase agricultural productivity. Drip irrigation is spreading rapidly in Africa, with significant benefits.

Drip irrigation delivers water (and fertilizer) directly to the roots of plants, thereby improving soil moisture conditions; in some studies, this has resulted in yield gains of up to 100%, water savings of up to 40–80%, and associated fertilizer, pesticide, and labor savings over conventional irrigation systems

The solar-powered systems, however, look to offer the potential for even better results. From the study on impacts of photovoltaic drip irrigation (PVDI) systems it was reported:

The women’s agricultural group members utilizing the PVDI systems became strong net producers in vegetables with extra income earned from sales, significantly increasing their purchases of staples, pulses, and protein during the dry season, and oil during the rainy season.

Finally, survey respondents were asked how frequently they were unable to meet their household food needs. Based on the frequency and most recent incident, households were assigned a food insecurity score ranging from zero (no problems during the previous year) to one (perpetually unable to meet food needs). This score changed significantly for project beneficiaries, as they were 17% less likely to feel chronically food-insecure. In short, the PVDI systems had a remarkable effect on both year-round and seasonal food access.

One of the basic design characteristics is a “battery-free configuration, thereby avoiding one of the major pitfalls of photovoltai use in the developing world.

In a photovoltaic- (or solar-) powered drip irrigation (PVDI) system, a PV array powers a pump (either surface or submersible, depending on the water source) that feeds water to a reservoir. The reservoir then gravity-distributes the water to a low-pressure drip irrigation system.

This arrangement leads to a benefit that provided one of those ‘head-slapping of course’ moments.

No batteries are used in the system: The pump only runs during the daytime, and energy storage is in the height of the column of water in the reservoir. Sizing of pumps, reservoirs, and fields is done on the basis of water availability and local evapotranspiration needs. The system passively self-regulates: Because solar radiation is the main driver of both pump speed and evapotranspiration, the volume of water pumped increases on clear hot days when plants need more water, and vice versa.

Now, clearly solar systems have higher upfront costs – but so does any sophisticated irrigation system (what, after all, are irrigation ditches but ‘upfront costs’?). Even so, rather astonishingly, the scientists conclude a 2.3 year payback on the installation of a PVDI system. Their research led them to the conclusion that:

solar-powered drip irrigation significantly augments both household income and nutritional intake, particularly during the dry season, and is cost effective compared to alternative technologies.

Leap frogging past fossil-fueled systems into PVDIs looks, based on this research, to make sense for areas home to the world’s poorest citizens. And, this tool for increasing wealth and improving food security has another benefit:

When considering the energy requirements for expanded irrigation in rural Africa, PVDI systems have an additional advantage over liquid-fuel-based systems in that they provide emissions-free pumping power. Assuming that a similar size pump set (0.75–1.5 kW) would replace the solar-powered pump and would require 0.15 L of fuel per cubic meter of water pumped, we calculate that each garden avoids a minimum of 0.86 t of carbon emissions per yr (12.9 t over a 15 yr lifetime) in comparison with the liquid-fuel alternative.

Each PVDI system would, over 15 years, cut carbon emissions roughly equivalent to 60 percent of an average American’s annual emissions. (Hint — another way of realizing that we need lots of silver dust rather than seeking an elusive silver bullet.)

Article by A. Siegel appearing courtesy Celsias.

photo: Elsa Wenzel

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