Carbon Pipelines Negative T

Uniqueness – US Leading

US is ahead

Hill 12 (Joshua, “US Retakes #1 Spot in Clean Energy Investment in 2011”, http://cleantechnica.com/2012/04/12/us-clean-energy-investment-in-2011-number-1/)

New research on clean energy financing in the Group of Twenty (G-20) nations released by The Pew Charitable Trusts shows that investment grew to a record $263 billion in 2011, a 6.5 percent increase over the previous year, with the United States beating out China in the race to secure private clean energy finances and investment. The U.S. attracted $48 billion in clean energy investment in 2011, a 42 percent increase over the previous year. As a result, the U.S. saw an addition of 6.7 gigawatts (GW) of wind and, for the first time, more than 1 GW of solar energy, enough to power 800,000 homes. By the end of the year, total U.S. installed renewable energy capacity topped 93 GW, second only to China, but this position will be difficult to hold with the expiry of Treasury grants and the Department of Energy’s loan guarantee programs. “In 2011, the global clean energy sector grew again, the U.S. reclaimed its lead as the top destination for private investment, and consumers reaped the rewards of significantly reduced prices for clean energy technologies, such as solar panels, which are now nearly 50 percent cheaper than a year ago,” said Phyllis Cuttino, director of Pew’s Clean Energy Program. “And yet, the yo-yo effect of U.S. clean energy policy hurts the ability of the United States to consistently compete and turn U.S.-led innovation into manufacturing, deployment, and export opportunities. Creative, stable, and transparent policies remain a critical signal to private investors.” Globally, the combination of falling clean energy technology prices coupled with growing investments saw an acceleration of clean energy generating capacity by a record 83.5 GW in 2011, bringing the global total to 565 GW. Experts believe that with solar and wind technologies becoming more cost-competitive, renewable energy will become the preferred electric generating capacity for emerging economies. 2011 saw G-20 investments in solar continue to rise, increasing 44 percent to $128 billion, making solar the leading technology for clean energy investment for the second year in a row. This increase offset a 15 percent decline in investments for both wind and energy efficiency in 2011. “The clean energy sector received its trillionth dollar of private investment just before the end of 2011, demonstrating significant growth over the past eight years,” said Michael Liebreich, CEO of Bloomberg New Energy Finance, Pew’s research partner. “Solar installations drove most of the activity last year as the falling price of photovoltaic modules, now 75 percent lower than three years ago, more than compensated for weakening clean energy support mechanisms in a number of parts of the world.” Overall clean energy investment continued to grow, with China attracting $45.5 billion, spurring the deployment of 20 GW of wind power, the most of any nation. Germany ranked third for the second year in a row among the G-20 members with $30.6 billion and 7.4 GW of solar power installed, while Italy attracted $28 billion and deployed a world record of nearly 8 GW of solar power. Source: Clean Technica (http://s.tt/19dg0)

Uniqueness – Solar Specific Cards

Solar investment rising – falling polysilicon prices encourage

Fessler 12 (David, senior analyst for Investment U “Polysilicon Prices in 2012: The Tipping Point For Solar”, January 31st, 2012, http://www.investmentu.com/2012/January/polysilicon-green-energy.html)
Solar energy detractors point to the fact that it can’t compete without “huge” government subsidies. And up until now, I couldn’t argue to the contrary. But very soon, those detractors will likely be eating their words. I’ve said it many times in the past: Technology marches on, and the cost of manufacturing will come down. Well the cost of manufacturing solar isn’t just coming down; it’s dropping through the floor. By the end of this year, solar will be so cheap it will compete with just about any other form of generation. It already does in some places, and at commercial scale levels. The best part? It will do it without subsidies. You see, solar panel prices are about to cross a tipping point. It’s all due to the drop in price of a solar module’s most crucial ingredient: polysilicon. The Polysilicon House of Cards Polysilicon prices have collapsed 90% in the last five years. That translates directly into lower module costs, lower panel prices and ultimately into a lower installed cost per watt. How did this happen? Way back in 2006, there was a run on polysilicon. It turns out it’s the same material used to make integrated circuits. But all of a sudden, the solar industry was booming, and competing for what was then a limited supply. Its use for solar was rising rapidly, and 2006 was the first year that 50% of all polysilicon went into the manufacture of modules for solar panels. And panel manufacturers were clamoring for even more. Polysilicon makers were laughing all the way to the bank, and then some. They essentially were an oligopoly, and were earning upwards of 40% margins on their product, according to a recent research report published by GTM Research. Prices just kept rising along with demand, and by 2008 the shortage was so severe, polysilicon was selling for over $400 per kilogram on the spot market. Margins had risen to 70%. Naturally, this lured new players into the market, and led existing makers to expand manufacturing capacity. But they overestimated how much was really going to be needed. By 2011, much of this additional capacity began to come online, and polysilicon prices started falling. By March of 2011, the spot price had dropped to $80 per kilogram, and by this past December, it was all the way down to $30 per kilo. This incredibly low spot price was all the leverage customers with long-term contracts needed to renegotiate lower prices. GTM Research predicts that in 2012, these declining silicon prices will lead to even lower module prices. At the beginning of 2011, module prices were $1.80 per watt. By the end of 2011, they were halved to $0.90 per watt. Closing in on Grid Parity This year, GTM expects module prices to breach the $0.70-per-watt barrier and continue to head south. Of course, with other manufacturing costs and installation being relatively fixed, lower raw material means lower panel prices. And $0.70 per watt is below the magic $1.00-per-watt level that’s widely viewed as “grid parity” for solar. That’s the point where it makes just as much sense to use solar as any other form of generation. The system I installed at my farm is 10.08 kilowatts (KW). Over its 25-year lifetime, it’s expected to produce an average of 12,000 to 18,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year. I’m leasing my system for five years, and will then purchase it. My total all-in cost is about $27,000. (Since I’m leasing the system, I don’t receive any government subsidies or tax breaks.) Let’s assume that the system produces the minimum amount per year, 12,000 kWh. Multiplying by 25 and then dividing by the cost of the system, we come up with $0.08 per kWh. My current electricity from the grid operator costs $0.14 per kWh. That’s almost a 50% savings. If I produce even more, my savings will be even higher. And this system has panels that were manufactured in 2011. Panels made this year will be even cheaper, and so will the all-in cost. Misinformation and Black Eyes So what’s keeping solar from being widely adopted? Lack of information, for one… The industry got quite a black eye over the Solyndra deal. GTM Research Senior Analyst, Brett Prior, believes the industry will continue to grow at 10% to 20% per year for the foreseeable future. He had this to say about the polysilicon market today: “After a half-decade of silicon demand outstripping supply, the aggressive expansion plans finally overshot. “This supply/demand imbalance will push producers to lower contract prices closer to the level of manufacturing costs at $20 per kilogram, and will force higher-cost manufacturers to exit the industry. “The end result is that the current roster of over 170 polysilicon manufacturers and startups will likely be winnowed down to a dozen survivors by the end of decade.” I believe that as prices continue to drop, solar will continue to gain in popularity. Big panel manufacturers like U.S.-based SunPower Corporation (Nasdaq: SPWR) will be around when the dust settles. They currently make the most efficient (19%) commercially available panels in the world. The stock is way off its highs of a year ago, but is up a healthy 22% since the beginning of the year. So is it solar boom time? I don’t have a crystal ball, but with module prices continuing to drop, it becomes more attractive every day. That’s good news for panel manufacturers, as they’ll continue to improve as volumes ramp up. Investors certainly won’t find them any cheaper than they are right now.

Huge advances in solar power are coming now

Lacey 11

Stephen, reporter/blogger for Climate Progress, where he writes on clean energy policy, technologies, and finance, “A Little Night Solar: BrightSource Energy Offers Multi-Hour Thermal Storage,” Climate Progress, http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/08/03/286519/a-little-night-solar-brightsource-energy-offers-multi-hour-thermal-storage/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+climateprogress%2FlCrX+%28Climate+Progress%29

Yesterday, we highlighted an interesting concentrating solar power plant design from MIT that could significantly reduce costs and allow projects to generate electricity 24-hours a day using molten salt storage. Coincidentally, one of the leading CSP developers, BrightSource Energy, announced this morning that it will be offering molten salt storage for future power plant designs, allowing the company to extend electricity production into the evening. It’s not a 15-hour system like the Gemasolar plant in Spain – a project that became the first to generate ‘round the clock electricity. But the multi-hour system will help BrightSource lower the cost of electricity produced at a facility. BrightSource is developing a 392-MW Power Tower project in the Mojave Desert. The system does not feature molten salt storage, but future projects will presumably come equipped with the technology. While utilities deploy large amounts of solar PV, the CSP sector has been slow to flourish. That’s because PV plants are faster and often cheaper to build. However, large-scale CSP projects with storage provide more firm power that utilities can better rely on throughout the day – and often into the night. “That’s where these CSP technologies can have a real advantage,” says GTM Research Senior Analyst Brett Prior.

Will meet 100 percent of energy demands within 2 decades

Johnston 11 (John, “100% Solar Energy In 20 Yrs No Problem, Says Futurist Ray Kurzweil”, http://www.the9billion.com/2011/02/25/100-solar-energy-in-20-yrs-no-problem-says-futurist-ray-kurzweil/)
Futurist Ray Kurzweil has a prediction about the future of solar energy. He asserts that solar technology is improving at such a rate that it will soon be able to compete with fossil fuels. It will also be able to supply 100% of the world’s energy in about 20 years. Kurzwell has previously, and successfully, predicted that a computer would beat a human in chess by 1998, and that a worldwide communications network would emerge in the mid 1990s. Many of Kurzweil’s predictions are based on his law of accelerating returns, which maintains that technological change is exponential rather than linear, and that information technologies grow exponentially in capacity and power. This has been observed with computer processing power, which has doubled every 2 years for almost 50 years. Kurzweil believes this is also the case with solar technology. Solar power is doubling about every 2 years globally, and it has been doing this for the past 20 years. Today, solar energy is more expensive than using fossil fuels, but costs are declining fast. We are only a few years away from solar being around the same cost as fossil fuels. Kurzweil maintains that after that point, solar will continue to go down in price and will become more popular. He adds that currently solar power meets a very small percentage of the world’s energy needs, and people tend to dismiss technologies when they are only a very small fraction of the total solution. Crucially, he points out that if solar power doubles every 2 years, 8 more times, it will meet 100 percent of the world’s energy needs. Following that math, it will take 16 years, that’s 2027. He adds that the world will increase its energy needs during that time too, so we should add another couple of times to double on top of that. So in about 20 years, around 2031, we will be meeting at least 100 percent of the world’s energy needs just with solar energy. On the possible political obstacles involved, he says that as the cost per watt of solar falls significantly below coal and oil, people are going to change for economic reasons alone. It will cease to be a political issue.

Solar is strong now – survived the green bubble

Savitz 11

Eric, “Venture Capital: The Case For Investing In Solar,” http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericsavitz/2011/01/13/venture-capital-the-case-for-investing-in-solar/

Today, when you read about trends in venture capital investment, it would seem that you should have a funeral dirge playing in the background: investments are down 21% in software, 32% in biotech and 27% in medical devices. The hardest hit of all has been taken by an area that had been a VC darling just a few short years ago: the clean tech sector. Ernst & Young reported that VC funding for clean tech in the 2010 third quarter was down 55% from a year ago. Some investors are beginning to think that clean tech itself was a bubble, and that bubble has burst. But at Foundation Capital, we see this third quarter darkness as dawn, not dusk. And we see solar as one of the brightest opportunities still on the horizon. Specifically, we think that new models of financing have the opportunity to make residential solar – long the environmental community’s aspiration – a practical and profitable business reality. Here’s why. In the recent past, cleantech was dominated by large, capital-intensive projects. These blockbuster deals generated a lot of buzz, but have become a tough sell in the current economic and political climate. Case in point: California recently approved construction of a 370-megawatt solar thermal project in the middle of the Mojave Desert—the first such large-scale project in the U.S. in over twenty years. The plant will produce enough energy to power 725,000 homes. But to the chagrin of environmentalists, all that clean energy also threatens the habitat of an endangered desert tortoise. But what if there was a model that didn’t require displacing desert tortoises to bring solar power to the masses? A model that could save consumers 15 percent on their utility bills with an up-front investment of just $1,000 or less? Cost-competitive residential solar power is possible through a variation of a tried and true leasing business model and it’s called solar power service. Solar panels have been available for decades, but high up-front costs, complex technology and expensive maintenance have hurt solar’s appeal and discouraged widespread adoption. Today, several companies offer a new model of residential solar installation that finally overcomes all of these hurdles. It’s called a solar power purchase agreement (PPA), and it is essentially a sophisticated leasing arrangement. For a fixed monthly fee, homeowners can sign up for solar energy as a service from companies like Solar City, SunRun, or Sungevity. Under a solar PPA, the homeowner is freed from the $24,000 average installation cost, and the maintenance and converter replacement costs. Instead, it’s the provider who will manage the installation, monitor the panels to make sure they’re working efficiently, and repair them if they aren’t. The consumer then buys back the power produced on their roof at a fixed rate. These financing mechanisms make solar power as hassle-free as power from a traditional utility, with two notable exceptions; it’s cleaner and cheaper. Many utilities charge tiered rates—making consumers pay more per kilowatt-hour the more energy used. (In California, if you’re spending $500 a month with PG&E, some of your bill is likely in tiers three and four – meaning that you could be spending more than 30 cents more per kilowatt hour than you were with your first hour of usage. Given that Californians spend more than $5 billion a year for power just in tiers three through five, the potential savings for homeowners are huge.) With a solar PPA, consumers get the same low rate no matter how much power they use. And because solar PPA users generate a share of their own energy, it shrinks both their utility bill and their carbon footprint. This is a win/win for homeowners, and we think it’s a great bet for investors, especially following President Obama’s extension of the 1603 Tax Grant program as part of the larger tax agreement. This tax credit ensures that the solar power as a service model will continue to thrive. For the first time in history, residential solar is not just a viable choice, it’s the sensible one. Right now, when you fly into a typical American city, you see miles of black roofs (mostly tarpaper shingles, made with a byproduct from burning coal), flanked by green lawns. But to me and my colleagues, those black roofs look like a vast untapped market. That’s because the sun’s energy is keeping those lawns green, but when it hits the roofs, that energy gets absorbed as heat. This means a power plant has to burn more coal so a home’s air conditioner can compensate. Under the PPA solar service model, instead of giving money to the coal industry each month, consumers can put that solar energy to work and generate 75% of a home’s energy right from the rooftop. That’s why I believe that the sun isn’t setting on clean tech. It’s just coming over the horizon.

Solar venture capital funding is high now

Pleging 11

Steven, “Despite Solyndra’s Death, the future of Solar Energy is Sunny,” The Green Faction, http://www.thegreenfaction.com/2011/11/10/despite-solyndra%E2%80%99s-death-the-future-of-solar-energy-is-sunny/

I believe that the loss of industry players Solyndra, Evergreen, and SpectraWatt opens the market for more innovative solar companies to succeed with smarter tactics and mainstream products that fit into existing manufacturing models. Remember when the dot.com bubble burst in 2000 and, seemingly overnight, some companies ceased making millions hand-over-fist? Flash forward to 2011, when nearly everyone is online, Internet technology has become more accessible and fortunes continue to be made. Real innovation always finds its pot of gold. We’ve seen a considerable reduction in solar panel costs, but that is exactly why there is reason to be optimistic. Lower prices open markets that were previously barred economically. I believe most people fail to understand the solar sector. Unlike other established markets the solar industry is still a tiny fraction of the overall energy production worldwide. Solar’s competition is really fossil fuel, or in other words, the established way electricity is being generated. With subsidies long in place for nuclear, coal and gas in the U.S. along with the cheap cost of production for coal and natural gas, solar is essentially competing with that $0.10/kWh average cost of electricity in the United States and globally. It is not only wise we devote our resources toward solar technology; it is essential. We are already facing serious ramifications of fossil fuel emissions. Increases in carbon dioxide concentration along with global surface temperatures are showing a decline in agricultural yields due to climate change. , This along with melting glaciers and shifts in climate zones do not bode well for climate change stabilization without drastic efforts in greenhouse gas abatement. There are also the obvious human costs of other sources of energy, from water quality issues related to gas fracking and the loss of mountain tops and streams with coal mining to the shocking failure of the Fukushima Daichi nuclear power plant reactors in March of 2011 that has forced one hundred thousand Japanese in a twelve mile radius to evacuate. Yes, solar energy does need to arrive at end-user costs that are closer to fossil fuels, and concurrently, our research and development areas need to lead us beyond current solar PV technologies. The recent fall of Solyndra is a lesson in over-specialization but is not a damning of solar’s viability. The U.S. has 1,750 MW of PV planned for 2011 and currently employs 100,000 people, more than coal mining or steel manufacturing. Solyndra was producing a PV product that did not fit within traditional balance of system (BOS) solar industry structures. Their novel cylindrical solar modules which have a capacity to capture sunlight from 360º (if rooftops are painted white) and resist snow and dust, also required a shift in the industry as a whole in order to adopt them. Unfortunately, Solyndra’s timing was terrible, global poly-silicon supplies caught up with rising demand, going from a high of $500 per kilogram in 2008 to a mere $35 on spot markets today. Combined with a Chinese manufacturing boom, that lowered the overall cost of panels by 40 percent this year, Solyndra was unable to compete. On October 19th, seven solar PV manufacturers filed a federal trade dispute claiming China is dumping solar panels in the US below their own manufacturing cost, which likely in part, explains the 40 percent decrease in panels. Unfortunately, for Evergreen and Solyndra, that filing is too late. The United States spends almost $500 billion annually purchasing energy from other countries. About $4 billion of taxpayer money is allotted to nuclear, natural gas, and nuclear company subsidies, even when many geothermal sources are reaching or have reached, capacity. We need a better paradigm. New solar technologies can change this. The U.S. has vast regions that offer some of the sunniest places on earth, and you don’t need to live in the desert to harness solar power. New Jersey is second only to California in adoption of solar infrastructure. Despite the announcement recently that Germany will be lowering their feed-in tariffs in January of 2012, they remain 40% of the total solar market globally while receiving less average daily solar radiation than New Jersey . In the U.S., we are seeing a likelihood of long-term thin-film implementation when we develop the right technological fit. Within a few years, we expect at least a dozen markets will be economically viable without subsidies. Tariff reductions are occurring throughout Europe as the EU struggles with the Greek financial crisis. Despite this the solar market there has increased 65 percent as opposed to the 82 percent increase in 2010. While changes in policy are lowering European expectations slightly, the U.S. market is projected to increase by as much as 9 percent this year. The global solar market is expected to install 22 MW of electricity in 2011. Of course, the largest solar demands will be coming from China and India. From a purely economic standpoint, there will be no reason for China to remain with silicon when better alternatives become available. Solar PV installations in Asia grew by over 57% from 2006-2010, and 2010 showed an incredible 100% increase from 2009 and yet China still exports nearly 95% of their total PV production. However, China recently announced a national feed-in tariff program, increasing 2012 solar market projections. Many venture capitalists have established funds dedicated to launching green technology initiatives. First Solar, the largest thin-film manufacturer in the world, will see approximately $3.75 billion in revenue this year, and there are a number of solar companies emerging with very attractive growth opportunities precisely because there is so much room for improvement in terms of efficiencies and a reduction in materials costs. As with the dotcom crash, the death of Solyndra, Evergreen and others will usher in a more robust solar industry not signal the disappearance of PV as a viable alternative for future energy needs. Both companies were a tiny fraction of an enormous and rapidly growing global market. The egalitarian balance is one that will afford large-scale, global installation of solar energy panels at a price people can manage.

Solar investment high now

Godinez 9

Victor, “Solar energy startup companies raked in venture capital investments in 2008,” Dallas News, http://techblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2009/01/solar-energy-startup-companies.html

The venture capital industry is getting a bit skittish -- investments in startup companies fell eight percent from 2007 to $28.3 billion in 2008, the National Venture Capital Association reported over the weekend. But even with VC firms tightening their belts in the face of the recession, there is still one type of technology that is scoring big investment bucks: solar energy. So-called "clean tech" companies received 50 percent more venture money in 2008 than they did in 2007. And the list of 10 biggest venture investments of 2008 was dominated by solar startups (list after the jump). What's mean for all of us? Hopefully it eventually means cheaper energy that's not reliant on coal or some other petroleum product.

New breakthroughs are coming that solve 24/7

Lacey 11

Stephen, reporter/blogger for Climate Progress, where he writes on clean energy policy, technologies, and finance, “MIT Creating 24-Hour Solar Power on the Cheap?,” Climate Progress, http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/08/02/285708/solar-for-vampires-mit-team-creating-low-cost-247-solar-power/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+climateprogress%2FlCrX+%28Climate+Progress%29

Researchers at MIT are designing a new method of building concentrating solar power plants with thermal storage that they say could lower the cost of energy by 50% compared with existing technologies. Last month, a 19.9 MW power-tower concentrating solar power plant in Spain became the first to generate electricity for 24 hours using molten-salt storage. But the cost of building that demonstration plant is higher than most CSP technologies – around $18 per watt, putting the cost of electricity somewhere around 30 U.S. cents per kilowatt-hour. The company developing the plant, Torresol, wasn’t building it to prove the design could be the cheapest. It was a demonstration plant to prove molten storage technology and allow the company to scale up a much larger plant. But it also showed that there’s still work to be done in order to bring down costs of concentrating solar power designs. MIT Mechanical Engineering Professor Alexander Slocum – along with a group of other researchers – says he’s designed a new type of tank for molten salt storage that could reduce equipment needs, increase durability and ultimately reduce the cost of electricity being generated by a plant. Rather than use a complicated plumbing infrastructure to heat and pump the molten salt for storage, Slocum’s design puts the salt storage and water heating in a single tank mounted on the ground, rather than on a tower far above the field of mirrors. Under the new design, the mirrors are actually mounted on a hillside above the storage tank and reflect sunlight down into a small opening in the top. The system could be “cheap, with a minimum number of parts,” says Slocum, the Pappalardo Professor of Mechanical Engineering at MIT and lead author of the paper. Reflecting the system’s 24/7 power capability, it is called CSPonD (for Concentrated Solar Power on Demand). The new system could also be more durable than existing CSP systems whose heat-absorbing receivers cool down at night or on cloudy days. “It’s the swings in temperature that cause [metal] fatigue and failure,” Slocum says. The traditional way to address temperature swings, he says: “You have to way oversize” the system’s components. “That adds cost and reduces efficiency.” As this technology is still in the research phase, the actual cost projections for such a plant can’t be precisely mapped. But the team says electricity could be as low as 7 cents per kilowatt-hour and as high as 33 cents per kilowatt-hour. Those cost ranges would be determined by many factors, including turbine capacity, size of the mirror field, quality of solar resources and a reduction in equipment needs. If the design works as the researchers suggest, it could hold a lot of potential. Because CSP plants have a higher cost per watt — and thus a higher cost of electricity — the use of storage like molten salt will be key to the success of the industry, GTM Research Senior Analyst Brett Prior tells Climate Progress: “If you want to make real progress with deploying these technologies, you need to have the same dispatchable characteristics as natural gas — you need firm power. Companies need to market their technology as something different than PV, which is a peaking resource, but can be more attractive on a cost basis right now. That’s where these CSP technologies can have a real advantage.” Prior says that Solar Reserve, a U.S.-based company developing power tower technology with molten salt storage in California and Nevada, has a projected cost of energy at 11 cents per kilowatt-hour. That’s just below what large-scale thin-film PV projects are producing today. So in theory, the MIT design could have major cost advantages if it works at scale. But as history shows, actually getting to that point isn’t easy. Many of the CSP designs that are being deployed on the demonstration and commercial scale have taken many years to get to this point. However, MIT’s Slocum says that the plant would be built using existing technologies — it would just require a new way of thinking about how to construct the project. Most of the individual elements of the proposed system — with the exception of mirror arrays positioned on hillsides — have been suggested or tested before, Slocum says. What this team has done is essentially an “assemblage and simplification of known elements,” Slocum says. “We did not have to invent any new physics, and we’re not using anything that’s not already proven” in other applications.

Solar is unique – innovations are fast and can be implemented immediately

-this card is about PV, not CSP

Lacey 11 - reporter for Climate Progress, where he writes on clean energy policy, technologies, and finance

Stephen, “Anatomy of a Solar PV System: How to Continue “Ferocious Cost Reductions” for Solar Electricity,” Climate Progress, http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/07/06/261550/solar-pv-system-cost-reductions/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+climateprogress%2FlCrX+%28Climate+Progress%29

Solar PV is unique. Because manufacturing can scale so quickly and the technology can be deployed so rapidly on existing infrastructure, the rate of innovation in PV is arguably faster than in any other energy sector. The digital age has made us accustomed to constant change, which is probably one reason people get so impatient with the seemingly slow pace of change in the energy sector. The rate of change in PV most closely resembles what we see in the IT sector, which makes it a very compelling story. And it’s not just journalists who are giving PV so much attention – it’s playing out in the business world as well. In 2011 alone, four major U.S. projects totaling 1,850 MW of capacity have switched from CSP to PV because the economics of PV have changed so drastically while the economics of CSP have changed more slowly. A recent Reuters story on the trend had some very telling quotes: “The pace is quickening,” GTM Research analyst Brett Prior said of the numbers of projects making the switch to PV. “You can build a PV project all-in and it will cost less upfront and cost less ongoing. You will make more money on that project, and so it just makes sense to switch it.” “PV is available now and financeable now,” said Sean Gallagher, managing director of government and regulatory affairs for K Road Power. “The production of SunCatcher technology has been delayed for a couple of years. It can’t be deployed as soon as PV can be deployed.” “Our CSP is a little bit more restrictive,” [Edward Sullivan of Solar Millennium] said. “We have to develop 250MW chunks, so that requires us to develop large continuous swaths, whereas PV is much more flexible.” What is driving these changes? There is a lot of fascinating research and pre-commercial activity happening around plastic solar cells, inks, fibers and other materials. But the most exciting innovations are coming from businesses finding new ways to manufacture, finance, package, sell and install solar – all with today’s commercially-available technologies.

Non-intermittence has been demonstrated

Lacey 11 - reporter for Climate Progress, where he writes on clean energy policy, technologies, and finance

Stephen, “Solar Can Be Baseload: Spanish CSP Plant with Storage Produces Electricity for 24 Hours Straight,” Climate Progress, http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/07/05/260438/solar-can-be-baseload-spanish-csp-plant-with-storage-produces-electricity-for-24-hours-straight/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+climateprogress%2FlCrX+%28Climate+Progress%29

While Americans celebrated U.S. history on the Fourth of July yesterday, a company in Spain celebrated an historic moment for the solar industry: Torresol’s 19.9 MW concentrating solar power plant became the first ever to generate uninterrupted electricity for 24 hours straight. The plant uses a Power Tower design which features a field of 2,650 mirrors that concentrate sunlight onto a boiler in a central receiver tower. The plant also utilizes molten salt as a heat-transfer fluid that allows the plant to generate electricity when there’s no sunlight. Recharge News reported on the milestone: After commissioning in May, the plant was finally ready to operate at full-blast in late June and benefited from a particularly sunny stretch of weather, according to Diego Ramirez, director of production at Torresol. “The high performance of the installations coincided with several days of excellent solar radiation, which made it possible for the hot-salt storage tank to reach full capacity,” Ramirez explains.

CSP key

Romm 8

Joseph, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, where he oversees ClimateProgress.org., “The technology that will save humanity”, April 14, 2008, http://www.salon.com/2008/04/14/solar_electric_thermal/singleton/

Certainly we will need many different technologies to stop global warming. They include electric cars and plug-in hybrids, wind turbines and solar photovoltaics, which use sunlight to make electricity from solid-state materials like silicon semiconductors. Yet after speaking with energy experts and seeing countless presentations on all forms of clean power, I believe the one technology closest to being a silver bullet for global warming is the other solar power: solar thermal electric, which concentrates the sun’s rays to heat a fluid that drives an electric generator. It is the best source of clean energy to replace coal and sustain economic development. I bet that it will deliver more power every year this century than coal with carbon capture and storage — for much less money and with far less environmental damage. Clearly, the world needs a massive amount of carbon-free electricity by 2050 to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions. The industrialized countries need to cut their carbon dioxide emissions from electricity generation by more than 80 percent in four decades. Developing countries need to find a way to raise living standards without increasing electricity emissions in the short term, and then reduce those emissions sharply. And, over the next few decades, the world needs to switch to a ground transportation system whose primary fuel is clean electricity. This electricity must meet a number of important criteria. It must be affordable: New electricity generation should cost at most about 10 cents per kilowatt hour, a price that would probably beat nuclear power and would certainly beat coal with carbon capture and storage, if the latter even proves practical on a large scale. The electricity cannot be intermittent and hard to store, as is energy from wind power and solar photovoltaics. We need power that either stays constant day and night or, even better, matches electricity demand, which typically rises in the morning, peaks in the late afternoon, and lasts late into the evening. This carbon-free electricity must provide thousands of gigawatts of power and make use of a low-cost fuel that has huge reserves accessible to both industrialized and developing countries. It should not make use of much freshwater or arable land, which are likely to be scarce in a climate-changed world with 3 billion more people. Solar electric thermal, also known as concentrated solar power (CSP), meets all these criteria. A technology that has the beauty of simplicity, it has proved effective for generations. As the Web site of CSP company Ausra illustrates, solar thermal has a long and fascinating history.

Only CSP solves

Romm 8 (Joseph, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, oversees ClimateProgress.org, author of “Hell and High Water: Global Warming – The Solution and the Politics”, served as acting assistant secretary of energy for energy efficiency and renewable energy in 1997, holds a Ph.D. in physics from MIT, “The technology that will save humanity”, http://www.salon.com/2008/04/14/solar_electric_thermal/)//AMV

One of oldest forms of energy used by humans — sunlight concentrated by mirrors — is poised to make an astonishing comeback. I believe it will be the most important form of carbon-free power in the 21st century. That’s because it’s the only form of clean electricity that can meet all the demanding requirements of this century. Certainly we will need many different technologies to stop global warming. They include electric cars and plug-in hybrids, wind turbines and solar photovoltaics, which use sunlight to make electricity from solid-state materials like silicon semiconductors. Yet after speaking with energy experts and seeing countless presentations on all forms of clean power, I believe the one technology closest to being a silver bullet for global warming is the other solar power: solar thermal electric, which concentrates the sun’s rays to heat a fluid that drives an electric generator. It is the best source of clean energy to replace coal and sustain economic development. I bet that it will deliver more power every year this century than coal with carbon capture and storage — for much less money and with far less environmental damage.

Specifically, investment in concentrated solar power increasing – falling costs and steep technological developments

Stancich 12 (Rikki, reporter for CSPToday, “Ventizz: Concentrated solar power poised for PV-style growth”, http://social.csptoday.com/technology/ventizz-concentrated-solar-power-poised-pv-style-growth)

Dr. Helmut Vorndran, Ventizz Capital Partners’ General Partner, comments on the private equity fund’s recent investment into Rioglass, and on the concentrated solar power sector’s burgeoning investment potential. Interview by Rikki Stancich in Paris Ventizz Capital Fund recently announced its investment into Rioglass Solar, one of the leading manufacturers of solar reflectors for concentrating solar power (CSP) plants. CSP Today contacts Ventizz Capital Partners to learn more about the deal and whether the private equity fund will seek out futher investment opportunities in the concentrated solar power sector. CSP Today: The Rioglass investment in December marks Ventizz' first foray into the concentrated solar power (CSP) sector. Why did Ventizz opt to invest in a glass reflector manufacturer? Dr. Helmut Vorndran: The mirror itself is a critical component for ensuring the efficiency and reliability of utility scale power production. Rioglass is the world market leader for these mirrors among just a few companies that are able to provide such hiqh-quality and bankable components. At the end of the day the cost competitiveness of CSP plants depend, among other things, on the quality of the mirror. As such Rioglass Solar, as a technology driven company with a clear USP, propriety know-how and the position as the world market leader, is a typical investment case for Ventizz and fits very well into Ventizz´ investment profile. CSP Today: Did you consider any alternative reflector technologies (i.e. shatterproof, lightweight polymer or aluminium alternatives)? If not, why? Dr. Helmut Vorndran: We clearly consider Rioglass Solar as a platform investment from which we drive further activities in the CSP mirror sector. We have carefully analysed other reflector technologies than glass, but if you consider the lifetime such components and the requirements need to become bankable, we concluded that Rioglass Solar is using the right technology. In addition, with its strong R&D capacities, Rioglass offers tremendous opportunities to further increase the efficiency of the reflector and drive down the cost of the overall reflector system that go far beyond its world leading mirror technology. Thus we are able not only to quickly capture future technology trends in CSP but also to set trends on our own. CSP Today: What growth potential does Ventizz predict in the CSP reflector space? Dr. Helmut Vorndran: We believe that the market for CSP is still in its infancy and will grow from the 1GW additional capacity per annum as of today, to 2-3GW and beyond in the coming years. But this will very much depend on first, the ability to further reduce the cost of the technology and second the financing environment for such large CSP projects. Once the new CSP projects in the US are on the grid and the many projects in the emerging markets like India, Morocco and South Africa have been successfully implemented, we will have new reference points for the CSP technology which will help to set the benchmark for cost and quality of the power delivered to the grid. At this point we expect the market to accelerate significantly. Specifically the reflector market we will see a broader spectrum of CSP technologies and therefore reflector solutions, which will require flexible production technologies and local production sights. CSP Today: Is Ventizz considering any other investments in this sector? Dr. Helmut Vorndran: In our view the renewable energy assets basket of the currently investing Ventizz Capital Fund IV L.P. represents the best diversified cleantech portfolio in Europe. We constantly monitor developments in all renewable energy markets in general and seek to diversify our renewable energy portfolio even further. Of course we are also looking at expanding our CSP-engagement. CSP Today: Ventizz is among a growing number of PE investors who are entering the renewable energy space. What key factors instilled the confidence in Ventizz to invest in relatively new technologies like CSP? Dr. Helmut Vorndran: We are expecting a similar growth in CSP to the one we have seen in the PV market. Both markets are driven significantly by steep technological learning curves and the subsequent falling costs. This correlates strongly with our philosophy: Ventizz is all about looking for the technological edge and how to translate this into sustainable and profitable growth.

More evidence

Wolf 10 – leading environmental writer on global warming and other natural issues

2010, Vicki Wolf, “Advances in Energy Technology Promise More Than Global Warming Solutions” http://www.cleanhouston.org/energy/features/tech_promise.htm

Advances and breakthroughs in technology this year range from energy efficiency with plug-in electric cars to improving ways to tap into energy from the wind and sun. Most of these technological advances promise ways to reduce dependence on fossil fuel, reduce global warming gasses, stimulate the economy and create jobs. Implementing these technologies also will mean better air quality. As large cities and businesses begin to use these technologies, the prices will come down for everyone. Most experts agree we will need a broad array of technologies to stop global warming. Joe Romm, climatologist, author and host of the Climate Progress Blog, lists solar photovoltaics, wind turbines and plug-in hybrids. After researching clean energy technology he says, “The one technology closest to being a silver bullet for global warming is the other solar power.” He’s talking about Concentrated Solar Power (CSP), which concentrates the sun’s rays to heat a liquid that drives an electric generator. The key is cheap storage, according to Romm. “The easiest way to deal with the intermittency of the sun is cheap storage — and thermal storage is much cheaper and has a much higher round-trip efficiency than electric storage.” Romm says CSP has the ability to provide power reliably through the day to key locations around the world. He believes CSP is essential in what he calls “the full global warming solution.” As new technology becomes available, governments and businesses will need to decide on the best investments to meet energy demand. Dr. Robert Harriss, president of HARC (Houston Advanced Research Center) says energy efficiency is first on the list. “Technology that offers the best climate change solutions are those that contribute to a more resilient energy supply at the lowest cost. “Everyone agrees that energy efficiency is the most effective investment,” Harriss says.