GreenVolts To Build World's Largest CPV Project  

TreeHugger reports that concentrated solar PV company GreenVolts has won a contract with PG&E in California - GreenVolts Grabs $30 M for World's Largest Non-Silicon Photovoltaic Project.

GreenVolts won the Clean Tech Open in 2006. Last year they raised $10 million in Series A funding. This year they’ve raised $30 million in series B funding and signed a power purchase agreement with PG&E for 2 MW of power by 2009. We’d call that great progress. And yet, they only have a few short months to hook up to the grid and eek in just under the wire for the expiration of the renewable energy tax credits and install what they’re expecting to be the world’s largest non-silicon concentrating PV project.

GreenVolts has plans to set up camp on 8 acres of land in Tracy, California. Their technology cuts down land requirements while still producing twice the electricity of traditional solar panels thanks to the use of solar concentration. They use dishes that track the sun across the sky, and concentrate the rays onto small, highly efficient solar cells that can convert nearly 40% of energy into electricity.

GreenVolts indended to raise $100 million with their second round of fundraising, so it’s not clear if what they managed to scrape up will be enough to launch their project, the first phase of which was scheduled to be complete this year. We’re rooting for them, though, because more renewable energy sources are always a welcome sight.

We know how to solve our energy problems and to fight global warming—all we lack is honest, bold leadership. We had better find that leadership quickly, and not just for the sake of bringing down energy prices, but because it's essential to keep our whole economy competitive in a world rapidly moving beyond the dirty fuels of the past.

The first step is making a real investment in energy efficiency. New fuel-efficiency standards for cars and trucks enacted last December are a small step in the right direction, but we can go much further. In fact, if we could get the average American car running at 40 miles per gallon, we could save more than 20 billion barrels of oil, which is more than the oil companies could ever get out of all of the protected offshore areas combined.

With intelligent policies, we could get plug-in hybrids, electric cars and new, clean biofuels to market faster. A 2007 report from NRDC and the Electric Power Research Institute predicts that plug-in hybrids could cut U.S. oil consumption by up to 4 million barrels a day by mid-century, while reducing global warming pollution at the same time. That would be like taking more than 82 million cars off the road.

With intelligent policies, we could clean up the power grid that charges those plug-in hybrids, replacing filthy coal and nuclear power, with its dangerous waste and considerable safety problems, with energy from the wind and the sun, and from advanced biofuels. Just look at what California has been able to do in the realm of solar power and energy efficiency in such a short time. Those same intelligent policies would also bring a flood of investments in clean-energy projects from Wall Street—investments that now stay out of the energy markets because Washington has been unwilling to commit to a clean-energy future for America.