Electrical Marketing's LiveWire

National homebuilder KB Home is continuing its push to market all-solar new housing communities with a deal announced this week to buy 43 building lots from Newhall Land in Valencia, Calif., about 30 miles north of Los Angeles. The new homes will include solar power systems as a standard feature. KB Home recently announced plans to open 10 communities across Southern California in which all of the homes will be built with photovoltaic solar systems. Details

The Ryan Co., a contracting subsidiary of Quanta Services Inc., Houston, will install 55,000 solar panels for a 10MW project in New Jersey that will connect to Atlantic City Electric’s grid and power 2,000 homes. The New Jersey Oak Solar project is being developed by Lincoln Renewable Energy (LRE), Chicago. A LRE press release said when completed later this year, the New Jersey Oak Solar project will be the largest non-utility owned solar project east of the Mississippi. Quanta Renewable Energy Services and The Ryan Co. will provide comprehensive engineering, procurement and construction services. Following project completion, Quanta will operate and maintain the facility under contract with LRE. Construction is projected to begin in June with an estimated project completion date of December.
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If you are a big believer in wind and have a hankering to invest in wind technology companies, this quick Motley Fool analysis of the major players may be of interest.

Following its $168 million investment in the BrightSource Ivanpah solar power and a smaller investment in a German solar photovoltaic plant that will provide power for approximately 5,000 homes, Google announced in “The Official Google Blog” that it will invest $100 million in Oregon’s Shepherds Flat Wind Farm in Oregon which when complete will provide power for 235,000 homes. As reported in an Oct. 12 post in Electrical Marketing’s Live Wire last October, Google has also invested $200 million in the offshore Atlantic Wind Connection wind farm in the Atlantic Ocean.
GE won a $1.4 billion contract from independent power producer Caithness Energy for the wind farm and is supplying 2.5MW turbines for the installation. The Shepherds Flat wind farm is the largest wind farm ever to be built in the United States.

Interesting post here by William Pentland with Forbes about the challenges the Pacific Northwest’s regional transmission system has when the area’s hydroelectric dams and wind farms both crank out more power than than expected at the same time.

As part of its push to build senior-living communities loaded with energy-efficient amenities, housing developer Del Webb will be building all-solar housing developments targeted at the 55+ demographic at two new communities in the Phoenix metro area. Combined, these two Del Webb communities, Sun City Festival in Buckeye and Sun City Anthem at Merrill Ranch in Florence, are planned for approximately 11,200 new homes. The company says the communities will be the largest in Arizona and among the largest in the nation to offer solar as standard to homebuyers.
The new homes will include a 1.8 kW roof-integrated solar-electric power system by SunPower Corp. The homes will also offer CFLs, high-efficiency heating and cooling systems (14 SEER HVAC), CFLs, enhanced attic insulation, tankless water heaters and low water use toilets and fixtures. Del Webb is building solar into other senior living communities in Arizona, California and New Jersey. Details