DOE TIPS SOLAR RESEARCH A DIME

Professor Nathan Lewis of the California Institute of Technology recently pointed out that the U.S. spends more at the gas pump every HOUR than it spends on solar energy research every YEAR.

The $13.7 million in U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) grants reported here require 20% matching funds from the recipient universities or their private industry partners, meaning the total investment will be $17.4 million.

If NewEnergyNews is reading these budget numbers correctly, total research spending on fossil fuel energy in 2007 was nearly four hundred seventy million dollars. Total research spending on nuclear energy in 2007 was in the three hundred forty million dollar range. Total solar and wind energy expenditures, research and everything else, in 2007 was just over one hundred ninety million dollars.

A recent Government Accounting Office (GAO) study indicates the fossil fuel industry numbers may be over half a billion dollars and the nuclear industry numbers as high as $1.2 billion while solar and wind remain near $0.2 billion.

The point: The U.S. gets the energy industry it pays for.

According to DOE, the projects it is investing this new money in will bring solar energy prices from their present $0.18-$0.23/kilowatt hour (kWh) price to a market competitive $0.05 - $0.10/kWh. Half way through the next decade.

DOE: “These projects are integral to President Bush’s Solar America Initiative, which aims to make solar energy cost-competitive with conventional forms of electricity by 2015.”

Details on the universities and the research projects getting the money are at the DOE site.

It's not a pretty picture. Close study shows upticks for fossil fuels R&D during the 2 Bush administrations. (click to enlarge)

Energy Dept. unveils solar project funds
March 21, 2008 (UPI)
and
U.S. Department of Energy to Invest up to $13.7 Million for Brekathrough Solar Energy Projects; 11 Projects selected from universities across the country
Tom Welch, March 12, 2008 (Department of Energy)

WHO
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)

WHAT
DOE announced it will invest $13.7 million in 11 advanced solar energy technology university research projects.

In 2006, coal and nuclear were getting most of the love, even as global climate change worsened and nuclear waste storage at Yucca Mtn. was rejected. (click to enlarge)

WHEN
- The grants will be allotted over 3 years, 2008 through 2010.
- The goal of President Bush’s Solar America Initiative is to make solar energy cost-competitive with conventional forms of electricity by 2015.

WHERE
The universities selected: Arizona State University, the California Institute of Technology, the Georgia Institute of Technology, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, North Carolina State University, Pennsylvania State University, the University of Delaware, the University of Florida, the University of Toledo

click to enlarge

WHY
- Each university will have a solar energy industry partner.
- The projects fall in 2 general areas: (1) How to efficiently manufacture more efficient solar cells and (2) How to facilitate commercialization and marketing of solar technology.
- DOE describes solar energy as a form of energy diversification that will cut greenhouse gas emissions and relieve U.S. dependence on foreign oil.
- DOE hopes to retain scientists and graduate students in the field by immersing them in the commercial process through these projects.
- The projects selected:
(1)Arizona State University (Tempe, AZ) with SolFocus and Soliant Energy: Reliability Evaluation of Concentrator Photovoltaics per IEC Qualification Specifications. DOE will provide up to $625,304 for this approximately $800,000 project.
(2)California Institute of Technology (Pasadena, CA) with Spectrolab: 100 millimeter (mm) Engineered InP on Si Laminate Substrates for InP based Multijunction Solar Cells. DOE will provide up to $837,000 for this approximately $1 million project.
(3)Georgia Institute of Technology (Atlanta, GA) with Sixtron: Rear Contact Technologies for Next- Generation High-Efficiency Commercial Silicon Solar Cells. DOE will provide up to $1.5 million for this approximately $1.9 million project.
(4)Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Cambridge, MA) with CaliSolar, Inc. and BP Solar, Inc: Defect Engineering, Cell Processing, and Modeling for High-Performance, Low-Cost Crystalline Silicon Photovoltaics. DOE will provide up to $1.5 million for this approximately $1.9 million project.
(5)North Carolina State University (Raleigh, NC) with Spectrolab: Tunable Narrow Bandgap Absorbers for Ultra High Efficiency Multijunction Solar Cells. DOE will provide up to $1,147,468 for this approximately $1.4 million project.
(6)Pennsylvania State University (University Park, PA) with Honeywell: Organic Semiconductor Heterojunction Solar Cells for Efficient, Low-Cost, Large Area Scalable Solar Energy Conversion. DOE will provide up to $1,231,843 for this approximately $1.5 million project.



(7)University of Delaware Institute of Energy Conversion (Newark, DE) with Dow Corning: Development of a Low-Cost Insulated Foil Substrate for CIGS Photovoltaics. DOE will provide up to $1,478,331 for this approximately $1.85 million project.
(8)University of Delaware (Newark, DE) with SunPower: High Efficiency Back Contact Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells. DOE will provide up to $1,494,736 for this approximately $1.9 million project.
(9)University of Florida (Gainesville FL) with Global Solar Energy Inc., International Solar Electric Technology Inc., Nanosolar Inc., and Solyndra Inc: Routes for Rapid Synthesis of CIGS Absorbers. DOE will provide up to $599,556 for this approximately $800,000 project.
(10)University of Toledo (Toledo, OH) with Calyxo USA, Inc: Improved Atmospheric Vapor Pressure Deposition to Produce Thin CdTe Absorber Layers. DOE will provide up to $1,164,174 for this approximately $1.7 million project.
(11)University of Toledo (Toledo, OH) with Xunlight: High-Rate Fabrication of a-Si-Based Thin-Film Solar Cells Using Large-area VHF PECVD. DOE will provide up to $1,442,266 for this approximately $1.9 million project.

QUOTES
Alexander Karsner, Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, DOE “Harnessing the natural and abundant power of the sun and more cost-effectively converting it into energy has enormous potential to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions and provide greater stability in electricity costs…These projects will not only bolster innovation in photovoltaic technology, but they will help meet the President’s goal of making clean and renewable solar power commercially viable by 2015.”