Credit: Suttipon Yakham/Shutterstock

This month I had the opportunity to visit the factory and headquarters of 1366 Technologies just outside of Boston, Massachusetts (the company derives its name from the amount of watts per square meter of solar irradiance at the earth’s surface). The 1366 story is particularly intriguing because it demonstrates that – when it comes to solar energy – the march of technology and the potential for improvements is far from over. With the technology to cut solar wafer costs by 50 percent and the business partners to help make it happen, 1366 intends to make renewables even more affordable in the near future.

Many people think of the solar module as the input with the least room to fall, and point to the gains to be had in balance of systems costs – such as racking and inverters – or soft costs, such as sales, design, permitting, interconnection and inspection. And indeed these gains are quite significant: Germany, for example, can install a residential solar system for less than half the cost […]