Articles Posted in Energy

The Milwaukee Public Museum’s 8-story tower’s marble façade facing West Wells Street is being replaced with 234 solar panels. It was reported that, over the past 50 years, the Museum’s heavy marble façade on the south wall facing West Wells Street has weathered and become less stable. Milwaukee County, which owns the building, reportedly elected to use solar panels as the replacement option because of the energy-generating potential of solar. The Museum’s solar wall is expected to generate 77,533 KW hours of electricity per year, the equivalent of having 442, 60-W light bulbs on for 8 hours every day for an entire year. For now, the Museum will be the only building in Milwaukee with a full solar wall that is generating electricity.

It was reported that Milwaukee-based manufacturer Helios USA has been contracted to produce the Museum’s solar panels. Construction is expected to last approximately 5 months, commencing Monday, July 29. The initial phase, which will involve removal of the existing marble façade, is expected to take 4 weeks.

Photo © March 10, 2006, fitzgene – creative commons.

UPDATE: Natural Resources Defense Council Staff Blog, Great News: NY Governor Cuomo Pledges $1 Billion For Solar (Jan. 8, 2014)

On July 17, 2013, New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced that the State University of New York’s (SUNY) College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering (CNSE) will revitalize a vacant Kodak cleanroom building in Rochester, “transforming it into a first-of-its-kind CNSE Photovoltaic Manufacturing and Technology Development Facility (CNSE MDF) for crystalline silicon photovoltaics, part of a $100 million initiative that will attract solar energy jobs and companies to the Greater Rochester Area.” This effort will also include the acquisition and relocation to the CNSE MDF of “the assets of Silicon Valley solar company SVTC as part of a $100M initiative that will create over 100 high-tech jobs and positions New York as the national leader in accelerating innovative solar technologies.”

The project is expected to set “a precedent for further investment in this green industry in New York State” and to “attract additional investments from companies around the world and accelerate our development and use of solar energy,” growing New York’s clean energy economy. It is reportedly the “first initiative as part of the project will relocate a critical component of the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) SunShot initiative from California’s Silicon Valley to Upstate New York, positioning New York as the recognized national leader in accelerating the development and use of solar energy nationwide.”

Renovation of the former Kodak’s MEMS inkjet facility is underway to transform the 57,000-square-foot building at 115 Canal Landing Boulevard in the Canal Ponds Business Park. The initiative will include the fitting up of a state-of-the-art, 20,000-square-foot cleanroom. The press release confirms that a late fall opening is anticipated.

As part of the CNSE MDF project, it was reported that “over $19 million in cutting-edge tools and equipment formerly utilized by SVTC, a Silicon Valley-based solar energy company, are being relocated to the CNSE MDF and will constitute the foundation of the manufacturing development line, a result of the acquisition of SVTC’s assets by CNSE.” It further confirmed that the U.S. Department of Energy “is providing nearly $11 million in cash funding to support procurement and installation of high-tech tools and equipment, with investment from private industry partners expected to exceed $65 million to support the development and operation of the CNSE MDF.” In addition, it was reported that, “[t]o support the project, New York State will invest $4.8 million through the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA).” New York’s investment is to be directed entirely to CNSE with no private company to receive any state funds as part of the initiative.

This is to be the solar industry’s first full-service collaborative facility dedicated to advancing crystalline silicon, or c-Si technologies. The CNSE MDF will provide a range of services and equipment, including complete manufacturing lines, access to individual tools, secure fab space for users’ proprietary tools, and pilot production services in an intellectual property secure environment. It is expected that the CNSE MDF will attract solar industry companies to New York to access a state-of-the-art resource that will dramatically reduce the cost, time, and risk associated with transitioning innovative solar technologies from research to commercial manufacturing of crystalline silicon photovoltaics. It is also expected to play a critical role in the national effort to develop a strong photovoltaic (PV) manufacturing industry, and serve to accelerate the introduction and use of solar energy in homes and businesses across the country. Among other things, it is expected to enable education and training to support the expansion of the highly skilled workforce required by the U.S. PV manufacturing industry.

The establishment of the CNSE MDF for c-Si PV technology is also expected to complement and expand the capabilities and expertise of the national U.S. Photovoltaic Manufacturing Consortium (PVMC), headquartered at CNSE as part of the DOE’s SunShot Initiative. The PVMC is reportedly leading the national effort to reduce the cost of installed solar energy systems from $5 per watt to less than $1 per watt over the next 10 years.

Governor Cuomo’s announcement comes on the heels of his July 9, 2013 announcement that $54 Million will be awarded to fund 79 large-scale solar power projects across the State of New York, adding 64 MWs to the state’s solar capacity.

Photo © July 1, 2011, Deutsche Bank, All Rights Reserved, Creative Commons.

UPDATE: Sacramento Business Journal, California hits solar power record, twice (Mar. 11, 2014); The Huffington Post, California More Than Doubles Solar Energy In 2013 (Jan. 13, 2014): “California installed more megawatts of solar energy in 2013 than it did in the last 30 years combined, the California Solar Energy Industries Association reported … ‘Today, California is closing out the year with more than 2,000 MW of rooftop solar systems installed statewide,’ CALSEIA executive director Bernadette Del Chiaro said.”

On July 10, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) issued its California Solar Initiative Annual Program Assessment on the progress of the California Solar Initiative (CSI). The Assessment reflects that the program has installed 66% of its total goal with another 19% reserved in pending projects. This is an estimated 1,629 MW of installed solar capacity at 167,878 customer sites in the investor-owned utility territories through the end of the first quarter of 2013. The CPUC estimates that this is enough to power approximately 150,000 homes and avoid building three power plants. To read the Assessment, click California Solar Initiative Annual Program Assessment.

In January 2007, California began an $3.3 billion ratepayer-funded effort to install 3,000 MW of new solar over the next decade and transform the market for solar energy by reducing the cost of solar generating equipment. The CPUC’s portion of the solar effort is known as the CSI. The CPUC boasts that is the country’s largest solar program and has a $2.2 billion budget and a goal of 1,940 MW of solar capacity by the end of 2016.

CPUC’s Assessment includes the following highlights:

• A record 391 MW were installed statewide in 2012, a growth of 26% from 2011.
• Pacific Gas and Electric Company achieved the most installations in the non-residential sector of any investor-owned utility, having met 70% of their non-residential installation goal.
• Applicants to the low income portion of CSI, known as the “Single-Family Affordable Solar Homes” program, have received $64 million in support for their residential solar systems while the “Multifamily Affordable Solar Housing” (MASH) program has completed 287 projects representing a total capacity of 18.4 MW. There are an additional 83 MASH projects in process, for a total capacity of 11.3 MW. “Virtual Net Metering” has facilitated thousands of tenants receiving the direct benefits of solar as reductions in their monthly electric bills.
• In just over 3 years of operation, the CSI-Thermal program has received 1,215 applications for $56.3 million in incentives.
• All but 92 MW, or 6%, of solar capacity in the state is signed up for Net Energy Metering (NEM) tariffs. Pursuant to California Assembly Bill 2514 and CPUC Decision 12-05-036, the CPUC has initiated a study on the costs and benefits of NEM to ratepayers. The study is expected to be released later this year.

Additional Resources: Solar Industry, California More Than Doubles Solar Power Market In 2013 (Dec. 31, 2013)

In early July, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) announced the withdrawal of lands identified for solar energy development in the West from new mining claims that could impede development of solar energy sites. Public Land Order No. 7818 (PLO 7818) withdraws 303,900 acres of land within 17 Solar Energy Zones in Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah. You can read the PLO 7818 here.

Under the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976, BLM is charged with managing the public lands for multiple uses. BLM manages more than 245 million acres of public land, land known as the “National System of Public Lands.” The National System of Public Lands are primarily located in 12 Western states, including Alaska. BLM also administers 700 million acres of sub-surface mineral estate throughout the nation. BLM recently confirmed that in Fiscal Year 2012 activities on public lands generated $4.6 billion in revenue, much of which was shared with the states where the activities occurred. In addition, it reported that public lands contributed more than $112 billion to the U.S. economy and helped support more than 500,000 jobs.

In October 2012, the Department of the Interior established the Solar Energy Zones as part of a western solar plan that provides a road map for utility-scale solar energy development on lands managed by the BLM in Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah. According to BLM, the “Solar Energy Zones encompass the lands most suitable for solar energy development because of their excellent solar resources, access to existing or planned transmission, and relatively low conflict with biological, cultural and historic resources.” Since 2009, BLM has approved right-of-way applications for 25 solar energy development projects with planned total capacity of over 8,000 megawatts, or enough to power over 2.4 million homes. PLO 7818 withdraws the public lands encompassed by Solar Energy Zones for 20 years from potentially conflicting uses, including mining, subject to valid existing use rights, and opens the door to additional solar energy development projects in these states.

At the 2013 North America Intersolar Conference in San Francisco, California Governor Jerry Brown, and many others spoke confidently about solar opportunities in California. “Just within the last two months we actually recorded over 2,000 MW of solar energy being put into the grid…,” Governor Brown reported. He also confirmed his “goal of 1 million solar rooftops.” He encourages a call to action, marshaling “intelligence and collaboration and political response…” You can hear Governor Brown’s 2013 North America Intersolar Conference Keynote Address here.

Governor Brown launched California’s first round of solar incentives in 1978, during his first two-term tenure as the Governor of the State of California. California now puts more than 2,000 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of solar power into its grid, and Governor Brown wants to see 1 million GWh by 2025, to meet the 33% Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS), a regulation that requires the increased production of energy from renewable energy sources, such as wind, solar, biomass, and geothermal. The state now has 130,000 photovoltaics (PV) installations on homes and businesses, growing toward Governor Brown’s stated goal of a million solar roofs.