New Solar Power Plants

Californians will soon be using a more natural, less expensive way to produce their electricity. Pacific Gas and Electric (NYSE: PCG), which is based in San Francisco, will be making this possible by teaming up with builders SunPower (NasdaqGS: SPWR) and Optisolar.

Optisolar will be the leading builder, and PG&E is estimating that Optisolar’s facility, a 550-megawatt farm structure, will omit enough carbon emissions that are equivalent to removing 90,000 cars and their fuel pollution. Spain leads at this time, with their 23-megawatt plant, and Australia is in the process of building a 154-megawatt station.

California is bound by the legislative climate law AB 32, which requires them to turn back their greenhouse emissions to the level it was in 1990, by the year 2020. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is determined to make California, the highest producer of greenhouse emissions due to its immense population, the leader in environment policy making.

P G&E will be making this possible with their proposed plan to produce enough solar power to accommodate 250,000 homes. But they aren’t the only U.S. state determined to be the leader in solar power facilities. Floridian commissioners have given the green light for Florida Power and Light (Amex: FPU) to build three such facilities by 2009, the first of which will be the largest commercial solar-power plant in the state. SunPower has also been chosen by Florida to build their first 75-megawatt solar-power plant, stationed in Martin County.

This trend is becoming fastly embraced by all states, and will put the U.S. on the track to once again lead as pioneers in a fairly new frontier. The U.S. Senate is passing new laws, such as the Clean Energy Stimulus Act (S.2821), that will force each state to have to comply and rely on more natural resources for energy, while House Democrats are providing incentatives such as feed-in tariffs for states wishing to build solar-powered plants.

The projection is that within the next few years each state will have their own solar-energy projects in progress. This will end our dependency on energy fuel that is unhealthy for our planet, and with each effort to become so, the U.S. might well become the leader in solar-energy at a much lower cost to the consumer.