Scheer Solar Economy Renewable Energy for a Sustainable Global Future (Earthscan, 2005)

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a new wave of development can take off faster than ever, providing they fit entrenched interests and offer large corporations opportunities to consolidate and expand their markets. If, however, innovations run counter to or even endanger corporate business models, then they will be opposed with the massed might of tightly knit business structures. Large corporations do not look kindly on what they see as trespassers on their territory.

Of all the cases of radical technological innovation analysed by James M Utterback of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, only one quarter were championed by established companies. Older companies prefer to spend hundreds of millions improving on established products (so-called incremental change) than one or two million on developing new products for which the existence of a market has not been proven. The market seems ‘too small’, the risk ‘too high’. Established firms have no interest in relinquishing proven technology and/or established markets. They timidly assume that the new product will take too long to penetrate the market, if it ever does. For large companies, only the certainty of expectations or experience can justify a change of strategy or the ploughing of a new furrow. For this reason, either they do not engage at all with radically new technologies that replace existing products, or they do so only half-heartedly. Yet according to Utterback, ‘total engagement’ is needed to make a new technology work.1 If on top of this, as in the case of energy, existing firms are also fettered by established supply chains, then the tentative approach large companies are taking to renewable energy becomes easier to comprehend.

For precisely this reason, it is of central importance that the technologies for converting and using solar energy should be conceived in such a way that, like the steam-engine before them, they will become an unstoppable economic force. The $64,000 question is: what are the ‘killer applications’ for solar resources?

C H A P T E R 6

Energy beyond the grid

ACHIEVING MORE EFFECTIVE and more comprehen-

sive energy supplies has always meant the construction and expansion of energy grids. Energy grids have become bywords for economic progress and prosperity. The advent of grids, however, heralded the seemingly irrevocable demise of autonomous energy production. The wider the reach of the distribution grid, the larger the suppliers, and vice versa – irrespective of the commodity supplied, be it electricity, gas, water or heat. The same also goes for the oil and coal distribution networks. The national grid for electricity in particular symbolized the conclusion and perfection of the modern energy system. Consequently, electricity generation technologies are evaluated and selected on the basis of their compatibility with the national grid, and the technologies for generation from renewable sources are also being developed for seamless integration with the grid.

Technologies for autonomous power generation, ie, with no grid connection, are not taken seriously by energy experts. They are at best regarded as special cases, makeshift or childish nonsense, appropriate only for niche applications or backward regions of the developing world. Energy-hungry society usually regards those who – for idealistic reasons – aim for complete energy autonomy as cranks and oddballs. Energyautonomous living, including an array of autonomous devices and solar-powered vehicles, was all the rage in the USA of the 1970s, drawing on the ideals of individual freedom of the civil rights movement.1 Mainstream society jeered or simply took no notice. Efforts to develop solar power technology have consequently given little consideration to the idea of

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autonomous power supplies (albeit with the exception of PV installations for developing country villages with no grid connection). This focus on integrating renewable energy into the national grid shows up most clearly in the lack of research into electricity storage.

In fact, it is the unique capacity for autonomous and localgrid power supplies that only renewable energy can offer which presents the greatest opportunity to break energy supply chains and revolutionize economic structures. The following sections consider the technological options available.

Wireless power: the potential of solar stand-alone and stand-by technologies

Grid-independent PV is already ubiquitous. It started with pocket calculators, solar wristwatches, portable radios and miniature pumps for back gardens or signal buoys, which draw their power from built-in solar cells. The range of devices available is continually expanding, and most can be ordered through appropriate catalogues. The most prominent distributors are Real Goods of California and the solar technology mail-order company GWU, based in Fürth, Germany.2 The variety of autonomous technologies ranges from solar-powered road-sign lighting, parking meters, electric fences, electric razors, cameras, hand-drills, automatic garage doors, emergency telephones, lamps, lawn-mowers, hand-held vacuum cleaners, ventilators, detectors for domestic alarm systems, automatic teller machines (ATMs) and street lighting through to in-car air conditioning powered by solar sun-roofs, and many others. In the 1980s, the German research ministry even sponsored a research and development programme for small devices like these at the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems in Freiburg, under the leadership of Adolf Götzberger and Jürgen Schmidt, although the programme was later scaled back.3

Even so, the ranks of solar-powered stand-alone devices have long since included more demanding applications, such as battery chargers or rechargers for mobile phones; mobile phones and powerbooks containing built-in solar panels; lighthouses and radio beacons; and boats and refrigerated lorries

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powered by solar cells alone, the latter drawing power for the refrigeration system from the solar panels on the trailer roof. The possibilities are almost unlimited, potentially including all devices that currently run on mains electricity or batteries: desk or standard lamps in closed but well-lit rooms, remote control units, the whole gamut of household appliances through to fridges where the door could be a solar panel. Each individual application could be dismissed as a side issue, but in sum, providing that they become mass-produced standard appliances, they could quickly become important.

Electricity companies were never generous enough to underestimate the potential impact of household and office gadgets on their sales. The availability of a wide array of specialist gadgets enhances turnover. The appreciable rise in electricity consumption in homes and offices over recent decades can largely be attributed to innumerable labour-saving devices and the systematic electrification of everyday household and office equipment. In Germany, homes and offices consume 200 billion kWh annually, which is 38 per cent of the entire electricity supply.

The term ‘stand-alone system’ covers both those which are wired up and always ready for use, and those which function or can function completely independently, without wires. Take the apparently small example of the household doorbell. The transformer for a doorbell consumes between 9 and 22 kWh a year. For the around 37 million households in Germany, that adds up to a total consumption of over 500 million kWh annually, equivalent to the electricity demand of a town of 100,000 inhabitants. A single, matchbox-sized PV module mounted on the wall by the bell would be enough to keep the bell going. To put it another way, this would equate to the installation of 500 MW of photovoltaics, four times the annual world output in 1998. Moreover, a stand-alone doorbell would not need a transformer and, in detached houses, there would be no need for additional wiring. The result would be cheaper or at least as cheap as conventional doorbells.

Many stand-alone devices are powered by batteries, both rechargeables and non-rechargeables. In 1997, turnover in the global market was $35 billion, and the industry is expecting

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growth of 5 per cent per annum, resulting from the demand for consumer electronics in particular.4

Most batteries, both rechargeables (and accumulators) and non-rechargeables, could be replaced by built-in solar panels or solar-powered chargers. This would even make the devices more user-friendly, as they could be recharged on the hoof without needing to find a wall socket. In the case of solar pocket calculators, for example, there would also be no need to worry about changing non-rechargeable batteries. Non-rechargeable batteries would largely disappear from the market. Mobile phones that can recharge in any available sunlight would save users from worrying whether the power will run out at an inopportune moment; likewise, laptops with solar cells in the lid could recharge during use. Mobile phones currently need 35 kWh a year on average; base-station rechargers for cordless phones need 42 kWh. Making these devices autonomous using solar panels would save the individual user around seven or eight pounds a year. Twelve million such devices – the estimated size of the mobile phone market in Germany – would represent the replacement of 900 million kWh of conventional electricity with solar energy. The substitution of primary energy would be three times as high, once the various losses along the supply chain have been factored in.

Since solar panels can be incorporated into every electronic device, constant improvements in the conversion efficiency of solar cells, the energy efficiency of the devices and the capacity of accumulators offer ever greater opportunities to ensure that the growing number of electronic devices does not translate into greater demand for mains electricity. 1978 saw the USA’s first grand plan for industrial production of PV. But although it received authorization, it was never actually implemented. The entire army was to be equipped with solar-power field telephones, in order to eliminate the need for batteries – even back then, it had been calculated that this would cost less than the conventional power supplies of the time.5 Furthermore, solar cells are not an issue with respect to waste disposal – unlike batteries, which present a serious toxic waste problem.

The usual cost comparisons per kWh do not apply to builtin solar panels, because this would no more be an issue for

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people than it is with batteries. The amount of electricity consumed by battery chargers cannot be measured statistically. The necessary charging time is usually exceeded, sometimes by hours or even days; the resultant loss of electricity is pure waste. As a result, mobile phones, for example, probably consume far more power than they actually need. Accumulators and the transformers that feed them also waste significant quantities of electricity. When devices are not used for an extended period of time, the loss of electricity due to selfdischarge is considerable, up to 95 per cent of the actual amount used. Transformers also consume electricity in converting 240 volts (V) mains to levels usual for electrical devices of between 1.5 and 60 V, and they do this even when the devices they supply are switched off.

Consumer surveys have been used to calculate moderately reliable figures for the energy wasted by the mains-backed standby modes of televisions, video cassette recorders (VCRs), hi-fis, fax machines, hot water boilers, household appliances with builtin clocks, telephone extensions, answering machines, CD players, and personal computers (PCs) with monitors or modems in the home and at the office. If all households each ran only one television, one satellite receiver, one VCR, one answering machine, one hi-fi and one fax machine, then using figures worked out for average stand-by power consumption, this adds up to an annual electricity demand of almost 600 kWh, at an additional individual cost of €62 ($55) a year, for household electronics in stand-by mode. It is calculated that Germany wastes 20 billion kWh annually on stand-by functions, at a cost of over €2 billion, or nearly $2 billion. This is the same as the electricity consumption of Hamburg, Berlin, Munich and Frankfurt combined. For comparison, statistically measured electricity production from renewable sources in Germany in 1998 was around 25 billion kWh. For the EU, electricity consumption by devices on standby has been calculated to be 100 billion kWh a year, or one fifth of Germany’s total electricity consumption of 500 billion kWh per annum, equivalent to a conventional power station capacity of around 20,000 MW. These figures were reached even without accounting for the losses from inefficiencies within electronic devices. In most cases, power is supplied to all parts of an

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electronic device even when only one component is being actively used, rather as if a house only had one light switch, thus making it impossible to light only one room at a time.

Stand-by functions are now the subject of heated debate. Demands for new, energy-efficient appliances meet with the rejoinder that stand-by mode is an unavoidable necessity for devices like answering machines or fax machines, which have to be ‘always-on’ to work.6 Considerable development effort goes into reducing the power consumption of these appliances, and thereby reducing or avoiding the losses due to always-on operation. There are awareness-raising advertising campaigns and specialist workshops aimed at producers, sellers and customers, labelling regimes mooted, and so on. Yet hardly anyone is making the case for what would be the most obvious solution, namely that all these problems could be easily circumvented by building solar panels into always-on appliances.

If stand-alone and stand-by functions were to be powered in future primarily by solar panels – in the name of lower costs, greater convenience and environmental protection – this alone would probably raise the share of renewable energy to well over 10 per cent of the total electricity demand, enough to replace at least 10,000 MW of capacity in Germany alone. Around ten times the current world output of PV would be needed, which could give the technology such a boost that it would quickly become faster and cheaper to deploy for other, larger-scale applications. As the power for always-on devices forms part of the base load, allegedly a no-go area for PV, such solar-powered devices would also effectively demolish one of the standard arguments against solar electricity.

This presents an opportunity of an order of magnitude that promoters of PV scarcely dare envisage for the foreseeable future. Industrial suppliers will need imaginative product development and marketing concepts if they are to rise to the challenge of bringing out superior appliances and making them succeed in the marketplace. For makers of conventional alwayson and stand-alone devices, the effort required would be no more than improving on established, saleable products, and no great leap into the unknown. For the electricity industry, of course, it would mean a painful market contraction.

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The opportunities for cordless power just described also demonstrate how solar and energy-efficient technologies can complement each other in a productive way, rather than being treated as mutually exclusive. For the greater the level of energy efficiency, the faster solar power can grow – and help erode the interwoven structures of the conventional energy industry. Hans-Joachim Bruch, an engineer and advisor to the German environment ministry, calculated for this book how large and how powerful a built-in solar panel would have to be in order to power the stand-by mode of an always-on device the long way round, through the mains (see Table 6.1). As solar panels could supply power not just when the device is inactive, but also while it is in use, solar-powered always-on devices could replace double the 20 billion kWh that standby functions are calculated to consume, ie 40 billion kWh. Including losses over the entire electricity supply chain, that adds up to the replacement of a total of 120 billion kWh of primary energy!

There are no economic factors holding this development back; only the lack of imagination on the part of established industries and the opposing interests of the battery and electricity companies. That global producers of electrical devices such as Bosch have largely closed their minds towards this potential for (solar) technological innovation does not exactly show them to be forward-thinking companies.

The situation in Japan is already rather different. The government-initiated ‘Sunshine’ project has secured the collaboration of almost all large companies in the electrical and glass industries and, besides government money, these firms are investing far more of their own resources in the development of PV than companies in other countries – and have been doing so for years. Japanese industry applied for over 6000 patents on PV technology between 1981 and 1995 alone, many of which were for small devices.7 Apart from a few exceptions like Siemens and Pilkington, European electrical and glass manufacturers have not yet woken up to this issue. Phillips has even called a halt to its initial foray into PV.

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Table 6.1 Stand-by power consumption and equivalent PV panel area

	Stand-by power consumption
	Average for	New, energy-	Highest
	existing	efficient	power
	appliances	appliances	consumption1
	(Watts)	(Watts)	(Watts)
Entertainment electronics
Televisions	12	0.1	20
VCRs	15	1.0	28
Satellite receivers	20	3.0	35
Hi-fi systems	12	1.0	14.5
CD players	6	0.1	7
Household appliances
Electric cooker with built-in clock	6	3.0	7
Microwave oven with built-in clock	3	3.0	4
Coffee machine with built-in clock	4	2.0	5
Communications equipment
Telephones (2–10 units)	20	8.0	25
Answering machine	4	1.6	12
Fax machine	12	1.0	100
Home computers
PC and monitor	100	2.5	200
Ink-jet printer	10	2.0	70
Modem	8	3.3	10

1 Highest power consumption: primarily older units.

2 Output in watts per module (with optimum orientation) for equivalent annual power consumption in stand-by mode; panel area needed in m2, assuming

11 per cent efficiency without generation and transmission losses. Source: UBA/Hans-Joachim Bruch

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Annual stand-by power consumption			PV panel needed to supply the appliance,
			assuming that the power is transmitted
				over the grid (output and area)2
Average for	New, energy-	Highest	Average for		New, energy-		Highest
existing	efficient	power	existing		efficient		power
appliances	appliances	consumption1 appliances			appliances		consumption1
(kWh/yr)	(kWh/yr)	(kWh/yr)	W	m2	W	m2	W	m2
83	1	139	95	0.87	1.2	0.01	160	1.45
126	8	235	145	1.32	9.2	0.08	270	2.45
139	21	242	160	1.45	24.1	0.22	278	2.53
96	8	116	110	1.00	9.2	0.08	133	1.21
50	1	59	57	0.52	1.2	0.01	68	0.62
48	24	56	55	0.50	27.8	0.25	64	0.59
26	26	35	30	0.27	30.0	0.27	40	0.37
12	6	15	14	0.13	6.9	0.06	17	0.16
161	4	200	185	1.68	73.6	0.67	230	2.09
35	14	104	40	0.37	16.1	0.15	120	1.09
104	9	870	120	1.09	10.3	0.09	1000	9.09
44	1	88	51	0.46	1.2	0.01	101	0.92
4	1	31	5	0.04	1.2	0.01	36	0.32
2	1	2	2	0.02	1.2	0.01	2	0.02