1. HONR 229L: Climate Change: Science, Economics, and Governance
Solar Photovoltaics
Your name here
18 October 2017

2. I’d suggest first going through the Admission Ticket questions, which you can start by posing the first as a question to the class:
In the KH book, industry research firm Clean Edge makes a prediction of the total installed capacity for solar photovoltaics (PV) in year 2015.
What was the prediction?
b) What was the actual worldwide installed capacity reached  at the end of year 2016, according to (

3. The title “cumulative growth” is the same as installed capacity”
This is a wonderful website that is succinct and has some great graphics you can incorporate into the presentation.
As a follow-up to the prior slide, might want to show this image, which depicts the time evolution of installed worldwide PV capacity (unfortunately stope in 2015):
The title “cumulative growth” is the same as installed capacity”

4. This is a wonderful website http://solarcellcentral
This is a wonderful website that is succinct and has some great graphics you can incorporate into the presentation.
As a follow-up to the prior slide, might want to show and this image, which shows the annual growth (increase in capacity per year) of worldwide PVs

5. why do you think the PV growth has been so rapid?
Can have various threads of discussion around these two slides, such as:
why do you think the PV growth has been so rapid?
what countries are leading this growth?

6. In terms of the countries, can show this table:
Can have various threads of discussion around these two slides, such as:
In terms of the countries, can show this table:

7. Can have various threads of discussion around these two slides, such as:
What practice has the German government employed to facilitate the widespread use of solar?
(this is covered in KH & the wiki)
Are students surprised by the rise of solar in China, especially given what Jared Diamond
had written about about China?

8. For the “rise of solar in China” question, can remind students I had shown the slide on the following page, at the second class meeting, which does contain a significant commitment by China to halt the growth of their CO2 emissions over a relatively short period of time

9. Paris Climate Agreement, Dec 2015:
Article 2, Section 1, Part a):
Objective to hold “increase in GMST to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels and
to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels”
INDC: Intended Nationally Determined Contributions to reduce GHG emissions
 Submitted prior to COP21-UNFCCC meeting in Paris
 Extend from present to year 2030
GMST: Global Mean Surface Temperature
COP: Conference of the Parties
UNFCCC: United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
Nov 2014:
Presidents Obama & Xi announce:
U.S. will reduce GHG emissions to 27% below 2005 level by 2025
China will peak CO2 emissions by 2030 with best effort to peak early

10. I would greatly appreciate if you could discuss this Admission Ticket question:
The KH book gives a numerical value for how much the price per peak watt for solar energy must be, for solar energy to be able to compete with “coal-fired electricity virtually everywhere”. This number appears twice in the reading; also the wiki page provides the same price per peak watt cost for solar energy to achieve economic parity with the grid.
a) what is the price per peak watt for solar energy needed to achieve cost parity with coal?
b) according to when was this parity achieved?
c) according to KH, what other additional critical hurdle must be overcome to enable solar-generated electricity to compete with coal-fired electricity virtually everywhere?

11. I would greatly appreciate if you could discuss the rest of the Admission Ticket questions
Next one is:
Feel free to use this image from
and also, please to spend time talking about c):
the hurdle of energy storage is HUGE because wide spread adoption of solar, to meet base line demand,
really will require overcoming the limitation of the intermittency of solar.

12. OK, time to move onto Chapter 3!
Please first ask the students to describe the difference in operating principle between solar photovoltaics and solar thermal.
You can ask the class to answer, then provide an answer in your own words.
On the next page, I include a scan of the image from the book (sorry but the Google Play version of the book lacked images, hence I had to scan). You can use the scanned image, or something from this fascinating webpage:
or anything else to address this question.

13. Here is the scan:

14. Then can focus on the second AT question:
The KH book notes “a key advantage of solar thermal over solar PV”. What is this key advantage and how, possibly, might this key advantage play a role in overcoming a major shortcoming of renewable energy?
Can provide fruitful grounds for a brief discussion 

15. Might want to head next to the fourth & fifth AT question and lead a discussion about the “mission goal” of the three companies, and also describe perhaps the other company, Himin Solar Energy Group.
I think you “know the drill” 
Great if you can go by the companies one by one, ask the students for their input first, then walk them through your take on each company (their mission, followed by their outcome). This can take up a fair amount of time. Here are some possible websites of interest:
(please note this is an old website)

16. Can with a focus on either this AT question:
The KH books quotes John O’ Donnell as stating financing is ‘the last big obstacle to large-scale renewable energy deployment”. The book then goes on to name three additional obstacles.
a) What are these three additional obstacles?
b) Based either on the class readings, your intuition, or your own (brief) independent research, which of these three obstacles do you think is truly the hardest to overcome and how do you think it could possibly by overcome?
and/or this question:
a) What is a “renewable portfolio standard” (appears in KH, Chapter 3) and what is a “feed-in tariff” (KH, Chapter 2)?
b) According to what country presently is the world leader in electricity generation from solar thermal?
c) Which of the two policy options mentioned in a) did this country employ to facilitate the growth of solar thermal? And is this policy still in place within this country, for new projects
Of course the country for b) is Spain … you are welcome to “go to town” with description of their way cool system (easy to find images on the web)

17. Finally, should you so desire, you can present your answer to the final AT question for Chapter 2:
The KH book provides an estimate of how much land would be needed to produce enough electricity to power the entire US from solar photovoltaic technology. This estimate is based on a certain assumption for the efficiency of the solar PV.
a) what is the “length of the square” (KH use the word “side”) that would be needed for the US to get all of its electricity needs from solar PV?
b) what did KH assume about the efficiency of solar PV to arrive at this estimate?
c) what would the “length of the square” (or “side”) be if the efficiency would rise to the highest achieved using a proprietary triple-junction by the Sharp Corporation, that is described on the wiki
and, if you decide to go this route, can use the reply to guide a discussion about whether folks think this would be feasible of the US to implement.
Seems to me the two huge hurdles would be:
a) intermittency of solar energy (i.e. how do we generate electricity at night?)
b) distribution of the electricity from the preferred sunny regions to population centers, using a rather
aged grid that operates in a “byzantine” manner

18. This should facilitate a 45 min discussion.
Feel free to use whatever you’d like of what I have provided. Of course, fine to grab whatever additional figures you’d like off the web, highlight whatever aspects of KH reading or wiki you’d like, etc.
Good luck: and I’ll be happy to preview a draft !