Trend: Wal-Mart's RFP for solar energy systems for its stores that could signal a tipping point for solar adoption in the US.
Joel Makower at the Two Steps Forward blog describes Wal-Mart's interest in using solar power for stores. There's an opportunity for a large supplier to install the solar sytems and sell the power to Wal-Mart, which might set a precedent for commercial and residential adoption (I could see General Electric in this role).
Link: Joel Makower: Two Steps Forward: Wal-Mart's Solar Energy Vision
Wal-Mart ... recently issued an RFP, or request for proposal, to install solar energy systems on its stores in five states -- the largest procurement of solar ever proposed. Bids are due on January 5....
The request for proposal ... asks bidders to consider three options in considering how to power Wal-Mart by sunlight:
- a direct purchase by Wal-Mart of turnkey solar energy systems, along with a plan to maintain the systems;
- solar systems that are installed, owned, and operated by the supplier, which would then sell all of the system's electricity output to Wal-Mart; and
- an arrangement in which Wal-Mart would lease solar installations, own all of their electricity output, and have an option to purchase the systems if it desired.
Those three paths represent a pretty good overview of the options available these days to commercial and industrial purchasers of solar. The second and third options, in which the systems are developed and owned (at least initially) by a third party, help to overcome one of solar's major obstacles: its large, up-front capital expense. Companies are more willing to "go solar" if there's no large, up-front expenditure and their monthly energy costs don't change much, or even go down. In its RFP, Wal-Mart is asking solar companies to act like a small-scale utility, owning the equipment, but selling the electricity to Wal-Mart.
(By the way, such arrangements should by no means be limited to companies. Individual homeowners and renters should be able to purchase electricity generated by solar panels on their roofs, installed and owned by third parties, rather than having to buy and install pricey solar panels themselves. We want the power, not the power plants. As Amory Lovins has famously put it, "It's not kilowatt-hours that we want, it's hot showers and cold beer.")