Solar Energy Political and Legal Influences - Research Paper Example

Solar Energy Political and Legal Influences Introduction Solar energy is an environmental-friendly and less harmful source of power. Not like power from a nuclear or an oil source, solar energy is safe, clean, and renewable. Political and legal factors have largely influenced the growth and use of solar energy. The U.S. Department of Energy has backed up a number of industry-specific works on energy development. The thrust for comprehensive energy research in the U.S. has been provided only by individuals or private corporations, for whom financial support are slow. Major developments in photovoltaic technology may trim down the prices of solar household units, but these major developments are likely to be delayed by weak federal assistance. Furthermore, even if prices were significantly reduced, the lack of legislation for the use of solar energy prevents many residential consumers from setting up solar heating units. In other words, it is uncertain whether solar energy can meet the world’s immediate energy requirements. Certainly, there are numerous steps that policymakers can take to support and encourage the use of solar energy. For instance, public utility agencies could persuade consumers to buy solar heating units by giving low- or zero-interest loans subsidized by utility firms. Or public agencies could persuade utilities to rent solar heating units by offering a bigger rate of return as an encouragement (Hough, 2007). The Energy Project of the Harvard Business School predicts that solar energy could cater to a substantial portion of America’s energy requirements (Laird, 2001). However, others are uncertain and pessimistic due to numerous legal and political barriers that solar energy confronts. In spite of tax inducements, operating solar infrastructures remain very costly for majority of residential consumers. The Political and Legal Aspects of Solar Energy Development “Prior to the first oil embargo in 1973 the federal government’s tax policy was designed to encourage fossil fuel exploration and production” (Skarboe et al., 2010, 20). The energy discourse during the 1970s was largely driven by the energy crisis experienced by the United States in 1973 and 1978. The U.S. Congress started to grasp the need to promote the production of renewable energy and financially supported research for developing wind and solar energy. The Solar Energy Research Act was ratified in 1974, which supported the use of solar energy that may positively contribute to the energy needs of the nation (Skarboe et al., 2010, 20-21). Congress carried on with the endorsement of solar power with the 1978 Energy Tax Act (ETA), which involved a 30% tax incentive for users of solar technology. After two years, the Energy Security Act was ratified which raised the incentive for renewable energy and tax incentive for solar power. The 1992 Energy Policy Act mandated a $0.018 per kilowatt-hour tax incentive for the generation of renewable energy. Other legislations aimed at the endorsement of solar energy use have been ratified (Skarboe et al., 2010, 21). The 2005 Energy Policy Act generated $250 million for the procurement of solar infrastructures in public buildings. The Congress, in 2008, restored the tax incentives for the production of wind and solar energy (Skarboe et al., 2010, 21-22). But in spite of continuous solar energy inducements and tax rewards, the investments have failed to transform solar energy into a cost-effective alternative source of power. In spite of the environmental advantages solar energy promises through minimized emissions of CO2, solar energy presently comprises a very small portion of electricity production in the United States. Its development has been hampered by political barriers, the absence of transmission system, irregularities, and high cost. The world greatly requires far-reaching energy developments, that discourage the emission of CO2 which reveals the actual cost of the harmful aspects produced by traditional sources of power. The present federal tax policy offers investment tax incentives for the development and production of solar energy (Prakash & Garg, 2000). There are two major issues with the present legislations aimed at endorsing the use of solar energy. First, the financial support for solar power are not adequate to transform solar energy into a competitive source of electricity. Second, such tax incentives should be subsidized one way or another, either through lesser spending or greater taxes. Although they are intended to reduce generation of electricity from fossil fuels, the incentives change the performance of other sources of power (Winston & Edelbach, 2012). A more effective strategy would be a tax on power sources that are proven to be harmful, like tax on carbon. The present legislations single out political ‘elites’ in the energy sector, and fail to allow the market to determine which renewable source of energy are capable of competing and that are the most feasible. With the enforcement of tax on carbon, solar energy’s competitiveness would strengthen, but the level of tax and the speed at which it would rise would decide the level of competitiveness of solar energy. Carbon tax does contribute to the competitiveness of alternative sources of energy, but with regard to solar power, unless major steps are taken to lessen the cost, solar energy is not likely to become a cost-effective production alternative, even under substantial price on carbon. At present solar energy is authorized through renewable energy payments or renewable energy standards (Skarboe et al., 2010). With assistance from tax credits and funding by the federal government and states, installations of solar energy systems have witnessed a fast-paced development. Nevertheless, it is vital to examine the policy objectives and the dynamics of the market. If the objective is a low-carbon legislation, there are other sources that can generate low-carbon power in a more affordable way than solar energy at present is able to provide. U.S. energy legislators embraced fixed technical and standard assumptions about energy technologies for more than thirty years. Both forms of assumptions influenced the problem framework that professionals and authorities exercised in developing and analyzing energy legislation. Policymakers who evaluated new souces of energy and its prospects framed their problems in terms of national security and economic gains. Ideas of economic gains evolved over the years, from the assumption that energy must be inexpensive to drive optimal economic progress to more sophisticated assumptions that energy markets should be competent to acquire maximum economic gain (Laird, 2001). However, both ideas suggest developing, producing, and acquiring energy at the least possible cost. Talks about national security stressed trading in oil from sources that are resistant to the disruption of political actions. Exactly how legislators articulated their ideas and values depended on the conditional situations where in they are situated, but both groups of prevailing assumptions created a problem framework that significantly marginalized solar proponents. Due to its high cost, solar energy struggled in its competition with fossil fuels, and due to its scattered attribute, it did not complement the current energy generation process (Laird, 2001). Even though legislators began to consider a variety of environmental protection ideas in their analysis, that contributed little to the existing state of affairs. Furthermore, technical and standard assumptions worked together in intricate ways, and the difference between them was disputed and vague. Take for instance the empirical idea adopted by a White House adviser about the impracticality of the solar power as a primary source of energy. This adviser picked from a conversation with Congressman Mike McCormack what he referred to as a ‘Solar fact’ that acquiring 1% of the overall energy need of the country from a solar source would necessitate transforming 10% of all houses into solar residences, and would require billions of dollars (Laird, 2001, 181). The adviser viewed this a ‘fact’, the strongest empirical designation. And still, enclosed in this so-called fact were several debatable and traditional empirical ideas. It claimed empirically that the cost of solar infrastructures would not drop significantly. It also suggested that the U.S. should continue its massive consumption levels, which in itself comprises ideas about the technological prospects for energy competence and the popularity of continuously growing material utilization (Laird, 2001, 181). Modifications in any of these fundamental assumptions would modify this seemingly straightforward ‘fact’. For more than three decades solar proponents introduced their technologies that utilized various sources of renewable energy as a means to develop a massive, infinite, but scattered, resource. Almost all of them did not imagine that building a solar society required major political or social adjustment. Early solar advocates, like Farrington Daniels and Hoyt Hottel, all aimed to lower the cost of solar energy, mostly with the belief that it would fill the void in the current energy infrastructure, supplanting fossil fuels, and strengthening social and political order, with improved security and, possibly, less greenhouse gasses (Hough, 2007). Many of them recognized no inconsistency in supporting research in both nuclear and solar energy, or artificial and solar power, and their sole discontent was that nuclear power received an unjustly huge percentage of federal funding. Most of these solar proponents believe that solar infrastructures created another way of reinforcing the present state of affairs against the complete removal of fossil fuels (Laird, 2001). A new kind of solar proponent surfaced by the 1970s. These advocates emerged from the sector of the environmental movement that observed that the basic societal and political structures, or those related to agricultural production and industrial manufacturing, transportation, patterns of settlement, and housing, were profoundly defective. These environmental activists did not merely seek solar technologies. They want technologies that would strengthen and be more consistent with a new political and social order, one where in local community autonomy and environmental conservation dislodge growing environmental destruction and bureaucratization (Wustenhagen et al., 2007). They believe that initiating a major change in the energy sector would be like initiating a total legislative reform. Whether their desired technologies would have built the society they wanted is not the main concern at this point. Instead, the concern is that their social objectives and assumptions about technology as a social catalyst pushed them into a new understanding of the energy crisis and the contribution of solar energy. Within their problem framework, solar power was not just a workable solution to the energy crisis, it was the sole favorable solution, the sole renewable energy system that would promote and reinforce the kind of society that they wanted. Within their framework, problems like high cost and an underdeveloped industry were issues to be resolved, not impediments to policymaking (Laird, 2001). This common characterization of solar energy systems unite environmental activists as a social group and influenced their decisions, encouraging them to campaign for more modest, more autonomous solar systems. The problem framework that emerged from this understanding led them to consider issues like high costs as minor problems, exactly the reverse of traditional political and legal frames. Bill Powers, a committee member of Solar Done Right, publicly mentioned the political barriers preventing the implementation of solar energy in the United States. He said, “economically and technologically, the game is over. The hang-ups in the U.S. are strictly political” (Wells, 2012, para 2). Gas and oil remains to be the main emphasis in political discourse and renewable power is addressed with apathy. The Solar Energy Industry Association reports that recently roughly 52,00 housing solar systems were set up in the United States, considerably higher than before (Wells, 2012, para 4-6). Since 2010, there was an increase of 109% for solar photovoltaic (PV) installations. Indeed, impressive proposals proliferate. California’s city of Brea, for instance, shifted to a form of funding—Pay-if-You-Save-- that has become widely accepted among government departments. The solar energy transformation is happening, as a result of the industry’s innovativeness and resourcefulness (Wells, 2012, para 7-9). What is needed now is the profound support of the government and policymakers. Western states, like California, are among the favorites of the solar power programs of the U.S. Energy Department. The Obama government declared that it was financially supporting SunShot solar energy program. Recently, Obama demanded renewable energy objectives that are quite ambitious (Graeber, 2012, para 1). Currently, the Obama administration mandated a grander ‘all-of-the-above’ local energy policy. Steven Chu, U.S. Energy Secretary, announced that he will invest in new solar programs as part of the SunShot project of his agency. SunShot seeks to reduce the total expenditure in the solar power sector. According to the Energy Department, this would make solar energy usage more affordable and expansive by 2030 (Graeber, 2012, para 1-2). However, the detractors of Obama in the Republican Party are not very interested in his solar energy programs. The administration justified the initiative by claiming that the renewable energy sector was becoming highly competitive and perhaps Obama’s initiative will further boost its position. And so they invested more resources into solar energy. The government in Scotland is investing extensively in renewable energy because it is aiming for a full implementation of renewable energy, not only to make it more affordable to generate. Recently, U.S. policymakers passed a bill that, paradoxically, should have removed politics from the disagreement over the Keystone XL pipeline (Graeber, 2012, para 4). This happened at a time when many of the announcements of the British Department of Energy and Climate Change had focused on the greening movement (Graeber, 2012, para 3-5). Most European countries is trying to free the economy from CO2. But U.S. policymakers are still pushing for crude and oil drilling. Conclusions The political and legal barriers to solar energy development and utilization are varied, ranging from the political framing of solar energy as expensive and unsustainable to the total rejection of solar power initiatives because of fear of losing massive profits from oil, crude, natural gas, fossil fuels, and other established sources of energy. Moreover, financial subsidies are mostly focused on the research and development of non-solar, non-renewable energy sources. However, the U.S. Congress and the energy department have made some major steps toward promoting the development, production, and utilization of solar energy. Many past and current energy legislations offered tax incentives to encourage residential consumers to install solar heating units in their homes. But these efforts are not enough if support from the policymakers and government is superficial and self-centered. References Graeber, D. (2012, February 14). Why is there so much political energy behind solar power? Huffington Post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daniel-j-graeber/why-is-there-so-much-poli_b_1276178.html Hough, T. (2007). Recent developments in solar energy. New York: Nova Publishers. Laird, F. (2001). Solar Energy, Technology Policy, and Institutional Values. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. Prakash, G, & Garg, H. (2000). Solar energy: Fundamentals and applications. NY: Tata McGraw-Hill Education. Skarboe, B., Azeredo, C., & Ehsani, N. (2010). The Future of Residential Solar PV. Retrieved from http://energy.ece.tamu.edu/solarprimer/reports/G10.pdf Wells, K. (2012, October 25). Solar Energy is Ready. The U.S. Isn’t. Bloomberg Business Week. Retrieved from http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-10-25/solar-energy-is-ready-dot-the-u-dot-s-dot-isnt Winston, M, & Edelbach, R 2012, Society, ethics and technology, Cengage Learning, New York. Wustenhagen, R., Wolsink, M. & Burer, M. (2007). Social acceptance of renewable energy innovation: An introduction to the concept. Energy Policy. 35(5): 2683-2691. Read More