Tag: solar

India’s coal demand is rising—even as it pushes hard for solar | Fast Company

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

BY ASSOCIATED PRESS 4 MINUTE READ India Prime Minister Narendra Modi was in the midst of a months-long reelection campaign this April when he took to social media to trumpet a “remarkable feat!” and a “historic milestone” for his country: crossing 1 billion metric tons of coal and lignite production. It was proof, Modi said, of India’s “commitment to ensuring a vibrant coal sector.”

A month later, for the third year in a row, his government ordered some coal plants to run at full capacity to meet high electricity demand during the increasingly hot summer months.

Even though India has been significantly increasing its renewable energy capacity in recent years, when demand for electricity surges, it still goes back to its most trusted source of power: coal.

Read More

This new solar shingle from GAF Energy gets nailed right onto a roof | Fast Company

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The concept seems obvious: Why put solar panels on a roof when you could just make the roof out of solar panels? But Tesla’s attempt to design a solar roof didn’t go well: The solar tiles turned out to be challenging to install, and the final price for customers has sometimes become tens of thousands of dollars higher than they were quoted. But GAF Energy, a spinoff of the world’s largest roofing company, launched a new solar roof today that it believes can succeed—and that could help radically speed up the adoption of home solar.

“The potential for solar is enormous, but we haven’t come close to meeting it,” says Martin DeBono, president of GAF Energy, which is part of parent company Standard Industries, which also owns GAF. “When you have a heritage in roofing, and you see solar panels going up the same way in 2020 as they were put up in 1990, yeah, you realize there’s an opportunity for innovation.”

Read More

What Apple Just Did in Solar Is a Really Big Deal | Bloomberg Business

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

It was a year ago this week that Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook responded to a climate-change heckler at the company’s annual shareholder meeting with an impassioned rebuttal in which he famously told investors who care only about profits to “get out of the stock.”

Now Cook is putting his prodigious sums of money where his mouth is, proclaiming the “biggest, boldest and most ambitious project ever,” an $850 million agreement to buy solar power from First Solar, the biggest U.S. developer of solar farms. The deal will supply enough electricity to power all of Apple’s California stores, offices, headquarters and a data center, Cook said Tuesday at the Goldman Sachs technology conference in San Francisco.

It’s the biggest-ever solar procurement deal for a company that isn’t a utility, and it nearly triples Apple’s stake in solar, according to an analysis by Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF). “The investment amount is enormous,” said Michel Di Capua, head of North American research at BNEF. “This is a really big deal.”

Read More.

Driving Solar Electric | Green Car Institute.org

~ lmehit ~ Leave a comment

Driving Solar Electric

Ford is offering an innovative package that pairs electric car ownership with a rooftop solar energy system generating enough electricity to offset an average of 1,000 miles of driving each month. The result is what many electric vehicle owners dream of – the ability to drive with zero emissions and effectively, without additional load on the grid. While the SunPower system doesn’t actually charge Ford’s upcoming 2012 Focus Electric directly, it does feed enough solar-generated electricity into the grid to offset the energy required for keeping batteries charged. Focus Electric owners can add the solar option for less than $10,000 after federal incentives.

The ‘Drive Green for Life’ program not only provides an all-new option for those who want to go the extra mile to drive sustainably, but also is big win for solar energy. Moves like this will motivate consumers to embrace solar energy who may not have done so otherwise.

via Driving Solar Electric | Green Car Institute.