$467 Million Funding for Renewable Energy

"The nation that leads the world in creating new sources of clean energy will be the nation that leads the 21st-century global economy."  Barrack Obama


Against a backdrop of 72000 solar panels, Barrack Obama gave a speech at Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas on Wednesday, announcing over $467 Million in Recovery Act Funding for Geothermal and Solar Energy Projects.   The Nellis Air Force Base lays claim to the largest solar energy installation of its kind in the Western Hemisphere.  The solar panels are intended to provide 25% of the electricity requirements for 12,000 people living and working at the base.

Solar Energy Projects (117.6 Million)

Photovoltaic Technology Development

$51.5 million will be invested with the aim of making solar energy cost-competitive with conventional sources of electricity by advancing photovoltaic concepts and high impact technologies,

Solar Energy Deployment

$40.5 million will be spent on removing the barriers to wider adoption of solar energy in residential, commercial and municipal environments.  Projects will focus on such things as grid connection, market barriers and the shortage of trained solar energy installers.

Concentrating Solar Power Research and Development

$25.6 million for improvments to the reliability of concentrating solar power technologies and improved test and evaluation support to the solar industry.

Geothermal Energy ($350 Million)

Geothermal Demonstration Projects

$140 Million will be allocated for demonstration of advanced geothermal energy technology in new geographic areas, as well as geothermal energy production from geopressured fields and oil and natural gas fields.

Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) R&D

Geothermal energy systems must be located near easily-accessible geothermal water resources, thus limiting widespread use.  EGS uses engineered reservoirs to make use of available heat resources which can used to produce electricity.  R&D is needed to demonstrate that the ESG technology will be ready in the near-term.  $80 Million will be used to fund this activity. 

Innovative Exploration Techniques

$100 Million fund will be used to reduce the up front risk for the private sector by investing in and validating innovative exploration technologies and methods.    Projects will include siting, drilling, and characterization of a series of exploration wells utilizing innovative exploration techniques. 

National Geothermal Data System, Resource Assessment, and Classification System

$100 Million will be used to fund a detailed characterization of geothermal energy resources nationwide.  In addition a nationwide data system will be developed to make resource data available to academia, researchers, and the private sector.  DOE will support the development of a geothermal resource classification system for use in determining site potential.

Solar Power Coming of Age

Solar Power Coming of Age

Hi!  I would like to introduce myself.  My name is Steve.  I started the BlogOnSmog website about a year ago, initially blogging on a host of different green topics.  A couple of months ago I decided to recruit more bloggers and introduce different day-of-week topics.  The recruitment has been relatively successful and there are now 5 bloggers here excluding myself. 

While I am searching for two more bloggers to complete the 7-day week, I have decided to fill in the missing two blog days and write the posts for Solar Sunday and Techno Tuesday myself.  Solar Sunday is dedicated to all forms of renewable energy, including but not restricted to:  solar, wind and hydro-electric power.  Techno Tuesday is a blog about green technology.  I expect there will be overlap between the two blogs (as I discuss solar technology for example) but hopefully this will be kept to a minimum.  I'll try to focus on applications on Sundays and details behind the technology on Tuesdays.

I am very excited about the Solar Sunday blog.  The majority of people do not realize that most of the world's energy resources originate from the sun's rays striking the earth.  Some energy is preserved as fossil fuel, while some is usable indirectly as wind, hydro or wave power.  Most of the renewable energy we take advantage of is hydro-electric as seen in the pie chart below.

Source:  Wikipedia Commons

In spite of the distribution of renewable energy projects, I will spend a fair amount of my time blogging about solar power, simply because the technologies and applications are fast coming of age.  Researchers are not only pushing the envelope of light conversion efficiency, they are reducing production costs and matching technologies to specific applications.  Please tune in next week!

Steve Auger
Founder of www.BlogOnSmog.com