A daily technical, financial, and political review/analysis of important green energy news.

1366 abandons plans for New York factory – DOE agreed to fund 1366 Technologies’ first large-scale solar manufacturing facility in upstate New York in 2011, six and a half years later no disbursements have been made, and the company has withdrawn from the loan guarantee process. Seems to me as if we’re talking out of one side of the mouth by putting a tariff on all solar power imports, while ignoring directly supporting a company with the revenue from those tariffs. This suggests a failure in thinking through certain variables in this local solar content goal.

India reportedly mulling halt to PV anti-dumping measures – If India cancels the anti-dumping investigation and refrain from implementing the provisional safeguards tariffs, global PV demand may rebound in second-quarter 2018, Taiwan-based solar cell makers indicated. India is now a player. And if they want to grow a market – they’re going to have to think real hard. The country will have, at a minimum, a 7.5% import tariff on all solar hardware – the question now – how do we support a domestic market the best? Which market? Installers and electricity users, or manufacturers, the workers and the supply chains? Can we dance the line of both?

Tesla Semi sets out on first cargo trip from Gigafactory 1 to Fremont factory, says Elon Musk – Some corporate customers buy PPAs and pay for carbon credits so they can pollute, its a necessity of the world we live in. Some companies though, they don’t take that line as truth – they don’t live within the status quo. They instead live with the chaos that sits at the front edge of humanity – the churn of technology, writing new rules. Tesla is building a factory that runs completely on renewable energy, to build batteries that go in trucks and cars that can run completely on clean energy. We are seeing the creation of the truly clean supply chain.

China’s Power Move: Reading between the (transmission) lines on Beijing’s global infrastructure projects – If it interested you to watch how the world bent to the might of U.S. steel as we chased oil around the planet, then you might see a future being shaped by China and its delivery of electricity into central and southeast Asia. The HVDC powerline could be a future peacemaker – or a tool dictate with. This news, complements very much so this announcements – China plans to create energy ministry in government shake-up. Electricity is power, figuratively and literally.

Strata Solar expands into rooftop, community solar asset ownership – My recent work experience shows me that margins in the commercial and industrial space are a little bit stronger, with it being easier for a utility scale company and their finance to come down, versus the residential companies squeezing upward. If you can talk pro forma with a CFO, then you can talk solar with a corporate customer. Utility scale folk have that skill, and with the only market growing in the US being the middle sized corporate/community solar projects – Strata needed to expand.

Tweet below represents a new record low of the peak of ice in the Arctic Winter. About 1% less ice at this year’s peak vs last year’s record low peak.

Feature image comes from the Department of EnergyThe Golden 1 Center in Sacramento, CA. Photo by Chris Allan.

If you’re interested in residential several quotes from a local residential solar contract, Understandsolar.com will connect you with that local talent so you can start a proper bidding war for your roof.

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