Posted on 12/16/2005 1:01:39 PM PST by calcowgirl
California regulators on Thursday allocated $300 million collected from electricity customers to subsidize purchases and installation of solar energy units in 2006.
The action was aimed at "jump starting our implementation of what was originally called the governor's million solar roofs initiative," said California Public Utilities Commission President Mike Peevey.
That proposal was "a marquee idea of the governor's ... legislative agenda (but) got bogged down in politics in Sacramento," said PUC member Susan Kennedy, who attended her last meeting after being tapped to become chief of staff for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
A broader plan that would tap ratepayers for about $2.8 billion in solar subsidies over the next decade was set for consideration at the PUC's Jan. 12 meeting. That measure could put units to make electricity from sunshine on the roofs of 1 million California houses and produce 3,000 megawatts of solar capacity, Peevey said.
That output would exceed the generating capacity of PG&E's largest power plant, and contribute to meeting the state's ambitious goals to generate 20 percent of its power by 2010 from sources other than existing nuclear, fossil fuel and large hydroelectric plants.
Expanded solar subsidies add to the crazy quilt of energy rules and laws that California has sewn together since the 2000-01 energy crisis. That crisis caused a retreat from the state's far-reaching effort to introduce competition into the electricity system, but no clear mandate has taken the place of that experiment with deregulation.
Solar has been embraced across the political spectrum, especially after soaring energy prices and last summer's rolling blackouts in Southern California put pressure on state officials to address unresolved energy issues. Solar subsidies also fit within the Schwarzenegger administration's high-profile commitment to make California a leader in addressing greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming.
But some economists question the wisdom of picking solar as the main beneficiary of the state's push to reduce such emissions. "It's a lot more expensive than other alternatives," especially wind energy, said James Bushnell, research director at the UC Energy Institute. The planned subsidies may lock in the use of technologies that become outmoded. The subsidies also make less sense than broader approaches, such as a tax on all carbon emissions or credits that allow competing technologies to prove their worth, he said.
But businesses are already rushing to exploit a new public interest in -- and willingness to bankroll -- alternative power solutions. On Thursday, Berkeley-based PowerLight Corp. announced a $330 million deal to buy solar panels from SunPower Corp., a Sunnyvale-based company that last month completed a $138.6 million initial public offering.
In another demonstration of investors' growing appetite for energy ventures, Suntech Power Holdings Co., a Chinese solar cell maker, on Wednesday sold $395.7 million in an IPO of shares listed on the New York Stock Exchange. The price of those shares jumped 41 percent in their first day of trading.
Seeing the (Power)Light Bump about gubamint subsidization of alternative energy sources.
Solar energy is our future.
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