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AMERICAN We are a public company and have our headquarters and factory here in the U.S. 508.357.2221 www.evergreensolar.com ST_1.4 PUBLISHED BY SOLAR THE AMERICAN SOLAR ENERGY SOCIETY United States Section of the International Solar Energy Society TODAY® Features VOL. 17, NO. 1 Angus Duncan JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2003 32 28 24 Warren Gretz, NREL Robb Williamson Drew Gillett 36 Consumers Go Solar On Our Cover 24 Bringing Solar Into the Mainstream The Solar Decathlon, a solar home design and construction competition for college students, drew an estimated 100,000 visitors and a great deal of media interest. by Stuart Price 28 Buying Green Power—You Really Can Make a Difference Regardless of where you live, you can purchase green power to encourage greater use of renewable energy technologies. by Blair Swezey and Lori Bird 32 Demonstrating a Sustainable Path The Philip Merrill Environmental Center of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation Lynn M. Lickteig serves as a model of sustainable development and a demonstration project for Zeke Yewdall (left), a student in the resource protection/restoration, environmental advocacy and education. College of Engineering and Applied by Alex Wilson Science at the University of Colorado at “Back to Boulder and Glenn Cashmore (right) a 36 Solar Heat in Snow Country the Future” student in the College of Architecture feature and Planning at the University of In our Back to the Future offering for this issue, an active solar Colorado at Denver, join Assistant heating system designed by the late Harry Thomason provides two-thirds Professor Julee Herdt, faculty advisor for the Architecture team, in front of their of the space heating for the Pinnacle Road U.S. Customs border station in house, which took first place in the Solar Richford, Vermont, on the U.S.-Canadian border. Decathlon. by Nick Pine January/February 2003 3 PUBLISHED BY SOLAR THE AMERICAN SOLAR ENERGY SOCIETY United States Section of the International Solar Energy Society TODAY® Contents VOL. 17, NO. 1 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2003 Columns 7 Chair’s Corner: Revisiting “Jaws” by Mike Nicklas 9 From the Editor: Voting with Our Dollars by Maureen McIntyre 14 View from Washington: What Now? by Joel B. Stronberg 20 Doctor PV: Solar Marketing—Quality Customer Service Is Priceless by Mark McCray, Ph.D. 22 Solar Industry Trends: Transportation Bill—A New Market for Solar 54 by Glenn Hamer In Our Next Issue 46 Energy Policy News: Crash Programs and Renewable Energy by Frank N. Laird, Ph.D. In developing countries, governments and non-governmental organizations are 48 Investing in Clean Energy: Investing in Wind by Rona Fried providing energy services with distrib- uted renewable energy systems rather 52 Small Wind Systems: On Intimate Terms With a Wind Generator than going to the expense of extending by Mick Sagrillo the utility grid. In our next issue, we’ll report on some of these projects and 54 Wind Energy News: Dispersed Generation Benefits Farmers the economic, social and environmental by Kathy Belyeu impacts on local populations. 62 Readers Forum: Holding Government to Corporate Standards by Scott Sklar SOLAR TODAY is a member benefit for the following organizations: Departments 10 Letters to the Editor 12 ASES News 56 Interstate Renewable Energy Council 16 Chapter News P.O. Box 1156 Latham, New York 12110-1156 42 Resources (518) 458-6059 (phone & fax) 50 New Products e-mail: [email protected] web site: www.irecusa.org 56 Education News 57 Industry News 60 Advertisers Index 61 Calendar Solar Energy Industries Association 1616 H Street, NW, 8th Floor Printed on recycled paper Washington, DC 20006 with vegetable ink. SOLAR TODAY web site: www.solartoday.org (202) 628-7745 e-mail: [email protected] web site: www.seia.org Articles appearing in this journal are indexed in Environmental Periodicals Bibliography and ArchiText Construction Index, web site: www.afsonl.com. January/February 2003 5 hundreds of megawatts of operating sys- Chair’s Corner tems and incredible promise. It is difficult to understand the rationale behind elimi- nating support for CSP. Another technology that lost favor early on was daylighting. Today, retrofitting sim- Revisiting “Jaws” ple daylighting strategies into our build- ings could reduce energy demand by three- quarters of a quad. And the savings possi- n 1990, the U.S. consumed about 83 what went wrong and fix it. If EIA’s older ble over the next twenty years from well- Iquads of energy. In September 1990, “business-as-usual” numbers hold, by 2030 designed daylighting systems in new build- Michael Davis—then Assistant Secretary energy demand will double and carbon ings—with paybacks of less than two to for Energy Efficiency and Renewable dioxide emissions will reach 3240 million three years—is conservatively estimated Energy (EERE) at the U.S. Department of metric tons. to be in excess of an additional quarter of a Energy (DOE)—addressed attendees at an The reason the contribution from renew- quad. Excluding all the existing contribu- ASES Roundtable. In his remarks, Davis able energy technologies has not followed tions from daylighting, that amounts to one explained that if U.S. energy consumption Davis’ trajectory is that the renewable ener- quad of potential. Here is a technology that patterns continued unchecked, consump- gy research and development budget that can reduce a building’s daytime lighting tion would grow to alarming levels—100 was a key element of his scenario never demand by two-thirds, cut cooling loads by quads by 2000, in excess of 130 quads in materialized. The lack of consistent con- a quarter, increase the productivity and 2010 and 206 quads by 2030. gressional and presidential support has pro- improve the health of the occupants, pay for Assistant Secretary Davis, a Reagan duced predictable results—near-market itself in a couple of years and reduce U.S. appointee, stressed the importance of technologies have been delayed and many energy demand by 1 percent. What a EERE research and development (R&D) previously funded technologies (because missed opportunity. and the role DOE could play in stimulating of DOE’s resultant strategy to eliminate One could certainly argue that because the renewable energy market. He sug- support and focus on fewer and fewer tech- daylighting is such a great investment for gested that our country’s goal should be to nologies) never advanced. As it stands building owners it doesn’t need support. restrict growth in energy demand to less today, even if the remaining funded tech- From a system cost subsidy standpoint, I than 1 percent per year while simultane- nologies are successful, it is unlikely that would agree. ously increasing the use of energy effi- we could achieve 38 percent renewable But from a practical standpoint, unless ciency and renewable energy tech- energy by 2030. all the technological barriers are under- nologies. stood and addressed, we won’t come In this scenario—which he enthusi- close to realizing daylighting’s poten- astically referred to as “jaws”—the U.S. tial. In fact, we could actually be hurt would implement strategies intended more than helped. Good daylighting, to hold consumption to the Energy simply put, is more design than product. Information Administration’s (EIA’s) Good daylighting requires well-trained “Conservation Strategy” levels. This designers and accurate design tools that meant consumption would amount to can integrate continually changing day- 108 quads in 2030 and the government lighting conditions into energy models. would fund the R&D efforts necessary Although demand for daylighting is to raise the contribution of renewable at an all-time high, the tools and skills do energy technologies to 20 percent in not exist within the design community to 2010, 28 percent in 2020 and 38 percent meet this demand. The result is that in 2030. He felt that we could cut ener- there are too many “daylit” buildings gy consumption in buildings, industries being designed that actually increase and transportation by 30 percent and, energy consumption. With just a little through “accelerated renewable R&D,” help, the benefit could be enormous. achieve this objective. Mike Nicklas We would be much further ahead today The EIA’s current projections, if DOE had not pulled back its support released this year, indicate that by 2005— Renewables can reach this level of con- of passive solar and daylighting technolo- three years from now—energy consump- tribution, but not if funding is concentrated gies more than a decade ago. But it’s not tion in the U.S. will reach 108 quads—25 on just a couple of technologies. To most too late to do something about it now. years ahead of Michael Davis’ “jaws” strat- cost-effectively achieve this goal, we must Over the years, DOE has dropped many egy. With our 2000 consumption at 99.3 be committed to a more comprehensive promising technologies that, if support had quads, we have clearly not implemented strategy that captures the benefits of all continued, would have resulted in a radi- the necessary strategies to either control our promising renewable energy tech- cally different energy and environmental demand or increase the use of renewable nologies.