US DOE awards USD 12m to make it simple to go solar

Nov 6, 2013 - The US Energy Department (DOE) said today it would provide some USD 12 million (EUR 9m) in financing to eight teams that are working to make its faster and easier for homes and business to install own solar systems.

The money is coming under a second round of the Rooftop Solar Challenge, a project under the US government’s SunShot Initiative that aims to reduce the cost of solar energy and make it fully cost-competitive with conventional energy by 2020.

These USD 12 million, to be matched by at least USD 4 million in third-party financing, will allow the awardees to go ahead with various project whose ultimate goal is to cut red tape for the rooftop solar segment. The chosen teams will create and spread solutions that help standardise the complex permitting and grid connection procedures that are usually unsimilar in different jurisdictions. They will also work to facilitate easy, cheaper bulk purchasing and support user-friendly, fast online applications.

The Energy Department explained that already soft costs such as permitting, installation and maintenance, bring over 60% of the cost of rooftop photovoltaic (PV) arrays in the country. Reducing such costs is important for the wider adoption of PV.

(USD 1 = EUR 0.740)

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