Thursday, October 20th, 2011
Is this any way to drive an industry? The answer is a resounding no. The US has virtually no federal renewable energy policy, and almost by accident has become a major solar market in the world despite itself. Many naysayers like to frame the argument in terms of subsidies and handouts, but virtually all forms of energy get some form of governmental support, which for those industries is called policy—somehow people call it subsidies when referring to support for the solar industry and other renewable energy. What makes the solar energy industry special is the extent to which it has had to depend on a patchwork of state and local incentive structures that are as fragile as the state and local budgets to which they are beholden. As local budgets tighten, the windows close leaving many homeowners out of luck and out of patience. Only those who have been able to maneuver their way to the front of the line get the reward. As states cut back on their budgets, solar support has become precarious. Underfunded and handled on a state-by-state basis, failed incentives are leaving homeowners who want to put solar panels on their homes out in the cold and the market unstable and unpredictable. There is a clear need for a stable, long-term federal incentive structure and Congress and the Administration should see that it is in the interest of the country to forge this policy sooner than later.
Tags: energy policy act, itc, renewable energy policy, Solar Energy Industry, solar energy policy, solar industry, solar installation, solar power
Posted in Solar Policy & Incentives | Comments Off
Monday, October 3rd, 2011
You think that the solar industry is just emerging. Well, you may be right, but don’t tell that to the people who have been on the solar home tours for the past 21 years. The 21st Annual Metro Washington, D.C. Tour of Slar and Green Homes took place this past weekend, and if you missed this solar home tour or the one in your area, then you missed out on seeing some of the vibrant solar homes that have taken the solar challenge. This year’s solar home tours, like the Solar Decathlon on the National Mall a week before, was not blessed with sunny weather, but that did not deter the spirits of those who wanted to check out the solar home panels, and solar water heater systems throughout the DC metro region. Despite the rain, solar homeowners were eager to show off their energy efficient houses and to show that, even when it is not sunny, their solar arrays help save on energy costs.
Tags: energy efficient houses, home solar panels, Solar Decathlon, solar heating systems, solar home, Solar Home Panel, solar home tour, solar homes, solar industry, solar thermal panels, Solar Water Heater
Posted in Solar Energy Products, Solar Events, Solar Home Panels | Comments Off
Friday, September 9th, 2011
SolarTown is just up the street from a local independent sporting goods store, which moved in when this area was just making a comeback from years of neglect. The service is good, the product selection is good and the prices are right. These factors should make the store a fixture in the community, but three months ago, a sporting goods chain moved in just a block away at DC USA, the largest retail complex in Washington, DC. The prices for the chain store may be slightly better, but even more than the prices, the location is much better. The small independent store saw its revenue drop by over a half in three months, and as you can see from the picture at the right, it is now going out of business. Oh, how in just a few months, the fortunes of this small store changed. So has been the effect of the tsunami of Chinese manufacturing on the solar industry. In just a couple of years, the Chinese ramped up production, lowered prices and swamped the US and other markets.
Tags: dc usa, evergreen solar, solar companies, solar industry, solar module, solar news, solarworld, solon solar, Solyndra
Posted in Solar Home Panels, Solar Policy & Incentives | Comments Off
Friday, August 19th, 2011
The loud sucking noise you hear is the sound of solar manufacturing going overseas. If it were not clear before this month, it is now abundantly evident that manufacturing of solar panels that you may want to put on your home in the United States are not going to come from the US anymore. The trend of manufacturing of solar panels in China is only accelerating as the news in the past few weeks has shown. The evidence is plastered on every news release—we surrender and are leaving town fast. BP Solar hammered shut its operations in Maryland. Evergreen Solar filed for bankruptcy. And now Solon is closing its US plant. Solar panels are not like nails or screws, but more akin to refrigerators or dish washers—consumers pay more for quality and features. We still hold that view and will advise our customers to shop wisely and look at various criteria to rate solar modules, and of course one of those is cost, but that should not be the end all. The market, as shown by the flight of solar manufacturing, is going elsewhere. Thinning margins means a commodity market and the Chinese are willing to tough it out in the long to capture the lion’s share of the business. The future for manufacturing of solar panels in the United States is bleak.
Tags: bp solar, evergreen solar, solar industry, solar modules, solar panel, solar panels, solon
Posted in Solar Home Panels | Comments Off
Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011
An investment analyst calls SolarTown, inquiring about trends in the solar panel market for 2011, particularly the supply of modules. It reminds me of the study I heard about in business school that if you ask 100 of the leading economists whether interest rates will rise or fall, 42% will get it right. You can pay a lot of money for analyst reports, but with the solar energy market expanding rapidly and incentives seemingly changing day to day, it is hard to predict supplies. That has been a challenge for us, especially last year, but we think that we did well by our customers to secure modules at good prices.
Tags: buy solar panels, Discount Solar Panels, energy market, excess supply, home solar panels, solar energy, solar industry, solar modules, solar panels
Posted in Solar Home Panels | Comments Off
Friday, January 28th, 2011
I was glad to hear that solar made it into Obama’s speech earlier this week, but solar is finding itself lumped in with some strange bedfellows, nuclear and now even natural gas. How did that happen? Sometimes the story of a product or technology is all in the marketing. The success or failure of a product may depend less on the ultimate merits or utility of a product but more on the consumer’s perceptions of that product. In other words, it depends on what consumers think they see, not what they actually see. To get solar into the mainstream, then, we need to come up with a new branding effort. “New and improved solar” is not going to get us very far, but we need you to weigh in helping the solar industry to adopt a new nomenclature that will attract the masses. Think cheap solar, or eco-solar, or simply superb solar. The one that I like the best is sexy solar as in I just put some sexy solar panels on my roof this week.
Tags: chilean sea bass, clean coal, clean energy, energy policy, photovoltaic panels, renewable energy, Solar Energy Products, Solar Energy Systems, solar industry, solar photovoltaic panels
Posted in Solar Energy Products, Solar Policy & Incentives | Comments Off
Wednesday, January 12th, 2011
Solar Champion Felled by Would-Be Assassin. Like many others, I was riveted by the news over the weekend that Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords had been shot at close range at a meeting with her constituents. My initial reaction was that this was news you would expect to come from Kabul, not Tucson. But as the news came in, it became clear that the senseless violence commonplace in war zones had invaded the quiet streets of one shopping center in Arizona and almost claimed the life of solar champion Gabrielle Giffords.
Tags: congresswoman gabrielle giffords, gabrielle giffords, solar car team, solar community, solar energy, solar industry
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Friday, December 17th, 2010
These are some of the highlights of the year gone by and an outlook of things to come for 2011. The solar industry has waited to find out what would be the fate of the Treasury Grant program. If you haven’t tuned in for this debate, this development is very good news for the renewable energy industry. The solar industry had another stellar growth year. A recent report predicted that the industry will grow as much as 22% in 2010, when all of the numbers (modules) have been counted. The one gnawing issue is that the solar industry is quickly becoming a Chinese industry, as even today the Chinese own 66% of world production. It was a better year to put home solar panels on your roof than investing in solar stocks. Morningstar says that solar investors “could be in for a rude awakening come 2011.” The biggest change in the industry came with the micro-inverter. Sure, solar panel efficiencies improved, which means more output for the buck, and the price of PV came down, but the biggest change in the industry came with the industry acceptance for residential PV installation of the micro-inverter. Enphase is no doubt the market leader, but there are many, many wanabees and the competition for micro-inverters will heat up in 2011. The other major shift we saw in the industry is that regardless of whether the homeowner gets a micro-inverter, the homeowner almost invariably wants to get monitoring of the solar energy system.
Tags: Discount Solar Panels, Financing Solar Energy Systems, grant program, home solar panels, pace programs, renewable energy industry, solar energy, Solar Energy Systems, solar industry, solar installations, Solar Leasing, Solar Loan Program, Treasury Grant Program
Posted in Solar Home Panels, Solar Policy & Incentives, SolarTown Current Affairs | Comments Off
Thursday, November 11th, 2010
I take no pride in writing this blog post about discount solar panels because no matter how hard we try to persuade our customers to look past cost, by and large, they are not convinced. In the last several months, the single most important criterion for our customers in purchasing home solar panels is price. There are numerous ways to differentiate solar modules. We have even introduced a solar panel comparison to alert you to significant differences in the panels that we sell. Of course, the essential difference is expected output, and you will want to look at efficiency and the PTC rating (PVUsa Test Conditions) to come up with an estimate of what your solar panels will produce over the life of the panels. There are other parameters that you may want to consider, such as size and weight. Aesthetics, that is the look of the panels, is no small matter if you live in a trendy area and your southern facing roof is visible from the street. But as we have been looking at the results from the past several months, we have noticed one unmistakable trend: our customers love low cost panels.
Tags: Canadian Solar solar panels, Conergy Solar Panels, Discount Solar Modules, Discount Solar Panels, home solar panels, Low Cost Solar Panels, Sanyo Solar Panels, solar industry, solar modules, solar panel, Solar Panel Manufacturer
Posted in Solar Home Panels | 2 Comments »
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010
The sea change that occurred yesterday in the elections has the solar industry abuzz in speculation and trepidation. There is much analysis and a lot more guess work at play, but the political developments should focus the mind on what can be done. The first clue is what the lame duck Congress will try to do. We already know that cap and trade is a nonstarter, but some remnants of an energy bill may be pushed forward before the new Congress convenes in January. Many solar industry analysts are watching for a particular piece of legislation known as the Treasury Grant program.
Tags: energy bill, refundable tax credit, Solar Energy Industry, Solar Energy System, solar industry, solar panels, Treasury Grant Program
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