Category Archives: Renewable Energy

If it works in Germany, it works everywhere —Nuri Demirdoven of McKinsey

Germany is a world leader in solar and other renewable energy because
it decided to do it and provided incentives.
Nuri Demirdoven of McKinsey & Company said at the

Southern Solar Summit
that in the U.S. southeast
there is not currently enough demand to see solar become widespread
before 2020: unless incentives are provided.
Distributed solar is in a better position due to no need for distribution,
he added.

About incentives, he asked:



“Why not Georgia?”

He recommends taking advantages of our strengths in this region.
We may not have a lot of demand yet, but we have two solar
manufacturers in Georgia, and increasing interest in incentives by
the state.

Overall solar works, and is an economic development engine.
But the question is what are the commitments you are willing to make,
in understanding your strengths, and picking one or two goals.

He cited TVA as an example of an organization that has done that
and is moving ahead.

He recommended making a business case for solar in Georgia.
Many of the other speakers are busily doing various pieces of that.

-jsq

Sign up for renewable energy from Georgia Power —Jaime Hockin @ Solar Summit

Panelist Jaime Hockin of Georgia Power pointed out that gapower customers
can
sign up for green energy right now.


Here’s where:

Residential Green Energy Signup.


  1. Standard Green Energy Option: $3.50 (plus tax) a month per 100 kWh block.


    This option delivers Green-e Energy certified renewable energy that is
    generated entirely by biomass.


  2. Premium Green Energy with Solar Option: $5.00 (plus tax) a month per 100 kWh block.


    This option delivers Green-e Energy certified renewable energy that
    contains a mix of at least 50% solar and 50% biomass energy.

You get a separate line item on your bill for whichever one you buy.

Some people claim that there’s no way to do this because it’s just
electrons once it gets on the wire.
Sure, and money is just dollars once you spend it.
But contracts can determine where those dollars go, and in exchange for what:

Due to the way electricity is transmitted and distributed, energy
purchased or produced from renewable energy resources may not be
specifically delivered to you. However, the renewable energy you purchase
will be added to the power grid and will displace incremental power that
would have otherwise been produced from traditional generating resources.

So as Jaime Hockin advised, if you want to show you want renewable
energy, and you are a Georgia Power customer, sign up and
Georgia Power will hear you!

-jsq

No land for solar in Georgia?



Nelson Hawk, after an excellent panel presentation at the

Georgia Solar Summit,
repeated the old canard that there’s not much land available for solar in the
southeast.
I couldn’t stand it, and blurted out “parking lots!”
And airports, and road rights of way, and, let me think: rooftops!
Or waste water treatment plants, like

Valdosta just used,
or barns on the north edges of fields, or the acreage
Georgia Power is wasting on nuclear plants, or….





Gretchen Quarterman and Dan Corrie

Dan Corrie notes that Cobb EMC bought up
3600 acres in Ben Hill County for a coal plant.
That acreage could generate quite a bit of solar power!

-jsq

New Jersey is #2 in solar power: where’s Georgia? —Richard Polich of Kema @ Solar Summit



Did you know New Jersey generates more solar energy than any other
state except California?
New Jersey, hundreds of miles to the north of Georgia,
has 320 megaWatts installed
and 329 megaWatts in the pipeline.
This is according to Richard Polich of KEMA at the

Georgia Solar Summit this morning.

New Jersey, not even Arizona is number 2 in solar in the U.S.
According to

a recent Arizona State University study,
Georgia is the third top state “that would benefit from solar deployment
through generating and exporting energy to other states”.
Here’s a business opportunity for Georgia!

-jsq

Energy as a National Security Challenge —Col. Dan Nolan @ Solar Summit

In his morning keynote at the sold-out

Southern Solar Summit,
Col. Dan Nolan (U.S. Army ret.) asked the musical question:

“When did our Marines become Birkenstock-wearing tree huggers?”

This was after some Marines asked for solar power so they wouldn’t
have to haul fuel in long convoys, which were among the most dangerous missions.
Most of that fuel was going into very inefficient generators to run
very inefficient air conditioners in tents in the desert.
Dealing with that got the military thinking about energy security:
assured access to mission-critical energy.

Looking up, he asked:



“What is it we as a nation need to understand about our own energy security?”

He identified America’s strategic center of gravity as its economy.
It’s very resilient but has vulnerabilities open to attack.
So how do we secure those vulnerabilities?

The main vulnerabilities are:

Continue reading →

From 4 to 40 solar companies in Georgia —James Marlow @ Solar Summit

James Marlow started the

Georgia Solar Summit by saying
in a few years we’ve gone from four to forty solar companies in Georgia, and
we should:



“Stop talking about what we’re going to do in the future,
and start talking about what we’re going to do in 100 days.”

He directly challenged Gov. Deal and the legislature.

“This is about goodness and light, and sound economics.”

The next speaker (didn’t get his name, sorry) ran through some statistics,
including:

  • 93,502 U.S. solar workers: doubled since 2009

  • 26% growth

  • No other industry is growing like this.

A telling comparison:

  • 1GW nuclear power station takes 10 years to build.

  • In one month Germany installed 2GW of solar last June.

Germany, which is far north of Georgia.
Georgia has far more sun.

-jsq

This is what a mayor with vision sounds like

Mayor Julian Castro of San Antonio

speaks at 44:25
about



…the nexus between sustainability and job creation.
Every now and then, perhaps once in a generation,
there presents itself a moment, an opportunity,
for those cities that are willing to seize it,
to truly benefit the region for generations to come.

Here’s
the video:

Continue reading →

San Antonio promises to shut down a coal plant

We could do something like this.
We’ve already made a start with Wiregrass Solar.


San Antonio, the Clean-Energy City?
Look out Austin, SA Mayor Julian Castro promises to shut-down a coal plant by 2018.



At an event this afternoon at UT-San Antonio, Mayor Julian Castro
announced a suite of green energy projects that he said would position
San Antonio as the nation’s “recognized leader in clean energy technology”
and help fulfill his aggressive environmental goals.

Most notably, Castro and leaders from CPS Energy, the city-owned utility,
pledged to shut down one of its coal-fired power plants 15 years ahead
of schedule. By 2018, the city would mothball the 871-megawatt J.T. Deely
Power Plant — a bold move in a growing state that’s seemingly addicted
to coal.

So what are they going to use for energy?

Continue reading →

Southern Company committed to communities, renewable energy, energy efficiency

Thomas A. Fanning, chairman, president and CEO of Southern Company,
says his company is committed to communities, renewable energy, and
energy efficiency.
So
helping finance municipal refitting and solar projects
should be a natural for Southern Company!

According to PR from Southern Company, 25 May 2011,

Southern Company Holds Annual Meeting of Shareholders



Fanning also emphasized a continued commitment to the communities the
company serves and stressed the need for a national energy policy and
a robust research and development initiative.

“Southern Company keeps customers at the center of every decision
we make,” said Fanning. “We remain committed to providing reliable,
affordable energy for our customers and to do that we need to maintain
a diverse fuel mix as well as stay focused on developing the newest
technologies.”

Referencing a diverse fuel mix, Fanning highlighted the company’s
commitment to nuclear energy, including building the nation’s first new
units in 30 years. He also discussed the importance of preserving coal –
America’s most abundant energy resource – as well as the role of natural
gas, renewable energy and energy efficiency in meeting its customers
energy needs.

“Furthermore, we are the only company in the industry that is doing
it all. We’ve committed more than $20 billion to these efforts,”
Fanning said.

Sure, he listed renewable energy and energy efficiency last.
But this is the same Thomas A. Fanning who said in May that he’s

“bullish” on solar.
The same CEO of the parent company of Georgia Power, which just

connected a 300 kiloWatt solar plant in Lowndes County.
The same CEO who’s being nagged by the Georgia PSC chairman

“to come up with options in the next 30 days for expanding the tiny amount of electricity generated from solar power.”
And a company that spends more than $20 billion on new energy projects
can afford a few tens of millions for community refitting and solar.

-jsq