It really pains me when I read fellow weblogs like this one where regular people are lamenting the poor performance and almost “ripoff category” in which so many solar products can be placed.
So many look at TV commercials for solar and see the gadgets offered only to be disappointed with their performance. Do they blame the bulb in a poor solar light? The casing? The battery? The circuit? NOPE. They blame SOLAR! SImply put, its always the tendency to blame the unknown quantity. That with which we are not totally comfortable gets first crack as blame for poor performance.
Yet the fact is that solar has been performing admirably in one category for decades that consumers have embraced…solar calculators. How many people complain about their solar calculators? None that I’ve heard of..in the light anyways!
So we now go to the crux of the matter which is the fact that developers have taken a “solar technology” and attempted to apply it to as many possible real-life situations as possible, even if the combination of solar power generation, power management and storage technologies were not properly suited. It comes down to that triangle of power which dictates whether or not a product will be succesful in creating that often-elusive sensation of complete customer satisfaction.
In an earlier blog I wrote about “lasting value”. The fact that this is only one business model. As the telemarketers have proven so often, there are enough suckers indeed to plunk out money on a promise which is so unreal, it actually doesn’t matter. Hopefully in time, there are enough quality solar products out there delivering on the expectations that consumers begin to understand that NOT all solar is created equal.
If you are out there thinking of marketing or designing a solar product and would like a seasoned opinion, please do not hesitate to post a comment on this blog entry with your email address and I’ll contact you shortly thereafter. Even if ICP Solar is not involved commercially, I’d rather help someone avoid putting a bad product onto the market and have them win with a good one instead.
Sass
1 Comment
About a year ago, you wrote some comments to a piece in SiliconBeat about developments in the field of next generation solar technology and manufacturing, particularly within the field of thin-film CIGS manufacturing. As you may know, there are at least four companies, Nanosolar, Miasole, Heliovolt, and Daystar Technologies, that claim to be on the verge of manufacturing commercial quantities of CIGS panels. Of the four, as best as I can tell, Daystar seems the closest to commercial production, with a target of 2007 for production. Yet you called Daystar a “daydream” last year. I’m wondering what your current opinion is, given developments over the last year. I’m not so interested in which has the most interesting or promising technology (as that probably goes to Nanosolar) but which you think is the most likely to reach commercial production first.