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Key findings:

· The biggest opportunity will come from photovoltaics as printed silicon offers the best of all worlds; good environmental stability without the need for complex encapsulation, potentially very high performance, and lowered costs through the use of high-throughput printing. Printed nanosilicon PV panels will generate well over $1 billion in revenue by 2016.

· Printed silicon may also be the solution to the industry's growing impatience with organic TFTs (OTFTs). OTFTs have been slow to improve in terms of performance, cost and durability. By contrast, printed silicon offers a future in which TFTs arrays can be fabricated at low cost with the performance of the conventionally built TFTs. Device-level revenues generated by printed silicon TFTs for display backplanes alone are likely to reach more than $300 million by 2016.

· NanoMarkets believes that printed silicon will create major opportunities for ink makers. For now, the printed silicon firms closest to commercialization appear to be making their own inks. But once the leading printed silicon companies have demonstrated success, they will focus on the evolution and marketing of devices and that will create a niche opportunity for ink makers to produce high-value silicon inks in quantity.

PV Tracking Applications Gather Momentum

Think of solar panels and you're likely to envision them fixed in a single position. But the sun travels from east to west every day -- at least from the perspective of the Earth -- and also moves from north to south as the seasons change. And solar panels make the most electricity when they are positioned 90 degrees from incoming sunlight.

Solar trackers attempt to solve this problem. They follow the sun, so that the panels mounted on them can catch more rays and make more electricity. Companies claim trackers can increase solar arrays' efficiency by up to 40 percent in some regions. So as developers chase higher returns on their solar investments, trackers have been gaining popularity. Paula Mints, a principal analyst at Navigant Consulting, projects that tracking systems will be used in at least 85 percent of commercial installations with more than 1 megawatt (MW) of capacity between 2009 and 2012.

Several companies say they are seeing tracker growth. Miguel de Anquin, vice president of Premier Power, a solar installer in El Dorado Hills, Calif., says that about 70 percent of its ground-mounted commercial projects involve trackers today. That compares to only 20 to 30 percent of a far smaller pool of projects just four years ago, he says.

Read the rest of the article from www.RenewableEnergyWorld.com

US faces higher energy bills

Windmills and solar panel arrays have become symbols of America’s growing interest in alternative energy. Yet as Congress begins debating new rules to restrict carbon dioxide emissions and promote electricity produced from renewable sources, an underlying question is how much more Americans will be willing to pay to harness the wind and the sun.

Curbing carbon dioxide emissions — a central part of tackling climate change — will almost certainly raise electricity prices, experts say. And increasing the nation’s reliance on renewable energy will in itself raise costs.

Fifteen months into a recession, that prospect does not sit well in some quarters.

“Consumers right now are extremely price-sensitive,” said Barry Moline, executive director of the Florida Municipal Electric Association, whose member utilities serve about three million people.

Federal efforts to rein in carbon dioxide emissions are starting to seem inevitable. The Environmental Protection Agency last week moved to regulate heat-trapping gases as harmful pollutants. And the Obama administration and Democratic leaders in Congress are hoping to push through a cap-and-trade bill that would force polluters to curb their emissions or buy permits from cleaner producers. Congress is also discussing whether to require that a certain percentage of the nation’s electricity come from renewable sources.

The effect of any these measures will be to increase the cost of electricity. Regulation of carbon dioxide emissions will increase the cost of burning coal, a carbon-heavy energy source and currently the cheapest form of fossil fuel. Higher production costs will result in higher electricity rates.

European Commission launches European Green Capital Award

Starting in 2010, one European city will be selected as the European Green Capital of the year. The award will be given to a city that has a consistent record of achieving high environmental standards, is permanently committed to ambitious action, further environmental improvement and sustainable development, and can act as a role model to inspire other cities and promote best practices in all other European cities.

Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas said: “I hope that this award will act as a powerful incentive for local governments and authorities to improve living conditions for Europe’s city-dwellers. Many cities are already committed to improving protection of their environment: I am confident that this award will encourage many more to follow suit.”

The European Green Capital Award has been conceived as an initiative to promote and reward these efforts. The award shows that a city wants to – and does! - solve environmental problems so as to improve the quality of life of its citizens, and reduce the burden it imposes on the global environment as a whole. It provides an incentive for cities to inspire each other and share best practices, while at the same time engaging in friendly competition.

Scottish government challenges industry leaders

With an ambition to have 50% of electricity from renewables by 2020, the Scottish government has challenged industry leaders to come up with the ideas to meet this goal. It is likely that wind and wave generation will feature as nuclear has already been ruled out and Scotland may be climatically unsuited to much solar generation.

The government has already offered a £10 million prize for innovation in marine energy.

Tavish Scott, the chairman of the Scottish Parliament's economy and energy committee which is overseeing the inquiry, said he believed it would be hard to meet the target as local opposition to big projects had already proved difficult to overcome. He highlighted the recent rejection of a huge wind farm on Lewis as an example.

Speaking to BBC Scotland , he added: "People are concerned about the sheer scale of some of these projects that do come forward, but I would hope that one of the issues the committee can address is looking at that process in its entirety.

"We have to consider what more could be done at an earlier stage to make the argument for tackling climate change, and also how we ensure it is designed in the most sensitive manner."

Scottish Renewables spokesman pointed out that challenges relating to planning, grid and skills had to be overcome of any progress was to be made.

Micro-generation plans published by UK Tories

Trying to recapture the initiative on the green agenda, Opposition leader, David Cameron, highlighted the importance of feed-in tariffs set at the appropriate level as a means of encouraging homes and businesses to generate their own power.

Recognising the success of a similar approach in European countries, especially Germany, Conservative Party proposals will compel British energy companies to take electricity from homes and other small scale producers and guarantee a fixed-price for several years.

A mass market in micro-generation would be more efficient, and by people making their own energy using, for example, biomass, solar or the combined heat and power boilers that will be on the market in a few years' time, they will be more conscious of their energy usage.

The United Nations Climate Change Conference, attended by representatives of 180 countries at the Indonesian resort of Bali, began its work this morning, in putting together a convention that will be a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. I say a week, but is actually a two week conference; the important ministerial conference is next week.

Hopefully, quite a lot, although very much in the detail. We trailed some of the issues in a recent Home Solar Power article and highlighted points of interest to those considering installing home solar power systems.

Obviously, there are a number of ways to deal with climate change: reducing emissions is one that will feature heavily in this conference; developing alternative energy sources is another; and all are likely to impact on the lifestyles of most people on the planet.

Some of the biggest polluting industries are those that produce electricity, using coal or gas. (Regrettably, it looks likely that the American Congress is going to produce an energy bill which will be sympathetic to coal-fired power stations. See this story for more on that.) Governments will need to increase pressure on electricity producing companies to invest in and/or create renewable energy sources; the form of financial incentives to businesses and home-owners to install their own renewables needs to be revisited; building approvals need to require both energy-savings and renewables in all new buildings.

Such pressures will release the market to invest heavily in R&D to produce even more efficient commercial and home solar power (PV) and solar heating systems. Solar powered homes of the 2040s will look nothing like the systems being installed today. It is out of R&D that the biggest savings will accrue.

Under a government initiative, the cities of Bristol, Leeds and Manchester will develop "city-wide action plans" to slash CO2 emissions. It is not clear how long it will take for the action plans to be developed, how long they will take to be implemented or when they might achieve their, as yet, unspecified objective.

The news release from the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) indicated the sum of £250,000 had been set aside for this project.

"New measures and initiatives will be introduced and could include renewable energy and trigeneration (creating power, heat and cooling from a single source) along with energy saving measures such as insulation and promoting cycling to work. Key public service bodies, businesses and community leaders in each of the cities will contribute to the strategy and its implementation."

The chair of one of the qangos which will be involved in the project, said, "Our research tells us that inspiring citizens as members of their local community will give them more power to act. In communities, people can better believe in the impact of their actions, they are big fish in a small pond, not powerless members of the whole world.

"The public discussion on climate change has evolved at an unprecedented rate over the past year. We need to build on this momentum and make it easier for people to adopt low carbon lifestyles. This initiative will provide us with insight into how we can work with cities all over the UK. This will be central to our long-term thinking. Only then can we bring about real change."

These three cities, like many of the other old industrial cities of the UK, have seen a growth in apartment-style city-centre living in the past decade. They also still have many post-war housing estates, including tower blocks. For virtually all of these residential units, there is little likelihood that home solar power systems are going to be even a partial answer to reducing carbon emissions.

The Berkeley City Council unanimously approved an innovative plan Tuesday night to help property owners buy solar energy systems without paying any money up front, writes Carolyn Jones in the San Francisco Chronicle.

The city will borrow money at a relatively low interest rate to pay for solar panel installation for property owners who want to participate. Because the city would be borrowing a large sum of money, the interest rate would be lower than what a property owner could secure individually.

The council will create a solar financing district,where home and business owners could take advantage of this financing to pay for solar panels over 20 years. It is estimated the annual repayments would be about the same or less than what the property owner would save on energy bills.

"We've heard from people around the world who want to do this because it's such a novel, simple idea," said Mayor Tom Bates. "This can be a guide for cities everywhere."

The plan is likely to go into effect in about eight months, after the legal and accounting details are worked out.

The solar financing plan is part of Berkeley's effort to reach its goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions 80 percent by 2050.

Ahead of the Solar Power 2007 conference and expo at Long Beach, reports are in that the solar power industry is having an impact on home sales.

The Los Angeles Times interviewed some of the exhibitors at the conference - expected to attract 11,000 people - and reported the following:

Interest has been spurred by California's subsidised Million Solar Roofs programme, the goal of which is to create 3,000 megawatts of new solar power by 2017 and to build solar power systems into half of all new homes by 2015. Currently only 5% of new homes are so equipped.

The future seems to be a combination of rooftops generating power and utility-sized plants such as are planned for around the Mojave Desert.

Energy Week is here but not enough energy in Congress

The New York Times (see below) believes there is potential for the US Congress to produce a great Energy Bill this year. However, in an editorial today, it is critical of Democrats in particular of finding excuses for not making progress.

"Democratic leaders in the House and Senate should stop inventing endless excuses — Iraq, a crowded calendar, procedural difficulties — for why they cannot move swiftly to reconcile their two energy bills.

"One of the big sticking points is a Senate provision requiring meaningful improvements in fuel economy. Again the automobile companies say they can’t do it. History — and Judge Sessions — say they can.

"Energy bills are almost always controversial. This year's bills are more problematic than most because they contain some tough provisions requiring serious investment in efficiency and major changes in the way we create and deliver energy. This is a big test for Democrats. If they cannot deliver an energy bill, there is little hope they can ever handle the more complex, but essential, task of producing a comprehensive strategy on climate change."

US Congress gets to work on 2007 Energy Bill

The House and Senate begin negotiations on the 2007 Energy Bill in a changed social and political environment. After each produced their own energy bill earlier in the summer, they are now meeting to agree the content of the bill.

In the view of The New York Times, Congress has produced "two respectable, if incomplete, energy bills that could be merged into one truly outstanding bill". Amongst the Times must have list is renewable electricity. There was a divergence of views within the Congress on this issue earlier in the year. The House sought a requirement from utilities that 15 per cent of power generation should come from a combination of efficiency and renewables, such as wind and solar power; the Senate voted down a similar provision.

The Times asserts that the House must stand firm on this provision, believing that the chances of slowing global warming requires a reduction in the burning of fossil fuels like coal and natural gas.

Voters are realising at last that the United States, as the world's largest polluter per head of population, has to take some responsibility for limiting global warming. It would be good, too, to see a gradual shift in economic subsidies from the traditional CO2 fuels to renewables. Congressmen and women need to reflect the changing social and political attitudes in their deliberations.

Polymers seen as the way to cheaper solar cells.

New technologies are developed quickly as the rush to develop cheaper options for alternative fuels. Home owners looking to install their own solar power system will want to follow the research recently announced by the New Jersey Institute of Technology.

Researchers there are looking at polymers rather than silicon to create solar cells, the basic unit of a solar energy system.

“Developing organic solar cells from polymers, however, is a cheap and potentially simpler alternative,” said Somenath Mitra, PhD, professor and acting chair of NJIT’s Department of Chemistry and Environmental Sciences. “We foresee a great deal of interest in our work because solar cells can be inexpensively printed or simply painted on exterior building walls and/or roof tops. Imagine some day driving in your hybrid car with a solar panel painted on the roof, which is producing electricity to drive the engine. The opportunities are endless.”

The solar cell developed at NJIT uses a carbon nanotubes complex, which by the way, is a molecular configuration of carbon in a cylindrical shape. The name is derived from the tube’s miniscule size. Scientists estimate nanotubes to be 50,000 times smaller than a human hair. Nevertheless, just one nanotube can conduct current better than any conventional electrical wire. “Actually, nanotubes are significantly better conductors than copper,” Mitra added.

Mitra and his research team took the carbon nanotubes and combined them with tiny carbon Buckyballs (known as fullerenes) to form snake-like structures. Buckyballs trap electrons, although they can’t make electrons flow. Add sunlight to excite the polymers, and the buckyballs will grab the electrons. Nanotubes, behaving like copper wires, will then be able to make the electrons or current flow.

“Using this unique combination in an organic solar cell recipe can enhance the efficiency of future painted-on solar cells,” said Mitra. “Someday, I hope to see this process become an inexpensive energy alternative for households around the world.”

NZ Home Solar Water Heating Grant

A $500 grant for the installation of home solar water heating systems was announced on 25 May 2007. The grant is being offered through solar water heating suppliers who meet certain energy performance, price and installation standards.

Energy Conscious Design, Azzuro Solar New Zealand Limited and New Zealand Solar Limited are the first suppliers to join the Government's solar water heating programme. A number of other suppliers are in the process of joining the scheme.

There is no financial incentive to installing solar photovoltaic systems;, NZ already gets 70% of its energy from renewable sources such as hydro and geothermal. However, NZers are being encouraged to be more efficient in their use of energy and a new website has been established to promote sustainable homes.

California legislators try to reverse the slump in grant applications

The California Public Utilities Commission (PUC) succeeded in removing the California Solar Initiative's time variant pricing requirement until the PUC develops Time of Use (TOU) tariffs in the next general rate increase of utilities in 2009.

Forcing people in receipt of Solar Initiative grants to sign up to high grid tariffs had turned home owners away in their droves from installing home solar power, particularly those in hot, dry desert climates where air conditioning load drives demand. Customers found that the difference in rates on that remaining use would result in a higher bill. Similarly, for some customers, even though their bills with solar would be lower, the TOU requirement could reduce the amount of those savings substantially, and
dramatically increase the payback period of a solar system.

The effect of the original law can be seen in this diagram.

Figure 1: First quarter incentive reservations have dropped in comparison to previous years

UK Grants available again from 29 May

After closing down the grant scheme on 1 March 2007, the government's new policy has been announced with effect from 29 May 2007.

The maximum grant has been lowered to £2,500, but there is a strong emphasis on requiring energy efficiency measures to be in place before a home-owner can even apply for a grant.

The pre-conditions that must be met are the insulation of the whole of the loft of the property to meet current building regulations, installation of cavity wall insulation, fitting of low energy light bulbs in all appropriate light fittings, installation of basic controls for heating systems to include a room thermostat and a programmer or timer, and having received planning consents.

While £18m has been allocated for the financial years 2006/07 - 2007/08, it will be allocated on a first come first served basis. This will be an improvement on the previous system in which funds were allocated monthly on a first come first served basis. Ominously, the DTI said, "There will be no further funds and no further measures to extend the scheme life."

What amounted to a stop-start policy was only made worse earlier in the year when the whole grant system was suspended, resulting in a number of installation firms having to lay off staff. The Guardian had then quoted Dave Timms of Friends of the Earth as saying "This is an astonishing way to treat a fledgling industry . . . The announcement of job losses means the situation has now descended from farce into tragedy. We need to see a quantum leap in the funding for small-scale renewable energy and a regulatory framework which rolls these technologies nationwide".