Giant Retailers Harnessing Solar Power For Energy Savings

Retailers are typically obsessed with what to put under their roofs, not on them. Yet the nation's biggest store chains are coming to see their immense, flat roofs as an untapped resource.

In recent months, chains including Wal-Mart Stores, Kohl's, Safeway and Whole Foods Market have installed solar panels on roofs of their stores to generate electricity on a large scale. One reason they are racing is to beat a Dec. 31 deadline to gain tax advantages for these projects.

So far, most chains have outfitted fewer than 10 percent of their stores. Over the long run, assuming Congress renews a favorable tax provision and more states offer incentives, the chains promise a solar construction program that would ultimately put panels atop almost every big store in the country.

The trend, while not entirely new, is accelerating as the chains seize a chance to bolster their environmental credentials by cutting back on their use of electricity from coal.

"It's very clear that green energy is now front and center in the minds of the business sector," said Daniel M. Kammen, an energy expert at the University of California, Berkeley. "Not only will you see panels on the roofs of your local stores, but I suspect very soon retailers will have stickers in their windows saying, 'This is a green energy store.' "

Read the whole story here.

Comments

[research]

if you live in AZ CA CN MN CO Mo NY OR TX,

Installed Solar power is FREE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.power-savetv.com/incentives.html

[LiberalBuzz]

Great ideas and glad to see they are FINALLY getting the idea. Using the sun to power your store which gives the energy grids a much needed break especially with the continued possibility of rolling blackouts in So. Cal. If all the major stores did this the rollings blackouts would probably stop AND if we could get more of them put up in So Cal we might, just might, be able to tell the oil and coal companies to stuff it.

I can only hope that solar panel production can be ramped up to meet the growing demands from buisness and home owners.

ALL schools should have them and with any kind of luck even the White House will have them put back on after Ronnie Raygun, Kow Towing to the energy companies had them taken down denigrating them in the process, may he rot in hlel.

[KillTheMessenger]

Don't get your short term hopes up too much. Solar panels have an EROEI of approx. 10. Which means that for the first two to three years of their life they are repaying the energy that went into their production (oil and natural gas is approaching the same EROEI fast, so that's not a particular disadvantage of solar panels). What it means, though, is that even is we put all our primary energy production into nothing but making solar cells, we could only replace ten percent of our generating capacity with solar cells a year. In reality it will be closet to a couple percent, unless someone comes up with a real increase in EROEI.

From this follows that a realistic time scale for massive solar adoption is 30 years. That's still fast in the world of energy, but it is not a short term solution by any means.

You are, of course, right about the time to act being thirty years ago. And America messed it up for good.

[OldKnute]

Excuse me????

Killthemessenger,

Sorry to disagree,,,, Solar Cells that are manufactured using Plants that are Solar Powered have absolutely NO,, energy reclamation cycle.

On the other hand,,,, OIL,,

Must be researched and located,, wells dug,,, must be pumped,, Stored,, Piped and Pumped,, loaded into Ships,, sent 14 thousand miles,, piped and pumped to a storage depot,,, pumped to a refinery, heated,, chemicals and minerals mined, manufactured, added,,, cooked for three days,,, pumped to storage,,, loaded onto trucks,, shipped and Trucked to retailers,,, Stored,,, pumped into our cars and provide an income and home for all involved,, have wars fought over,,, and our children to die for,,

Oil,,,, Has one HELL,, of a Energy Reclamation Cycle.

JMO

All the best

Knute Neo-LIB

[1will]

Maybe they can pay their employees a decent rate with the savings.

[KillTheMessenger]

There are no savings here. Solar electricity is approx. 21 cents/kWh on this scale. They can buy electricity off the grid for 8 cents per kWh. The upside is in tax incentives and public relations, all of which are paid for by the public.

I am still all for it because we need these kinds of deals to make solar electricity viable in the long term. But as far as WalMart etc. are concerned, I am realistic about the motives and financial structure of these deals.

[perk]

Actually, the new commercial rates for 7/1/2008 to 10/1/2008 for my area, southeast served by Entergy, Inc. , are about $.175 per KWH with demand fees, taxes and fuel cost adjustments. Since that rate increased from $.114 in the last quarter, I can envision an Internal Rate of Return that is competitive with Walmart's other investments.

Of course my assumption is that energy rates will increase another $.06 - $.12 over the 20 year life of the installation. I could be wrong on that.

[OldKnute]

Hahahaha!!!

Oh here we go again with the Killer Chant.

Hehehehe!!

Killthemessenger, Yes,,,, good tax incentives and they can pay for all their electrical needs for the next 25 years,,, AND offer peek-demand surplus to flow back into the grid.

Hey and they are walking the walk,,, you know,, GREEN,, and giving back to their communities. Helping the NEW Economy have extra power to build new Industries around,, saving the environment,, cleaning the air.

Ummm? 25 years of locked in Electricity?

Lemmie see,, not much more than 25 years ago, I was paying 3 cents a KW,, Gas was 45 cents a gallon,,,,, before the Iran/Iraq war, $1.30, during the Iran/Iraq war,, 91 cents after the Iran/Iraq war and diesel 52 cents.

Maybe Wall-Mart thinks there will be another,,,,, Iran/Iraq war?????

The present,,, Iran/Iraq,,,, war pushed prices over $5.00 a gallon.

I know!

Tell Wal-Mart to stop,,, we will just have to stop having Iran/Iraq wars,, that"s all.

Or,, Let Wal-Mart proceed and we can go to war with Iran and Iraq.

All the best

Knute Neo-LIB

[ahornick]

Their second resource would be their large parking lots. They could get heating and cooling from burying geothermal coils under the parking areas further reducing their energy costs and utility carbon footprint.

[fredamae]

Energy savings for retailers... I wonder if they will pass those "savings" on to the consumers without offering some lame "rationale" for not doing so.

[bbrecht]

Now here's a radical idea for retailers: turn off your lights during closing hours.

How much energy would that save?

[KillTheMessenger]

Some retailers have begun to turn the lights lower at daytime, too. The "ideal" retail lighting is traditionally established by the brightness which maximizes sales and it was well known for decades that brighter lights sell better. The result were stores that wasted enormous amounts of energy. Some retailers have found it better to lose a percent or two of sales but save energy and advertise it as being "green". In reality, they just stopped the practice of being wasteful.

[nirek]

I just got my 24 panels in and they are beautiful. As I look down the hill at the school I see a huge area of flat roof that could hold a lot of solar panels and make plenty of electricity. I thought this about 3 months ago and now I see this article. Makes me feel smart.

[mamacat]

In sunny California, I would like to see them make shaded parking lots and walk ways, with solar panels giving the shade. Instead of just having solar panels take up space, put them to use making shade as well as electricity.

[KillTheMessenger]

You are absolutely right. It turns out that in the Southwest one could generate most of the energy needed for electric cars from solar panels mounted above the parking and garage space needed for the same cars. Not sure that is true for the rest of the US, but in prime solar states it for sure is.

[MajorKong]

Makes sense. There's a lot of square footage on the roof of those big-box stores. Might as well put it to use.

[KOisGod]

And the captains of the Industrial age (the republican's) say, Why, LOL, when there's still coal to burn?

[nirek]

If we had solar panels on all available roofs we could reach Al Gores goal and clean the air while creating electric power.
Germany makes more solar power then any other country, and Vermont where I am has more sunshine then Germany does, so it is possible.

[sheila]

yep - we gotta get better energy policy for most middle class people to get onboard, though. you would be a good spokesperson in your area to argue for feed in tariffs and a full 30% federal tax credit!

[KillTheMessenger]

Solar cells don't vote, coal miners do.