Solar Power Update for Feb. 11, 2009

February 11, 2009 at 9:39 pm 1 comment

The big news of the week is actually local to me for a change in the Southern California Edison (SCE), my local electrical utility has signed what is touted as the “world’s largest solar power deal”.

The story on Earth2tech (http://earth2tech.com/2009/02/11/so-cal-edison-and-brightsource-sign-huge-13gw-solar-deal/) and many other sites is all about the deal for 1.3 Gigawatts of power to be provided by startup Bright Source Energy (http://www.brightsourceenergy.com/). I agree with the author about the concerns about raising the capital in the current economic conditions, however I am certainly cheering for it completion and success!

Excerpt: “Of course, developing 4.2 GW of solar power in the deserts of California takes massive funds — the five plants with PG&E will cost on the order of $2-3 billion. The SCE deal will likely cost a bit more than that. And it’s certainly not a good time to raise project financing for solar plants. Reuters had reported that BrightSource hadn’t secured financing for its first plant for the deal with PG&E and was waiting for funds from the stimulus package before starting construction. The company has raised more than $160 million, including a massive $115 million Series C round announced in May. Investors include Google.org, BP Alternative Energy, StatoilHydro Venture, Black River, VantagePoint Venture Partners, Morgan Stanley, DBL Investors, Draper Fisher Jurvetson and Chevron Technology Ventures.”

The other interesting story is all about one of my favorite subject maintenance of your solar system once it is installed. You do realize there is preventative maintenance on those solar panels you installed? In any event a Californian company, Heliotex (http://www.solarpanelcleaningsystems.com/solar-panel-cleaning-services.php#pl) has come up with a system to automatically clean and rinse your roof top system. They also sell systems to make your valuable panels harder to steal which may also be something we should also consider. The original story is on Green Tech Gazette (http://www.greentechgazette.com/index.php/solar-energy/self-cleaning-solar-panels-save-homeowners-money/).

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