The event featured some wonderful presentations by our panelists and we wanted to share them with you here.

Here is the presentation from the Mass Clean Energy Center giving an overview of the CommonWealth Solar rebate program, renewable energy certificates, tax incentives, and other financial options to help pay for a solar project.

SunBug Solar gave a presentation about Solar Renewable Energy Credits (SRECs).

Here is the presentation from Mass Energy about regulations, “neighborhood” net metering, and ownership structures.

Nexamp presented about photovoltaic projects for businesses, institutions, and government facilities.

If you would like to find out more, check out our website about… [view entry]

There’s no way that Cambridge’s 267 KW of PV could generate 1.2 MWh/yr of electricity because the sun don’t always shine! Especially here in New England… but if we assume the sun shines for an average of 3 hours each day, the existing PV installations would produce 292 MkWh of electricity per year. This is still a substantial amount of power. The Energy Information Agency reports… [view entry]

Sunpods Inc ‘s solar power-assist system is made up of four solar panels which are fixed on the roof of the bus. They can charge an on-board battery bank to power the air-conditioning and wireless connectivity equipment when the bus is inactive. Tested on a Bauer Intelligent Transportation bus since January… [view entry]

Phyllis Cuttino, who directs the Pew Environment Group’s Global Warming Campaign explained that, “Having built a strong manufacturing base and export markets, China is working now to meet domestic demand by installing substantial new clean energy-generating capacity to meet ambitious… [view entry]

The Commonwealth Solar Program provides rebates through a non-competitive application process for the installation of photovoltaic (PV) projects. The Commonwealth Solar II Rebate Program provides rebates for commercial systems up to 5 kilowatts (kW) and all residential systems (regardless of size). The Commonwealth Solar Stimulus Rebate Program provides rebates for commercial PV systems sized greater than 5 kW up to 200 kW.

The Commonwealth Solar program issued awards for the installation of 23.5 megawatts (MW) of solar power over the last two years, but recently ran short of funding. The new rebate programs for homeowners, business, and communities throughout the Commonwealth  will help the commonwealth reach Governor… [view entry]

One of the first home improvements Rachel and I made when we purchased our condo here in Cambridge this spring was a solar hot water installation on our rooftop.

The system we had put in uses vacuum tubes, a newer, more efficient type of solar collector than the black box flat panels of old. As a writer covering energy and the environment in Cambridge and China, I’d spent the past three years tracing this new and exotic technology back to the factories and cities in China where they are surprisingly commonplace.

I first read about the tubes three years ago in a story in the Boston Globe. A family in Newbury, MA was using a massive installation to provide hot water and heat for their giant barn of a house. … [view entry]

Now that winter’s just around the corner, though you might be hard-pressed to believe it with how fickle Mother Nature’ been of late, you’re probably starting to dread the heating bills that accompany it. But just because it’s getting cold doesn’t mean you cannot take advantage of free energy from the sun.

For most of us, it’s probably too late to orient our homes so most windows are on the southern face, or plant deciduous trees on the same side of the house, and evergreens on the windward.¹ But there are still plenty of ways to take advantage of this underused resourced, not the least of which is leaving your curtains open during the day, especially if you have modern, low-emissivity (“low-e”), insulated windows.

Another interesting way to use the sun… [view entry]

A proposal by the Western Massachusetts Electric Co. (WMECO) to build up to 6 megawatts of solar photovoltaic power in its service area was approved August 12th by The Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities.  The utility provides power to roughly 200,000 residents in Western Mass, specifically the counties of Hampden, Hampshire, Franklin and Berkshire county.   Approval was received after applying under Massachusetts’s Green Communities Act, an Act that allows utilities to own and operate solar generating facilities up to 50 megawatts.  Utility revenues will be used to fund the project, and WMECO agreed to spread those charges out over a number of years.  The project is set for completion and full operation by 2012.

In the New England publication Mass High Tech, DPU Chairman Paul Hibbard was… [view entry]