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Study Shows Solar PV Price Trends in California

Solar PV costs in California have declined significantly in recent years, according to a new report released today by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The report presents the most comprehensive analysis performed to date of grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) cost trends in California, which is by far the largest PV market in the U.S., and is the third-largest in the world (behind Japan and Germany). The report’s findings are based on a statistical analysis of the installed cost of nearly 19,000 installed or waiting-to-be-installed PV systems in California, totaling 254 MW. These solar systems have been supported by one of the state’s two largest solar rebate programs, overseen by the California Energy Commission (CEC) and the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC). The report’s findings are particularly important given the recent announcement that California will establish an ambitious new 11-year, $3.2 billion incentive program for customer-sited solar installations. “PV costs have declined substantially, especially among smaller (< 30 kW) systems funded by the CEC's program," says report co-author Mark Bolinger. The report finds that costs under the CEC program have dropped by an average of 7.3% a year, while the larger (30 kW and above) CPUC-funded systems have had average cost declines […]

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National Electronics Recycling Clearinghouse Announced

The National Center for Electronics Recycling (NCER) and the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) announced the formation of an initiative to aid in the development of a national infrastructure for electronics recycling. The initiative, known as the National Electronics Recycling Infrastructure Clearinghouse (NERIC), represents a key step in the ultimate formation of a harmonized system for managing used electronics across the nation. Said Jason Linnell, executive director of NCER, “This initiative encompasses many of the important principles embraced by the NCER since its formation last year, which are active participation of the electronics industry, research and education on the benefits of multi-state harmonization of recycling systems, and cooperative action among public and private sector stakeholder groups.” As more individual states develop mandatory electronics recycling programs, stakeholders will be looking for strategies to ensure development of logical and efficient electronics recycling systems that work together. NERIC will pull together information useful for these strategies, including utilization of a private sector organization. The hub of activity for this initiative will be the NERIC website at www.ecyclingresource.org. On the site, electronics recycling stakeholders can find information on the initial NERIC projects, such as: Information and analysis on product scope issues and other critical data […]

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