Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Things are good, and they're getting better. The solar industry is admittedly still just un-
der 1 percent of the whole energy picture, but it's growing fast. Solar is David against
King CONG's Goliath, but we're armed with a mighty, badass, solar-powered slingshot.
As my Aussie friends like to say, “From little things, big things grow.”
And what are some of these “big things”? For starters, the cold hard cash being
pumpedintotheindustryiswherethesmartmoneyisgoing.JustbeforeChristmas2011,
Google invested $94 million in four large-scale solar photovoltaic projects, edging the
total amount the search giant invested in clean-energy projects toward $900 million. Not
to be beaten, and always one to place a bet when assets are artificially depressed, invest-
ment guru Warren Buffett dropped almost $2 billion on California's Topaz Solar Farm,
whichwillsellsolarelectricitytoPacificGasandElectric(PG&E),thelocalutilitycom-
pany, and generate electricity for about 160,000 homes. Globally, investment in renew-
ableenergywasupto$260billion,from$243billionin2010and$186.5billionin2009.
Solargothalfofthat.IndeedBloombergNewEnergyFinancerecordedthetrillionthdol-
lar of investment in clean energy since its records started in 2004.
So, though the Solyndra scandal was the big solar-energy industry newsmaker in
2011, several more-significant events point to the globe's movement from dirty, central-
ized electricity production to clean, local power. Some of them were as significant as a
seachange,thoughtheweatherpeople inthemassmediamaynothavespottedthem,one
being the economic aftermath of Japan's devastating 2011 earthquake and subsequent
tsunami,whichcausedameltdownatthecountry'sFukushimanuclearpowerplant.This
proof of the risks of nuclear power drove yet another nail into the coffin of nuclear en-
ergy in the United States.
Nukes are all but done here because what banker today could legitimately finance a
nuclear power plant? No one will finance one unless the money comes from socialized
governmentswillingtotakeontheriskswithpublicfunds.I'mnotsayingnukesare
com-
pletely
dead; in February 2012 Southern Company, an electricity generator, announced
plans to build two nuclear plants in Georgia, but this construction is possible only be-
cause it is being prepaid by consumers at the rate of $3 per month. This mandatory way
of capitalizing the plants will be augmented by Department of Energy loan guarantees
that are 20 times what Solyndra got. The point is really that one of the biggest pieces
of financial news that has yet to be clearly reported is that there's little chance that new
nukes can compete with clean electricity from solar panels.
At the same time that the media was missing this big shift in the markets away from
a nuclear renaissance, reports showed that major economies throughout the world were
moving to clean-energy sources, but this trend was rarely addressed in mainstream out-
lets. For every negative Solyndragate scoop, there should have been three times as many
stories on how advanced economies were getting their juice.
