Green Wombat

Palo Alto startup SolFocus has yet to release its high-efficiency solar concentrator technology but the company is already expanding overseas, said co-founder Steve Horne this afternoon at the ThinkEquity Greentech confab. He said in 2007 SolFocus will operate test sites in California, India and Hawaii and has signed a deal to produce half a megawatt of solar power in Spain.
The company also inked an agreement with an Indian manufacturer. Altogether, SolFocus will install 2 megawatts of solar power next year, according to Horne, the
company’s
chief scientist.
"It’s a global business," he said. "In 2007 we’ll be turning our design into a full-fledged product."  SolFocus initially plans to build small-scale power plants that will feature fields of solar concentrator panels. The photovoltaic technology uses small lenses and curved mirrors to concentrate the sun’s rays on solar modules made by Spectrolab, the Boeing subsidiary that just set a world’s record for wringing a 40.7 percent efficiency rate from its solar cells. Horne said SolFocus is currently working on a second
generation version of its technology, which should be ready for market in two to three years.  Going global was a theme of the day. Ira Ehrenpreis, a cleantech venture capitalist with Technology Partners, told the standing-room-only audience that investors need to be prepared to travel away from Sand Hill Road as renewable energy technology, research and markets are found far afield from Silicon Valley.