CA Farmers Drill Wells, Pump with Solar

Drill, baby, drill! Then go solar.... 

Sometimes solutions to problems are hidden in plain sight. Two avocado farmers in San Diego County experienced exactly that.

Their problems were two-fold: The skyrocketing cost of water for irrigation and the equally exploding costs to pump it. Their solution, tripped upon by sheer necessity, came by drilling for their own water, digging their own ponds to hold it and building solar power systems to pump it. Even better, a lot of the equipment and labor was already on hand.

Of course, drilling the wells and making the holding areas cost money but the medium- and long-term savings are considerable. What's more, water availability and the rising
cost for it is mitigated. Going solar however, required some outside expertise.

Enter Larry Slominski.

Slominski's been in solar since way before solar was cool. His first-hand experience ranges from installing off-grid PV systems in Micronesia while in the Peace Corps to a 2MW grid-tied installation at the Fresno-Yosemite International Airport.

Larry Slominski

A mechanical engineer by training, Slominski has been involved with every facet of the solar industry including both crystalline and amorphous-silicon panel technologies; single- and dual-access trackers; concentrated PV; string and micro-inverters; and all forms of ballasted, BIPV and penetrating roof applications and ground-mounted projects. Walking with him at a solar trade show and seeing someone in every third booth hailing Larry like a long-lost army buddy, you know he is a maven of the solar field.

Slominski worked with the two farmers on practical panel array plans on the land made available. His services also included compliance, permitting, rebate and tax incentive advisement, equipment selection and procurement, project oversight, inspection preparation and system commissioning.

"Solar panel prices are at an all-time low and when you add incentives along with the high cost of energy and water, in these cases," says Slominski, "it's a great time to go solar." He said when on-staff farm labor is added to the mix, payback can come in less than five years. One of the two farmers, he says, will save a cool million by taking this new tack.

"Farmers know if they cannot control external market forces, they can  vastly improve their bottom line by drilling their own wells and utilizing solar power," Slominski concludes, "and these two alternatives have been there in plain sight for quite awhile."

For inquiries contact Larry Slominski at LTS Energy, 760/505-6822 (lslominski@aol.com) or David Brands, 760/908-3770 (dbrands72@gmail.com).

Solar Pricing at Historical Lows

Industry continues to rise...

Last January saw solar panel pricing hit historical lows worldwide. As a result and despite the economy, the solar photovoltaic industry is having a pretty good year both at the commercial and residential levels.

Granted, the California Solar Initiative's rebates have triggered down to rather meager levels and some say this has tempered the fall of panel pricing in the state with the country's largest monetary stake in solar power. This writer disagrees.

Competition in California for solar business has never been fiercer. Since the nation's financial debacle nearly two years ago, scores of electrical contractors around the country who lost new-construction or repair work or simply ignored PV, have now jumped into PV with both feet.

PV and Growth

Furthermore, as the solar industry is one of the few growth sectors in the nation's staggering economy, PV equipment makers and marketers continue streaming into California and neighboring states. Fueled by the federal solar investment tax credit and renewable energy standards demanded by state governments on utilities, the PV picture gets rosier. Finally, the cost of electricity continues to rise, though at a rather stilted pace for the time being. In short, everybody who's anybody in solar is in or coming to California. And it's spreading.

Solar and Wall Street

Solar stocks, as can be seen in this blog's weekly update, have traveled much the same path as other tech issues. To be sure, solar stock prices are down from pre-crisis levels in 2008 but so are virtually every other stock on Wall Street. Still, there have been more solar start-ups and few failures worldwide and more foreign PV manufacturers are setting up plants stateside. Besides, after a generation of stupendous growth in the stock market, investors are eschewing risk and looking more to bonds for safety, anyway.

Solar Financing

When this writer began selling solar installations in 2002, most prospects had plenty of home equity. They could get an easy $50,000 home equity line of credit with a simple phone call to their bank. Those days are gone, of course, so the PV industry had to get creative. Since then solar manufacturers and dealers have answered the soft market with leasing options, same-as-cash unsecured "bridge" loans, and more standard--and unsecured--term loans.

So, believe it or not, it's a good time to go solar.

How good is it? Find out in my next post.