SOLAR TODAY Blog

Schuco Designs a Cooler Module

Schuco has redesigned its photovoltaic modules to help them stay cool. As they heat up in the sun, today's silicon PV cells lose about one half percent of their power for every degree Celsius. Schuco engineers used the FloVENT computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software from Mentor Graphics Corporation Mechanical Analysis Division (formerly Flomerics) to model energy absorption and reflection, and to simulate heat flow out to the aluminum frame and surrounding air. By optimizing heat flow, Schuco gets a cooler, more powerful module. "As the first in our industry to perform CFD simulation, we believe that we are now able to provide our customers with substantially higher power output than an equivalent competitive design," said Hamid Batoul, technical director of Schuco's solar department in Paris.

Suntech Pluto Cells Achieve 18 Percent Efficiency

Suntech announced in March that it's routinely achieving conversion efficiencies up to 19 percent with monocrystalline photovoltaic cells and 17 percent with multicrystalline cells, in large-scale production, by using the Pluto anti-reflective technology developed at the University of New South Wales.

Independent testing at the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems in Germany confirmed 18.8 percent conversion efficiency for a monocrystalline Pluto PV cell, and 17.2 percent for a multi-crystalline cell. Both cells came from Suntech's 34MW Pluto production line.

Last summer, Michael Totten wrote a couple of columns in SOLAR TODAY about Google's sustainable energy projects. A flurry of letters (July/August 08) followed, proposing ways in which Google's software products -- in particular, Google Earth -- might be adapted to solar energy planning.

We've seen a number of these mash-ups recently. The slickest and most appealing was put together by CH2MHill Enterprise Spatial Solutions for the City of Berkeley, and linked through the Community Energy Services Corp. (CESC) website. It shows about 650 solar installs all over town. You can zoom in on any installation and get a pretty nice view of the roof and yard, as if you were hovering in a balloon about 300 feet up. What's interesting is the relative dearth of commercial installations. If you want to patronize a solar-cooled grocery store, for instance, you're out of luck for now -- even Berkeley Bowl has a naked roof. But a few apartment buildings and medical facilities have arrays.

Check it out.

Pres. Barack Obama, in a speech today to the National Academy of Sciences, committed the United States to spend at least 3% of GDP on research and development, including a major commitment to energy projects.

The initiative includes doubling the budgets for the National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Standards and Technology, among other agencies, plus about $400 million to launch ARPA-E, the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Energy.

A major administration goal, Obama reiterated, is to cut carbon emissions 80% by 2050.

Non-fossil liquid fuels got a boost yesterday when the California Air Resources Board called for a 10% cut in the carbon emissions of motor fuels by 2020.

On the face of it, the rule is good news for the ethanol and biodiesel industries. To limit land-conversion and food-competition problems, CARB favors low-carbon fuels with high energy content per acre. The board has published complex rules that are seen to promote sugar cane over corn ethanol, for instance. In response to protests from the corn ethanol lobby, CARB promises to revisit the rules and rewrite as future research warrants.

Motor fuels for local and rail transport can be significantly replaced by electricity. But kerosene (jet fuel) and gasoline for piston aircraft engines cannot. The technical problems in making jet fuel from vegetable oils have been solved, but there doesn't appear to be a practical way to grow enough of it to feed the airlines and America's flying armed forces. In the meantime, the Air Force seems happy to fly on synthetic fuel from natural gas, which has a fatter carbon footprint than straight petroleum kerosene.

For transoceanic travel, it's not hard to envision a revival of ocean liners running on non-carbon fuels (ships are about 1000 times more efficient that airplanes per ton-mile) and a revival of rail for local and intercity travel (steel wheels are about 10 times more efficient than rubber tires).

That leaves piston-powered aircraft -- about 250,000 of them in North America. 98% of light planes and helicopters use 100-octane aviation gasoline, a "boutique" product produced in small runs once a year (a few use diesel engines running on jet fuel). Avgas still contains about 3 milligrams of tetraethyl lead per gallon. The EPA wants the lead out. At least one company has come up with a formula for a 104-octane lead-free fuel based on junk biomass feedstocks, and that's what Pipers and Cessnas and Mooneys may burn in a few years.

Obama on energy: "The nation that leads the world in creating new energy sources will be the nation that leads the 21st century global economy. America can be that nation."

Fight shapes up over climate-and-energy bills

Mojave CSP plants would use too much water: Park Service officer

It's Earth Day. Companies and agencies large and small use the occasion to announce green initiatives. Some of these are trivial greenwash, but some mark real progress in mainstreaming renewable energy. Here are a few of today's winners:

Bright Automotive, an Indiana start-up with backing from the Rocky Mountain Institute, Alcoa, Google, Johnson Controls and the Turner Foundation, announced its Idea PHEV delivery van, meant to dramatically reduce the fuel use of large delivery fleets. The company has applied for a $450 million federal loan to start production, with the goal of making 50,000 light trucks annually by 2013. That would be roughly 10% of the U.S. market for delivery vehicles.

Wal-Mart, which just finished putting PV arrays on the roofs of 18 stores, said it would double its PV capacity over the next 18 months through a power purchase agreement with BP Solar. California Wal-Marts with PV can get up to 30% of their electricity on-site. That helps the state meet its RPS of 33% by 2020.

Construction began on a 180MW wind farm at Paplote Creek in South Texas, schedule to go online by the end of the year.

The U.S. Department of the Interior announced final rules for offshore wind farms, clearing the way for some massive projects on the East Coast.

Nevada is shaping up to be a test case for the success of solar power.

The good news, reported on Friday, is that the state's electric utilities met their 9% RPS requirement in 2008. A number of questions remain going forward, all centered on the issue of how they'll meet their 12% requirement this year and 15% by 2015.

The utility companies want to continue building central power plants, based on concentrating solar and geothermal stations, photovoltaic arrays and wind farms. Even with the costs of acquiring land and stringing new transmission lines, they see this as the best long-term business model for their investors.

Labor unions and environmental groups see a better future in roof-top PV arrays. They see more long-term jobs and far less environmental impact along this route.

Both sides are lobbying hard for attention in the state legislature. But it's nice to see little evidence that the coal companies and nuclear industry are spending money knocking any of the renewable technologies.

Two stories came through this week that made me blink:

Pacific Gas & Electric signed a preliminary agreement to buy power generated in space,  and the Vatican announced plans to build a 100 MW solar power plant -- the largest in Europe -- and export electricity to Italy.

In the March issue of SOLAR TODAY I wrote a skeptical piece about the chances anyone will ever launch a satellite that can beam utility-scale power to Earth (see page 18).

NERC report: Upgraded grid will handle national RPS

Italian firm opens 65MW geothermal plants in Nevada

Ohio PUC sets rules for 25% RPS

Indiana catches up with neighbors, approves 15% RPS

FERC OKs incentive for $10 billion Midwest wind transmission line

Following on to Monday's story about the rising fortunes of thin-film PV relative to silicon, today's Wall Street Journal reports that FirstSolar will sell 48 MW of PV modules to Sempra Generation, of San Diego, for installation at a solar farm in southern Nevada. Sempra doesn't have a customer for the power yet, but the company is confident it will sell to one of the many utility companies scrambling to meet an RPS goal.

Sempra already has 10 MW of FirstSolar panels at the site, and expects eventually to have 300 MW of capacity there.

Bottom line: The state RPS mandate is a wonderful thing, and right now it's driving more thin-film development than anything else.