Founder and President Emeritus of SunPower, Richard Swanson, has been selected as the recipient for the 2011 Karl Böer Solar Energy Medal of Merit. The honor comes with a cash award of US$50,000, which is funded by the Karl Böer Solar Energy Medal of Merit Trust. The Medal is given every two years to an individual that has made ground-breaking contributions towards the promotion of solar energy through research, development or economic enterprise or to an individual that has proven themselves with valuable and enduring contributions to the solar energy field.
During its fourth quarter in 2010, Clear Skies Solar released that it was expanding its market focus with a new division that would focus on solar installation projects in the sub-300kW division for commercial and residential installations. Moving forward with this resolution, the company has added new members to its sales and management teams including Allen Sosis as vice president of sales and marketing and John Conte as the national vice president of residential sales.
Siemens Industry has signed a supply and distribution agreement with Enphase Energy for the sale of Enphase’s solar microinverters systems through Siemens electrical equipment distributers network. The agreement will see Enphase furnish Siemens with its solar microinverters and Enlighten, a web-based monitoring service.
Pro-Tech Energy Solutions has appointed Richard Cooper as its new president. Cooper will be charged with helping Pro-Tech reach its goal of becoming Northeast America’s biggest developer of turnkey solar projects.
Despite the confusion over the GSE’s PV installation figures for 2010, Barclays Capital PV analyst Vishal Shah said in an investors note that no matter what the actual installation figure will be for 2010, it is increasingly likely that the Italian government would have to pay for 6GW worth of subsidies at the 2010 FiT rate.
GE Capital, NRG Energy and ConocoPhillips have jointly committed US$300 million in capital for a new joint venture: Energy Technology Ventures. The JV will fund around 30 venture-and growth-stage companies over the next four years, including the next generation photovoltaics developer Alta Devices. Although details about financial details of the JV and the initial investments have not been disclosed, the JV will focus early investments in companies developing “game-changing” technologies.
China’s drive to consolidate its leading position in PV manufacturing has been reinforced with a credit facility offered to JinkoSolar from the Bank of China that could be worth approximately US$7.6 billion over a five-year period.
Jean-Marc Gilson has been appointed as Avantor Performance Materials’ new chief executive officer. Gilson will work alongside the company’s executive chairman, Raj Gupta, and core leadership team, and be responsible for managing the company’s strategic development and future global direction.
Steed Technology recently completed the full acquisition of outstanding stock for Applied Technology Specialists (ATSI). Steed has confirmed that manufacturing of all products will remain in Northern California, while research and development will continue in Oklahoma. Both companies will now operate under the Steed name.
The Murfreesboro Solar Project has not broken ground yet, but that has not stopped GreenCo Solutions and the North Carolina Electric Membership Corporation (NCEMC) from announcing their intent to buy renewable energy certificates (REC) and electricity, respectively, from the solar project that Duke Energy acquired from SunPower in December 2010.
