by
Paul
Benhaimas the base material which achieved an efficiency of 6/6. The first
industrial use occurred soon afterwards: the powering of a remote
telephone repeater station in rural Georgia. In the late 1950s,
NASA installed a 108-cell photovoltaic array on America's first
satellite, Vanguard One. The costs for such systems are
understandably quite high, reaching over US$100 per watt. For
earth-bound applications, where environmental and size
constraints are not nearly so severe, much cheaper devices have
been developed. Although economically it is not yet a fully mature
technology, photovoltaic technology is now on the threshold of a
performance-to-cost capability which would permit it to make
significant advances in many new market areas. With costs falling
each year, photovoltaics is already commercially mature in many
remote applications, where it can compete with the higher
installation costs of long links to the grid or expensive generation
from diesel sets. Such applications already include healthcare in
the developing world, telecommunications repeaters, cathodic
protection of pipelines, and marine buoys.
In its election agenda, the Labour administration in the UK
made many claims regarding its support for renewable energy.
Now is the time to demonstrate the Government's genuine
commitment. Let's follow the shining solar examples set by CAT,
the Netherlands, Germany, and our other European partners.
Action is urgently needed from the developed economies to
produce a mature programme for the advancement of solar and
other renewable technologies. This is vital if we are to help China
and the emerging Eastern economies 'leapfrog' excessive fossil
fuel emissions and move directly to the sustainable alternatives.
We must act now, before the global cost in terms of climate
change becomes too high for all of us.