Silver News
German Energy-Renewables Tax Pushes Silver
By Samuel Etris, Senior Technical Consultant to The Silver Institute
Speakers at The International Conference Renewables2004 last year in Bonn, Germany, urged governments to underwrite programs that would expand the use of renewable sources of energy. At the top of their list was photovoltaics, very thin wafers of ultra-pure silicon that convert solar energy into electricity and are backed by silver to gather the current and carry it to electric lines. Over 90 percent of the photovoltaics sold today are silver-backed crystalline silicon units, the most efficient
converters of solar energy.
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The German government response to the Conference was to set a renewables
assessment tax on normal electricity use of 6 to 7.76 euro cents per kilowatt hour to remunerate home owners who installed photovoltaic units. Home owners are paid 0.50 euros per kilowatt hour of electricity for the electricity their units feed into the German electric grid, a payment guaranteed for 20 years. With this incentive, German home owners have rushed to install photovoltaic units on top of their houses. In 1998, German photovoltaic panel energy production was about 9,500,000 watts per hour. With the new incentive, it has jumped to nearly 400,000,000 watts per hour.
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In Japan, government-subsidized solar energy panels have produced nearly 300,000,000 watts, and Spain has adopted the same basic model as Germany. In the United States, the recently-enacted U.S. Energy Policy Act of 2005 provides for substantial production tax credits (1.8 cents per kWh) for many renewable energy options for nine years, if they are on-line by the end of 2007.
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According to the U.S. Department of Energy, worldwide installation volume last year produced 1,200,000,000 watts, compared to about 70,000,000 watts the year before, with silicon/silver units accounting for 90 percent of the solar conversion cells. This demand has strained the production lines of silicon/silver photovoltaic cells over the past two years. It also has pressed forward
economies of scale that are expected to reduce production costs some 5 percent per year, encouraging the production of new assemblies to efficiently mount the cells.
Although thousands of homes in Germany, Japan, and
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elsewhere profit from roof units, it is in the remote regions of the world far from commercial power grids that photovoltaics offer the most advantage. Lesser developed countries now use photovoltaic power to pump deep well water and to operate sanitizing systems, while remote hospitals use photovoltaic cells to help refrigerate pharmaceuticals. Portable units also provide electric power for recreational vehicles, yachts, and remote businesses.
Commercial scale systems are under construction, too. Shell Solar is building a photovoltaic plant in Bavaria, Germany, that will supply 10,000,000 watts per hour, enough electricity to power 3,300 households.
Silver News - Fourth Quarter 2005
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