Feds, Schwarzenegger sign pact to aid renewable energy efforts

At a news conference held on a Loyola University rooftop covered with solar panels, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger this morning signed a memorandum of understanding to streamline siting and approval of renewable energy facilities on public lands.

The memorandum — the first between a state and the federal government involving energy production — aims to expedite about 30 solar, wind and geothermal projects on track to break ground by the end of 2010 and become eligible for more than $15 billion in federal stimulus funds.

“We know the future is in clean power, clean energy and clean technology,” Schwarzenegger said, “and we are taking action so that California will be able to meet its ambitious renewable energy and environmental goals.”

The memorandum, he said, will address a serious problem with the existing process for siting and approving facilities: It is too slow.

The development of renewable energy on public lands has been a top priority of the Obama administration as it seeks to ease the nation’s dependency on foreign oil. In addition, Schwarzenegger has urged that the state be able to draw one-third of its electricity needs from renewable sources by 2020.

-- Louis Sahagun

Comments

[Ozzie Zehner]

We have to consider if it is reasonable to spend escalating sums of cash to install solar technologies that are in the stone-age of their development when we could instead be investing that money into the very research and development activities that could some day make them a viable solution for a broader populace.

Current solar cell technologies necessitate large up-front investments and vast quantities of mined minerals for their manufacture. Not only are solar cells a terribly expensive way to reduce CO2 emissions, but their manufacturing process is one of the largest emitters of hexafluroethane (C2F6), nitrogen trifluoride (NF3), and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) – three gruesome greenhouse gasses that make CO2 seem harmless. Furthermore, solar cells are difficult to install, require regular cleanings and rely on a thinly-spread solar radiation from a sun that only shines half of the day, a cosmological constant showing no signs of improving.

For solar-based energy to make an impact, we will have to shift funding away from fabrication and toward research and development, implement passive solar techniques on a much larger scale, update building codes, and plant trees (the ultimate solar mechanism).

Ozzie Zehner

Ozzie Zehner is an energy consultant at ZehnerStudio.com and the Executive Director of Imagitrends.com, a nonpartisan 501(c)(3) nonprofit.