A few years from now we we be able to see how many dollars per kilowatt hour this project cost. On a recent trip, only a few of the hundred or more wind turbines had their blades moving at all. It is likely that none were generating power. How much CO2 does a stopped windturbine waste in its equipment and transformers and buried power lines. Yes a buried power line wastes power, more power than one on poles. ..HG..

You down wit OPT? Yeah you know me! You down wit OPT? Yeah you know me! Sorry...flashback to a song from my youth. At any rate, I'm fascinated by wave energy - hopefully someone will be able to do some massive utility scale projects soon...maybe integrate these into wind turbines someway somehow like we've discussed on other posts.

"19-megawatt wave project in Portland, Victoria, led by the US-based Ocean Power Technologies and Leighton Holdings, received $66.5 million. The project trumped more fancied West Australian projects, which the the director of OPT Australasia, Gilbert George, credited to its partnership with Leighton.

Mr George said the project would need to raise a further $100 million at least before its full realisation, but he was ''very excited'' about the grant's potential to help this along."

As usual there are stock price rises for the co's involved coincident with this and the rest of $235 million 'grants'

Losers?
"Shares in Carnegie Wave Energy slumped today after it missed out on federal government renewable energy funds for its wave power project"
"We will continue to develop our Garden Island project with the support of the Western AustralianAustralian government's $12.5 million grant and then look to develop at our international sites where this is significant support for wave energy and where our projects have already received funding commitments from the French and Canadian governments"

The rest of the monies shared between 2 geothermal 25 and 39 MW plants and one solar.

October 26, 2009...Australian semiconductor company, BluGlass Limited, has been awarded $4.96 million of Commonwealth Government funding to assist with the development and commercialization of its high efficiency thin-film solar cell technology. BluGlass has secured the funding under Climate Ready Program which is one of the three elements of the $240 million Clean Business Australia initiative. The 'High-Efficiency Thin-Film Solar Cell' project aims to develop a third generation photovoltaic technology for manufacturing high efficiency solar cells based on the compound semiconductor material, indium-gallium nitride (InGaN). AusIndustry, the Australian federal government's program to provide assistance to industry, will provide the cash to BluGlass over 33 months. As part of the funding agreement BluGlass will match the AusIndustry funding with its own expenditure.

"Australia’s federal government, led by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, has approved plans for a $60 million dollar factory which is to become the largest manufacturer of solar cells in the Southern Hemisphere.
The company responsible for the project, Solar Spark Australia, is the first to be awarded Major Project Facillitation status under the Rudd government, and it plans to begin powering 9,000 homes by late next year.

This marks increased hope that Australia can meet goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 60% by 2050."