SHINE: A 'Moon Shot' for Solar Energy

I'm pleased to announce the publication The Solar High-Impact National Energy (SHINE) Project, a major new study I've been working on for the better part of a year with my colleagues at Clean Edge, in collaboration with Co-op America's Solar Catalyst Group.

The free report can be downloaded Here.

SHINE calls for an ambitious and aggressive, three-pronged initiative to make solar both cost-competitive and a significant part of America’s energy mix within 10 years. It emphasizes the positive benefits American-made solar can have on energy security, U.S. business growth, the creation of thousands of jobs across the nation, environmental and public health, and reducing stress on America’s electricity grid.

With Business As Usual, we get none of this. In fact, we are likely to lose yet another American industry, and all the jobs that go with it, to Europe and Asia.

Specifically, SHINE calls for three program:

Solar Utilization National Underwriting Plan (SUNUP): a federal block-grant program, providing matching funds to states to implement innovative and cost-effective solar installation programs;

U.S. Rooftop Initiative for Solar Energy (U.S. RISE): an aggressive, long-term federal commitment to purchase solar systems for government facilities and operations; and

American Solar Advancement Prize (ASAP): a high-stakes, high-reward competition to develop and deploy new technologies and systems that could dramatically accelerate the reduction in solar’s costs within a decade.

SHINE is centered on the uniquely American way of solving problems: by stimulating markets -- in this case, to the point where solar can take off and bring jobs, prosperity, and security to America through private-sector initiative. It can address environmental problems such as climate change without resorting to regulations and treaties.

As a program that calls forth the power of markets, SHINE focuses on lowering the price of solar so that it can compete in every energy market and make a major contribution to energy security and independence -- on rooftops for homeowners and businesses, in neighborhood and regional installations for utilities, and by providing low-cost energy for the coming generation of hydrogen fuel cells and high-efficiency batteries.

Combined, SHINE’s three programs reduce the price of solar far faster than would take place under Business As Usual, thereby creating mass markets for solar far sooner than they would otherwise develop. By 2025, SHINE would reduce prices to as low as 80 cents per installed watt, compared to about $2.71 for Business As Usual -- a dramatic difference that would make solar cost-competitive with -- perhaps cheaper than -- fossil fuels and other more polluting energy sources.

And, along the way, SHINE would ensure America’s participation in what is expected to be one of the fastest-growing global industries of the next decade. It would reverse the loss of high-paying jobs already taking place in the U.S. renewable energy sector, which has seen companies and jobs depart American shores for China, Germany, Japan, Korea, and elsewhere. And by reclaiming leadership in this sector, the United States would enjoy the creation of up to 580,000 good-paying U.S. jobs -- most of which cannot be exported overseas because they involve local installation and maintenance of solar systems on rooftops and in neighborhoods in every community.

SHINE report focuses on solar photovoltaics (PV), the technology by which sunlight is turned directly into electricity -- the types of systems seen increasingly on building rooftops. PV is not the only solar technology. Solar thermal systems -- in which the sun heats water for use by a building’s occupants -- are common primarily outside the U.S. And concentrating solar power technologies -- which use reflective materials such as mirrors to concentrate the sun’s energy, which is then converted into electricity using any of several technologies -- has huge potential for large-scale, utility-like electric generating systems.

All three technologies are important components of a solar energy future, but we believe it is solar PV that holds the largest short-term potential to provide the greatest economic, environmental, social, and national security benefits.

We also believe that a U.S. energy policy that delivers the national security, economic protection, and health and safety that Americans deserve also requires full commitment to energy efficiency as well as to other renewable energy sources, from wind to biomass to geothermal. Yet, after all of these technologies are fully deployed there will still be unmet energy needs; needs that can be uniquely fulfilled by solar.

And solar PV technology is ready. The quality and reliability of solar PV have matured, the price has dropped, and technology is poised for widespread deployment. The American marketplace has rolled out, with great success and prosperity, technologies that were much less mature than solar when they began to scale up -- transistors, personal computers, cell phones, and high-definition TV, just to name a few. SHINE’s programs will serve to create and accelerate a virtuous circle of technology improvement, market expansion, and price reductions that will only enhance solar’s value and appeal.

I hope you'll take a look . . . and look forward to your comments.

The publication of SHINE coincides with the release of a new study released by the Energy Foundation and undertaken by Navigant Consulting, Inc., which describes the vast market potential for rooftop solar photovoltaic systems (PV) in the United States. The study, “PV Grid Connected Market Potential in 2010 Under a Cost Breakthrough Scenario,” provides an estimate of the market for PV systems in the United States based on available rooftop space for residential and commercial solar PV.

Among the key findings are that by 2010:

At $2.00-2.50 per installed watt, the annual market potential for grid-connected residential and commercial building PV applications is estimated at 2,900 MW, representing an annual market of about $6.6 billion (equipment and installations).

Rooftop space is not a constraining factor for solar development. Residential and commercial rooftop space in the U.S. could accommodate up to 710,000 MW of solar electric power (if all rooftops were fully utilized, taking into account proper orientation of buildings, shading from trees, HVAC equipment, and other solar access factors). For comparison, total electricity-generating capacity in the U.S. today is about 950,000 MW.

The Pacific and Mid-Atlantic regions together would account for 52% of the potential residential and commercial sector demand.

California alone has the potential for about 40% of the total building rooftop market potential—through a combination of favorable sunlight levels and high retail energy prices.

Other distributed forms of PV electric generation, including ground-mounted PV, car ports, curtain walls (a type of commercial building window), and awnings could further add to the potential identified by Navigant Consulting.

Comments

[elizabeth burton]

Joel,

I'm very excited to read about this huge push to make solar power a major energy source; I'm grateful for the work that you and others are doing to make this a reality.

That said, I'm wondering if you could address the following concern: are you or any other movers and shakers in the solar world giving any thought to the question of the safe handling of solar panels throughout their lifecycle (manufacturing, use, and ultimate disposal)? I'm influenced here by McDonough & Braungart's writings on cradle-to-cradle principles. My impression is that solar panels contain various toxic metals (cadmium and lead?). Do you know how long a typical solar panel is expected to be usable? Any plans for what happens to it at the end of its useful life? Any manufacturing companies planning to take them back to recover the materials (particularly the toxic ones)?
I would be unambiguously excited about the coming of solar power if I were assured that we will not continue to spread toxic metals around even as we move away from fossil fuels. Thanks for any light you can shed on this.

[Denis Du Bois]

Fascinating findings, Joel. I've been writing about rooftop concentrating solar lately, so your statement about rooftop space made me wonder.

Gross rooftop space might not be an issue, but how much is net available, permissible space, with owners willing to invest, incentives available to encourage it, roofing manufacturers willing to uphold warranties, and sunlight easements to prevent future shading?

Along those lines, I interviewed Brad Hines, CEO of Soliant Energy (formerly Practical Instruments) about his company's rooftop concentrating solar and its involvement in the Solar America Inititiative. It was an interesting conversation. I published the interview as a podcast:

Soliant Energy Targets Commercial Rooftops with its Concentrating Solar Platform