Solar, Solar Everywhere and Conferences That Make You Think

Jennifer Runyon
January 15, 2013 | 3 Comments

In 2012, the U.S. solar industry installed roughly 3.2 GW of capacity. This was more solar power capacity than had ever been installed before. Falling PV module prices and large-scale solar PV farms coming online during the year are what drove it. Most analysts agree that 2013 will be another record year in the U.S. for installed solar capacity.

That said, it’s important to note that the industry isn’t just slowly and steadily marching forward but rather it’s stumbling along like a drunken sailor in a three-steps forward, two-steps back fashion. Markets slow down at the same time that others pop up. When California — the mecca for solar — starts to falter, East Coast states like New Jersey, Pennsylvania and New York pick up the slack. Where will funding come from next? What's the next big technological breakthrough we expect to see in solar? Will the U.S. ever develop an energy policy? Good questions and luckily we have answers.

Next month, whether you live and work on the east coast or the west coast, if you have questions about the solar industry, there will be a solar conference near you where you can go and get some answers. And even if you don’t want to leave your desk we still have solutions for you.

First, The Shows

Solar Energy Trade Show’s PV America is set to take place in Philadelphia from February 5-7. RenewableEnergyWorld.com will again be powering Solar Central at the show, conducting live interviews with experts on topics such as Addressing Local Environmental Issues, Opportunities to Advance Partnerships with Electric Utilities and Enticing New Investors to the Solar Industry. With Solar Idea swaps, PV Technical Training and a super innovative “Choose Your Own General Session,” this is a show you won’t want to miss.

The very next week, the solar conference ship docks on the West Coast with Pennwell’s Solar Power-Gen taking place in San Diego from February 13-15. At that show (full disclosure – I’m the conference chairperson) we’ll have an amazing array of experts to help you sort out your business plans for this year and into the future. Interested in finance? We have three sessions on the topic, examining incentives, project finance and how to structure your deals. Interested in technology? We’ve got sessions covering O&M for solar power plants, concentrating solar and technology considerations for the entire spectrum of solar project development. There are three other tracks — policy, markets and utility integration — each offering three interesting and informative sessions on their respective topics. In addition, the plenary session (our Day 2 Keynote) will cover Mergers and Acquisitions in the solar space, something that is expected to continue for at least another year. The first day keynote will focus on the intersection between utilities and solar companies and how the two very different segments of American business can work together profitably.

Not Up for Any Travel? Learn from Your Desk

If travel isn’t in your future, you can still take advantage of learning opportunities. First of all, this Thursday, January 17, at 2 ET, 1 CT and 11 PT, we’ll be holding a webcast on Solar Power in 2013 featuring four industry experts who will all be presenting at Solar Power-Gen. You can learn more about the webcast and register here.

In addtition, during PV America, we will be offering live streaming of our roundtable discussions in Solar Central. Check out the schedule here then be sure to come back at the appropriate time to watch a live broadcast of the roundtable interview that interests you.

And as always, RenewableEnergyWorld.com offers you the most important solar news and information that you need to do your job. We hope to see you at one of these live events soon.

Lead image: Impressionist Painting of a Ship with Sun via Shutterstock

The information and views expressed in this blog post are solely those of the author and not necessarily those of RenewableEnergyWorld.com or the companies that advertise on this Web site and other publications. This blog was posted directly by the author and was not reviewed for accuracy, spelling or grammar.

3 Comments

Dr. A. Cannara
February 28, 2013

Howard, our descendents are looking back at us from the future and rightly expecting us to make wise decisions through study.

Burning anything for power is wasteful. In the case of hydrogen, it;s not only hard to separate from water, requiring energy, it's the lightest element, thus needs considerable energy to compress to useful volumes.

It's explosive in air and so, when adding thousands of PSI for compression, it's a larger danger than present, liquid fuels.

There is no future need for combustion fuels except for special systems, like aircraft. All else is most efficiently done via electricity. A vehicle burning hydrogen wastes most of the energy contained in the hydrogen-air combustion -- it's exhaust heat, compression heat, etc.

An electric vehicle not only has ~90% drive efficiency, it returns to demand a recharge >10% smaller than what it originally got, simply due to regenerative braking. No thermal/gas-compression engine system can match that.

The list continues of why the "hydrogen highway" was never viable.

Solar, on the other hand, can meet peak daytime loads just from local, on-structure installations. With efficient storage, EVs & advanced nuclear (which can make carbon-neutral fuels) there's no need for any odd power sources to be conjured up for thousands of years.

Both solar & nuclear are independent of Earth, so we can make use of them without harming the environment. Over 2% of Earth's land has human structure on it -- more than enough area for even present solar of ~20% efficiency to meet peak needs. Add EVs/storage & nuclear base load -- done.

Howard Phillips
February 28, 2013

Solar is great, but WATER, because it contains 67% hydrogen, contains the world's largest energy resource. Getting the hydrogen from the water is the problem. Should we be working more on this?

The world's first CC-HOD hardware and equipment-design conference, April 8, 2013, is based on the demonstration of hydrogen production at 30 gallons/minute using water and scrap materials. Primary purpose of this conference is to host a meeting where hardware designers and R&D product development professionals will be briefed on new CC-HOD methods useful for generating hydrogen at commercially-useful rates. For time, date and agenda for the conference, please see www.PhillipsCompany.4T.com/REG.pdf

The world's first process using catalytic carbon for producing hydrogen-for-fuel from scrap materials was demonstrated earlier this year. A Hydrogen Design Conference will be held on April 8, 2013 to transfer this technology to any company wanting cell design guidelines for commercialization of this technology. Using a new technology, called CC-HOD, hydrogen was produced at several output rates, up to approximately 30 gallons per minute of hydrogen. For a report on this demonstration, please see www.PhillipsCompany.4T.com/CD.pdf

The CC-HOD method for producing hydrogen has the following characteristics:
1. Results in more energy when the hydrogen is used (combusted, burned) than the energy required to generate the hydrogen, and
2. Uses only low-cost and friendly materials (carbon and fuel), and
3. Uses only two fuels — aluminum and water, and
4. Can generate ANY rate (LPM, GPM) of hydrogen, limited only by the hardware design, and
5. Because of the above, eliminates the need for hydrogen storage tanks for most applications, and
6. Can output hydrogen, directly from the cell, at ANY pressure, limited only by the hardware design, and
7. Can produce the hydrogen ON DEMAND, or "HOD."
More info: www.PhillipsCompany.4T.com/HYDROGEN.html

Dr. A. Cannara
January 16, 2013

Local solar beats all other 'renewables', especially wasteful wind 'farms'. Good to see folks getting some sens about it, as our Calif. "million solar homes" initiative does, and many of our municipalities and educational institutions are now doing.

There's more than enough human structure on earth to supply peak daytime power needs. Even NYC was LIDAR surveyed and found able to meet half its peak summer daytime load via just rooftop solar.

Local solar (DG) also saves on transmission loss and builds a more reliable, robust grid.

No need for resource-intensive, species-threatening, subsidy-sucking scams like wind, wave, etc. DG, EVs, efficient storage and advanced nuclear do the job for thousands of years.

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Jennifer Runyon

Jennifer Runyon is managing editor of RenewableEnergyWorld.com coordinating, writing and/or editing columns, features, news stories and blogs for the publications. She also serves as conference chair of Solar Power-Gen Conference and Exhibition...