Terrains of degraded conditions or security zones can be used of RES and provide solution of European energetic independence 2163 municipalities across Europe were directly involved in the promotion of clean sun energy via the PVs in Bloom Project, a partnership-driven initiative funded by Intelligent Energy Europe Programme of the EC, involving 3 countries from central parts Europe and 3 from the South. “Added value offered by the project was pulling together different public bodies and private investors. Various actors were putting forces together and it turned out to be very helpful in obtaining concrete results”, concluded Francesco Pareti, Head of Department, Eurosportello del Veneto (lead partner of the project), at the closing conference held in Budapest, 22nd September.

Here below the presentations of keynote speakers:

01 – Francesco Pareti

Head of the EU Policy Department, Unioncamere del Veneto
The PVs in BLOOM Project: approach to sustainability and impact achieved

02 – Marie Latour

National policy advisor
BUILDING ON THE PV EXPERIENCE OF EUROPEAN MARKETS

03 – Péter Ujhelyi

Energy Centre Non-profit Limited Company
The role of the Energy Efficiency, Environment and Energy Information Agency in RES Promotion

04 – Judit Bálint

The Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe (REC)
Global environmental tendencies and energy sustainability

05 – Donato Bedin

Senior Expert Unioncamere Veneto
Sustainable Approaches for the Valorization of Marginal Lands through RES

06 – Vicente Guna Serrano

Technical Director of Hidrogaia SL, Spain
Feasibility of PVPPs in Marginal Terrains in Spain

07 – Wieslaw Rajski

Mayor of Wierzchoslawice Municipality, Poland
Municipality Experience in Setting up 1,8 MWp PV Plant

08 – Luis Miguel Montes

Coordination technician for a sustainable development projects of Jaen province at Innovation and Development Agency of Andalusia, Spain
Solar power plants owned by the municipalities, Jaén, Spain

09 – George Gerovasilis

Institute of Energy for South East Europe, Greece
The Best Practice Model of PVs in BLOOM Installation

10 – Ján Otcenáš

photovoltaic expert
Installation of PV Plants in Slovakia

Tomorrow, at 10:00 of 22nd of September, we will stream the closing event of PVS in BLOOM.

In this way, dear reader, you can follow directly from Photovoltaic People blog the speeches of our project partners and important experts from your office and use Twitter or our page on Facebook to interact and make questions.

Here you can find the program.

See you tomorrow.

During it’s 36 months long experience PVS IN BLOOM project has triggered more than 19 MW of installed solar energy on marginal areas in Europe.

The final conferences which is to be held in Budapest, 22nd September, will promote project effective realizations and the most important solutions for combining renewable energy sources with a strategic approach to the management of areas characterized by intrinsic, induced or latent marginality (terrains that are no longer able to answer positively to investments or that have exhausted their primary and exclusive function).

This project approach encourages both the investments and significant increase of green energy production in Europe.

event partners: www.energia.sk, www.sapi.sk

The keynote speakers represent main actors of the RE industry and public sector representatives. The focus will be on the development of an advanced knowledge for specialized experts in the requalification of areas in latent marginality through RES, witnessing the realization of real plants in various marginalized areas in Europe and the formulation of new regulations promoting investments following the PVs in BLOOM approach, as well as institutional representatives which will describe the policy and market scenario in different EU countries (Italy, Hungary, Spain, etc.).

Program of the conference (to be completed):

Final International Conference PVS in BLOOM

22 September, 2011

Location:

Hotel Boscolo, Dohány utca 64, Budapest, Hungary

Program:

9:30-10:00

Participants Registration

10:00 The Future of PV in Europe

Chaired by Unioncamere del Veneto (Lead Partner IEE project PVs in Bloom)

10:00- 10:15
Introductory Speech
The PVs in BLOOM Project: Approach to Sustainability and Impact Achieved
Francesco Pareti, Head of Department, Eurosportello del Veneto and Head of the EEN Consortium Fried Europe for North East Italy

10:15-10:45
Building on the Experience of the European Market to Successfully Development of the Hungarian PVs Industry
Marie Latour, National Policy Advisor European Photovoltaic industry association (EPIA)

10:45 -11:15
Hungarian RES Policies
Péter Olajos, Deputy State Secretary for Climate Change and Green Development, Hungary

11:15 -11:45
The role of the Energy Efficiency, Environment and Energy Agency in RES Promotion
Péter Ujhelyi, Energy Centre Non-profit Limited Company

11:45 -12:15
Global environmental tendencies and energy sustainability
Judit Bálint, The Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe (REC)

12:15-12:45
Sustainability Approaches for the Valorization of Marginal Lands through RES
Donato Bedin, Senior Technical expert, Unioncamere del Veneto

12:45-13:15
Feasibility of PVPPs in Marginal Terrains in Spain
Vicente Guna Serrano, Technical Director of Hidrogaia SL, Spain

Lunch (buffet): 13:15 – 14:30

14:30 Panel discussion on policies enhancing marginal lands requalification through RES

Chaired by Camera di Commercio Italo-Slovacca

Speakers Session
Presentation of the best practices and discussion on policies, programs and measures at regional and national level, concerning the valorization of marginal lands through RES.

Panel discussion speakers:
Municipality Experience in Setting up 1,8 MWp PV Plant
Wieslaw Rajski, Mayor of Wierzchoslawice Municipality, Poland

Solar power plants owned by the municipalities, Jaén, Spain
Luis Miguel Montes, Coordination technician for a sustainable development projects of Jaen province at Innovation and Development Agency of Andalusia, Spain

The Best Practice Model of PVs in BLOOM Installation
George Gerovasilis, Institute of Energy for South East Europe, Greece

Installation of PV Plants in Slovakia
Ján Otčenáš, photovoltaic expert

16:30 -17:00 Closing Cocktail

Option: During the cocktail a press conference

______________________________________________________________
Conference Language is English

Contact: r.sevec@camitslovakia.sk

French Oil Company Total bought the ownership of relevant share of one of the most important company in photovoltaic sector: SunPower. The strategy of Total includes buying for up to 60% of SunPower’s outstanding Class A Common shares, and 60% of SunPower’s outstanding Class B Common shares, the difference between these two shares is to give different right of vote.
With this agree, Total provides 1 billion dollars in credit to support SunPower over the next five years and to develop more efficient photovoltaic systems.

“The world future energy balance will be the result of a long-term transition in which renewable energies will take their place alongside conventional resources,” said Philippe Boisseau , President, Total Gas and Power Division. “Over the past years, Total has built up sizeable renewable energy activities. Today, Total is executing on its strategy to become a major integrated player in solar energy. We evaluated multiple solar investments for more than two years and concluded that SunPower is the right partner based on its people, world-leading technology and cost roadmap, vertical integration strategy and downstream footprint.”

“Solar is becoming a material addition to the new generation portfolio around the world, with more than 40,000 MW of solar photovoltaic power installed globally,” continued Werner. “Total and SunPower will collaborate to ensure that solar becomes a platform for an efficient, competitive and sustainable energy future. Already, SunPower’s high-efficiency, high-reliability solar photovoltaic power plant costs are competitive with other new resources.”

This news caused positive and negative reactions. The negative one might be come from the doubt about the “real intentions” that an Oil Company could hide behind this strategy. In addition to the unsatisfied people seeing an Oil colossus became the most powerful shareholder of the leader in renewable energy, this purchase could come from a diversify strategy, it could be a sign about a real change from the traditional energy to the renewable energy.

From SunPower

The 2nd session of training seminars in the frame of the PV in Bloom project organized by Project Partner University of Jaen will be held on May 5th – 6th and 10th – 11th at Centro de Estudios Avanzados en Energía y Medio Ambiente. CAMPUS DE LAS LAGUNILLAS. Building C6 Universidad de Jaén.

Last week, Google announced the purpose to invest 168 million dollars to create the world’s largest solar power plant, installing it in the Mojave Desert (USA).
This news come approximately a week following than the publication of the intend, by the web colossus, to invest 5 million dollars in Germany, especially in a solar photovoltaic farm in Brandeburg an der Havel Germany.

With this system, sun rays, concentrated through fields of heliostat, are directed towards the top of a tower when, a receiver converts the rays into steam that power a traditional turbine and generator to make electricity.

Google is not the only investor in this project, indeed it needs, in addiction to the founds allocated from the site, more than a billion dollars, this foresee the presence of other investors including: NRG Energy (300 million dollars), U.S. Department of Energy (1.37 million dollars). Part of Google motivation is to help the solar power sector reach maturity faster.

The solar farm will have a capacity of 392 MW. That’s the equivalent of “taking more than 90,000 cars off the road over the lifetime of the plant, projected to be more than 25 years.”

This type of solar power technology is one that Google is trying to improve upon themselves.  The company announced last year that it was working on a more efficient mirror technology that could lower the cost of solar thermal plants.

From: inhabitat

Barak Obama declared, in his State of the Union address in January 2011, that 80% of the USA should run on clean energy by 2035. What’s left of the priorities of his Government after the double crisis in Japan and Libya?  In a speech at the end of March, at Georgetown University, the president went further to try to recapture the initiative on energy policy. He said that while there were no quick solution to fix the nation’s oil addiction, the United States needed to take a series of immediate steps to cut oil usage.

In just two years of administration Obama’s purposes, first of all those about fighting the climatic change, had to face a succession of economic, political, technical and natural disasters. The New York Times writes:

The financial crisis undercut public faith in markets. The Deepwater Horizon explosion and spill set back plans for offshore drilling by several years. The Japanese earthquake and tsunami, which led to a major release of radioactivity at the Fukushima Daiichi reactor complex, raised fears about nuclear power.

In this situation, the opposition pary of the Republicans gained trust in the midterm elections.

So what is the next step of Obama’s administration to avoid loosing public support and to reach at least a fraction of its purposes? “The only way for America’s energy supply to be truly secure is by permanently reducing our dependence on oil,” he said. To do so, America has to follow a strategy of discouraging dirty, old energy sources through regulation and encouraging clean, new technologies by heavy spending on innovation.

Steven Chu, the secretary of energy and a Nobel laureate in physics, is a technology enthusiast and says the nation can produce the innovations in clean energy necessary to meet the president’s goals if the right incentives are in place. “Why not start today?” Mr. Chu said in an interview. “Just think of what it does. It unleashes private capital, private capital sitting on the sidelines, that immediately creates jobs.”

From The New York Times

Picture from flickr|rob.rudloff

The German company IMO, one of the largest world producers of solar and photovoltaic panels, is planning to release in the U.S. market, specifically in the south of California, a kind of solar panel that follows the daily movement of the sun. This type of system is inspired by sunflowers that turn in the direction of the sun.

The panels, which move following the movement of the sun, manage to earn between 20% and 30% more energy. This higher production of electricity will avoid the emission of amounts of carbon dioxide equivalent to the use of about 15.000 tons of coal, equate to a reduction of pollution created by a machine that travels 170.000 km, or have planted about 6.700 trees. Production of these panels will give an output of 42.000 kW of power, equal to the annual needs of four families.

These important benefits mentioned above are with problems given by the size of the plant. In fact, every single panel covers an area of almost 500 square meters. The panels are assembled thanks to a crane, on a rotating metal structure 16 meters tall.

The facilities, with a useful life about 25 years, will soon on sale. The price is between $ 100.000 and $ 200.000. The company has high hopes on government incentives such as tax credits to finance these investments.

From: Alternative Energy

Next year it will start the first project organized by Krommenie city, Holland, that consists in development of the first “photovoltaic cycle lane”, called SolaRoad.

Dutch population is famous for its habits using bicycle as almost the only means of transport. Here the idea born to use the extended cycling paths system as electricity energy production installing photovoltaic system under a glass sheet built for satisfy the cyclist’s need and requirement: not slippery and resistant against bad weather.

This project aims to supply public lighting, road signs, gradually also cover supply in nearby houses.

The trial will start from one cycle lane, but not just limited to the city of Krommenie. What Holland promises is very ambitious: to convert much of the network of cycle paths in Holland in “photovoltaic cycle lanes”.

This unusual testing can show that the public authorities have an important role in development of innovative and unusual methods in the production of electricity, thinking over the usual concept on the use of photovoltaic panels.

From: rinnovabili.it

German government, lead by Chancellor Angela Merkel, announced the acceleration of the plan to close 7 old nuclear reactor that were supposed to be mainteined for another 12 years. Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi has made ​​a choice on the same line of thought: postponing the plan to adopt nuclear energy, meant to reduce the country’s dependence on fossil fuel imports. The Japanese crisis has altered the debate about nuclear energy all around the world, putting more pressure on states to accelerate their renewable energy and smart grid technologies.

Germany is the country that has made the most aggressive efforts in order to adopt renewable energy systems in the last years but, still, a large part of their power relies on nuclear reactors. The initial plan was to perform maintenance works in order to let the old plants survive other 12 years (because of the high initial costs of building new ones). But nuclear fuel disposal is a quagmire in which Germany has not been able to find a viable long-term solution. The Japanese accident definitely made the Government shift on its issue.

Italian Government lead by Silvio Berlusconi was pushing in the last months for the reintroduction of nuceal energy in Italy (24 years after the population refused it with a referendum). The last act of the government about renawable energies, the so-called Decree Romani, was a mild cut of the incentives; the opposition parties feared that the cut was aimed to make space for nuclear power. A new popular referendum was ready to be voted next summer on the matter of nuclear energy. The accident has now completely shaped the situation in Italy: Berlusconi’s government, probably afraid of loosing the referendum, postponed all the plans which, according to the Minister of Environment Stefania Prestigiacomo, are “still valid”.

The impact on the public opinion of the Japanese crisis has been strong and Governments can’t just ignore it. The positive trend of the favourable voices have been obscured by all the fears and the concerns that nuclear power rises. It will be interesting to see if the change in the plans of the executives will be real, with a particular regard on alternative sources of energy, or just a façade to prevent discontent in the short term.

From inhabitat

Picture from flickr|europeanpeoplesparty