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301 Moved Permanently

301 Moved Permanently


nginx

In his 1999 novel of code-cracking for country and profit, “Cryptonomicon,” Neal Stephenson makes an observation about developing countries furiously consuming their natural resources in order to make the jump to hyperspace - becoming world-class players - before burning out and falling into perpetual economic oblivion.

Once your export is knowledge, you’ve made the jump. If you run out of resources first, you’re ashes.

Getting into hyperspace requires a lot of electricity. There is a strong argument to be made that solar power is becoming the ideal source for enabling the ramp-up to a knowledge-based economy, as well as sustaining that course into the future.

In June, the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) published a report showing that spending on renewable energy technologies in the developing world was only 18% less than in the developed world. In 2007, by comparison, developed economies were spending 2.5 times as much as developing ones. UNEP noted that falling prices for photovoltaic modules have made solar projects particularly cost-effective at all levels.

Utility-scale PV plants have relatively short gestation periods from conception to operation, with much of the foreshortening occurring in the construction phase. Regulatory issues aside, PV plants are comparatively easy to build. Even the largest PV arrays are essentially modular installations.

For example, the New Mexico Public Regulatory Commission recently granted a power purchase agreement between developer First Solar and utility El Paso Electric for the 50 MW solar plant at Macho Springs. First Solar says construction will begin this month. Power is expected to begin flowing to ratepayers in May 2014. That’s less than a year of actual construction time. This is not atypical for plants of this scale.

In addition to their modular designs, PV plants fit nicely into an existing grid or can form the nucleus of an off-grid power distribution network. Because they don’t consume fuel per se, an extensive refueling infrastructure isn’t needed to support them. You can plop a PV plant down in the middle of nowhere (okay, a road would be nice) and tie in the surrounding community using technology that is mature and readily available.

Solar technology’s relative ease of installation appears to be generating a similar dynamic. UNEP says global solar PV capacity surpassed 100 GW in 2012. The success of utility-scale solar projects throughout the world should be a good indicator of the hyperspace worthiness of a given region and for the planet as a whole. S

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