5 Reasons Why Solar Thermal is becoming Favored Choice for Hybrid Clean Fossil Fuel Power Plants

10 Feb, 2012
Concentrated Solar Thermal

Solar Thermal Technology is facing an existential threat as plunging solar panel prices have made other solar technologies fight for their future. Many Solar Thermal Companies have closed down in 2011 and many of the CSP Power Plants have now been converted in to PV panel projects. This is because the costs of building a solar panel power plant is less than half that of a solar thermal plant. You can read the advantages and disadvantages of solar thermal technology below.

However Solar Thermal Technology is finding a niche in Hybrid Fossil Fuel Power Plants . The reason that Solar Thermal is gaining traction in Solar Hybrid Plants is

1) They can use the existing Electricity and Transmission Infrastructure of the new Fossil Fuel Plant or the Existing One

2) Solar Thermal Technology in most cases generate Steam which can be used by the Turbines of the Fossil Fuel Plant saving additional costs

3) They help in Utilties meet the RPS standard or generate Green Certificates which generates additional money

4) Helps in Backing the Green Credentials of the Owner

5) Hybrid Plants also don’t have to face the problems of Intermittency as the Gas or Coal Plant can generate Electricity at any Time.

Advantages of Solar Thermal Energy

  • No Fuel Cost - Solar Thermal Energy does not require any fuel like most other sources of renewable energy.This is a huge advantage over other fossil fuels whose costs are increasing at a drastic  rate every year.Electricity prices are increasingly rapidly in most parts of  the world much faster than general inflation.Price shocks due to high fuel costs are a big risk with fossil fuel energy these days
  • Predictable,24/7 Power -Solar Thermal Energy can generate power 24 hours a day.This is made possible as solar thermal power plants store the energy in the form of molten salts etc.Other forms of Renewable Energy like Solar PV and Wind Energy are intermittent in nature.The electricity supply is much more uniform and reliable.
  •  No Pollution and Global Warming Effects – Solar Thermal Energy does not cause pollution which is one of the biggest advantages .Note there are costs associated with the equipment used to build and transport Solar Thermal Energy Equipment
  • Using Existing Industrial Base - Solar Thermal Energy uses equipment like solar thermal mirrors and turbines which is made in large scale at low cost by the existing Industrial Base and requires no major changes in equipment and materials unlike new technologies such as CIGs Panels.

Disadvantages of Solar Thermal Energy

1) High Costs – Solar Thermal Energy costs at least Euro 3.5/watt and has not declined too much in the last 3-4 years .However these costs are too high  as Solar PV already costs Euro 2.5/watt and even on a conservative basis will have its costs reduced by 5% in the next 10 years making it attain half the cost of Solar Thermal Technology by 2020

2) Future Technology has a high probability of making CSP Obsolete – Solar Energy has become a Hotbed of Innovation with daily news of some new breakthrough in materials and process in PV Technology.Oerlikon has come out with a radial new a-Si Technology while CIGs player are touting increased efficiencies.Chinese Solar Companies have captured large chunks of the Solar Market through low cost leadership while number of Global Heavyweights like Posco,Samsung,Hyundai,Sharp,GE,TSMC promise to further decrease these costs.

3) Water Issue – Solar Thermal Plants use lots of Water which is Major Problem in Desert Areas.Using non-water cooling raises the cost of CSP projects too much.While using SeaWater has been proposed it remains to be seen if it possible to implement this solution as this would imply building Plants very near the Coastline

4) Ecological and Cultural Issues – The Usage of Massive Arrays of Mirrors is noted to heavily impact the Desert  Wildlife endangering the endangered species.California has already seen a massive fight on this issue with Project Developers curtailing the size of their Plants and spending money to move the wildlife

5) Limited Locations and Size Limitations – Solar Thermal  Energy can only be built in places which have the high amount of solar radiation.They can be built in deserts mostly and require a large land area.This means its not possible to build them in populated areas.Solar Thermal Energy also can only be built in large sizes which are at least 50 MW in size to be economical.This contrasts to Solar PV which is sold in sizes as low as 5 Watts

6) Long Gestation Time Leading to Cost Overruns – The Gestation Time for permitting,financing,drilling etc. can easily take 5-7 years to develop a concentrated solar thermal power plant.Compare this to 6 months for a small wind farm or 3 months for a Solar PV plant

7)  Financing is the biggest problem in developing projects particularly for small solar thermal developers in this industry.

Solar Power Plants in USA (Photovoltaic,Thermal) – Growing by the Day

7 Jul, 2011
Concentrated Solar Thermal,Solar Energy,Solar Photovoltaic Energy

Solar Power Plants in the USA are proliferating with the falling cost of solar energy and the increase in government support through the Treasury Grant subsidy.Thousands of Solar Jobs are being created in the USA as solar installers increase their workforce to cope with the rapid surge in demand.The crash in prices of solar panels has led to increase in demand for solar system installations.Also the state Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) laws which make it mandatory for utilities to source a portion of their power from green energy sources has boosted the use of solar energy.Besides rooftop solar systems,large solar power plants are being built in the USA comprising of millions of solar panels with the help of DOE loan guarantees and 1603 Grants.Not only solar photovoltaic systems,but also solar thermal power plants which use solar heat to generate power are being built.Though some of the solar thermal power plants are now being converted to solar panel power farms due to their lower costs,still some solar thermal companies like Brightsource Energy continue to build massive solar farms.The list of solar power plants in the US is a constantly moving target but here is a list of the major solar power plants in the USA as well as some of the upcoming large solar power plants.Note this list is subjective as you can’t have a strict rule of solar system size to classify it a solar power plant.Also the huge number of solar installations makes it almost impossible to construct an exhaustive list of solar power plants.Here I am writing about the big solar power developers and their plans on developing large solar power plants.There are a number of smaller solar developers which I have not written about here.

Read about the advantages and disadvantages of large solar farms over rooftop solar installations

First Solar has more than 1 GW of Solar Farms getting DOE Loan Guarantees

While Solar Panel stocks have been getting massively hit ,First Solar has not seen some of the massive drops mainly as 3 of its large solar farms may get big DOE Loan Guarantees which will allow it to easily sail through one of the worst times in the solar panel industry.Note First Solar has 3 projects getting the DOE Loan – $680 million for the Antelope Valley Solar Ranch in Los Angeles County, $1.88 billion for the Desert Sunlight project in Riverside County and $1.93 billion in loans for the Topaz Solar project in San Luis Obispo County.

These Three solar farms will generate around 1330 MW of solar energy when completed and will make First Solar the biggest solar installer in the US.Two of  these solar panel projects have 550 MW of solar capacity making them the biggest solar panel plants in the world.

NRG Energy and Prologis with DOE Loan Guarantee and Bank of America $1.4 Billion Debt Finance

NRG Energy has been one of the largest developers of  solar energy in the USA with a number of large scale utility projects using both solar PV and solar thermal technologies.NRG Solar which is a wholly owned subsidiary of NRG Energy has almost 2000 MW of solar energy capacity being developed with almost half being constructed.NRG has aggressively bought solar panel projects from First Solar  and has also tied up withBrightsource Energy acquiring an equity interest in the 392 MW solar thermal power plant being built by the company.NRG Energy has now turned its attention to the commercial rooftop market tying up with warehouse operator Prologis and Bank of America to build 733 MW of projects spread across 28 states in the USA.The company has also got a loan guarantee of $1.2 billion from DOE which will further improve the returns from these projects.This is the largest distributed solar project in the world right now and shows a template for further such solar projects in the future by leading energy providers and large rooftop owners.

National Solar to build Twenty 20 MW farms in a single place

National Solar a developer of solar farms is shortlisting sites to build a huge 400 MW solar farm in twenty segments of 20 MW each.Note US  Solar Installers/developers are increasing as solar energy industry keeps on growing at almost a 100% growth rate.While a number of established solar developers have been acquired by upstream large solar panel companies,newer ones keep popping up.Note the cost of the project is around $3.5/watt which is the same as that being estimated by NRG Energy.The Solar System costs have declined dramatically in the last 2-3 years by around 35-40% from around $5.5-6/watt to $3.5/watt at present.With solar panel prices expected to keep declining at around 10% annually expect more such solar panel projects to be announced.

Sunpower has touted its “Oasis” power 1 MW block as a low cost LCOE solution to the solar utility market.This power block which comes with most of the BOS parts assembled saves costs in installation through standardization and scale.The company won a massive  711 AC MW contract with USA utility Edison which is one of the largest in the solar energy history.Sunpower has also  managed numerous wins in the government sector supplying solar panels to the US  Air Force,Municipal Departments

Brightsource Energy,the Solar Thermal Startup has been making huge progress getting high profile investors and managing a $1.37 billion DOE grant for its Ivanpah 392 MW Solar Thermal Power Plant.The Company has managed to get its billion dollar Ivanpah Project financed through equity investments from NRG Energy and Google.The company has also started the process of applying to build a 750 MW plant in California.

Abengoa - Abengoa is one of the most well known suppliers of Solar Thermal Equipment in the world and is a proven developer of large scale Solar Plants in Spain and USA.This Spanish giant has signed a JV with India’s largest capital equipment company BHEL to manufacture components for Solar Thermal Plants..t has managed to win a large DOE grant for constructing another large Solar Thermal Plant in the USA.

 SolarReserve is a US company which uses  integrated molten salt thermal energy storage technology in conjunction with solar power towers licensed from United Technologies Corporation (UTC).The company has got approvals to build CSP plants in Arizona and California.

 Solar Millennium – The company is one of the most aggressive players in the Solar Thermal Energy Sector.The company is in the process of building CSP plants in Africa,Europe,India and USA.This German company has won several project approvals to build CSP plants in Califronia through its JV Solar Trust with Ferrostaal Inc.It recently sold its US pipeline to Solarhybrid which is not converting all the CSP plants to solar panel farms.

You can read about solar power plants upcoming and built at Wikipedia

Advantages and Disadvantages of Solar Thermal Energy (Power Towers,Parabolic Troughs)

7 Jul, 2011
Concentrated Solar Thermal

Solar Thermal Energy has been losing out in the last couple of years to solar photovoltaic energy which is seeing a huge increase in demand amidst very low prices.Some of the major solar thermal energy projects in the globe have been converted into solar pv installations due to its lower costs.Some of the major solar thermal energy companies like Solar Millennium have sold their solar thermal portfolios to other companies while Stirling Power Systems has gone bankrupt.Tessera has sold its solar thermal plants which had gotten DOE Loan Guarantees in California to Solar Developers who have made these solar thermal plants into solar panel ones.However there are some companies like eSolar and Brightsource Energy which are powering ahead with their technologies and projects with backing from big industrial MNC  conglomerates like GE and Areva.Their Power Tower Technologies are supposedly more efficient than the mainstream parabolic toughs that are used.

Advantages of Solar Thermal Energy

  • No Fuel Cost - Solar Thermal Energy does not require any fuel like most other sources of renewable energy.This is a huge advantage over other fossil fuels whose costs are increasing at a drastic  rate every year.Electricity prices are increasingly rapidly in most parts of  the world much faster than general inflation.Price shocks due to high fuel costs are a big risk with fossil fuel energy these days
  • Predictable,24/7 Power -Solar Thermal Energy can generate power 24 hours a day.This is made possible as solar thermal power plants store the energy in the form of molten salts etc.Other forms of Renewable Energy like Solar PV and Wind Energy are intermittent in nature.The electricity supply is much more uniform and reliable.
  •  No Pollution and Global Warming Effects – Solar Thermal Energy does not cause pollution which is one of the biggest advantages .Note there are costs associated with the equipment used to build and transport Solar Thermal Energy Equipment
  • Using Existing Industrial Base - Solar Thermal Energy uses equipment like solar thermal mirrors and turbines which is made in large scale at low cost by the existing Industrial Base and requires no major changes in equipment and materials unlike new technologies such as CIGs Panels.

Disadvantages of Solar Thermal Energy

1) High Costs – Solar Thermal Energy costs at least Euro 3.5/watt and has not declined too much in the last 3-4 years .However these costs are too high  as Solar PV already costs Euro 2.5/watt and even on a conservative basis will have its costs reduced by 5% in the next 10 years making it attain half the cost of Solar Thermal Technology by 2020

2) Future Technology has a high probability of making CSP Obsolete – Solar Energy has become a Hotbed of Innovation with daily news of some new breakthrough in materials and process in PV Technology.Oerlikon has come out with a radial new a-Si Technology while CIGs player are touting increased efficiencies.Chinese Solar Companies have captured large chunks of the Solar Market through low cost leadership while number of Global Heavyweights like Posco,Samsung,Hyundai,Sharp,GE,TSMC promise to further decrease these costs.

3) Water Issue – Solar Thermal Plants use lots of Water which is Major Problem in Desert Areas.Using non-water cooling raises the cost of CSP projects too much.While using SeaWater has been proposed it remains to be seen if it possible to implement this solution as this would imply building Plants very near the Coastline

4) Ecological and Cultural Issues – The Usage of Massive Arrays of Mirrors is noted to heavily impact the Desert  Wildlife endangering the endangered species.California has already seen a massive fight on this issue with Project Developers curtailing the size of their Plants and spending money to move the wildlife

5) Limited Locations and Size Limitations – Solar Thermal  Energy can only be built in places which have the high amount of solar radiation.They can be built in deserts mostly and require a large land area.This means its not possible to build them in populated areas.Solar Thermal Energy also can only be built in large sizes which are at least 50 MW in size to be economical.This contrasts to Solar PV which is sold in sizes as low as 5 Watts

6) Long Gestation Time Leading to Cost Overruns – The Gestation Time for permitting,financing,drilling etc. can easily take 5-7 years to develop a concentrated solar thermal power plant.Compare this to 6 months for a small wind farm or 3 months for a Solar PV plant

7)  Financing is the biggest problem in developing projects particularly for small solar thermal developers in this industry.

Read about the Advantages and Disadvantages of Natural Gas ,Nuclear Energy and Coal

Solar Power Plants in India – Types (Solar Thermal,PV) and Cost of Setting Up

3 Jul, 2011
Concentrated Solar Thermal,Energy,Solar Energy,Solar EPC,Solar Photovoltaic Energy

What is a Solar Power Plant

Solar Power Plant isSolar Power Plants a Device which generates power or electricity using Solar Energy.Note normally solar power plants refers to large ground mounted solar farms rather than the residential solar rooftop projects.However it is only a matter of usage and a solar power plant can refer to a very small solar panel of 5 watts as well as a huge solar plant of hundreds of megawatts consisting of hundreds of thousands of solar panels.

 

Types of Solar Power Plants

Note there are a number of solar energy technologies which convert the power from the sun to electricity.However the two main solar technologies in use are Solar Thermal Technology and Solar Photovoltaic Technology.Current Solar PV Technology accounts of the lion’s share of solar power generated globally and is gaining more marketshare as costs of solar power decrease.

1) Solar Thermal Power Plants

2) Solar PV Power Plants

Solar Power Plants in India

Solar Power Plants in India have increased tremendously in 2011 as solar power plants under the Indian federal government JNNSM subsidy scheme get completed under Phase 1.While the success of India’s subsidy scheme was in doubt due to irrational bidding during the auction,the sharp decrease in the price of PV solar panels has made the project winners quite lucky.Solar Thermal Projects by big firms like Reliance Power and Lanco also have managed to get debt closure and should also get finished.While I am not in favor of the Indian government’s support for large solar farms over rooftop solar projects,it is helping in putting Indian prominently in the global solar map.The Second Phase is supposed to ameliorate these problems but the first plans do not seem to be too great.The support for large solar farms will be increased from the current 5 MW cap to 20-25 MW cap.This will lead to only large investors,utilities and companies being left in the fray and lead to lesser competition.

Read about the Largest Solar Power Plants in the World

Cost of Setting up a Power Plant in India

The biggest advantage of solar energy are declining costs particularly for polycrystalline solar panels which has made the costs of building a solar power  plant come down by 50% in the last 2-3 years.The costs of setting up solar thermal plants are higher and the costs have not come down as  much which is making solar developers of CSP plants convert them into PV power plants.The costs of a solar power plants also depends on what kind of solar panel technology you are using,for example it typically costs less for thin film solar plant and if you use solar trackers it costs more.The main thing that you should consider is the lifetime cost which is to divide the total cost of solar power plant divided by the energy generated over the lifetime of the plant.

  1. The capital cost of a large solar power plant using solar panels costs about $3/watt
  2. The capital cost of a large solar thermal power plant using parabolic troughts/power towers will  cost around $5-6/watt

Annexure

You can read the complete list of solar energy projects in India (note this is a ever changing list)

 Solar Thermal Power Plants to be constructed under JNNSM

  1. Lanco Solar  100 MW  Rajasthan
  2. Reliance Power 100 MW Rajasthan
  3. KSK Energy 100 MW Rajasthan
  4. Godavari Power 50 MW Rajasthan
  5. Aurum Renewables 20 MW Gujarat
  6. Corporate Ispat  50 MW Rajasthan
  7. Megha Engineering 50 MW Andhra Pradesh

Solar PV Power Plants under JNNSM ( 5 MW)

1 Camelot Enterprises Pvt. Ltd. Maharashtra
2 Khaya Solar Projects Nagore Rajasthan
3 DDE Renewable Energy Nagore Rajasthan
4 Electro Maritech Pvt Ltd Nagore Rajasthan
5 Vasavi Solar Power Nagore Rajasthan
6 Fine Hope Allied Energy Rajasthan
7 Karnataka Power Corpn. Ltd Karnataka
8 Newton Solar Pvt. Ltd Nagore Rajasthan
9 Green Tech Power Pvt. Ltd. Jodhpur Rajasthan
10 Saidham Overseas Pvt. Ltd Nagore Rajasthan
11 Mahindra Solar One Pvt. Ltd Jodhpur Rajasthan
12 Azure Power (Rajasthan) P.Ltd. Nagore Rajasthan
13 Rithwik Projects Pvt. Ltd, Anantapur AP
14 Sai Sudhir Energy Anantapur AP
15 Maharashtra Seamless Ltd Jaisalmer Rajasthan
16 Viraj Renewable Energy Jodhpur Rajasthan
17 Northwest Energy Nagore Rajasthan
18 Sun Edisson Energy P.Ltd Bikaner Rajasthan
19 Electrical Manufacturing Co.Ltd Allahabad UP
20 Alex Spectrum Radiations P.Ltd Bikaner Rajasthan
21 Indian Oil Corpn. Ltd. Barmer Rajasthan
22 Coastal Projects Ltd Chitradurg Karnataka
23 Welspun Solar AP Anantapur AP
24 CCCL Infrastructures Ltd Tuticorin TamilNadu
25 Alex Solar Pvt. Ltd. Orissa
26 Punj Lloyd Jodhpur Rajasthan
27 Bhaskar Green Power P.Ltd Jaisalmer Rajasthan
28 Oswal Woollen Mills Jodhpur Rajasthan
29 Amrit Animation P.Ltd Jaisalmer Rajasthan
30 Precision Technik P.Ltd Jaisalmer Rajasthan

At Least Half of 620 MW of Solar Power Capacity under JNNSM to Miss Financial Closure Deadline,Will Lose License as Irrational Non Serious Auction Winners to lose Bank Guarantees

30 Jun, 2011
Concentrated Solar Thermal,Energy,Solar Energy,Solar EPC,Solar Panels,Solar Photovoltaic Energy

Financing of Solar Energy Projects in India under JNNSM is proving to be a huge problem for the winners of Phase 1 auction under the federal subsidy scheme.Solar Energy in India has huge potential and attracted a number of companies to the first phase of the government tender under the 2020 plan to install 20 GW of solar energy.Note 620 MW of projects in the 5 MW and above category were awarded to 37 solar companies.Many of these firms had no background and had bid irrationally low to win these projects.With little experience and no established financial infrastructure it was an accident waiting to happen.MNRE offical has revealed that 18 of the companies have failed to achieve financial closure and would probably lose their license by the July 9 deadline.Note most of these bids were irrationally low and would not have made profits.Indian Banks and power financing institutions have refused to lend quite prudently.Note these companies are not putting collateral using their parent company’s assets which means that they too doubt the feasibility of their projects.Only huge penalties will deter future non serious participants as at least half of the solar power capacity won’t get installed in JNNSM Phase 1.It remains to be seen how this affects the future of the Indian Solar Mission.

Only 2 out of the 7 Solar Thermal Project Winners have achieved closure

The Solar Project Bidding was  extremely competitive with discounts of  more than 30% being offered to the base price of RS 15.31 for Solar Thermal generated Electricity.Note Rs 15.31 was determined to be a decent price on which a Solar Thermal Plant Developer could get decent returns just a year ago.Reliance Power,Lanco and KSK Energy has won 100 MW Projects while 4 others have gotten approval for small plants.The smaller winners are Godavari Power,Aurum Renewables,Corporate Ispat and Megha Engineering.Looks like all the small ones will lose their licenses.It means that only 200 MW of the 470 MW of Solar Thermal Projects will get installed .Here is a list of winners of the JNNSM solar projects

Debt Financing of Solar Power in India was a Problem from the Start

Indian Banks Reluctant to Lend to Solar Projects

Indian Banks have raised concerns over lending money to Solar Projects in India.The main problem arises from the fact that State Electricity Boards (SEBs) are counter-parties to the P0wer Purchase Agreements (PPAs) signed by the developers.Most of the State Electricity Distributors are in poor financial shape and have been known to frequently default on their financial obligations.This means that the cash flows of the Solar Project will depend on entities with poor financial reputation.Note the debt financing of the projects is non-recourse which means that Banks have only the Financed Project as collatarel.With the Solar Energy still being almost 3-4 times more expensive than normal Electricity Prices,it means the banks will  suffer a big loss.With almost 70-75% of the estimated $2.2 Billion in the first phase of the PV projects to be financed by debt,this represents a big hurdle for the success of Solar Energy.The government needs to come out with some sort of arrangement of guarantees for the smooth functioning of the Solar Mission and instill confidence amongst investors and Banks.

Half of firms awarded solar projects yet to achieve financial closure

The ministry of new & renewable energy has said half of the 37 firms awarded solar power projects are yet to achieve financial closure and their contracts will be terminated if they miss the July 9 deadline. “Any failure in meeting the deadline would result in forfeiture of bank guarantees,” a senior official in ministry of new & renewable energy said. He said, the ministry has received financial closure details of 17 photovoltaic (PV) and two concentrated solar power (CSP) projects. He declined to name individual developers.Banks and financial institutions say that they would finance projects only on the basis of their viability. “Only 2 CSP companies have approached us. We are funding on the soundness of balance sheet because we are concerned about the return,” said an official from Rural Electrification Corporation , a stateowned lending agency.

“Developers are unwilling to provide collateral security on the main company’s balance sheet”, the official said requesting anonymity.

Offshore Wind Energy to reach Grid Parity only after 2020 like Solar Thermal Power – Advantage Solar Photovoltaic Energy

12 May, 2011
Abengoa,Concentrated Solar Thermal,Offshore Wind,Renewable Energy,Solar Energy,Wind Energy

Offshore Wind Energy is supposed to increase from around  3 GW today to 75 GW by 2020 as countries in Europe,Asia and North America heavily support this industry.Onshore wind energy growth on the other hand is expected to  slow down as 38 GW of Wind Capacity were installed in 2010 with Western Markets showing a sharp slowdown.Note every industry sees costs declining with large capacity except the mature industries.For example Wind Energy has seen a 10% decline in costs for every 100% increase in installed capacity.Note offshore wind projects offer even more Wind Energy Advantages than normal Land Based Wind Farms.The only problem facing offshore wind power is high costs  as the industry still is on the learning curve.PWC has come up with a survey where most of the participants say that it will take 10-15 years for offshore wind energy to reach grid parity.What this means is that Offshore Wind Energy Companies will continue to depend on government subsidies like higher electricity prices,tax breaks,low interest loans to survive.

Total Costs of a Offshore Wind Park

The cost of an offshore wind park can range between $4.5-5.5 per MW which is much higher than land based wind at around $2 million per MW.However the load factors for offshore wind are higher so they compensate somewhat for the higher capital and operating costs for offshore wind energy.Note the PPAs being signed for offshore wind range fro 20-25c/Kwh which is much higher than the 8-10c/Kwh given for onshore wind energy

What the Survey Showed

The average construction cost per megawatt varied among questioned European offshore wind power developers, with 38 percent of survey respondents saying their average cost came to less than $3 million, while 31 percent quoted $4-5 million.But most building contractors and manufacturers of wind farm components asked in the survey expected the cost for construction and turbines to drop in the next five years, making it cheaper to instal new wind farms.

Solar Energy Dropping by almost 10% Every Year compared to Offshore Wind

Solar Energy is the fastest growing renewable energy source because its cost are declining at a rapid pace.Solar Thermal Energy is getting left behind Solar PV with a number of CSP Plants being abandoned and converted to Solar PV Farms.Note Offshore Wind too might get affected if Solar PV costs continue to decline as rapidly as they are doing right now.While Offshore Wind is being heavily supported by European countries,its a matter of time before Solar PV starts making inroads into this Green Energy source as  well.Note Europe with 80% of the world’s offshore wind farms is also home to 80% of the world’s solar energy capacity as well.

Solar Thermal Power will also take almost 10 years to Reach Grid Parity

Abengoa which is a leader amongst Solar Thermal Companies thinks that Solar Thermal Power won’t reach Grid Parity till 2020 and may even take a further 10 years to achieve parity with the fossil fuel  energy sources costs.This makes you wonder if CSP is a technology worth investing in since  Photovoltaic Technology has already reached grid parity in some parts of the world and should reach parity in most parts by 2015.PV Technology has seen a rapid advance in technology and cost cutting over the past few years making the installation cost come down to $3.5-4/watt compared to $6-7/watt for CSP Technology

Offshore wind can shed subsidy in 10-15 years: study

Offshore wind power technology will become economic without state subsidies in 10-15 years’ time, most government bodies said in a survey published on Thursday by consultancy PwC.Nearly half of the government bodies interviewed said they expected offshore wind to survive without subsidies within 10-15 years, while 17 percent of respondents counted on less than 10 years and an equal share thought 15-20 years were needed.

Eighty percent of those who forecast a decrease said costs could drop 10-20 percent.”Nearly all of the developers we surveyed said supply chain capacity constraints are a significant problem for offshore wind construction to such an extent that 82 percent said they create the risk of a seller’s market,” PwC found in its poll.

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