Wednesday, February 22, 2012

• Future of Geothermal Bright for Indonesia, Philippines — Finance and Regulatory Stability Critical
  ad of the GeoPower Indonesia & Philippines conference in Jakarta, I caught up with Edward McCartin, Senior Development Advisor at Alterra Power, a speaker at the June meeting that will host the key stakeholders in the Asian geothermal industry. Alterra Power Corp is a leading renewable energy developer, whose portfolio includes two geotherm
  
• Community Choice Aggregation Lets Cities Buy (Cleaner and Local) Electricity in Bulk
  30 states, citizens have just one choice for their electricity service.  It's like the old communist truism: "You can have any color car you want, as long as it's red."  What if citizens could collectively shop around for electricity in bulk to get lower prices and cleaner, local power? In six states they can with community choice agg
  
• Renewable Energy Financing Mechanisms and Incentives: What Can We Expect?
  le much attention has rightly been given to the expiration of the Section 1603 cash grant program at the end of 2011, there are other tax incentives for renewable energy that are also set to expire in the upcoming years. The decisions as to whether to renew these incentives will have a major impact on the future of renewable energy in the U.S. as these existing and new programs have been instrumental in sustaining investor and lender interest in the renewable energy sector, particularly in the wind and solar markets.
  
• Influential Women in Cleantech: Top 10 Women of Sustainability
  this second installment in our series on leading women in cleantech and sustainability sectors, we offer up our top picks for the sustainability sector. Quite often this category is dominated by women working in Corporate Social Responsibility, as it’s a sector where women have made great strides to gain leadership roles in the last few de
  
• Spanish Firms Gain Edge in Nascent African Renewables Market
  umber of Spanish firms have been awarded 510 MW worth of renewable-energy projects in South Africa and are set to compete in future auctions as the continent hastens plans to develop its green energy sector.
  

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

• Apple Tips Plans For Solar, Biogas Systems at NC Data Farm
  t year Apple commissioned its new 500,000-square-foot [not acre!] data center in Maiden, North Carolina. The facility, costing an estimated $1 billion facility to build, is the company's biggest data center several times over, aimed to support everything from iTunes to its iCloud services to the Siri voice functionality in the iPhone 4S.
  
• Investing in Dragons and Tigers: The Allure of China and India
  na and India are the ideal markets in which to realize clean technology, both from their government's stated goals and their economic, political and social needs.
  
• Trina Launches New Solar Advocacy and PR Campaign with Patrick Dempsey
  "Power Behind the Panel" is getting more in front. Last week, Trina Solar invited me and about 100 other guests to a private Beverly Hills home where Mark Kingsley, Trina’s Chief Commercial Officer (pictured below), and Grey’s Anatomy star Patrick Dempsey unveiled “15 Minutes,” a new solar PR and advocacy campaign.
  
• Chinese Tier-2 Modules Offered Below $1/W
  ces for crystalline-silicon (c-Si) solar photovoltaic (PV) modules fell below the $1/W mark in January 2012, and in some cases well below even that, marking the first time that global average prices have fallen below this milestone, according to IMS Research.
  
• Finding Talent the Creative Way: Are Your Race Horses Pulling Plows?
  n it comes to hiring, the biggest issue renewable energy employers face today is finding the right engineers with the right skills for their businesses. This can be identified as "talent mismatch," or an imbalance in the labor market between the people applying for positions and the skills required. The very nature of the renewable industry, with its constantly evolving technologies, presents great challenges for employers when it comes to finding the right matches for their mission-critical positions. But there are progressive actions that renewable energy employers can take to secure the right talent for future productivity. In fact, there are three simple considerations: identifying transferrable skills from other industries, using creativity to put people in the right positions, and offering dual-ladder career paths.