GreenVolts Seminar
Posted by Max Dunn Tue, 29 Apr 2008 16:59:00 GMT
Last night I attended a seminar put on by the Going Green! meetup group and the speaker was Craig Lewis who is VP Government Relations with GreenVolts. GreenVolt’s goal is to “deliver power to utility companies at fossil fuel costs”.
Craig talked a little about the GreenVolts product, which is a concentrating solar collector system with advanced tracking and is designed to be interconnected at the 12kv distribution level in sizes ranging from 1 to 20 mega-watts (MW). However, his main topic was “Accelerating the Transition to Smart Energy.” His conclusion was that to make alternative energy sources take off, the government needs to shift the subsidies paid to oil companies into long-term feed-in tariffs, i.e. requiring the electric companies to buy power at a set price for the next 10 to 15 years. This would allow alternative energy projects to have a guaranteed return and thus enable them to get long-term financing.
While Craig wouldn’t divulge the cost of their system, he did say it was about half of a typical flat-panel installation, so I am guessing that the cost is about $4 per watt, which would mean they could produce power at less than 9.5c per kilowatt, which is the rate they would be selling it to the utilities.
He also threw out some other interesting numbers:- Their system requires 3 acres per MW or 100 MW per square mile, which is a higher power density than other systems
- Oil imports comprise more than half of the U.S. deficit
- Oil companies received about $17 billion last year in subsidies while solar industry only got $200 million.
Here are the complete notes:
GreenVolts system
- High density 3 acres/MW
- Using multi-layer cells, 40% efficient
- Self stabilizing tracker
- Won’t disclose actual costs, but said it was half of flat panel
- Working on an 2MW project that should be online at the end of the year
- Interconnects at the distribution level, 1 to 20MW, which is more efficient
- CarouSol’s are self balancing and don’t need piers but sit on the ground, low and don’t self-shade
- Wind loading is a big issues because on some cells it can move the focus and reduce the efficiency of the whole series row
Transition is Crucial
- Oil imports are more than 50% of the US trade deficit
- $6 trillion worldwide energy market, mainly fossil fuels (John Dewer)
- US government subsidies $17 billion to oil companies a year directly through tax credits, etc
- US gov subsidies $200 million to solar industry. $50 million tax credits, $150 solar R&D
- MPR based on the avoided cost of building a combined-cycle natural gas plant. In 2007 MPR is 9.5c kWh, should rise about 15% this year.
- 100MW per sq/mile
- Above 20MW have to connect to large transmission lines
- SPVP program aims to install solar at $3.5/watt
- RPS (renewable portfolio standard) process takes 100s of thousands, so it is not viable under about 20MW
- Feed-in tariff program. Germany 20-year life, pays specific amount for each type of alternative energy