Today, the important link between solar use in the home and energy conservation and efficiency is being lost. While many well-intentioned system integrators preach the virtues of energy efficiency, grid connected solar by its very nature does not necessitate a rigorous assessment of the trade offs between a larger system and investments in energy efficiency.

December 5, 2006 Total Market World PV 1,500-2,000 MW/yr $11-14 billion/yr Growth: 20-40%/yr Major Markets Germany: 600-750 MW/yr; $4-5 billion/yr … Read more

Solar Office. Solar powered office building in Schonau, southern Germany.

Alt captured that rebellious spirit in his inspiring tale of the small town of Schönau and how residents built a solar utility in the deep recesses of Germany’s Schwartzwald–the Black Forest of legend. The story has all the elements of its own legend in the making. Small town Davids against electric utility Goliaths. Simple townsfolk with a bright, you could say “sunny”, outlook on the future. And a decades-long struggle to bring their dream to reality. There’s a movie script waiting to be written, or at least a documentary

Josef Pesch Freiburg Baden Wuertemburg Germany 11 21 2005 0066

Pesch was named a strom (electricity) rebel by Elektritzitätswerke Schönau (EWS) in 2005 and that was a good reason for … Read more

Related Files photon_magazin_german_model_solar_pv_contract_einspeisevertrag_eng-doc

The purpose of this article is to reflect upon this European experience with feed-in tariffs, to stimulate discussions regarding what promise they might hold for the development of solar photovoltaic electricity in Canada.

Note: The graphics to this article were lost when my original web site crashed in the fall of 2022. For … Read more