Be smarter with Solar, Tigo is doing this

By Don Clark

Solar panels can share a problem with Christmas tree lights. If one panel in an array stops working–or pumps out less electricity because of shade, dirt or bird droppings–the results can hurt the performance of other panels that are strung together.

Or so says Tigo Energy, a startup that is tackling the issue and is receiving more money to help that effort. Tigo A solar installation equipped with Tigo’s technologyTigo, based in Los Gatos, Calif., on Tuesday plans to announce that is receiving $10 million in additional equity capital from Generation Investment Management, an investment firm founded in 2004 by former vice president Al Gore and former Goldman Sachs executive David Blood. The company has also lined up a $10 million credit line secure Tigo, based in Los Gatos, Calif., on Tuesday announced it received $10 million in additional equity capital from Generation Investment Management, an investment firm founded in 2004 by former vice president Al Gore and former Goldman Sachs executive David Blood. The company has also lined up a $10 million credit line secured by its accounts receivable. Tigo says the latest infusion brings the capital it has raised to date to nearly $50 million. The closely held company, which has 70 employees, has been selling circuitry that can be integrated with new panels or retrofitted with existing ones. Tigo says the products let users track the performance of individual panels and adapt to disruptions, boosting the total performance of an array of panels by up to 20%–without taking any physical action, like replacing or cleaning a panel. Tigo’s leaders include Sam Arditi, a six-year Intel veteran who is Tigo’s CEO, and Jeffrey Krisa, who worked 17 years at the same chip giant. Just like Intel chips helped provide calculating power for computers and other products, “we are trying to take solar panels and make them smart panels,” Arditi says. The company plans to use proceeds from the added funding to expand manufacturing, international sales and logistics capabilities.

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Google Buys German Solar Power Plant

Google has long been committed to renewable energy resources – though how much of that is for environmental as opposed to monetary reasons is difficult to say. However, their green initiative investments have remained almost entirely in the United States. Now that’s changed, thanks to Google’s recent investment of 3.5 million euros in a German power plant.

The investment, which translates to approximately 5 million U.S. dollars, represents a buyout of 49% of the company’s ownership. The solar plant itself is located in Brandenburg and was completed at the end of 2010, shortly after which it was purchased by Capital Stage AG (with the exact purchase price being left undisclosed). Capital Stage AG has also purchased several other German solar farms, and now own a total of 14 across Italy and Germany.

While it’s uncertain precisely how Google’s investment funds will be used, the figures indicate significant backing that, should Capital AG follow its recent trends, will likely mean further expansion of the plant itself. There is plenty of room for expansion, with the power plant resting on a 47-acre property. The plant currently generates, 18.64 MW of power, well more than most other solar farms (many of which generate power in the 5 to 10 MW area).

Read more: http://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-buys-49-of-a-german-solar-power-plant/29095/#ixzz1JEpucO49

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Deal reached over biomass tax credits

By SUSAN MONTOYA BRYAN ALBUQUERQUE, N.M

A settlement has been reached in a lawsuit over millions of dollars in tax credits that were sought by developers of a proposed biomass power plant in central New Mexico that was once touted as part of the state's push for more renewable energy.

Officials with Western Water and Power Production LLC and the New Mexico Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department confirmed this week that an agreement was reached at the end of March and the case was dismissed.

Details of the settlement are confidential, but Western Water and Power has been allowed to reapply for the credits. If the proposed plant is operational by the end of 2013, the company will be eligible to receive the credits beginning in 2016.

The company sued last year over the state's decision to rescind $27 million in credits because of delays that pushed back construction of the plant.

David Cohen, co-owner of Western Water and Power, said he's encouraged that the settlement will clear the way for the company to attract financing for the $125 million project.

"Financing has been a big burden because of the overall meltdown in the credit markets. We're starting to see that easing now," he told The Associated Press in a phone interview.

The company has a letter of intent from interested investors and is working on completing its due diligence. If the investors sign on, Cohen said construction could begin as early as this summer.

It's been a long road for the proposed 35 megawatt plant.

Western Water and Power had made economic, political and regulatory headway after unveiling the project planned south of Estancia in October 2003. Former Gov. Bill Richardson's administration even included the plant on a list showing progress in developing alternative energy projects.

But the company ran into trouble while trying to obtain an air permit and the tax credits from the state, and some residents and environmentalists voiced concerns about the project's potential impact on air quality and New Mexico's forests. The proposed plant would be fueled by wood and forest byproducts.

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Bringing Light to dark India

By David Ferris at Matter Network

 

Mon Mar 28, 2011 1:51am EDT

I recently returned from India, where hundreds of millions of people -- 45 percent of the rural population -- live in villages with no electricity. Many of them are poor and live with the stubborn problems of illiteracy, malnutrition and hardship that no aid program has been able to fix. Now, however, some development experts and entrepreneurs are beginning to consider these people "energy-poor," and a world of difference resides in the distinction.

That's because solutions to being energy-poor are popping up all over the place. Solar lanterns are becoming available for the equivalent of U.S. $10 as prices for solar materials continues to drop, and better cookstoves are available that make more heat with less fuel. Biogas digesters are starting to provide electricity to whole villages. The thinking is that if the rural poor get more power -- literally, in the form of renewable heat and light -- their other problems might begin to take care of themselves.

Of course, it's not as simple as giving a rice farmer a solar lantern. Here's a look at the potential solutions and problems.

In the West and in other developed parts of the world, renewable-energy technologies like solar panels and wind turbines serve a different role than a place like rural India. They are "green" technologies that will one day supplant the polluting energy-producing technologies we already have, like coal, oil, and nuclear power (Japan's tsunami and the oil spill in the Gulf have cautioned us against relying too heavily on these). But our baseline supply of power is abundant. We've got the electricity we need to light classrooms, keep streets safe and heat our homes.

But for the four billion people in Africa, Asia and Latin America who have little or no access to electricity, the prospect of locally sourced, renewable power is quite literally a game-changer. They're no longer living in the dark. A solar-powered LED bulb provides enough light for the kids to study at night or for the parents to do important chores. A stove that uses less fuel could save a mother a few hours every day scavenging for firewood. And then there's the health benefits. It's estimated [pdf] that the emissions from kerosene lanterns and poorly-designed stoves contribute to half a million deaths in India each year, and cause four to six percent of all disease-related deaths in the country.

Additionally, Solar Fusion a Tampa based company has teamed up with a not for profit organization called Project Reverb which focuses on changing the World first by meeting the immediate need than providing continual education and training along with providing finance for micro-enterprises, creating a Reverberation that changes the World one tribe at a time. Contact Solar Fusion for more information.

 

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