solar
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Most efficient solar panel ever
Physics tells us that the most efficient solar cell should be able to convert 33.5 percent of solar energy into electricity, but to date the closest that the layabouts we call "scientists" were able to manage was 24 percent efficiency. Now a new solar cell has smashed that record, reaching 28.4 percent efficiency. They pull […]
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Solar Industry Executives Talk About Massive Solar Jobs Growth
In mid-October, my Tigercomm colleague Mark Sokolove and I took Scaling Green’s Communicating Energy lecture series on the road to the Solar Power International 2011 (SPI) conference and trade show in Dallas, Texas. With so many articulate, knowledgeable, clean energy thought leaders and company representatives in attendance, the opportunity to interview several of these folks on the state of the solar […]
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Critical List: Humanity is locking in dangerous climate change; California has 1 GW of solar
The International Energy Agency says that within the next five years humanity is likely to fritter away its last chance of avoiding dangerous climate change. Also, the world's still giving more support to fossil fuels than renewable energy—six times as much, when measured in state subsidies. The Obama administration wants to open up offshore areas […]
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Solar comes out of the shadows
Mainstream energy companies may finally be seeing the light when it comes to solar power.How do we know when solar becomes a mainstream energy source? One tip-off: when mainstream energy companies get serious about solar. For example, take NRG, a Fortune 250 wholesale energy generator with about 26 gigawatts of capacity in its portfolio. Most […]
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Dalai Lama supports nuclear power, disses wind and solar
In a news conference in Tokyo, the Dalai Lama told his increasingly anti-nuclear hosts that nuclear power is an important solution for underdeveloped countries still grappling with basic energy poverty. His talking points were almost identical to those of stateside nuclear advocates, including discussions of the risks of nuclear accidents compared to other everyday risks. […]
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‘Going Boulder’ means voting for local energy self-reliance
Photo: Zane Selvans This post originally appeared on Energy Self-Reliant States, a resource of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance’s New Rules Project. By a razor-thin margin, Boulder, Colo., citizens gave the city a victory for energy self-reliance on Tuesday, approving two ballot measures to let the city form a municipal utility. If the city moves […]
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Solar cheaper than fossil fuels in a decade, says Steven Chu
Solar power will be cheaper than fossil fuels at some point between the end of this decade and 2026*, said U.S. Secretary of Energy Steven Chu at the Washington Post's Smart Energy conference this morning. (For more on what Chu said, check out Guardian reporter Suzanne Goldenberg's tweets from the conference.) The date at which […]
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Is solar Britain’s new sunset industry?
Photo: doggy SchnauzerGovernment treasury departments don’t generally respond well to the idea that the environment matters, and here in the U.K. things are no different. Yesterday, Energy Minister Greg Barker announced proposals for a 50 percent reduction of the “feed-in tariff” — a program that guarantees homeowners an income for the power they produce from […]
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Don’t let Solyndra fool you: Solar PV is on fire
This post was written by J. Matthew Roney, research associate for the Earth Policy Institute. Additional resources at www.earth-policy.org. Solar photovoltaic (PV) companies manufactured a record 24,000 megawatts (MW) of PV cells worldwide in 2010, more than doubling their 2009 output. Annual PV production has grown nearly 100-fold since 2000, when just 277 MW of […]
