Nanosolar's Breakthrough - Solar Now Cheaper than Coal!

[LMagic007]

See Also Popular Science article;

http://www.popsci.com/popsci/flat/bo...n/item_59.html

[Andrea]

Search giant Google is investing hundreds of millions of dollars in renewable energy technologies.

The Californian firm wants to make green energy sources of electricity cheaper than that produced from coal.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7115786.stm

[arno]

http://www.google.com/intl/en/press/...127_green.html

Interesting.

[hoon]

It's great to see Google getting seriously behind this

[hoon]

There's an interesting piece here on whether Microsoft will/should follow suit.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=980

What's interesting is that Google may not be doing this just because "it's a good thing to do".

Look at the cost of oil as an energy source. If Google goes mainly green, they can achieve - at a high initial cost - a fairly constant energy supply (balanced between wind/solar/other). However, they won't be beholden to the price of oil on the marketplace.

Other industries who don't make the move will have to take into their financial analysis what the cost of oil will do for transportation, running server farms, etc. In the long run, Google can avoid that, and have a competitive edge over their rivals. Even if the price of oil should drop (not likely save for short spurts), they can still take advantage of the tax breaks and good image. It's a win/win for them.

[blackfoxtrade]

Google is listed on the Nasdaq and it needs to appeal to investors, especially at times like these when the overall economy is losing strength and the future looking pretty bleak. If Google does it because the board likes green energy or they see it as a business decision, doesn't really matter because in the end, it still comes down to money.

[LMagic007]

With all the profits they are making, its a good way to reduce there income tax. i.e. when profits are high, spend on productive capital and claim capital write off deductions.

It makes sense to do this as saving future dollars by reducing future power generation costs, has the same net effect as investing in new productive capital that produces better yields.

Good. Private corporations are the ones that should be spending money on renewable energy research, not the federal government.

[LMagic007]

Originally Posted by styger

Good. Private corporations are the ones that should be spending money on renewable energy research, not the federal government.

That simplistic idealistic argument is so primative, as to be out of touch with reality.

Good private corporations already do spend money. And it's governments role to provide incentives for them to do so. Which again they already do. Good public citizens also should stop buying gas guzzling cars, among indulging in other energy wasteful activities. And, fossil fuel based industries should not be subsidised by future CO2 greenhouse gas emission abatement costs, to be borne by future generations at our convenience.

Ultimately governments are the custodians responsible for good public interest policy frameworks, from which corporations draw upon, in their custodianship and pursuit of corporate profit for their investors, within the bounds of those frameworks.

In other words, we should be paying much more for fossil fuel based energy ( its true cost in consideration of its environmental cost, thus requiring enactment of government policy to reflect this end ), which would automatically make renewable energy far more competitive and wide spread.