Google and SolarCity are building clean energy....

Today's post: Wednesday, 6-15-2010

We need an 80% reduction in fossil fuel use by 2050 to avoid the worst global warming effects.

And, practically speaking, we need to also double our electricity generation and double the useful work done per unit of electricity & other energy sources as well during that same time to have a decent economy.

At some point, the oil that we’ve been using to power much of our economy will begin to run low enough that our world economy will shrink due to lack of supply or excessive costs or both. Kuwaiti scientists recently predicted peak oil in 2014 – just 3 years from now.

And, once the demand for oil picks up again with the apparent economic recovery or supply begins to plateau or drop, the prices will again go back up. That will cause more hard times economically unless we have enough alternative sources of energy to turn to.

Today’s post:

Google and SolarCity are building clean energy....

Between the two companies, Google and SolarCity have invested several hundred million dollars to well over a billion dollars in bringing clean energy sources online.

These two companies were in the news together in the past few days.

SAN MATEO, Calif. & MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)—

June 14, 2011 09:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time

SolarCity® and Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), today announced the creation of a new $280 million fund to finance residential solar projects. The Google-backed fund is the first collaboration between the Internet giant and the nation’s leading solar power and energy efficiency service provider, and represents Google’s largest investment to date in the clean energy sector.

The fund is SolarCity’s largest project financing fund and the largest residential solar fund created in the U.S.

SolarCity has now created 15 project funds with seven different partners to finance $1.28 billion in solar projects.

(Homeowners who desire to have solar photovoltaic panels on their home but do not have several thousand dollars in one chunk to have them installed far outnumber those who would break even or better if they could finance the installation. That’s because many months of the year the monthly payment will be less than the savings on the bill for electricity from their utility.

SolarCity is literally installing five times as much solar with these partnerships with companies like Google backing up their financing. Note that they have 6 other such partners in addition to this new deal with Google.)

(Sungevity of Oakland, CA also finances solar installations in addition to giving you an accurate quote based on satellite views of your house. I don’t know how they back their financing. But as we recently posted Lowe’s home improvement stores are beginning to sell Sungevity’s service in their over 1700 locations!)

In addition to these increases in local and near or connected to local transmission grid photovoltaic sources of electricity or distributed generation, Google and its founders and just previous CEO have invested and will invest in many other kinds of clean energy technology, companies, and kinds of sources.

For example:

From http://googlegreenblog.blogspot.com :

"We believe the world needs a wide range of clean energy options in the future, each serving different needs. We’ve already invested in several large-scale renewable energy projects, so we’re excited that this new partnership with SolarCity helps people power their homes directly with solar energy, too. We think “distributed” renewable energy (generated and used right at home) is a smart way to use solar photovoltaic (PV) technology to improve our power system since it helps avoid or alleviate distribution constraints on the traditional electricity grid.

Our investment is a quadruple-win for Google, SolarCity, its new customers and the environment. We continue to look for other renewable energy investments that make business sense and help develop and deploy cleaner sources of energy. Whether harnessing the sun on rooftops like Michael’s or in the desert sands of the Mojave, it’s all part of building a clean energy future.

Posted by Rick Needham, Director of Green Business Operations"

From: http://www.google.com/green/collaborations/support-innovations.html :

"To date, we’ve invested over $350 million in innovative clean energy companies and projects through Google.org, Google Ventures and Google corporate investments.

Through Google.org we’ve supported cleantech companies with scalable and potentially breakthrough technologies that could produce renewable energy cheaper than coal.

At Google Ventures, we look for passionate entrepreneurs who are excited about building disruptive companies that address a range of market and technical problems in this sector and beyond.

And recently, we’ve made project investments that offer a solid return on investment and could have a transformational impact on the sector, such as:

A $280 million investment to create a fund, in partnership with SolarCity, to help the company finance more solar installations across the country. This is our first investment in "distributed" renewable energy (generated and used right at home). We believe our investment is a quadruple-win for Google, SolarCity, the environment, and new customers who get access to clean energy at a economic rates.

Providing $55 million to finance part of the Alta Wind Energy Center (AWEC), a new wind installation being built in several phases to generate combined 1,550 MW -- enough to power 450,000 homes. It'll use some of the first transmission lines being developed specifically to transport renewable energy from remote areas to major population centers.

A $5 million investment in a solar photovoltaic power plant near Berlin, Germany – our first investment in Europe. The 18.65MW facility will provide clean energy to more than 5,000 households.

A $168 million investment in BrightSource Energy's Ivanpah solar power tower plant in the Mojave Desert in California, one of the world's largest solar energy projects. Ivanpah will deploy a compelling clean energy technology and produce 392MW of energy, enough to take 90,000 cars off the road during the lifetime of the plant.

An approximately $100 million investment in the Shepherds Flat Wind Farm, anticipated to be the largest in the world. When completed in 2012, Shepherds Flat will produce 845MW of energy -- enough to power more than 235,000 homes.

An investment in the critical development stage of a project to build a transmission backbone off the mid-Atlantic coast to accelerate offshore wind development, with the potential to connect 6,000MW of wind, enough to serve 1.9 million households.

A $38.8 million investment in two North Dakota wind farms that generate 169.5 megawatts (MW), enough to power 55,000 homes. These wind farms uses some of the latest wind turbine technology and control systems to provide one of the lowest-cost sources of renewable energy to the local grid."

So Google, through these investments, has now invested in distributed photovoltaic solar generation of electricity.

They’ve invested in a large solar thermal farm to generate electicity.

And, they’ve invested in wind generated electricity.

The local paper added that they are looking at investing in geothermal power also and that their google.org investments in clean energy technology have totaled $45 million.

In addition, Google’s founders invested in Nanosolar which uses a rolled printing approach and a fast and easy installation method to install thin film solar cells at a low cost per kilowatt hour of electricity.

More recently, their just previous CEO, Eric Schmidt, invested in Amprius which looks to have a technology allowing for batteries for electric cars that store enough more electricity to be lighter or go farther on a charge or both.

We need a 100 times more such efforts soon. But even so, these things do help keep optimism alive. And, they are helping build the multiple part foundation we must have for a clean energy economy.