TL: GREENPEACE BRIEFING: PLUGGING INTO THE SUN: SOLAR POWER AS
A SOLUTION TO GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE
SO: GREENPEACE, USA (GP)
DT: JULY, 1997

In December 1997, world governments will gather in Kyoto, Japan
to agree measures to save the world from dangerous climate
change.  A first step towards this goal will be limits on the
emissions of global warming gases caused by the burning of
fossil fuels such as oil, coal and gas.

A successful strategy to prevent the worst impacts from climate
change requires the urgent displacement of fossil fuels with
renewable energy sources.  To date, the intense lobbying of the
fossil fuel industry has led politicians to ignore solar as a
solution to the problem of climate change.

On earth, the amount of solar energy available to generate
photovoltaic power is about 10,000 times greater than total
world energy use today.  Photovoltaics were first developed in
the 1950s for space exploration and terrestrial systems
development began in the early 1970s following the oil crisis. 
Photovoltaic systems convert the sun's energy directly into
electricity.  This leads to a number of critical advantages
which solar power has over other forms of power.

Solar power is not a contributor to greenhouse gas emissions
which cause climate change.  It is also: highly reliable, the
best urban renewable energy source, easily mass produced and
installed and has low operating costs requiring minimal
servicing.  Photovoltaic power (PV) can be installed with
directly on roofs or facades (decentralized systems) or in
centralized large-scale power stations.

Two centralized PV stations already exist worldwide:

A 3.3 MW power station in Serre, Italy which was, for a long
period, the largest photovoltaic power station in the world.

A 2.2 MW power station built by the US Sacramento Municipal
Utility District (who also have constructed a 0.5 MW station).

In Greece, Greenpeace recently announced that the construction
of the world's biggest solar photovoltaic power station is about
to commence.  The Greek government has approved the first 5
Megawatts of a 50 MW power station.  At 50 Megawatts, the
station will be 5 times larger than any other single
photovoltaic installation in the world.

In Germany, Greenpeace helped create a market for PV, doubling
the demand for solar PV and at the same time reducing the costs
for a standardized system (2KW) by around 40 percent.

A number of other multi-megawatt photovoltaic power projects
have been put forward including: a 75-200 MW station in Arizona,
another 220 MW station in Arizona, a 100 MW station in India, a
4 MW station in Hawaii and a 50 MW station in California.

Currently, the highest barrier to the breakthrough of solar PV
is the unbalanced financial support for renewable energies
versus nuclear and fossil fuel energy.  In the United States and
European Union, the government significantly subsidizes fossil
fuels and nuclear power over solar and renewable power at a rate
of over 10:1.  Greenpeace advocates shifting subsidies away from
coal, oil and gas as a source of power generation to solar and
other renewable power as one solution to climate change.