Solar San Diego

Boxer will Fight Global Warming

The San Jose Mercury News (you may have to register, use BugMeNot.com) ran a piece regarding Senator Barbara Boxer's plans to curb greenhouse gas emissions.  Hearings are planned and the measures will likely get bipartisan support especially in the run up to the 2008 Presidential elections.  Any plan to curb emissions would be welcomed and as part of a package that includes more money for clean renewable energy development and adoptionit could be a boon for clean renewable energy companies.     

Solar Initiative's Success Depends on Costs Going Down

The San Diego Union Tribune in its Sunday and Monday issues (December 10, 2006 and December 11, 2006) had a two part report about the Million Solar Roofs Initiative and what its effect will be on the solar energy industry and the competiveness of solar energy.  That solar energy got the attention of the staid "U-T" is a great sign.      

Solar energy's day is dawning

State to embark on its biggest-ever photovoltaic project

When the sun rises on New Year's Day, it will signal the start of California's most ambitious effort yet to generate electricity from sunlight.

The California Solar Initiative commits the state to spending more than $3.4 billion over the next 10 years to subsidize the installation of 1 million solar roofs, or about 3,000 megawatts of electricity capacity, enough at peak output to match six modern natural-gas-fired power plants.

Even more important, the initiative is aimed at driving down the cost of solar-generated power to the point that it's comparable to producing power from burning coal and natural gas.

Read Sunday's entire article here.

Giving solar industry a spark

Initiative's success will depend on making power cost-competitive

If California's $3.4 billion solar initiative succeeds in promoting 1 million more rooftop, solar-electric systems, it could still be considered a failure.

That's because the 10-year program, set to begin next month, aims to do more than just subsidize installations. It's also intended to make solar electricity's cost comparable to the power provided by utilities. Today it costs twice as much.

If solar costs could be made competitive, the impact would be profound.

Read Monday's entire article here.

Applause in the Desert, the Desert Sun Chimes In

The Desert Sun in an editorial today applauded the City of Palm desert's move to cut energy consumption in the city by 30% over the next five years. The measures include:

" • Requiring new-home developers to give buyers the option of installing solar-power units.

• Teaming up with Southern California Edison and the Public Utilities Commission to offer up to $18 million in incentives for homeowners and businesses to replace inefficient air conditioners, pool heaters and the like.

• Providing energy audits for homeowners and businesses

• Spending a half-million dollars in city funds to create an Office of Energy Management.

• Educating homeowners, businesses and public agencies about the need for conservation.

• Developing public-private partnerships with Southern California Edison, Southern California Gas Co.    and the Building Industry Association Desert Chapter."

Hopefully other Cities and Towns in California will follow Palm Desert's example. You can read the entire editorial here.

Solar Enertech Lines Up Financing: $5.6 Million for Shanghai Facility

Solar Enertech Corp., the Shanghai China company with a marketing arm in Silicon Valley, announced that it lined up $5.6 million dollars in financing, consisting of $5.1 million in cash and $500,000 in convertible debentures that can be converted iat a future date.   The company also announced that it had engaged Knight Capital Markets LLC, a Jersey City, NJ market-maker in an advisory capacity.  It's full speed ahead for this leader in the solar field which recently rolled out its first solar modules on November 23.  Read the entire press release below:

Solar EnerTech Corp. Announces Completion of $5.6 Million Financing -- Engages Knight Capital Markets LLC as Advisors

Solar EnerTech Corp. (OTCBB: SOEN) (the Company) reports that it has completed private placements that provided funding in the amount of US $5.6 million dollars. The funds were raised as $5.1 million in equity private placements and $500,000 in convertible debentures, which are convertible at a future date. The use of these funds is allocated towards the completion of the Company's Shanghai-based manufacturing facility and acquisition and installation of equipment slated for the facility. Other uses include software development, and implementation of sales and marketing efforts focused on generating product sales.

In related news, Management wishes to announce the engagement of Knight Capital Markets LLC ("KCM") on an advisory basis to the Company. KCM operates as a market-maker in the Nasdaq Intermarket(TM), the over-the-counter market for New York Stock Exchange and American Stock Exchange listed securities. KCM is a broker-dealer registered with the SEC and is a member of the Nasdaq Stock Exchange and the NASD.

Knight Capital Markets is part of Knight Capital Group, Inc. headquartered in Jersey City, NJ and with offices throughout the USA and abroad. Founded in 1995, the company makes markets or trades in more than 16,000 equities and supplies liquidity to a great number of small and thinly traded equities. The Group is the largest market maker in listed securities in the third market, accounting for 4.72% of all daily listed share volume. Knight is a market leader in OTC equities and is ranked as the #2 market maker in Nasdaq volume with more than 8% market share; the #1 market maker in Nasdaq Small Cap stocks with more than 29% market share and is the #1 market maker in OTC Bulletin Board volume with more than 37% of market share. For more information about the company visit: http://www.knight-sec.com/

Company CEO Leo S. Young, states, "We are extremely fortunate and pleased to have the participation of Knight Capital Markets during this exciting period of growth. We feel certain that their expertise and guidance will benefit the Company greatly. We are confident that our rapid development will bring great returns for our investors."

The securities mentioned above and issued in this private placement have not been registered under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and may not be offered or sold in the United States absent registration or an applicable exemption from registration requirements of the Securities Act of 1933.

About Solar EnerTech Corp. (OTCBB: SOEN)

Solar EnerTech is a photovoltaic (PV) solar energy cell manufacturing enterprise based in Shanghai, China where the Company is establishing a sophisticated 42,000-square foot manufacturing and research facility in Shanghai's Jinqiao Modern Science and Technology Park. Solar EnerTech plans to invest in PV cell research to develop higher efficiency cells and put the results of that research to use immediately in its manufacturing processes. Led by one of the industry's top scientists, the Company's R&D program will work to bring Solar EnerTech to the forefront of advanced solar technology research and production. The Company has also established a marketing, purchasing and distribution arm in Northern California's Silicon Valley.

Forward-Looking Statements

Except for statements of historical fact, the information presented herein may contain forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of the Company to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Such factors include general economic and business conditions, the ability to acquire and develop specific projects, the ability to fund operations and changes in consumer and business consumption habits and other factors over which Solar EnerTech Corp. has little or no control.

On Behalf of the Board
Solar EnerTech Corp.
Leo Shi Young, President

Mr. Hand Gets Into Renewable Energy in Vermont

It's a good time in American History for Renewables, Mr. Hand.

Mr. Hand is making a difference and this Mr. Hand wasn't even born when the one with his back to us in the picture above (from Fast Times at Ridgemont High) became known to us all.  The Bennington Banner, a bastion of the first amendment from out of the Green Mountain State, has a story about a local young Vermonter, Thomas Hand, who is walking the talk when it comes to renewable and clean energy.

DORSET [VT]— A local energy crusader has taken his passion for renewable energy to the national level while still maintaining connections to his home community.

"...Thomas Hand of Dorset, a recent graduate of Middlebury College, has joined the staff of NativeEnergy, a Charlotte-based nonprofit that works with Native American and Alaska Native villages, as well as individual clients, to create projects that will have sustainable economic benefits for those populations. Most recently, Hand, 22, helped manage a project with his alma mater's ski team to help them go carbon-neutral. He's also helped lead the family business, Hand Motors in Manchester, to the cutting edge of renewable energy use.

Hand's interest in sustainability and environmental issues has a long history. While still a student at Middlebury, he worked on numerous energy efficiency initiatives. The most successful and well-known of these was Project BioBus...."

Read about what this youg man is doing to help the environment and promote clean renewable energy here.

Solar World AG Extends Its Supply of Solar Silicon, Joins with Scheuten Solar

Freiberg Germany's Solar World AG, one of the world's leading solar companies has formed a 50-50 joint venture with Scheuten Solarholding B.V., a Dutch company. The joint venture, named Scheuten SolarWorld Solizium GmbH, will develop and build "a manufacturing facility for the production of high purity solar silicon. " One thousand tons of metallurgical silicon will be dedicated to the venture initially. This will be the first time that "...a technology for the production of solar silicon using metallurgical silicon available in unlimited quantities is implemented on an industrial scale..." This looks like another win-win situation for two solar companies with Solar World insuring it's supply of silicon in what many analysts expect to be the lean years ahead for silicon supply.  

You can read the entire press release herein, below:

SolarWorld AG extends solar silicon supply

Joint Venture for raw material production established in Freiberg

 
SolarWorld AG (ISIN: DE0005108401) has established the Joint Venture „Scheuten SolarWorld Solizium GmbH“ for the future-oriented production of solar silicon with the Dutch company Scheuten Solarholding B.V. in which both companies hold a share of 50 per cent each. The Joint Venture will develop and build a manufacturing plant for the production of high purity solar silicon on the basis of metallurgical silicon with an annual capacity of initially 1,000 tons. In doing so the leading solar technology group in Freiberg is creating another source for the supply of raw materials to its solar industry production facilities.

 

First solar silicon production in Saxony

It is the first time in Germany that a technology for the production of solar silicon using metallurgical silicon available in unlimited quantities is implemented on an industrial scale. „In the course of our consistent group-wide growth we are opening up an additional raw material source with this new technology,” says Dipl.-Ing. Frank H. Asbeck, Chairman and CEO of SolarWorld AG. „By building the first industrial scale silicon production facility in Saxony we are at the same time increasing our vertical integration in Freiberg.“

To implement these new raw material activities the company has acquired a plot of land with a total area of 20,000 square meters including an administrative and a laboratory building at the Saxonia location – in the immediate vicinity of the existing silicon recycling activities and the logistics center of the SolarWorld Group. “At this location in Freiberg we will be able to use synergies for the realization of an economically viable technology for the production of solar grade silicon,“ explains Prof. Dr. Peter Woditsch who will assume the management of the Joint Venture on behalf of the SolarWorld Group. “Our Solar Material division has for years been successful in the reprocessing of raw materials for wafer production and will support the Joint Venture with its technology and know-how,” adds Professor Woditsch who is at the same time the CEO of the SolarWorld subsidiary Deutsche Solar AG which is responsible in Freiberg for all raw materials activities as well as the production of crystalline wafers from solar silicon.

Raw material generation in the group

With the new Joint Venture SolarWorld AG increases its technological options for raw material generation. The object is the upgrading of metallurgical silicon with a degree of purity of around 98 per cent. However, the photovoltaic industry needs raw material with an even higher degree of purity which is why the raw silicon has to be further upgraded.

  
In addition, SolarWorld AG operates another raw material Joint Venture – Joint Solar Silicon – together with the chemicals group Degussa. At the moment this company is building an industrial scale production site for the generation of solar grade silicon from a feedstock material called Silan at Rheinfelden. In parallel to its own raw material activities the group traditionally also relies on long-term partnerships with dependable external silicon suppliers.  

About SolarWorld AG: The SolarWorld Group is among the three largest solar power companies in the world. The group is dedicated exclusively to the core business of solar energy, combining all stages of the solar value chain, from the raw material silicon to turn-key solar power plants. The company operates production facilities in Germany, Sweden and the United States. In the United States, SolarWorld AG is the leading producer and provider of solar power technology. In addition, sales offices operate in South Africa and Singapore, completing the international alignment of the group. The responsibilities of these offices include the sale of rural solar power solutions that can make an important contribution to the sustainable economic development of the southern hemisphere.

In Freiberg, Saxony, the group operates one of the world's most advanced integrated solar production facilities where the SolarWorld Group turns solar grade silicon into high quality solar wafers, solar cells and solar modules. SolarWorld AG offers a broad and diverse range of products from modules for grid-coupled and grid-independent power generation all the way to a whole class of complete solar power systems for decentralized and centralized electricity generation. After the IPO at the end of 1999, the company developed within a few years from a solar trading house to a fully integrated solar technology group, increasing its workforce to more than 1,300 employees. SolarWorld AG is listed at the stock exchange in the technology index TecDAX, in the Dow Jones STOXX 600 as well as the international MSCI index, among others.

Two California Laws Affect Locals According to Nevada Paper

Two pieces of California legislation are highlighted in a Nevada Appeal article, first carried in sister newspaper, The Siearra Sun.  The article discusses AB 32, the Global Warming Solutions Act and the Greenhouse Gas Emissions Performance Standard and how they are affecting the utility district in Truckee.  Readers will recall that the Truckee Donner Utility district is trying to put through a 50 year deal with a coal plant prior to January 1, when such deals will be severely curtailed.  The possibiltiy of a carbon tax has been pointed out by more than one local resident in these letters to the editor, while this one utility customer feels as if the recent meeting on the subject was "hi-jacked by the Green/Sierra Club fraternity." What that ratepayer fails to mention is the possiblity that what he considers to be cheap energy will not be so cheap in the long term as well as the effect on the environment, which he seems to care about little.