The Cold Hard Truth About Solar Energy

The cold hard truth about solar energy is that it is not economically viable, except in specialized, limited and usually subsidized applications.  This is despite having Billions of tax-payer dollars fed into the bottomless pit of corrupt science (man-caused global warming) incompetent governments and crony capitalism (Solyndra).  So now British Petroleum (BP) has seen the light, figuratively speaking and they're pulling the plug on their solar energy efforts.  I could say I told you so.
Peter

BP shutting solar unit as industry struggles


3:13 pm ET 12/21/2011 - MarketWatch Databased News

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- After prominently featuring solar panels in its brand advertisements and at some of its gas stations, BP PLC is planning to shutter its BP Solar operation, according to reports on Wednesday.



BP PLC said global economic challenges have impacted the solar industry, making it difficult to sustain long term returns, according to an internal BP email cited by press reports. The move will affect 100 jobs.



BP, which has been in the solar business for decades, had featured solar panels prominently in its Beyond Petroleum advertising campaign.





BP said the solar business, which has been flooded by excess supply from China, has become commoditized.



A phone call and email to BP by MarketWatch was not immediately returned. BP will hold on to other alternative energy businesses, including wind.



BP inked a supply contract with JA Solar in 2010 as it started scaling back its own solar panel factories and trimming jobs.



Sam Wilkinson, senior market analyst of IMS Research said BP's decision comes as global photovoltaic module manufacturing capacity reaches 50 gigawatts, while demand is expected to total only 24 gigawatts this year. Average prices are now 44% lower than they were one year ago.



"Rapid manufacturing expansions have coincided with a slowdown in the growth of global demand," Wilkinson said in a statement emailed to MarketWatch. "The result has been intense competition and a fierce price war, and not enough demand to support all of the industry's hundreds of suppliers."



The move comes just days after First Solar, the only pure-play solar panel maker in the S&P 500 , issued a profit warning for 2012 and said it'll refocus its business toward large-scale utility projects, rather than residential solar panels. See: First Solar falls to lowest level since 2007.

Think About It: The Gulf Oil Leak Is An Accident, But The Failed Clean-Up Might Be Intentional

The idea of man-caused global warming has been shown to be a lie, (have a look around this blog if you need convincing) and the attempt to control carbon dioxide emissions is a horrible, cruel, costly folly. So the Obama Administration needed a crisis to convince people to reconsider the "Cap and Trade (Tax)" Energy Bill. Take a good hard look at what is being done to us by the Obama Administration.

Whether the botched clean-up efforts in the Gulf of Mexico are intentional or just the result of government incompetence, Obama has already, successfully extorted (blackmailed) $20 Billion from BP (British Petroleum). Which large oil company (or other industry) will he go after next? First it was the mortgage insurance industry, then the automakers, then Wall Street, then the health care industry, now the oil and energy industry is being set up to be controlled by the proposed "cap and trade" legislation. In the end, who pays? You and me, Joe and Jane taxpayer. You know it, or you should.

Obama is out to destroy the economy in order to save it. We are on the precipice of a major economic disaster caused by Obama's handling of this oil spill and this will be far, far more damaging to America than the leaked oil itself.
Peter


Could the Obama Administration be Blocking Gulf Clean-up Efforts Intentionally?"
Floyd and Mary Beth Brown
Friday, June 18, 2010 (source)

At first blush this sounds like an outlandish question with a conspiratorial twist. The corollary question goes like this: Is the Obama administration intentionally scaling back clean-up efforts in the Gulf in an attempt to maximize the damage so Democrats in Congress will have an excuse to take effective control over yet another major sector of our economy and impose crippling and draconian new taxes on the American people?

We first learned of this controversy reading Sher Zieve who wrote in the Canada Free Press: "Obama is doing the bare minimum so that destruction will be at an all-time maximum -- in order to shove his Cap and Trade bill (which will complete our destruction) down our throats."

Zieve added: "The BP oil disaster was custom-made for The Obama. The effective oil-skimmer systems utilized by the Saudis and others would work to greatly minimize the damage being caused to the US Gulf Coast. But, The Obama continues to drag his heels as States and lives are destroyed."

Fox News reported that when the Dutch government offered to help us clean up the oil spewing from the leaking BP oil rig, Obama initially turned them down cold. Norwegian and Dutch firms offered to help us too, but Obama said no.

It is reputed that the Roman Emperor Nero played his fiddle while Rome burnt to the ground so he could falsely blame the disaster on Christians and thereby rationalize a campaign of persecution against them.

Is it possible that Barack Hussein Obama and statists on Capitol Hill are using this crisis as an excuse to drive prices up at the pump, drive your utility bills through the roof, regulate your behavior and diminish your standard of living in this already queasy economy?

This much is certain -- in spite of what Obama told the American people during his Oval Office address to the nation, he did not adequately respond to this crisis. The administration has clearly failed in terms of organization and the use of resources available to the federal government.

Moreover, it's now indisputable that statists on Capitol Hill are attempting to exploit this disaster to push so-called cap and trade legislation. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell recently revealed: "At the same time as Americans wonder when this gusher will ever be plugged, we hear word that the administration and my good friend the majority leader want to piggy back their controversial new national energy tax -- also known as cap and trade -- to an oil spill response bill that could and should be an opportunity for true bipartisan cooperation. So here again, we see the administration using a crisis, in this case the disaster in the gulf, as an opportunity to muscle through Congress another deeply unpopular bill that has profound implications for small business and struggling households."

But why let something as trivial as the truth get in the way when it comes to pushing an extreme "green" agenda? Liberals like Barack Obama made this problem worse so they could "solve" the problem and, as we've come to expect, they plan to "solve" the problem by making it worse.

So, true to form, Obama declared a moratorium on off-shore drilling and to make matters worse, Obama wants to institute a massive new energy tax, masquerading as sound energy policy (so-called cap and trade), that will dramatically raise the cost of just about everything you produce or consume, deprive you of income, control your behavior and repress your liberties.

Obama's Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, once said that you should never let a good crisis go to waste and Barack Obama and Democrats on Capitol Hill aren't about to let this crisis go to waste. He may pontificate about holding BP to account but Obama and his leftist cronies fully intend to exploit this crisis to sneak liberty-stealing cap and trade legislation past the American people.

Al Gore To Stop Oil Leak In Gulf Of Mexico

Where is Al Gore when we really need him? Borrowed from here.