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Rhone Resch listened carefully today as Secretary of Energy Steven Chu announced "SunShot," a new federal initiative with the ambitious goal of reducing the total cost of photovoltaic (PV) solar power systems by 75 percent by the end of the decade.
Resch liked what he heard.
As president and CEO of the nation's largest solar trade organization, the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), Resch calls the initiative "significant because DOE is focusing on driving down the cost of the other components of a solar system" -- not just the cost of PV cells. In a statement following Chu's announcement, Resch said that the cost of PV panels has been cut in half in the last two years, so focusing on other aspects is the right approach.
The $27 million SunShot initiative focuses on four areas:
- Increasing the efficiency of the solar manufacturing process
- Optimizing the performance of the installation
- Improving solar PV technologies
- Streamlining the permitting process
Not to minimize the importance of the first three areas on the list, but it is the fourth item -- reducing solar "soft costs" -- that is bound to please the solar industry.
SolarTech, a consortium of industry stakeholders, had this to say after today's DOE announcement:
Eliminating solar soft costs and delays is mission critical for the SunShot to reach escape velocity. Variable costs related to permitting, inspection, and interconnection are killing our industry's ability to achieve speed and scale.
By the way; did you notice the space-race phrasing? Not a coincidence. In a riff on President Obama's recent State of the Union address, in which he declared that the nation is at a "Sputnik moment," the DOE's solar initiative is clearly named to evoke memories of the "Moon Shot" -- President Kennedy's reply to the Soviet Union's successful satellite launch.
And for those who didn't get the reference, a DOE press release spelled it out:
The SunShot program builds on the legacy of President Kennedy's 1960s "moon shot" goal, which laid out a plan to regain the country's lead in the space race and land a man on the moon.
But, if "SunShot" is analogous to the "moon shot," who's playing the role of the Soviet Union? China, perhaps?
Although Chu didn't mention that country by name today, it's no secret that China has been investing far more in solar research and manufacturing that the U.S., and has the global market share to prove it. The DOE did point out that:
The SunShot goal aims to restore America's once-dominant position in the global market for solar photovoltaics (PV), which has dwindled from 43 percent in 1995 to only six percent today.
Actually, the U.S. solar industry has been playing catch up since the mid-1980s when the Reagan Administration's DOE slashed the budget of the world's leading solar R&D facility -- the Solar Energy Research Institute (SERI) in Golden, Colorado. Germany and Japan bought up the solar patents developed by SERI and hired away the defunded researchers -- all at fire-sale prices. And the U.S. has been having our solar clock cleaned by other nations ever since.
Today, investments in SERI's descendant, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), have been paying off. Still based in Golden, NREL (which remains underfunded even now) has done extraordinary work in advanced PV and wind R&D.
Can SunShot finally put us back in first place in the solar power race?
The SEIA's Rhone Resch, for one, is optimistic.
This initiative will have the dual benefit of helping America stay competitive in the global marketplace and reducing the costs of solar energy to the point where solar is the cheapest form of electric generation for all Americans.
