Reply #9: I'd rather pay more for panels mfg'd in the U.S. and not shipped halfway around the world.

[DCKit]

The jobs, the tax revenue, rebuilding our manufacturing base, no pollution from shipping... the list of potential benefits is nearly endless. We need to stop looking to China for the cheap and easy solutions and begin to focus on rebuilding our own economy.

40% efficiency is great and the total efficiency would be higher if the waste heat from the 'cold' side of the sterling engine were used for heating, hot water or absorption cooling - concentrating solar/sterling co-generation. If not for residential or commercial, then greenhouses, fish farms or public spaces. Every new government building should be built with at least one and the big-box mega stores could shade their twenty acre parking lots with them.

"The conventional energy industry will be surprised by how quickly solar PV becomes mainstream..."

Bwahahahahaha. As if we haven't heard some version of that statement a million times in the past thirty years. Bring it on already!