The op-ed published in the Juneau Empire May 5, “Solar investments don’t pay off,” by Randy T. Simmons and Josh Smith, takes issue with taxpayer support for solar power, and calls for “solar energy producers to either prove their worth on their own, or exit the market.” This piece twists the facts to fit the authors’ myopic fossil-fuels-only agenda. Although the title suggests that solar energy has been a colossal disappointment in California, it appears that California is on track toward realizing its ambitious goals of target reduction, and in a way that can already be cost competitive.
As for the particular solar project pointed to by Simmons as a colossal failure and sufficient grounds to turn our backs on solar, it is apparently an ambitious project on a scale never before attempted. Called Ivanpah, it is the world’s first utility-scale direct steam solar tower. In its second year, 2015, according to a news story on cleantechnica.com, Pacific Gas & Electric customers received about 97 percent of Ivanpah’s contracted electrons. Performance is vastly improved over the first year, mainly due to engineering refinements, and it is performing closer to expectations. It appears to be far from the spectacular failure that Simmons and Smith represent.
Although solar still accounts for a tiny fraction of our country’s total electrical energy production, just over 1 per cent, solar installations increased twenty-three fold from 2008-2015. In February, solar installations passed the 1 million mark, with another million anticipated in just the next couple of years. The U.S. Energy Information Administration expects renewables in electric power generation to increase 10 percent this year alone. Solar is growing rapidly, and the swiftly declining costs of adopting solar are helping to drive that growth.
The use of public funds to support many aspects of solar development has spurred innovation and contributed to the growth of solar energy adoption. In the immediate future, as our country’s utility companies face the necessity of modernizing the aged electrical grid, the U.S. Dept. of Energy (DOE) aims to support the efficient integration of solar power and other renewables into that grid. DOE in 2011 launched its Sunshot Initiative, the goal of which is to “drive innovation to make solar energy cost competitive — without subsidies — with traditional energy sources before the end of the decade.”
The DOE has reports on its website nrel.gov, including the 2014 Renewable Energy Data Book, that include information about specific states that are leading the way toward a renewable energy future that is largely solar powered. California leads the pack.
Last October the International Energy Agency reported that renewable energy will represent the largest single source of electricity growth over the next five years. Top countries using solar power in the world include Germany, China, Italy, Japan, the U.S., and many EU countries.
Looking at the bigger picture, solar and other renewables have the potential to become the chief producers of energy for our planet while creating employment and economic opportunity around the globe.
I am so thankful to live in a community where clean hydropower is our chief energy source, thus giving us the opportunity to make our own modest contribution to the planet’s move to renewable energy, as a community and as individuals.
• Laura Fleming lives in Juneau.
