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The Southwest desert's real estate boom

From California to Arizona, demand for sites for solar power projects has ignited a land grab

Solar energy properties are scrambling to lock up desert land like the Mormon Mesa in Nevada.

An FPL solar power plant in the Californian Mojave. Laws requiring renewable-energy development will mean that many more are built, but environmentalists concerned about protecting the habitats of endangered species are torn.

(Fortune Magazine) -- Doug Buchanan grins with relief when he sees the carcasses. He has just driven up a steep dirt road onto a vast, sunbaked mesa overlooking the Mojave Desert in western Nevada. There, a few feet from the trail, lie the corpses of two steers. A raven perches on one, the only object more than three feet above the ground on this pancake-flat plateau. Cattle, dead or alive, qualify as good news in Buchanan's line of work. If cattle are present, that means grazing is permitted, and that in turn means that this land is most likely not protected habitat for the desert tortoise.

Buchanan, 53, is scouting sites for a solar power company called BrightSource Energy, an Oakland-based startup backed by Google (GOOG, Fortune 500) and Morgan Stanley (MS, Fortune 500). The blunt, fifth-generation Californian, who used to survey the same area for natural-gas power sites, knows that the presence of an endangered species such as the tortoise could derail BrightSource's plans to build a multibillion-dollar solar energy plant on the mesa.

BrightSource badly wants these 20 square miles of federal land on what is called Mormon Mesa. The company was in such a hurry to stake its claim with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management that it applied for a lease sight unseen. That's an expensive gamble for a startup, given that application fees alone run in the six figures. "I usually like to go out and kick the tires before filing a claim," Buchanan says, "but there's a lot of competitive pressure these days to move fast."

That's putting it mildly. A solar land rush is rolling across the desert Southwest. Goldman Sachs, utilities PG&E and FPL, Silicon Valley startups, Israeli and German solar firms, Chevron, speculators - all are scrambling to lock up hundreds of thousands of acres of long-worthless land now coveted as sites for solar power plants.

The race has barely begun - finished plants are years away - but it's blazing fastest in the Mojave, where the federal government controls immense stretches of some of the world's best solar real estate right next to the nation's biggest electricity markets. Just 20 months ago only five applications for solar sites had been filed with the BLM in the California Mojave. Today 104 claims have been received for nearly a million acres of land, representing a theoretical 60 gigawatts of electricity. (The entire state of California currently consumes 33 gigawatts annually.)

It's not just a federal-land grab either. Buyers are also vying for private property. Some are paying upwards of $10,000 an acre for desert dirt that a few years ago would have sold for $500.

No doubt the prospect of potential riches is overheating expectations. But California and surrounding states have mandated massive increases in renewable energy in the next few years. That has led some experts at Emerging Energy Research of Cambridge, Mass., to predict that Big Solar could be a $45 billion market by 2020.

Meanwhile, the land rush is setting the stage for a showdown between solar investors and those who want to protect a fragile environment that is home to the desert tortoise and other rare critters. The Southwest is on the cusp of what could be a green revolution. And the biggest obstacle of all may be ... environmentalists.

***

Over the past year a parade of executives bearing land claims have made the trek to a stucco BLM office just off the interstate in the dusty city of Needles, Calif., a 110-mile drive south from Las Vegas. (It's the town where the late "Peanuts" cartoonist, Charles M. Schulz, briefly lived as a boy; in the comic strip, Snoopy's brother Spike is a resident.) The Bush administration has instructed the BLM to facilitate renewable-energy projects (along with nonrenewable ones). But Sterling White, the BLM's earnest Needles field manager, is also concerned about what could happen if they transform the Mojave into a collection of giant power stations. "One of our biggest challenges is the cumulative impact of these projects," he says.

Nearly 80% of the land that White's office oversees is federally protected wilderness or endangered-species habitat. That leaves about 700,000 acres for solar power plants, only some of which are near transmission lines. Land leases are handed out on a first-come, first-served basis, but White is also supposed to weed out speculators from genuine solar developers based on loose criteria such as who is negotiating with utilities and who is applying for state power licenses. White has yet to approve a single lease, but he has summarily rejected four because they lie in protected-species habitat.

***

Solar prospectors tend to be as secretive about their land as forty-niners were about the veins of gold they discovered. Most bids are placed by limited-liability corporations with opaque names that conceal their ownership. And no one has been as quick to move into the Mojave - or as tightlipped about it - as Solar Investments.

That entity, it turns out, is Goldman Sachs's (GS, Fortune 500) solar subsidiary. The investment bank's designs on the desert are a topic of intense interest and speculation. Goldman declined to comment. But here's what we know:

Solar Investments filed its first land claim in December 2006 and within a month had applied for more than 125,000 acres for power plants that would produce ten gigawatts of electricity. Many of the sites lie close to the transmission lines that connect the desert to coastal cities. (Goldman has also staked claims on 40,000 acres of the Nevada desert.) **

Nobody expects Goldman to begin operating solar plants. It will probably either partner with another developer or sell its limited-liability company (and its leases) outright. The firm has been making the rounds of solar developers. "The conversation's been pretty wide-ranging, primarily as an investor interested in financing deals," says one solar energy executive approached by Goldman. "But there's clearly an element of interest in our technology." Goldman has requested permission to install meteorological equipment on its sites and is evaluating "competing technologies, including solar dish systems, power towers, and large-scale photovoltaic arrays," according to a letter Goldman sent to the BLM in August 2007.

NEXT: The desert boom (pg. 2)

China Solar Energy Industry Research And Forecast For 2008-2010

SOLAR DAILY

China Solar Energy Industry Research And Forecast For 2008-2010

China is the biggest solar water heater producer and consumer in the world. Both her output and consumption of solar water heaters account for over a half of the world total. Research shows that 58.52% of Chinese households have the intention of buying solar water heaters or replacing their gas/electric heaters with solar ones in five years' time. It is estimated that, by 2010, with 70 million square meters more of solar water heaters to be installed before then, the overall area of solar water heaters installed in China will reach 100 million square meters, amounting to a market capacity of 60 billion RMB.

by Staff Writers
Dublin, Ireland (SPX) Jan 07, 2008
Research and Markets has announced the addition of China Solar Energy Industry Research and Forecast, 2008-2010 to their offering. Solar is one of the fastest growing energy technologies in the global economy and in the cleantech universe. As is envisioned by the U.S. space program, future solar energy power plants will be placed on an orbit of about 6,000 km above the earth, from which electricity will be transmitted back to the earth by way of microwaves or laser beans.

If this plan comes to fruition, utilization of solar energy will no longer be subjected to such forces as the coming of nights and weather changes. Compared with other energies like coal and petroleum, solar energy is infinite and inexhaustible. It is also a type of clean energy that causes no environmental pollution.

Therefore, it will have an immeasurable impact on the future of human race.

Commercial development of solar energy has become a worldwide trend: The European Union, Japan and the United States have focused their energy supply security on the development of renewable energy resources such as solar energy. It is estimated that by 2030 solar energy-generated power will account for over ten percent of total global power supply, and that figure will rise to twenty percent in 2050. Large-scale development and exploitation of solar energy will help it to take up its due market share in energy supply.

Photovoltaic energy production that is combined to the grid is the major means for large-scale and commercial use of solar energy.

China is expected to emerge as one of the greatest solar energy production bases in the world after 2008. Certain fundamental conditions are already in place in China for the large scale development and exploitation of solar energy. These conditions include China's huge potential domestic market and solid resource foundation. Besides, China's solar energy industry has already taken shape, and progress has been made in technological development and innovation.

Solar energy becomes the new hope for China's energy resources: Given the recurrent oil and coal price spikes as well as the power shortages nationwide, energy is increasingly having a bottleneck effect on China's economy. This brings new opportunities for the development of solar energy.

The cost of generating electricity out of solar energy will come close to or even become lower than that of power generation by coal in the near future, making it possible for China to conduct vigorous development of solar energy. China's solar energy industry, having been nurtured in the domestic market for over ten years, is fully launched by now, and it has gained momentum for rapid development in the future.

China is the biggest solar water heater producer and consumer in the world. Both her output and consumption of solar water heaters account for over a half of the world total. Research shows that 58.52% of Chinese households have the intention of buying solar water heaters or replacing their gas/electric heaters with solar ones in five years' time. It is estimated that, by 2010, with 70 million square meters more of solar water heaters to be installed before then, the overall area of solar water heaters installed in China will reach 100 million square meters, amounting to a market capacity of 60 billion RMB.

The annual growth rate in the coming years will be maintained at 20 to 30 percent, which means that solar energy industry in China will become a genuine green "gold mine." If a quarter of the Chinese population use solar water heaters, China's solar energy market in 2020 will be projected to reach 270 million square meters. And this is the target the Chinese government is working at. Investment in solar water heater industry is worthwhile.

Our solar water heater industry starts with a very thin basis, but it has been expanding ever since its launch. Currently, the sales volume of solar water heaters in China is ten times that in Europe. Whether it is measured in terms of output or number of solar water heaters sold domestically, China ranks No. 1 in the world. Solar water heaters are also being applied and adapted to a wider range of uses and purposes in our country, so solar energy has a very bright future here.

At present, there are about 28,000 villages in China, or 7 million households and 30 million rural people, that have not yet had access to electricity, and 60% of the counties that have access are in great shortage of it. Most of these powerless areas, rich in solar energy resources, possess a huge market potential for photovoltaic energy production. Such being the case, Chinese government plans to exploit the rich photovoltaic energy and provide electricity for remote areas before 2010. Since 2005, China has begun large-scale construction of desert power plants and rooftop photovoltaic systems combined to the grid.

The market share of photovoltaic energy is expected to grow from 4 percent in 2003 to 20 percent in 2010 and to 60 percent in 2020. Most solar energy enterprises pursue the mode of photovoltaic electricity generation, which is one of the fastest growing industries in the world. It is also the industry that generates the greatest profits among all renewable resource industries. Solar cell industry investment trends: Currently, China's solar energy industry has already developed a power generation capacity of 15 MW. Meanwhile, quite solid a foundation has also been laid for the photovoltaic electricity generation industry.

Though the cost of photovoltaic generated electricity is still higher than coal-generated electricity, it is nevertheless an advantage in remote areas. As it does not incur the cost of fixing power wires in these areas, small solar energy generators are comparably cheaper and more applicable. Herein lies the reason for both the popularity and prosperity of solar cell industry in recent years.

Be it the photovoltaic industry or the solar water heater industry, the future trend will be the development of the technique of integrating solar energy utilization with construction.

The solar energy power generation industry is free from the worries involved in sales. The world solar energy market is obviously a seller's market, where demand is much larger than the supply. It is reported that major Chinese solar energy enterprises including Taiwan's Motech, Wuxi's Suntech Power, Yingli Green Energy and Sunoasis from Xinjiang Uigur Autonomous Region have been running at full capacity, receiving orders that have to be put off well after 2007.

Scope of the report:

-- New energy resource usage in the world and China

-- Solar energy industry basic status analysis (including leading public companies' analysis)

-- Chinese solar energy photovoltaic utilization development analysis

-- Chinese solar heating usage analysis (mainly Chinese solar water heater industry analysis)

-- Solar energy and construction

-- Solar energy industry market investment and development trends (including investment risk analysis, key enterprise analysis, market analysis and investment advice, and industry development trends)

-- 73 detailed charts

In the Beijing 2008 Olympics, there will be solar panels to help light the Olympic grounds! Green is the future!

Ausra's Las Vegas solar thermal plant comes online

Solar thermal company Ausra on Monday opened aLas Vegas factory meant to produce enough equipment each year to provide 700 megawatts of power.

The 130,000-square-foot facility is designed to manufacture massive mirrors and absorber tubes, employing 50 workers and leading to the creation of 1,400 construction jobs at solar sites.

Ausra makes utility-scale solar equipment that it says costs 30 percent to 40 percent less than photovoltaics. Its compact fresnel reflectors use relatively small amounts of steel and the same kind of glass used in building construction, according to Ausra.

"We're ready to respond now with a clean, reliable, and cost-competitive energy choice that will be an economic development machine for the country," Ausra CEO Robert Fishman said in a statement. Developers in southern Nevada are planning more than $50 billion worth of solar installations, he added.

Ausra's solar thermal reflectors at an Australian plant are near the bottom of this image.

(Credit: Ausra)

Companies seeking to install giant solar farms (click here for photos) are targeting the sunny southwestern United States and southern California.

"This facility will help position our state as the premiere place to invest in these new technologies," Nevada Sen. Harry Reid said in a statement.

Nevada's Nellis Air Force Base features a 14-megawatt solar plant.

Ausra and Pacific Gas and Electric unveiled a power purchase agreement last fall for a 177-megawatt solar thermal power plant for California meant to provide enough power for some 120,000 homes.

Funders of Ausra include Khosla Ventures and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. The company started in Australia but now has headquarters in Palo Alto, Calif., and has declared the aim to go public by 2010.

Unlike photovoltaics, which convert light energy to electricity, solar thermal systems harness thermal energy. With Ausra's technology, solar heat from compact Fresnel reflectors boils water in pipes, creating steam. The steam turns a steam turbine, generating electricity that's supposed to be competitive with prices from natural gas power plants.

There's no shortage of competition among solar-thermal start-ups.

eSolar, based in Pasadena, Calif., said on June 3 it will build 245 megawatts' worth of plants for Southern California Edison.

Schott, of Germany, inaugurated a factory near Seville, Spain in May, and broke ground for a plant in New Mexico in March.

BrightSource, based in Oakland, Calif., contracted with PG&E in March to build 500 megawatts of solar thermal equipment for California.

Israel's Solel announced in May two contracts to supply solar receivers for 11 Spanish power plants set to provide a total of 500 megawatts.

In Hawaii, Sopogy is experimenting with rooftop-ready, micro-solar thermal installations.

12 New Solar America Cities Earn $200,000 Grants

DENVER, Colorado, March 31, 2008 (ENS) - Twelve cities have been selected to become Solar America Cities that will receive federal grant funding and technical help to install solar technologies.

Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman announced Friday that the federal government will make available up to $2.4 million to the 12 cities, which he says were chosen for their commitment and comprehensive approach to the deployment of solar technologies and the development of sustainable solar infrastructures.

"These Solar America Cities aim to jumpstart integration of solar power and encourage other cities across the nation to follow suit," Secretary Bodman said, making the announcement at the New Frontiers in Energy Summit 2008 in Denver.

Denver is one of the 12 cities that will be one of the Solar America Cities along with the Texas cities of Houston and San Antonio; and the California cities of Sacramento, San Jose, and Santa Rosa.

The other cities selected are - Knoxville, Tennessee; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota; Orlando, Florida; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Seattle, Washington.

Workers intall solar panels on the Colorado Governor's Mansion in Denver. (Photo by David Parsons courtesy NREL)

Colorado Governor Bill Ritter today congratulated Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper and the city. "This national award recognizes Denver's greening efforts to reduce greenhouse gases and incorporate clean, renewable sources of power," the governor said. "The Solar America grant will further stimulate our renewable energy industry, protect our natural environment, increase our energy security and advance Colorado's New Energy Economy."

"This award is a great honor for Denver," Mayor Hickenlooper said. "It affirms all that our City team and our community have accomplished under our Greenprint Denver action agenda, and it provides funding for us to accomplish even more."

Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels said today that Seattle will leverage the $200,000 federal grant with $200,000 in local funds to promote the development of a sustainable solar energy infrastructure.

"Climate change is a very real threat to the future of our city and our planet. We must expand our options for clean, renewable power. Developing solar energy as a reliable power source will do just that," said Nickels, who launched the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement in 2005.

More than 800 other U.S. cities encompassing 79 million Americans, now have committed to enacting policies and programs to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Seattle's partners in developing itself as a Solar America city are Northwest Sustainable Energy for Economic Development, SEED, and the Washington State Department of Community, Trade and Economic Development.

"Northwest SEED is excited to work with the city to overcome the barriers to widespread deployment of solar energy," said Executive Director Jennifer Grove. "We look forward to demonstrating a community-based approach to meet Seattle's clean energy needs."

Each city will receive $200,000 from the Department of Energy. Combined with industry cost share and funding from each city, total investment in all 12 cities is estimated at $12.1 million.

Cities selected are geographically diverse and have varying degrees of solar resources and experience with solar technologies. Each city will adopt a variety of approaches to building up their solar infrastructure and deploying cutting-edge technologies.

The technologies include industrial strength projects such as concentrating solar power and large-scale solar thermal technology as well as individual applications such as solar water heating, and solar photovoltaic panels that turn sunlight directly into electricity.

"The innovative programs already underway in each city will help us raise the bar of what's possible, and will help cities and towns across America harness the tremendous potential of the Sun," Bodman said.

Subject to appropriation of the funds by Congress, the Energy Department will provide $3 million worth of technical assistance to the newly named Solar America Cities. Technical experts would help cities integrate solar technologies into energy planning, zoning and facilities; streamline local regulations and practices that affect solar adoption by residents and businesses; present solar financing options; and promote solar technology among residents and local businesses through outreach, curriculum development, and incentive programs.

The 12 new Solar America Cities join the 13 cities that were selected last year - Ann Arbor, Michigan; Austin, Texas; Boston, Massachusetts; Madison, Wisconsin; New Orleans, Louisiana; New York City; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Portland, Oregon; Salt Lake City, Utah; Tucson, Arizona; and three California cities - Berkeley, San Diego, and San Francisco.

The Solar America Cities First Annual Meeting is set for April 14 to 16 in sunny Tucson, Arizona.

First EU Commercial Concentrating Solar Power Tower Opens in Spain

SEVILLE, Spain, March 30, 2007 (ENS) - Europe's first commercial concentrating solar power plant was inaugurated today near the sunny southern Spanish city of Seville.

The 11 megawatt, MW, plant was inaugurated in the presence of the heads of the regional government of Andalusia and executives of the solar company Abengoa, whose parent company, Solucar, built the power plant.

The power plant in the municipality of Sanlucar la Mayor, 25 kilometers (15 miles) west of Seville, took more than four years to build, from July 1, 2001 to December 31, 2005.

Known as PS10, the project produces electricity with 624 large movable mirrors called heliostats.

Each of the mirrors has a surface measuring 120 square meters (1,290 square feet) that concentrates the Sun's rays to the top of a 115 meter (377 foot) high tower where a solar receiver and a steam turbine are located. The turbine drives a generator, producing electricity.

PS10 is the first of a set of solar electric power generation plants to be constructed in the same area that will total more than 300 MW by 2013. Power generation will be accomplished using a variety of technologies.

The first two power plants to be brought into operation at Sanlucar la Mayor are the PS10, the world's first tower technology solar thermoelectric power plant constructed for commercial operation, and Sevilla PV, the largest low concentration system photovoltaic plant in Europe.

The EU's first commercial concentrating solar power tower near Seville, Spain (Photo courtesy Abengoa)

When completed in the year 2013, the Sanlucar la Mayor Solar Platform will produce enough energy to cover the consumption of some 180,000 homes, equivalent to the needs of the city of Seville, using the concentrating solar power plant and other technologies.

Partly financed with European Union funds, the entire project requires an investment of 1.2 billion euro. The investment required to build the concentrating solar power plant amounted to €35 million, with a contribution of €5 million from the EU's Fifth Framework Programme for research, awarded for the project's innovative approach.

"These new technologies give Europe a new option to combat climate change and increase energy security while strengthening the competitiveness of the European industrial sector and creating jobs and growth," said Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs.

Concentrating solar power plants have few environmental impacts other than land use. They produce no environmental contaminants or greenhouse gases.

When complete, the Sanlucar la Mayor Solar Platform will prevent the emission of more than 600,000 metric tons of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year. These emissions would have resulted from burning fossil fuels to supply electricity to the 180,000 homes that will be served by the Solar Platform.

The need for concentrating solar power technology like PS10 arises because solar radiation reaches the Earth’s surface with a density that is adequate for heating systems but not for an efficient thermodynamic cycle for electricity production, Piebalgs explains.

The potential contribution of concentrating solar power plants to a more sustainable energy system has still to be fully exploited.

The EU has been supporting the concentrating solar power sector for more than 10 years, spending some €25 million to research projects working to develop this technology.

Piebalgs says this contribution has had a multiplying effect by leveraging a large amount of additional private investment worth several hundred million euro, in a ratio of about €10 for each euro invested by the European Union research program.

Also today, the European Commission published a map of the solar power potential of Europe. The map is produced by the Photovoltaic Geographical Information System of the Joint Research Centre which also includes an interactive service allowing users to calculate the solar power potential of any location in Europe.

The information in the map shows that an identical solar system will generate twice as much energy in sunny areas of Europe, such as Malta and Southern Spain, than in areas such as Scotland or northern Scandinavia.

The interactive information service map allows very specific calculation of the amount of energy that can be generated in any given location in Europe and its neighboring regions. This calculation is based on knowledge of the Sun's energy, geographic distribution, the different terrain across Europe and detailed technological analysis of the available photovoltaic technologies.

The map shows that considerable potential exists in Europe for greater use of solar energy. The EU is seeking to increase the share of renewable energies in its consumption to 20 percent in 2020.

Abengoa now is open for business in the United States. The $3 billion diversified energy company responsible for the Sanlucar la Mayor solar platform has created Solucar Power, Inc., a new U.S. subsidiary that will handle market development in solar energy.

Solucar Power Inc. will respond to utility requests for electricity using concentrating solar power technologies.