With adequate funding, alternative energy will power your laptop and car and lower your home energy bill in the next 10 years.
The energy crisis of the 1970s is a fading memory for aging baby boomers who once looked forward to a future warmed and illuminated by solar collectors and alternative fuels. Two-and-a-half decades of relatively cheap fuels have nearly relegated the quest for energy's holy grail to the history books. But according to energy investment banker Matthew Simmons, many of the world's oil fields are already declining. Also, Americans are again feeling the pinch in their pocketbooks as prices for oil and natural gas skyrocket.
Fuel cells and solar energy from photovoltaic (PV) cells promise to slow the consumption of nonrenewable resources. Jumpstarting these technologies, though, requires some healthy funding from the government and private sector. Researchers at the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) candidly say that their budgets are barely enough to keep up with their Japanese and European counterparts.
Glenn Hamer, executive director of the Solar Energy Industries Association, testified before the Congressional Energy and Water Appropriations subcommittees that worldwide solar production in 2003 topped 760 MW, up from 550 MW in 2002. As the U.S. produced just 109 MW, Hamer's 2004 request for an annual $100 million budget for PV research seems modest—less than one day in the war in Iraq.
Hamer says that worldwide PV energy production is doubling nearly every two years and should exceed 1 billion watts this year. The Renewable Energy Policy Project estimates that each megawatt of solar energy produced will support 35.5 jobs over the next 10 years. A solar industry that continues to grow at current rates could produce more than 150,000 jobs with about 40,000 direct jobs by 2020 for a workforce half the size of General Motors. Many of these positions are manufacturing jobs with high value added. Several solar manufacturers are locating their facilities near the Department of Energy's research sites.
BOOST SOLAR-CELL EFFICIENCY, LOWER COSTS
The DOE's 2003 PV roadmap put the PV business at about $2 billion in 2001. Yet it suggests that the cost of manufacturing PV products will have to come down for the market to be viable. Improved efficiencies and better mass production of cells will go a long way in lowering costs. Manufacturers need to develop low-cost, high-throughput technologies for high-efficiency thin-film and crystalline-silicon cells.
Conversion efficiency must improve from 7% to 10% for thin film and 12% to 14% for crystalline silicon to 18% to 20% while keeping the cost at less than 50 cents/W for both module types (Fig. 1). The system price paid by the end user, including operating and maintenance costs, is expected to be $3/W ac to $4/W ac in 2010. Total manufacturing costs, or the cost to produce the components in the system, are projected to be 50% to 60% of the price of the installed system.
At $3/W to $4/W, the cost of PVs in 10 years may still be too high to generate affordable electricity for the average home, but not to power portable devices and keep them charged. SunPower's recent PV cell tests out at 20% efficiency—better than the average range of existing cells at 12% to 15% (Fig. 2). This allows a 3-kW output in 17 m2, lowering the installed cost of an entire system.
Since worldwide production of PVs increases tenfold every decade, SunPower president Richard M. Swanson predicts the price of modules to drop by 50% each decade. If he's correct, PVs costing $3/W today could drop to $1.50/W by 2010. A 3-kW system would come in around $4500 for the modules, plus another $4500 for the installation and other miscellaneous costs. With tax credits and rising utility costs, consumers may find this price quite acceptable for offsetting high utility costs.
Another PV-like technology that promises to break the $1.50/W barrier even sooner is crystalline silicon on glass (CSG), which Pacific Solar is developing for rooftop systems. Company research director Martin Green anticipates CSG's manufacturing cost to be $1.25/W in 2005, well below the PV price. Currently, Pacific Solar's costs are about $1.95/W. These rooftop systems especially make sense for large office buildings and plants in sunny climes.
While Long Island, N.Y., isn't necessarily a sunny climate, the Long Island Power Authority and FALA Direct Mail Group in Farmingdale recently completed a 1.01-MW rooftop PV system installed by Power-Light Corp. The 13,424 PowerLight PV panels, with a total array size of 10,270 m2, cost FALA $6.1 million. Over the next 25 years, FALA could save as much as $12 million in energy costs when adjusted by 2.5% per year for inflation. The installation reduces FALA's energy bill by 10%, saving it an estimated 33% on its peak load requirements.