Renewable Energy News - 7.2009

23. July 2009 by admin.

ISSUE 8        JULY 2008

EIG NEWS

EUA announces an affiliation with Energy Independence Group [EIG]. EIG has offices in Minneapolis, MN and Ellsworth, WI. EIG is installing Renew-able Energy Systems in the two states.

EUA is helping EIG find customers and finance new installations. EUA expects that this move will help in financing EUA education efforts.

EUA is building a demonstration trailer which will contain a Solar Hot Air System, Solar Electricity [PV] System, Solar Hot Water components, and a Solar Cooker. It will be available to environmental organizations, schools, and nature centers that want to teach about Renewable Energy.

These newsletters are a major form of education and promotion for EUA. Please forward this letter to your mail list so that we can expand our outreach.

Contact EUA at sunuser@comcast.net to ask a question, offer suggestions, volunteer to help, or unsubscribe from the mailing list.

WISCONSIN’S CASH BACK REWARDS

Wisconsin has a program called Focus on Energy [FOE] that is giving cash back rewards to residents who install certified Renewable Energy [RE] Systems. The reward is based on the number of kilowatt hours of energy saved in a year’s time. The amount of energy saved depends on the size of the system in watts and the amount of sunshine received. The amount of sunshine received depends on the shading, the east/west orientation and the elevation angle of the modules.

A well designed system will be rewarded with 19% of the total cost. Since the Federal Government now rebates 30%, the owner will get a 49% total discount.

Gus Olson, Director of the Wisconsin Division of EIG, is installing a 4,000 watt system at his residence. On Saturday, June 11, friends and family members gathered to help Gus install 20 Solar Electric [PV] modules on the south roof of his work shed.

NEWS FROM HERE AND THERE

The three major items in a PV System are the PV Modules, the Inverter, and the metal rack. The Inverter changes the DC voltage from the module to AC voltage that is matched to the local line voltage and synchronized in time.

For his installation in Wisconsin, Gus Olson found American companies to supply the PV modules and the Inverter at competitive prices. However, the best price for the steel rack material was a steel extruder in Taiwan.

The reason it is possible for Taiwanese steel workers to compete in Wisconsin is not entirely a difference in wages. Our Congress uses our tax to subsidize the fossil fuel companies and keep the price of diesel fuel in the U.S. unreasonably low. Taiwanese shippers simply buy their fuel here and keep the cost of ocean freight artificially low.

Our fossil fuel companies convince our Congress that they should make U.S. taxpayers pay taxes to export American steel workers’ jobs to Taiwan. What a scam!

Did you know?

When silicon is taken from just one ton of sand and used in PV panels, that silicon can produce as much electricity as 500,000 tons of burning coal.

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