White House Says Rooftop Solar Mapping Tool Helps Inform Climate Change Responses

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Citing the importance of maps and geographic information databases in understanding problems and opportunities in shifting climate conditions, the White House pointed to a cooperative effort between the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) to map the solar potential of Los Angeles County.Headed by UCLA's Luskin Center for Innovation, the EDF-funded Los Angeles Solar and Efficiency Report (LASER) highlights the susceptibility of specific communities to the challenges of pollution and rising temperatures, as well as areas where development of rooftop solar would be most beneficial and cost-effective.

Described in the context of how data-driven software tools can help foster agricultural resilience, particularly in coastal regions, the White House indicated that public and private initiatives such as LASER advance the president’s so-called Climate Data Initiative.According to the EDF, open data resources can help inform officials and businesses how to invest resources to address pressing environmental challenges on a regional basis."Data mapping tools like LASER provide powerful visualizations of the harmful effects that climate change can have on our most vulnerable populations, while highlighting the potential for significant economic growth and substantially healthier communities," says Jorge Madrid, EDF’s senior partnerships coordinator.

Thin-film solar cells are rapidly taking market share away from the established crystalline technology, with their portion of photovoltaic wattage projected to more than double by 2013, according to a recent report from iSuppli Corp.iSuppli believes thin film will grow to account for 31% of the global solar panel market in terms of watts by 2013 - up from 14% in 2008."The market viability of thin-film has been solidly established by First Solar Inc. as it rockets to become the world's top solar panel maker this year, with more than a gigawatt of production," says Greg Sheppard, chief research officer for iSuppli.

"At the same time, the company has driven its cost of production to less than 90 cents per watt, keeping its costs at approximately half the level of crystalline module producers."The average thin-film solar panel price is expected to decline to $1.40 per watt in 2010, down 17.6% from $1.70 in 2009. Average prices for crystalline panels are expected to drop to $2.00 per watt in 2010, down 20% from $2.50 this year.Through 2012, crystalline prices will continue to close the thin-film pricing gap to some degree because its purveyors collectively have deeper pockets and keep pouring on capital spending, technology R&D developments and manufacturing refinements, iSuppli adds.Another accelerator of thin-film technology is the rising availability of turnkey production lines from companies such as Applied Materials, Oerlikon and Centrotherm.

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