Petra Solar turns cities into sun-power farms

Making clever use of parking lots, utility poles, and other spaces is one creative way to maximize renewable energy generation and minimize costs.

From Marketwatch:

Jersey City, N.J., may be an unlikely place to find a utility-scale solar farm, but Petra Solar has found a way to generate electricity from the sun even on hard-paved urban streets.

Bolted onto street-light and utility poles across Jersey City and other urban and suburban areas of the state, a five-foot by two-and-a-half-foot solar panel is attached about 15 feet above the ground, tilted south toward the sun.

Petra Solar

Petra Solar uses utility poles for hanging solar panels enhanced with smart grid technology.

Each new solar panel from the privately held South Plainfield, N.J., clean-energy technology firm generates about 225 watts of power, adding to generation capacity and helping utilities meet renewable-power requirements.

“It allows you to deploy quickly and cost effectively because you don’t have to invest in land, you’re not building substations or transformers,” said Petra Solar Chief Executive Shihab Kuran.

Under a contract with Public Service Enterprise Group Inc.  — New Jersey’s biggest utility — Petra Solar is now about halfway through its $200 million commitment to provide 40 megawatts of solar power in six cities and 300 rural and suburban communities in the utility’s service area. So far, it’s put up about 95,000 of the panels with a total generation capacity of 20 megawatts, enough power for 3,250 homes.

Petra Solar sells the panels to utilities, which are responsible for maintaining them during an expected life span of 25 years.

Petra Solar says it takes just 30 minutes to install one of its panels, which feeds its electricity directly into the utility’s power lines. Included in the gear are devices that hook up to an AT&T  communications network to allow utilities to remotely monitor their electricity lines.

The network gear helps old-school copper power wires behave more like an Internet-based information-technology system.

“The panels help create distributed energy, which takes stress away from central generation stations,” Kuran said. “When you generate power closer to the load, it’s more effective. Also, the smart-grid technology lets utilities have their eyes and ears open to what they’re delivering to their customers and that allows them to deliver the right amounts of power.” 

Kuran said he came up with the idea to use utility poles when he asked a prospective employee during a job interview to brainstorm about ways to apply solar technology.

“I was challenging the candidate to think outside the box in order to tackle the challenges we faced in New Jersey, where land is expensive...and the labor rate is high,” Kuran recalled in a phone interview with MarketWatch. “I looked outside my window and saw a pole. I said, ‘How about if we put (the solar panel) on the pole?’ ”

Panels draw complaints, praise

While the panel program continues to fan out across Public Service Electric and Gas Co.’s service area, the utility has drawn aesthetic complaints from some residents and municipal officials.

Robert Cotter, a director in the Division of City Planning for Jersey City, said municipal officials held a meeting with PSE&G to complain about Petra Solar panels upsetting the integrity of some historic blocks. Cotter said the city has no plans to mount any legal challenge because they would almost certainly lose.

“They agreed to remove five or six of them, but we’re stuck with them,” Cotter said. “Some folks do think they’re beautiful because they help create more sustainable power. I just don’t notice them any more.”

Plan to kick start widespread solar energy use makes sense

Tax breaks, subsidies, and leasing programs are great ways to renewable energy investment, but there's an even better way - one that not only doesn't cost the government money, but would make money!  Because energy prices are volatile, anyone comparing the savings from an investment in renewable energy (e.g. solar panels) needs to have an idea of what fossil fuel prices would be.  Knowing that prices will remain high makes the renewable energy investment a great idea.  Therefore, the government should establish a floor below which prices won't fall.  There could be a variable tax that changes based on the market price of a commodity such as oil or coal.  If, due to increased supply, decreased demand, or other factors, oil prices fall below a certain predetermined level, the federal government would increase the tax, so that the price remains at or above the level determined to encourage investment in alternative energy.  This makes those energy sources competitive with fossil fuels while raising money for the government to use (either for upgrading the electric grid, investing in renewables, or just paying down the debt).

From The Jackson Sun:

Americans gradually are coming to grips with the reality that high energy costs are here to stay. There are myriad problems associated with fossil fuels that range from limited resources to increasing worldwide demand, negative environmental impact and rising costs. One alternative that is gaining attention is solar power. But up-front costs of installing solar powered systems has kept many people and small businesses from moving in that direction. The Renewable Energy Through Leasing Act could change that.
The bipartisan legislation is sponsored by U.S. Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Mark Udall (D-Colo.). It would make leasing solar installations practical for homeowners and small business owners.
Installing solar equipment on a home or small business can run into tens of thousands of dollars, even on new construction where the cost can be amortized over the life of a home mortgage. But retrofitting a home or small business means high equipment and installation costs must be paid up front. That prices most people out of the solar energy market. The REAL Act, if passed by Congress, could jump start the installation of solar powered systems across the country.
Leasing equipment is a standard business practice and used by individuals for expensive items such as vehicles. For a lease to work, the leased equipment must have buyback or residual value that is used to calculate lease payments. Because solar powered systems are a relatively new product, there is no way to accurately determine the value of the equipment. The REAL Act would establish a system of insurance to guarantee the equipment value. The insurance would be paid for through premiums paid by solar manufacturers and vendors.
Home solar installations can produce electricity and be used for heating and to produce hot water for home use. Excess electricity not used by the homeowner is sold to local utility companies and redistributed. This helps bring down the long-term cost of solar installations.
Opening the door to widespread homeowner and small business use of solar energy could be a boon to the solar energy industry. It would help bring down costs, reduce greenhouse gasses and help reduce the nation's dependency on foreign oil. Solar technology is evolving rapidly, and solar panel efficiency has greatly improved in recent years.
Because the REAL Act requires insurance premiums to be paid to guarantee the solar equipment value, the Congressional Budget Office reports there would be no cost to taxpayers to create such a system.
The REAL Act is a creative way to spur development and growth of the solar energy industry while helping consumers, reducing American oil dependency and improving the environment.

Survey: Business Leaders Are Surprised That Sustainability Actually Pays Off

Overcoming the perception that sustainable practices cost money is a major hurdle to widespread implementation of them.  

From Good:


It pays to conserve. That's the finding of a survey of 247 executives in the U.S., U.K. and China released by the consulting firm Accenture. Seventy-two percent of them said the benefits of their company's sustainability initiatives exceeded their expectations.
We don't know how low those expectations were. Swapping out your incandescent bulbs at the warehouse is one thing, reducing your waste stream is another—which, by the way, can cut your landfill costs by a quarter million a year, to $10,000, if you do it right.
Still, this sampling of average businesses is instructive on the thinking taking place in C-suites. "It's clear that sustainability is no longer merely a matter of compliance," said Bruno Berthon, managing director of Accenture Sustainability Services. Most corporate leaders know sustainability can pay off, but about a third still think it's not important according to the survey. In fact, the same percentage of the executives think business is doing too much, 28 percent, as doing too little to make practices sustainable, 26 percent. Overall, the impression from average business leaders in the survey say being a sustainable business costs "a little more."
The most helpful piece of information from this survey, though, might be the information about what motivates sustainability shifts. The top two drivers, according to these execs, were investor pressure and regulation. Consumer pressure matters, but not as much as the pocketbook and the law.
Not surprisingly, opinions on whether greening a business was going to pay off financially closely mirrored the actual adoption of green initiatives. The bosses who aren't doing anything to increase sustainability were way more likely to say it doesn't pay. That may be because they're just unconvinced, but they may also be in industries where, frankly, it doesn't boost the bottom line, even if it does help society.
That's were measurement comes in. The profits from sustainability need to be as accurately measured as profits from pollution. "Measuring sustainability performance and results is the first practical step business leaders need to make, but requires new skills and proven methodologies," Berthon says.