Natural Resources committee  First of all, read the white paper we are coming out with next month. We have a very detailed graph, but if you take a look at where the experience curve ends and how it's coming down in price, and you extrapolate the growth of solar, if solar were to power the entire planet over

Natural Resources committee  Canada has three real gems: SDTC, NSERC, and Canmet. I've had in-depth involvement with all three organizations over the years. I believe that innovation is the core competency of Canada. We can't necessarily compete with cheap manufacturing, so we have to be innovative. We tal

Natural Resources committee  When the Russians sent up Sputnik, it had a battery that lasted for two weeks. When the Americans sent up Vanguard, it had a solar cell from Bell labs on it, and it lasted for six years. Solar works in outer space. It's extremely reliable. I was at a conference recently talking

Natural Resources committee  Okay. To use an example, this is a kilogram of silicon, and that's the main thing used to make solar cells. One kilogram of silicon, over its useful life, will produce about 10,000 kilowatt hours or about 5,000 litres of gasoline in an electric car. There are 5,000 litres of gaso

Natural Resources committee  Let me address, first of all, the longevity. Next time, call us, and we'll give you a solar system that will last a long, long, time.

Natural Resources committee  Also, I think, because you're dealing with natural elements, our aboriginal people I think are more sensitive to nature and to using it, and this is a very elegant way to get energy from the sun. But also, I think, they typically are in more remote areas. When I lived in West Van

Natural Resources committee  Sure.

Natural Resources committee  I think it's about the solar future and about changing the mindset. John touched a bit on that. In the U.S. we're seeing that over 90% of the population supports solar as being by far the....They're keen in Germany, where there's very strong public support, especially in the agri

Natural Resources committee  Let me start off by saying that in my opinion what is driving solar energy worldwide is all about job creation. That's what's driving it. There have been about a million jobs created in China in the last decade in solar. On May 10, 2006, I was at a solar conference and was appr

Natural Resources committee  Well, they're actually just being really liberal with the environment, but that's beside the point. The answer in 2010 was 16.7 gigawatts, so this is growing faster. The reason it's growing so much faster is that the German government, the Chinese government, and the U.S. gover

Natural Resources committee  I think one has to take a look at what's really going on in solar worldwide. We're in a race with the Germans, the Americans, and the Chinese. For example, in 2010, the Chinese government made available $41 billion to stimulate the solar industry. One of the reasons I took on ch