Background on Solyndra The Solyndra Company, founded in 2005 by Christian Gronet, designed, manufactured, and sold a unique type of solar panels. They were termed “solar photovoltaic (PV) systems” and were designed for large, flat to low sloped commercial building roofs. The panels were designed to have the best performance when mounted horizontally and to be installed very close together so that they covered a much higher percentage of the roof top thus producing more electricity than the typical flat panel solar panels by comparison. This was created through the production by absorbing light from all directions including indirect and reflected light as well as direct sunlight when combined with a white roof. This was due to the design of having rolled its copper indium gallium selenite or CIGS into a cylindrical shape. Each tube had 40 of them in each 1-meter-by-2-meter panel (Solyndra, 2008). The cylinders were approximately one inch in diameter and were made of two tubes. The company used proprietary equipment it developed to deposit CIGS along the outside of the inner tube amounting to around 200 CIGS cells. Atop of the cells there was an additional "optical coupling agent", which was used to concentrate the sunlight through the outer tube, and then the inner tube was inserted, then the whole thing was filled with a silicone oil then sealed with a glass and metal cap (insideclimatenew.org). Solyndra, of course, believed that their product was the best on the market and had plans to be the top manufacturer of solar energy roofs, especially in their home state of California. At the time Solyndra was being developed, California was in the process of instating new building requirements. These requirements went into effect in Janu... ... middle of paper ... ...gy.” (Stephens, 2011) The administration claims that they reached the decisions due to the fact that they were concerned for the laid off Solyndra employees. The decision were made so that those Solyndra employees could qualify for aid under another program for employees that have been displaced from their employment by foreign competition. So one question was should the DOE have backed Solyndra in the first place? Well in hindsight the answer certainly appears to be a resounding no! But the bigger question is should the government be financing companies to such an extreme extend as it did with Solyndra? For if the company fails, then who should be held responsible for paying back the loan. The money given was from the American tax payers, and it surly seems a crime to demand that pay for a failed business two fold due to unscrupulous lending from the government.
Two major car companies, General Motors (GM) and Chrysler, went bankrupt during the Great Recession. The Government had to make a choice; to get involved with helping them, which would help the economy, or let them fight for themselves. Both choices would leave some American citizens mad at the government. The Government decided to help them by establishing the Auto Bailout along with other programs like TARP. Although some think the Auto Bailout didn’t help small supplier companies, it was the right move for the government to take because it helped stop our economy from going further into a depression.
In the 1980s, American factories were closing at a rapid pace. President Reagan's famous "trickle-down" economics helped large corporations increase profits while at the same time he reduced the power of the union with the firing of over 11,000 Air Traffic Controllers who had gone on strike (Le Blanc 122).
Caetlin Asher Spanish 325 10 March 2017 Lack of Separation Between the Church and State The separation between state and Church has been a controversial issue for decades. In the movie “Mar Adentro”, this separation between Church and state, or lack thereof, is brought to attention through the court battle between the state and Ramón Sampedro. Ramón Sampedro was a sailor who became a quadriplegic during an accident diving into the ocean water causing a permanent spinal cord injury leaving him paralyzed. Over twenty years of being paralyzed from the neck down, Ramón decides to receive legal permission to end his life through assisted suicide, specifically Euthanasia.
In the short story The Scarlet ibis, the author James Hurst suggests how choices can affect an individual’s life.
This was devastating because a majority of these companies left, taking their jobs with it, abandoning the citizens
office; proscribed the practices of promising and withholding certain kinds of employment and unemployment relief as
President Obama’s decision to reject keystone Pipeline ignores a body of environmental facts, harms energy security and is detrimental to our economic wellbeing. Keystone pipeline has become a political pandering at the expense of our nation’s energy security. This subject has been a big controversy in the US for the past couple of years.
...t particular company backs up the congressmen. Today, state and federal policies tolerate and compensate the obliteration of U.S. jobs. These policies distribute financial breaks and government bonds, while still giving entrance to the U.S. market to companies that destroy American jobs and abuse employee’s rights by shipping their labor elsewhere. Government must reform policies that encourage and reward job creation and implement policies of research that will create new jobs for the future.
Rotman, David. "Finding a Solar Solution." Technology Review 2 (2012): 48-51. Print. 22 November 2014.
“We won’t leave our land, it’s our land not your land,” Budrus Women yell at the Israeli soldiers in the documentary Budrus by Julia Bacha. It is incredible to see women from different ages confronting their enemy with no fear of the consequences. They have a strong determination and hope that the enemy would leave their land. This reality scene is not very common but is definitely found in Budrus Village in Palestine showing how brave a woman can be defending her country.
How Efficient is Solar Energy Technology? Engineering Challenges. n. d. a. d. a. d. d. 8 April 2014. http://www.engineeringchallenges.org/cms/8996/9082.aspx>. How do Nuclear Plants Work?”
The fact is this: Placing so much value in the amount of money a company has will directly influence the morals of decision making. For example, “going green” is no longer a moral issue preached by young free spirited hippies in tie die t-shirts who truly believe in the cause at hand. It has become a billion dollar business. And as such it has spurred on alliances between big businesses and National Governments the world over. Profiting off of fear that they help create to keep lawmakers’ and lobbyists’ pockets fat. Whether you agree with our current president’s policies or not, the fact remains, a man who benefited heavily from lobbyist groups still made it his first issue in office to make a new executive order restricting them further. Obviously you do not bite the hand that feeds you without a good reason, for he sees the evil they produce. Current lobbyists
Wiebusch, B. (2001). New solar cell panels Space Station. [News]. Design News; Manhassett, 56(4), 24.
The future of the United States solar energy industry will be shaped not only by economic growth, but also by the rate of declining oil resources and the global realization of the consequences of human induced climate change. Political responses to this realization in the United States include; new policies, legislature, and tax incentives to both businesses and private households to promote growth and investment in the solar power industry.
Abstract: The current energy situation with fossil fuels as the main source of the world’s energy has two main flaws: fossil fuels contribute to global warming via the greenhouse effect and they are limited in the quantity that remains. Solar power solves both of these problems and can be captured by utilizing photovoltaic cells. However, photovoltaic cells have their own drawbacks due to their high costs of installation and maintenance.