Not if they've read Robert Zubrin's *Entering Space*, where there are some
very convincing calculations that SPS's beaming power to earth is very
unlikely to ever be commercially viable, barring a minimum 6000fold
reduction in launch costs.

On 7/3/06, john s wolter <johnswolter@...> wrote:
>
> Given all this "loose money" around maybe some could be snagged for SPS's.
> I think this report in a way is good news.
>
> BTW the group's default reply-to address is ...
>
> "No Reply" <notify-dg-solarpowersatelliteplace@yahoogroups.com>
>
> rather then...
>
> <solarpowersatelliteplace@yahoogroups.com>
>
> this may greatly reduce replys to postings.
>
> On 3 Jul 2006 11:56:42 -0000, solarpowersatelliteplace@yahoogroups.com <
> solarpowersatelliteplace@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
> >
> > There is 1 message in this issue.
> >
> > Topics in this digest:
> >
> > 1. Re: Digest Number 102
> > From: john s wolter
> >
> >
> > Message
> > ________________________________________________________________________
> >
> > 1. Re: Digest Number 102
> > Posted by: "john s wolter" johnswolter@... johnspwolter
> > Date: Sun Jul 2, 2006 9:38 pm (PDT)
> >
> > On 1 Jul 2006 15:40:40 -0000, solarpowersatelliteplace@yahoogroups.com <
> > solarpowersatelliteplace@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > There is 1 message in this issue.
> > >
> > > Topics in this digest:
> > >
> > > 1. VCs Bet on Solar, Biofuel Money-Losers in Green Energy Frenzy
> > > From: markreiff
> > >
> > >
> > > Message
> > >
> ________________________________________________________________________
> > >
> > > 1. VCs Bet on Solar, Biofuel Money-Losers in Green Energy Frenzy
> > > Posted by: "markreiff" no_reply@yahoogroups.com markreiff
> > > Date: Thu Jun 29, 2006 8:51 pm (PDT)
> > >
> > > FYI,
> > >
> > > "VCs Bet on Solar, Biofuel Money-Losers in Green Energy Frenzy"
> > > Bloomberg
> > > http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?
> > > pid=20601109&sid=a9wBJqPgMUT8&refer=home
> > >
> > > : SolFocus sounds like a typical Silicon Valley startup: Eight
> > > : employees, big ideas -- and zero profit. Yet in mid-May, the
> > > : phones at the eight-month-old company wouldn't stop ringing.
> > >
> > > : The callers were venture capitalists, and they were dangling
> > > : millions of dollars in front of the Palo Alto, California-based
> > > : solar panel maker. Ty Jagerson, vice president of business
> > > : development, says as soon as he'd start talking to one VC, another
> > > : would call offering money.
> > >
> > > : ``It was completely insane,'' Jagerson, 35, says.
> > >
> > > : Up and down Sand Hill Road, the venture capital hub south of San
> > > : Francisco, the financiers who bankrolled the technology boom of
> > > : the 1990s are chasing their next big thing: alternative forms of
> > > : energy.
> > >
> > > : As oil and natural gas prices climb, venture capitalists are
> > > : investing hundreds of millions of dollars in young, often money-
> > > : losing companies that hope to harness the power of the sun or the
> > > : heat inside the Earth.
> > >
> > > : In all, U.S. VC funds invested a record $739 million in renewable
> > > : energy in 2005, up 36 percent from 2004, according to Cleantech
> > > : Venture Network LLC, a research group based in Ann Arbor,
> > > : Michigan.
> > >
> > > : VCs haven't buzzed like this since the Internet captured
> > > : investors' imaginations in the 1990s. Alternative energy stocks
> > > : have surged the way dot-com shares did in 1999 -- before the
> > > : bottom fell out of the Nasdaq Stock Market.
> > >
> > > : Investors Rush In
> > >
> > > : The 40-stock WilderHill Clean Energy Index has rocketed since its
> > > : August 2004 debut, rising 90 percent to a record 251.17 on May 5.
> > > : Since then, the index has fallen 23 percent to trade at 194.21 on
> > > : June 28.
> > >
> > > : As they did in the late 1990s, stock investors are baying after
> > > : companies that have yet to turn a profit.
> > >
> > > : Erik Straser, 36, a partner at nearby Mohr Davidow Ventures who
> > > : once worked at the top-secret Los Alamos National Laboratory in
> > > : New Mexico, says the cure to our energy ills is right over our
> > > : heads. New solar-power cells may one day reshape the global
> > > : electricity industry, he says.
> > >
> > > : ``A lot of VCs have woken up to the sheer magnitude of opportunity
> > > : in the energy markets,'' says Ira Ehrenpreis, a partner at
> > > : Technology Partners, a Palo Alto-based VC firm.
> > >
> > > : Venture capitalists could use a winner. Many of them are still
> > > : nursing losses from the Nasdaq bust. After that rout,
> > > : institutional investors pulled back, and VCs' money dried up.
> > >
> > > : Investment flows into venture funds plunged to $4 billion in 2002
> > > : from a record $106 billion in 2000, according to the Washington-
> > > : based National Venture Capital Association. VC funds posted a
> > > : negative return of 6.8 percent from 1999 to 2005.
> > >
> > > : People have dreamed of finding cheap, clean sources of energy
> > > : since the oil-price shock of the 1970s. So far, the hopes for
> > > : alternative energy have far outstripped the reality.
> > >
> > > : Green power is expensive. Even now, after oil and natural gas
> > > : prices have surged to record highs, it's still usually cheaper to
> > > : generate electricity by burning fossil fuels than it is by using
> > > : solar panels, wind turbines or underground steam.
> > >
> > > : In May, Rosemead, California-based Southern California Edison
> > > : agreed to pay 6.15 cents per kilowatt-hour for electricity from
> > > : renewable sources, plus an additional, undisclosed rate to ensure
> > > : energy would be available during peak hours.
> > >
> > > : Power produced by natural gas-fired plants costs 4 to 6 cents per
> > > : kilowatt-hour. Solar power costs U.S. homeowners as much as
> > > : 30 cents per kilowatt-hour -- double or even triple the price of
> > > : gas- or coal-generated electricity, according to Jefferies & Co.,
> > > : a Los Angeles-based investment bank.
> > >
> > > : Subsidies
> > >
> > > : Strip out state and federal incentives designed to promote
> > > : renewable power -- subsidies that might disappear when the
> > > : political winds shift -- and the economics of green look even
> > > : worse.
> > >
> > > : Because it's relatively expensive, green power has never really
> > > : caught on. In 2005, wind turbines, solar panels and other
> > > : alternatives to fossil fuels generated about 357 billion kilowatt-
> > > : hours of electricity, or 9.4 percent of the juice used in the
> > > : U.S., according to the U.S. Department of Energy. That's down from
> > > : 11 percent in 1989.
> > >
> > > : `Just Around the Corner'
> > >
> > > : ``Alternative energy has been just around the corner for
> > > : 20 years,'' says J. Stephan Dolezalek, a partner at San Bruno,
> > > : California-based VantagePoint Venture Partners. Once a green-
> > > : power doubter, Dolezalek is now backing clean-energy startups.
> > >
> > > : Institutional investors that invest in VC funds are warming to
> > > : clean energy, too. The $130 billion California State Teachers'
> > > : Retirement System, for example, is investing $250 million in
> > > : alternative energy through VC and private equity funds.
> > >
> > > : ``We're not head over heels in love with this sector, but we're
> > > : moving prudently to invest in it,'' says Margot Wirth, a money
> > > : manager at the teachers' pension fund.
> > >
> > > : To green-energy skeptics, VCs have a familiar reply: This time,
> > > : things are different. The economic, environmental and cultural
> > > : stars have finally aligned for a new era of alternative power,
> > > : they say.
> > >
> > > : `Birkenstock Set'
> > >
> > > : ``Something has really changed,'' says Floyd of Nth Power, which
> > > : has invested solely in alternative energy since 1997. ``This
> > > : industry isn't just for the Birkenstock set anymore; it's got
> > > : serious capital behind it now.''
> > >
> > > : That includes corporate cash. General Electric Co. has made wind
> > > : turbines since 2002 and solar systems since 2004. Now, its GE
> > > : Energy Financial Services arm plans to triple its renewable energy
> > > : fund to $3 billion by 2008.
> > >
> > > : ``The growth opportunity is so apparent, so we're going after
> > > : it,'' says Kevin Walsh, managing director of GE Financial's
> > > : renewable energy unit.
> > >
> > > : `Move the Cost Needle Down'
> > >
> > > : At a restaurant near his office, Straser pushes aside his stir-fry
> > > : and grabs a pencil to diagram how rising energy costs are pressing
> > > : companies to seek alternatives like solar power.
> > >
> > > : ``Solar is all about cost performance now, and those companies
> > > : that can move the cost needle down, that's the only goal that
> > > : matters,'' Straser says, scribbling on the butcher paper covering
> > > : the tabletop.
> > >
> > > : In early 2005, Straser met with Martin Roscheisen, 37, a fellow
> > > : Stanford-trained engineer, who'd assembled a team of
> > > : 30 Ph.D.- level scientists and engineers in an office park in Palo
> > > : Alto. They were developing a new type of solar technology that
> > > : cost less to produce than typical silicon panels. Google
> > > : co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page were early investors in the
> > > : company, called Nanosolar Inc.
> > >
> > > : A few months later, Mohr Davidow led a $10.5 million round of
> > > : financing for Nanosolar, which included Benchmark Capital, the
> > > : Sand Hill Road VC firm that funded EBay Inc.
> > >
> > > : Nanotechnology
> > >
> > > : ``Given that we invested in the company before the product was
> > > : developed, there was a technical risk,'' Straser says of
> > > : Nanosolar. ``But we dove in deep on the technology, and we could
> > > : see how a breakthrough manufacturing process could unlock a huge
> > > : economic advantage.''
> > >
> > > : For 30 years, solar cells have been fashioned from silicon wafers
> > > : similar to the ones that semiconductor manufacturers like Intel
> > > : Corp. use to manufacture computer chips. The rigid, delicate
> > > : panels are expensive to make, costing customers about $5.40 per
> > > : watt, and must be mounted in modules on rooftops or other exposed
> > > : surfaces.
> > >
> > > : Using nanotechnology, the science of building microscopic
> > > : materials from single atoms and molecules, Nanosolar's scientists
> > > : created a ``photovoltaic ink'' that converts sunlight into
> > > : electricity. The ink is coated onto flexible, foil-like strips
> > > : that wind through roll presses similar to those that print
> > > : newspapers.
> > >
> > > : The thin film of ink, which is 1/100th the thickness of a silicon-
> > > : based solar cell, can be attached to walls or any other flat
> > > : surface or integrated into roofing material. Roscheisen says this
> > > : process will enable Nanosolar to make solar cells for as little as
> > > : a 10th of the cost of silicon panels.
> > >
> > > : Bay Area Factory
> > >
> > > : Roscheisen says he doesn't aspire to replace existing electricity
> > > : sources with his PowerSheet-brand solar cells.
> > >
> > > : ``Solar is fundamentally about peak power availability and
> > > : value,'' Roscheisen says.
> > >
> > > : Growing Pains
> > >
> > > : Right now, many solar companies are feeling growing pains.
> > > : Worldwide sales of solar panels more than doubled to $11.2 billion
> > > : in 2005 from $4.7 billion in 2003, according to Clean Edge Inc., a
> > > : Portland, Oregon-based research firm. Solar cell makers that can't
> > > : buy the silicon they need face backlogs of as long as two years,
> > > : says Jeffrey Bencik, an analyst at Jefferies in New York.
> > >
> > > : Nanosolar confronts commodity risks of its own. The company uses
> > > : copper and indium, both of which have undergone volatile price
> > > : swings during the past year. Indium, a metal as scarce as silver,
> > > : swung from $950 a kilogram in June 2005 to $1,035 in September, to
> > > : $797.50 on June 5.
> > >
> > > : An even bigger challenge is that Nanosolar's ``thin-film cells''
> > > : are less efficient than conventional solar panels. They convert
> > > : 14 percent of the sunlight that strikes them into electricity,
> > > : whereas silicon cells convert about 20 percent.
> > >
> > > : Then President Jimmy Carter jump-started the renewable power
> > > : industry with tax credits. Floyd was hooked.
> > >
> > > : ``There were a lot of new technologies coming on line, and there
> > > : weren't many entrepreneurs, so it was a market where you could
> > > : really make a mark,'' she says.
> > >
> > > : ``These are huge issues that have to be grappled with,'' he says.
> > > : ``We're talking about a transformation of the global energy
> > > : infrastructure over the next few decades.''
> > >
> > > : Time moves fast in Silicon Valley. In 1999, VCs were the heroes of
> > > : the New Economy. By 2002, many of them looked like goats. What
> > > : many investors seemed to forget during those dark, post-bubble
> > > : years is that, sometimes, the dreamers are right.
> > >
> > > : In less than a decade, a seemingly quixotic startup with a goofy
> > > : name -- Google -- has become one of the most valuable companies in
> > > : the world. VCs who can find a Google or Amazon or EBay of green
> > > : power will make a fortune. And if they happen to save the world
> > > : along the way, well, that's fine, too.
> > >
> > > Mark Reiff
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > Messages in this topic (1)
> > >
> ________________________________________________________________________
> > >
> ________________________________________________________________________
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
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> > >
> >
> >
> > --
> > John S. Wolter President
> > Wolter Works
> > Mailto:johnswolter@...
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> > Cell: 1-734-904-8433
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> > Messages in this topic (1)
> > ________________________________________________________________________
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> --
> John S. Wolter President
> Wolter Works
> Mailto:johnswolter@...
> Desk 1-734-665-1263
> Cell: 1-734-904-8433
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>
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