Eric Wesoff: January 14, 2009, 9:23 PM

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Stealthy Skyline Provides Name, Rank and Serial Number

I’ve spoken with the senior management of Skyline Solar a number of times and have yet been able to learn the details of what they’re doing.  We covered their funding non-announcement here.

I had heard good things about Skyline Solar during their funding campaign.  According to investors, the firm was knowledgeable, pragmatic and priced at a reasonable valuation. 

Skyline CEO and founder, Bob MacDonald (formerly employee number three at SolFocus), presented at the Silicon Valley Photovoltaics Society on Wednesday night and gave essentially the same not-too-revealing presentation he gave at the Photon event in December, well covered by Ed Gunther here.

They’re in stealth -- OK, I understand.  But you can’t have it both ways -- if you’re in stealth, why are you presenting to a technical audience?  You need to provide some more information than the main thesis of their talk which boiled down to:

We need to deploy a lot of solar quickly and inexpensively.  And by the way -- we're hiring.

And anytime your presentation is called “Meeting the Terawatt Challenge,� you know you’re in an information-free zone.

Bob spoke and let us know that:

• The principal materials in their system are aluminum and silicon.
• Their modules are 10 times the size of conventional solar panels.
• They use concentration of an unspecified magnitude and single-axis tracking.
• They are “accelerating the path to grid parityâ€?
• They’re going for medium sized installations -- from “large commercial to utilityâ€? size.
• They expect a 10 times reduction in the number of parts per installed MW.
• Their system requires about 5 acres per MW.
• Their pre-assembled reflective frame enables rapid installation.

So, it’s a silicon-based medium concentration PV system, say 10 times, with a simple tracking system that uses reflective aluminum instead of silvered glass.  Customized silicon cells are employed to cope with the increased current density.

Skyline seems to have thought out the challenges of cost and scalability in solar -- let’s hope they provide some more information about their product in the coming months.

An esteemed colleague and energy expert, Mr. Edward Beardsworth of Energy Technology Advisors and The Hub Lab, thinks the firm is doing good things.  But Ed also believes in the constructive application of zero point energy, cold fusion and EEStor.

Ucilia Wang: January 14, 2009, 3:41 PM

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Judge Reviews $2.6M Settlement Regarding Claims That Xcel Oversold Energy Credits

Xcel Energy, the largest utility in Colorado, is trying to settle a case with the state over allegations that it oversold wind energy credits between 2005 and 2007.

An administrative law judge is looking at the $2.6 million proposed settlement, reported the Associated Press.

Colorado’s Public Utilities Commission said Xcel sold more credits for wind energy generation than what it actually produced from wind farms in its Windsource program. The voluntary program allows Xcel’s customers to tag on an extra charge on their utility bills in support of wind energy generation. The program has about 47,000 participants. 

Other utilities in the country have similar programs. The PG&E, for example, has a ClimateSmart program in which customers can pay (about $5 per month for a typical household in Northern California) the utility to support projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The proposed settlement calls for Xcel to fork over $1.6 million in order to lower the fees that program participants will pay in 2009. The utility would spend an additional $1 million to buy renewable energy credits to fulfill a state mandate that requires utilities to buy a certain amount of electricity from renewable sources such as wind or solar.

Xcel sold more credits than what it produced because only two wind farms, with a combined capacity of 60 megawatts, could be used for the program, Xcel spokesman Joe Fuentes told me. 

“We had more demand than we had supply,� Fuentes said.

Obviously, the Colorado PUC and various groups that pointed out the practice and asked for a change didn’t think Xcel had a good excuse.

What Xcel hopes to be able to include all of its wind farms and other types of renewable energy generation in the Windsource program, Fuentes said. The utility has nearly 1.1 gigawatts of wind generation capacity now.

Xcel expects the administrative judge to issue a decision by the end of this month. After that, the utilities commission will review the proposed settlement and make a final decision.

Michael Kanellos: January 14, 2009, 11:10 AM

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Rumor: Applied Materials to Unfurl New Factory-in-a-Box Line Soon

Applied Materials is getting ready to expand its solar equipment lineup.

The company, according to sources, is going to announce a turnkey manufacturing unit for making microcrystalline solar modules this Summer. Microcrystalline solar cells are essentially a step up from traditional amorphous thin film solar cells: They contain an extra layer of material that enhance the efficiency. Amorphous silicon cells tend to sport around a 6 percent to 7 percent efficiency. Microcrystallines can get something like a 9 percent to 10 percent efficiency.

That’s far less than the 18 percent to 22 percent efficiency achieved by classic crystalline solar cells. Microcrystallines, however, are made on less expensive thin film manufacturing lines. Thus, with microcrystalline, you get better efficiency without all the cost.

Rival Oerlikon already sells a turnkey system for these kind of panels. Four customers have already adopted it.

An Applied spokesperson said the company has not made any official announcements or commitments. The company is talking about the possibility, but has not indicated when or if a move into this market might occur.

Oerlikon and Applied are the leaders in the factory-in-a-box segment. In this market, the companies effectively create a manufacturing line for a customer and hand over the keys. Applied has 12 customers that have agreed to set up factories around its amorphous silicon turnkey systems. When you count amorphous and microcrystalline customers, Oerlikon has 10.

Erecting a complete fabrication for a company helps smooth the path toward commercialization by eliminating a good portion of the R&D required to bring a product to market. Intel did something like this in the ‘90s: It would often design PCs or servers for smaller manufacturers to help them get to the market quicker. Applied has also used its technological know-how in semiconductor equipment manufacturing to help Asian chip makers move more rapidly. One joke I heard a few years ago was that the research labs for most Taiwanese companies is located in Santa Clara, Calif., or Applied’s headquarters.

Ucilia Wang: January 14, 2009, 9:18 AM

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What Utilities Want From a Carbon Cap-and-Trade

UPDATED: The U.S. Action Climate Partnership also is offering its take on what the new climate change policy should include. 

American utilities know a new federal emissions cap-and trade program is coming, so they are offering their own ideas about what the program should entail.

The Edison Electric Institute (EEI), which represents the bulk of power producers and retailers, outlined those suggestions Wednesday. Ideas include: cutting emissions to 80 percent below today’s level by 2050 and setting a lower and upper limit for the prices of trading emission allowances.

Regulating pricing would ensure that the cap-and-trade scheme wouldn’t become too costly for its members, the EEI argues. The gap between the lower and upper limits should start small, and grow only as more technologies become available to allow utilities to cut emissions more quickly.

Cost, of course, is a huge concern for utilities. They have no doubt watched the fight put up by Poland and some other European countries in recent months as the European Union worked on tightening its own emissions cap-and-trade program.

A cap and trade program sets limits on how much different types of polluters can emit, and requires those that pollute more than allowed to buy credits from those that emit less than permitted. The idea is to set strict emissions standards so that polluters will be compelled to reduce emissions instead of having to shell out big money to buy allowances.

The European Union started its cap-and-trade program in 2005, and its effectiveness is under debate. Some of the E.U. member countries also are worried that the a stricter emissions mandate would hurt their industries’ competitive edge especially when the global economy is in poor health.

The EEI’s call for reducing emissions to 80 percent below the current levels by 2050 is more lenient than what President-elect Barack Obama has advocated. The new president’s energy platform, outlined during the election, calls for reducing emissions to 80 percent below the 1990 levels by 2050.

The organization also wants the new cap-and-trade program to allocate 40 percent of the initial allowances to the electric power industry, which it says generates 40 percent of the emissions in the country.

The EEI says that while it favors a cap-and-trade program, it also would consider supporting a carbon tax or a hybrid program.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Climate Action Partnership (USCAP) is due to unveil its own suggestions for what to include in the climate change legislation (which would include the cap-and-trade program). The Wall Street Journal's Environmental Capital blog got to review the USCAP's ideas in advance. The group is made up of large energy, car and chemical companies such as PG&E, General Electric and Dow Chemical. The Nature Conservancy and the National Wildlife Federation also are members. 

Among other things, the USCAP wants the government to give away a big portion of emissions allowances for free to major polluters. It also wants a pricing floor for trading the allowances, and that should be $10 per ton. The group believes when you start at this price, you will give those big polluters incentives to cut emissions.