Energy Department Aims To Slash Solar Costs 75%

IBD's Click ^ | 2/4/2011 | Donna Howell

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Aiming to make the solar industry self-supporting without subsidies in a decade and more globally competitive, Energy Secretary Steven Chu on Friday launched an initiative to try to cut photovoltaic solar energy costs 75% by 2020. And he brought out SunPower(SPWRA) co-founder Dick Swanson to talk about efficiency gains made to date.

“In the 1960s President Kennedy launched the moonshot goal, to put a man on the moon within a decade. Today we’re launching what we call a SunShot race,” Chu said on a midday conference call with reporters.

[AFreeBird]

Let me guess: a 75% government subsidy?

[Da Coyote]

I’d love this to work.

However, we must remember that it’s those folks working in the dastardly, greedy capitalist group (e.g., the smart and productive folks capable of producing value) that will produce the actual product.

The Obama-butt govt loon-lets are incapable of lighting a bulb - given the bulb, wires and batteries.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

"Hey, Kids! Let's make stuff and invent things!"

[Recovering_Democrat]

Steven Chu is a joke. So is solar power.

[kittymyrib]

Considering the usual outcome of government programs, shortly after spending trillions to develop “cheap” solar energy, we can expect the sun to go out.

[aces]

What Dorks, choose something that we can see may work to spend our money, ..they have no clue and should have no money to spend, treat them like crackheads and don’t let them rob us..

[LRS]

Aiming to make the solar industry self-supporting without subsidies ...

I've been aiming to defy gravity, time, and entropy...

[Oldpuppymax]

If there were any MONEY in it, private enterprise would have solved any problems years ago. But of course, Chu doesn’t understand that. When people don’t want it, it must be SUBSIDIZED!!!!!!

[USFRIENDINVICTORIA]

To state the obvious: a great deal more R&D was required, before launching a full-scale implementation of solar power. It's still required. Implementation should not have taken place, until (at least) the economics were right. Massive government subsidies are not the answer. The oft-quoted rationale for subsidies and mandates for early implementation was that it would spur innovation. Maybe so — but, that's a very wasteful way to spur innovation.

[marron]

the DOE expects a “renaissance” in nuclear power around the world, and that the U.S needs to participate to be competitive.
“Ground has been broken on 16 new reactors around the world and the U.S. is not going to be a player unless we’re going to have a home market,”

I agree with him there.

[cripplecreek]

I can cut costs by eliminating the DOE.

[DBrow]

Efficiency is not the important factor. Oh, it plays a part, but dollars-per-watt installed is the key.

Doubling the efficiency at the cost of more than doubling manufacturing cost puts you on the losing end.

But a cell that is half as efficient and a third the cost gets you closer (offset by larger install costs since the areas will be bigger).

If there was a way to make $$ with unsubsidized photovoltaic, someone would have done it long ago and cleaned up.

As it stands now, the production of the gear is subsidized, and the install is subsidized, and the power produced must be purchased at high rates by the local utility (another subsidy).

It might be a better “subsidy” if the government just gave individuals the hardware along with a voucher for installation, since we can’t legislate the physics of the solar cells.

Evergreen Solar announced a while ago that the free building, free land, Fed manufacturing subsidy, and state-level funding was not enough and tool their factory to China. Bye bye government investment!

[hinckley buzzard]

Chu is a classic academic egghead, specializing in exotica like catching atoms with lasers and such, but when it comes to macro-scale real world issues, like climate and politics and economics, he has no clue. He is the Mandarin "rocket scientist" who can't change a tire without help.

Case in point--he thinks he can make solar profitable by 2020 or whenever, by cutting costs. What does he think the Chinese and other producers will also be doing all that time? (Hint: they won't be standing pat.) He will be chasing a moving target and doesn't even realize it, thus guaranteeing failure.

[meyer]

"Aiming to make the solar industry self-supporting without subsidies..."

That's easy - just stop subsidizing them. Success, in the free market, brings its own rewards. When the government steps in, the reward for success pales in comparison to the free ride that government grants presents to those that pretend to succeed but actually fail. In fact, the reward for failure is so great that people have a vested financial interest in NOT succeeding.

[stylin19a]

glimmer of good news from the bowels of the article, even if it's only lip service..

Chu also said the DOE expects a “renaissance” in nuclear power around the world, and that the U.S needs to participate to be competitive.

“Ground has been broken on 16 new reactors around the world and the U.S. is not going to be a player unless we’re going to have a home market,” he said.

[Lessthantolerant]

Chu is a smuck!

[rellimpank]

--yep--while Chuey is at it , maybe he could change "pi" to three also--sure would make areas of circles easier to figure-

--oh, wait-----

[antiRepublicrat]

But if we can get to, before the decade is out, one quarter of current costs ... down to this so-called dollar-a-watt target (for all costs),

Private investment, most famously by the Google Guys, already has the cost of the cells themselves down to $1 a watt.

We need to work on efficiency. The Sun's energy on Earth is 1 kW per square meter at noon on the equator. That's almost three megawatts on only a football field size. Current production photovoltaics turns maybe a tenth of that into electricity.

[Buckeye McFrog]

And who is going to do that exactly, a brilliant inventor or design engineer? No, some bureaucratic hack who is just going to decree that they will cost 75% less in nine years.