Speaker 1: Hi, you're listening to Switch It on the b F podcast,
Speaker 1: and today is all about solar. I sit down with
Speaker 1: Jenny Chase, who is the head of Solar Research and
Speaker 1: she has actually been an analyst at B and E
Speaker 1: F covering solar since the very beginning. We're going to
Speaker 1: talk about what's going on in two with prices which
Speaker 1: continue to rise for most components, materials and projects across
Speaker 1: the industry, but at the same time there continues to
Speaker 1: be strong demand and two is also likely to be
Speaker 1: a year of record build in Europe, in China as
Speaker 1: well as a few newer markets where high energy prices
Speaker 1: are driving adoption. So let's speak with Jenny about the
Speaker 1: solar quotable take market outlook and what she's observing across
Speaker 1: the industry. Hi, Jenny, thank you for joining. Hello Diana,
Speaker 1: Hello everyone. Well you're back here today, and I don't
Speaker 1: think I asked this question last time, so I'm gonna
Speaker 1: ask it as the first question as we start today,
Speaker 1: which is how long is it that you've been covering
Speaker 1: the solar industry. It's been seventeen years, okay, so you've
Speaker 1: got a good amount of time under your belt in
Speaker 1: a good amount of perspective on some of the highs
Speaker 1: and lows. And so I'm actually going to quote you
Speaker 1: back to yourself as we start this show today. So
Speaker 1: I took a look at the PV market outlook you
Speaker 1: that you did for the third four two, you and
Speaker 1: your team, and you say in this report that and
Speaker 1: they quote the future of solar is more uncertain than
Speaker 1: ever and even in the present, the picture is one
Speaker 1: of blurry but frantic growth. So I want to know
Speaker 1: what do you mean by this? Oh, dear, Yeah, it
Speaker 1: sounds very pretentious when you put it like that. I
Speaker 1: mean I started covering this industry when there was about
Speaker 1: a gigawatts maybe two giga exactly being installed every year,
Speaker 1: and this year we think there were two hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty one gigawatts being built. And as it's scaled up,
Speaker 1: the number of countries during solar has expanded massively. So
Speaker 1: there's there's now about a hundred and forty five currents
Speaker 1: that we had to maintaining current statistics and forecast for,
Speaker 1: and solar statistics are really hard. Dana countries very seldom
Speaker 1: produced timely information on how much older was being installed.
Speaker 1: A lot of the time they don't even collect this
Speaker 1: information if the solar is not grid connected, and so
Speaker 1: all the data we have on build of solar is
Speaker 1: quite backward looking, you know, at least six months backward looking,
Speaker 1: except for Chinese exports, and China is exporting loads of
Speaker 1: solar this year. We've got exports up up to July
Speaker 1: and they're really high. Europe has about fifty three giggs
Speaker 1: what's left China for Europe up to July, and we
Speaker 1: were expecting the whole European market to be about this year.
Speaker 1: So there's a whole load of models in Europe that
Speaker 1: haven't been installed yet, and sometimes it's just really hard
Speaker 1: to figure out what's going on. So the statistics are
Speaker 1: largely unreliable. And as a result, how did that impact
Speaker 1: your forecast? We put a big buffer in because we
Speaker 1: know the modules are going somewhere, and we've got this
Speaker 1: lock called the buffer where if none of our regional
Speaker 1: analysts identify where the modules are going, will leave a
Speaker 1: little bit of headway because we know they're probably wrong,
Speaker 1: and at least some of them will find all those
Speaker 1: modules in their geographies and be shocked. So I think,
Speaker 1: then let's talk about what's driving the higher costs. And
Speaker 1: I know that inflation is this word that everybody is
Speaker 1: mixing into pretty much every conversation right now, and I'm
Speaker 1: guessing by the time we get to the end of
Speaker 1: the year, it will be one of those words whereveryone's
Speaker 1: just exhausted by it. But if we're thinking about what's
Speaker 1: happening to solar modules, which have largely seen a decrease
Speaker 1: in prices for various reasons associated with the different components,
Speaker 1: what's causing maybe a short term increase in module prices
Speaker 1: in the near term. So sol is a bit unusual
Speaker 1: in the whole inflation baskets, and that we do expect
Speaker 1: it to reverse quite drastically. Because you did say that, yeah,
Speaker 1: you're saying that you think things are going to come
Speaker 1: down by the end of three. I think solar module
Speaker 1: prices are going to drop, probably start dropping by the
Speaker 1: end of twenty two, because, first of all, solo modules
Speaker 1: today cost about twenty six cents or what they were
Speaker 1: at lower nineteen. So there's this very unusual situation where
Speaker 1: even in nominal terms, they're higher than they used to be.
Speaker 1: In real terms, it's actually about flat, but in nominal
Speaker 1: terms they're more expensive than they used to be, and
Speaker 1: that's not a common situation in solar. The prices have
Speaker 1: been dropping for thirty years, pretty rapidly and pretty steadily. However,
Speaker 1: what's holding them up right now is a shortage of
Speaker 1: polystylican Policylican factories are big and expensive and take time
Speaker 1: to set up, and very simply global demand for solar
Speaker 1: modules has driven demand for solo polysilicon to be well
Speaker 1: ahead of how much is being produced. However, there's a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of factories coming online in China to make
Speaker 1: more polysilicon, and we also think there's probably some inventory
Speaker 1: build up of modules around the world. So we're expecting
Speaker 1: the crisis to drop back towards about twenty two cents
Speaker 1: from the current cents. Okay, so prices are coming down.
Speaker 1: Prices are not coming down yet. To be fair, the
Speaker 1: prices of modules could stay high for a long time,
Speaker 1: but that would mean an awful lot gets built next year,
Speaker 1: because the only thing that I can see would drive
Speaker 1: prices just I high all of next year would be
Speaker 1: if we build more solar next year, which I don't
Speaker 1: think we can. There were bottlenecks in installation labor in
Speaker 1: what sites are ready to get permitted to get permission
Speaker 1: to build solder on and connect to the grid. And
Speaker 1: there are also shortages of other components like inverters that
Speaker 1: help things up well. And so let's talk about solar
Speaker 1: industry growth because that's definitely something that a lot of
Speaker 1: people are thinking about right now in terms of high
Speaker 1: energy prices and you know, potentially countries looking at more
Speaker 1: domestically produced energy. And I do understand, and I know
Speaker 1: that listeners understand that natural gas and the volatility that
Speaker 1: we're seeing on prices over there, and how important flexible
Speaker 1: capacity is to the solar industry. It's definitely one of
Speaker 1: the pieces to the puzzle that you have to see
Speaker 1: in the big picture when you're thinking about solar. But
Speaker 1: largely do you see growth in this industry and roll
Speaker 1: out and if so where kind of in response to
Speaker 1: high energy prices? Absolutely. So. One of the biggest and
Speaker 1: also most difficult the track sectors is rooftop solar in Europe,
Speaker 1: so solar being built by house owners and business owners
Speaker 1: literally just to feed into the building that they're on
Speaker 1: and sometimes to feed into the grid if it's allowed.
Speaker 1: So this is one of the said ones where the
Speaker 1: data is poor nuts, but we're pretty sure from talking
Speaker 1: to installers and a third party finance companies and other
Speaker 1: sources that this is going gangbusters installers in Germany, so
Speaker 1: that they're sold out until next well into next year,
Speaker 1: simply because people are freaking out about their energy costs.
Speaker 1: And one of the ways you can deal with that
Speaker 1: is by putting a solo on your roof and buying
Speaker 1: less elepricity, which is something because Germany were early adopters
Speaker 1: with solar. I mean, they had a boom a decade
Speaker 1: and a half ago. Germany has a lot of solo,
Speaker 1: but it's still got some roofs that don't have solo
Speaker 1: on it, so I guess they're getting it now, better
Speaker 1: late than never. So solar could potentially help alleviate some
Speaker 1: of this volatility. And you mentioned Germany, you also have
Speaker 1: other parts of the world, so let's say, namely China,
Speaker 1: and you know in year, which even received a large
Speaker 1: number of panels earlier this year, do you still see
Speaker 1: build out of solar in Asia to the a booming
Speaker 1: space in the future. Oh, definitely. So of the two
Speaker 1: one gigawatts expect to be installed this year, about gigawats
Speaker 1: of that is in China. China has also got high
Speaker 1: energy prices, and it's also building large amounts of rooftop solar,
Speaker 1: plus some of the mega energy bases being planned in
Speaker 1: the desert under construction, and that's that's taking up a
Speaker 1: lot of a lot of solar modules. India is a
Speaker 1: little bit different because although the Indian market is much
Speaker 1: stronger this year than last year, the big reason there
Speaker 1: was a massive import boom in India is at import
Speaker 1: tariff coming in April, which meant that anyone planning to
Speaker 1: build solar in India brought their modules before April. So
Speaker 1: potentially this is going to drop off. Now, India is
Speaker 1: one of the countries that still has a pretty high
Speaker 1: dependence on what we would consider high carbon fuels, So
Speaker 1: cool is you know, still definitely thriving in India. Do
Speaker 1: you see solar you know you mentioned it kind of
Speaker 1: dropped off because of a change in policy. Do you
Speaker 1: see it just because of the low l c ELI
Speaker 1: being of interest in that geography going forward or is
Speaker 1: it going to cool? Absolutely, India will keep building solar.
Speaker 1: It takes a while for solar to really start digging
Speaker 1: into cold margins just because type changing any system takes
Speaker 1: a while. But India the Indian solar market is unlikely
Speaker 1: to cool. There are companies setting up manufacturing in India
Speaker 1: and there was a government incentive to do so, and probably,
Speaker 1: to be honest, even with a fully percent imports habiff,
Speaker 1: it's still likely to be worse buying some modules for
Speaker 1: rooftop use and they will continually big auctions that build
Speaker 1: big projects on open land in India. The future of
Speaker 1: solo in India is bright despite the import tariffs. That's
Speaker 1: a great pun too. I like all solar things being right,
Speaker 1: I love it boom, you know. And actually we're going
Speaker 1: to continue our trip around the world and one of
Speaker 1: the other continent that I actually want to talk about
Speaker 1: is Africa, and specifically in the run up to CAP
Speaker 1: twenty seven, which is taking place in November, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of discussion around alleviating energy poverty and the role
Speaker 1: that renewables could actually play in some parts of the world,
Speaker 1: and Africa definitely being one of them. Given that CAP
Speaker 1: twenty seven is being hosted in Egypt, there's just a
Speaker 1: lot of eyes on what renewable energy could look like
Speaker 1: on that continent. How do you think solar is going
Speaker 1: to play a role in Africa's energy future. In the
Speaker 1: long term, it will play a huge role. It should
Speaker 1: be possible for many, many countries to leap flo over ever,
Speaker 1: going through the coal and gas plant stage and go
Speaker 1: straight to fairly distributed energy networks that are pallered largely
Speaker 1: on renewables with battery backup. In the short term, things
Speaker 1: are not quite so bright. A lot of the large
Speaker 1: projects being built in Africa had power signed in and before,
Speaker 1: and those were prices assuming that there wouldn't be inflation,
Speaker 1: certainly not predicting the amount of inflation we've had, so
Speaker 1: a lot of projects and stuff Africa, for example, and
Speaker 1: other African countries essentially stalled by the fact that the
Speaker 1: costs are much higher than they expected when they signed
Speaker 1: power contracts. Just going back to the topic that we addressed,
Speaker 1: you know, ok, I guess a couple of minutes ago
Speaker 1: around the role that's older could potentially play in grading
Speaker 1: domestically produced energy and alleviating some of the strain on
Speaker 1: certain grids around price volatility. How long does it take
Speaker 1: to get a project, let's not say rooftop solar, but
Speaker 1: utility scale projects off the ground, let's say, from permitting
Speaker 1: all the way through the you know, electricity going through
Speaker 1: the power lines. Oh goodness. So the longest phase in
Speaker 1: this is the permit is the permitting almost wherever you are,
Speaker 1: the longest stage. We'll be getting the permitting and getting
Speaker 1: access to the grid. Once you've done that, then actually
Speaker 1: building it can be six weeks. Wow. But of course
Speaker 1: the permitting cans like a very very long time. Okay. So,
Speaker 1: I mean this is definitely an issue of whether or
Speaker 1: not certain countries want to see these projects come online
Speaker 1: quite quickly. And you know, the role that it could
Speaker 1: play in prices in the near term actually has to
Speaker 1: do with the logistics around the project rather than the
Speaker 1: project billed itself. And that's including getting some of these
Speaker 1: panels literally shipped from where they're manufactured to the site.
Speaker 1: That's probably a bit ambitious at the moment. Six okay, actually,
Speaker 1: I mean if they're going from China to Europe, that's
Speaker 1: probably six weeks for starters. On the other hand, I'm
Speaker 1: getting some emails offering me a container of modules or
Speaker 1: two and what a dam So like, if we're willing
Speaker 1: to use mixed modules, we can probably do it pretty quickly. Okay.
Speaker 1: So I was recently reading that there were negative power
Speaker 1: prices in certain parts of the US quite recently, and
Speaker 1: you know, at a time when high energy prices that
Speaker 1: we all end up seeing on our home energy bills,
Speaker 1: and I know that you know companies are seeing as well.
Speaker 1: Could you explain a little bit how you know grids
Speaker 1: and grid rollout may end up being one of the bottlenecks,
Speaker 1: maybe a very important one for the solar industry. I mean,
Speaker 1: I know it's space that we at B and e
Speaker 1: F have recently dedicated a team too, because we understand
Speaker 1: just how critically important grid infrastructure is to the entire
Speaker 1: web of renewables and you know, the energy system as
Speaker 1: a whole. They certainly are. The thing about solar power
Speaker 1: plants is that all the solar power plants in one
Speaker 1: region generated power roughly the same time. And if you
Speaker 1: have a lot of solar power plants in one small
Speaker 1: region connected to one bit of grid and there isn't
Speaker 1: a large amount of local load that runs in the daytime,
Speaker 1: you are quite like to get grid congestion, which just
Speaker 1: means that not all the power being produced can go
Speaker 1: down the grid and you can get zero prices or
Speaker 1: even sometimes negative prices if there were some perverse local incentives,
Speaker 1: which could be fixed either by maybe putting in a
Speaker 1: battery to save some of that local power for later
Speaker 1: when the solar production drops, or just by building morgrid.
Speaker 1: In a lot of places, the battery is actually cheaper
Speaker 1: and easier than solve the problem for now, but grids
Speaker 1: are a huge part of the solution to take power
Speaker 1: being generated in one place to another place where it's
Speaker 1: more valuable. Now for a very short break, stay with us.
Speaker 1: So in short, there are well, there's more than one
Speaker 1: solution to the grid question. One of them definitely is batteries.
Speaker 1: So we'll have to be very creative thinking about the
Speaker 1: future and how all of this is interconnected. Well, and
Speaker 1: while we're on the topic of the US, because that's
Speaker 1: sort of the case study that I was using there
Speaker 1: when we let into that topic, how about the Inflation
Speaker 1: Reduction Act. And I know, you know, those who are
Speaker 1: in the US at the moment are talking about this
Speaker 1: a ton and what it means for various parts of
Speaker 1: you know, the energy system. What does it mean for
Speaker 1: solar I think it's super exciting. I very much regret
Speaker 1: that we don't have a final this is what it
Speaker 1: means for solar demand number, But I think that we
Speaker 1: will see some domestic manufacturing in the U s particularly
Speaker 1: and got some way for US again, and it probably
Speaker 1: should increase our forecast of US build because it's really
Speaker 1: generous for solar. In fact, it's so generous for solo
Speaker 1: that I'm slightly concerned it's gonna set up a lot
Speaker 1: of perverse incentives over the next few years that might
Speaker 1: lead to tweaks along the line that are somewhat disruptive
Speaker 1: to the industry. Expand on that, what are they proverse incentives?
Speaker 1: So as I understand that you'll be able to claim
Speaker 1: the production tax credit for solar, which means that you
Speaker 1: should be able to offer very very very low prices
Speaker 1: for solar, and you'll probably get that regardless of whether
Speaker 1: it's fed into the grid. So I feel like we
Speaker 1: could just have an awful lot of solar plants built
Speaker 1: in not super smart places and very quickly. Then again,
Speaker 1: maybe they'll never get permission to build anything at all.
Speaker 1: I mean in the US two there is there are
Speaker 1: major bottlenecks. I've seen a lot of in the past.
Speaker 1: Is huge solar booms like Spains, like Romanias, like the
Speaker 1: Czech Republic, and those are very often followed by retroactive
Speaker 1: changes that make it less attractive than originally anticipated. And
Speaker 1: in the meantime you get developers who overpaid for rights
Speaker 1: to build a project, and there's all kinds of mess
Speaker 1: when you have very complex but very lucrative system. SOLO
Speaker 1: is not complicated, it's actually quite simple. And when you
Speaker 1: stack layers and layers of legal and tax, equity and
Speaker 1: financing complications on top of that and pay all those people,
Speaker 1: you can end up with a very expensive and somewhat
Speaker 1: unsustainable industry. And what are some of the things that
Speaker 1: people are objecting to solar roll out about? Because I'm
Speaker 1: thinking is a parallel. We recently recorded a show on
Speaker 1: nuclear with our colleague Christodomsey, who's been covering that space
Speaker 1: for an extraordinarily long time, and you know, he talked
Speaker 1: about just the amount of run up that it takes
Speaker 1: the just like you were saying, it's that permitting process
Speaker 1: at the beginning that is critically important but adds to
Speaker 1: the timeline. And then even with wind, you know there
Speaker 1: are those groups talking about, well what about the birds?
Speaker 1: What is the thing that is that sticking point for
Speaker 1: solar that causes us opposition? Generally everyone of solo right,
Speaker 1: I mean, does obviously killed birds. It's not going to
Speaker 1: say it killed no birds because okay, there are some
Speaker 1: types of waterfowl that can mistake solar panels for water
Speaker 1: with disastrous results in the desert. But natural selection has
Speaker 1: to do something right. So generally speaking, solo you can't
Speaker 1: see it from a long way off, but it does
Speaker 1: cover land that could be used for other things. So
Speaker 1: a lot of US development is on Bureau of Land
Speaker 1: Management lands in the US, which is is desert that
Speaker 1: has been preserved because it has ecological value, and it's
Speaker 1: probably not right to just say go and build solo
Speaker 1: all over these places. You know, you have to protect
Speaker 1: the desert tortoise and the other species that live there,
Speaker 1: and you do have to do some basic research. On
Speaker 1: the other time, there's quite a lot of this land,
Speaker 1: so maybe some of it is not critically important, and
Speaker 1: you can build solo on some of it and preserve
Speaker 1: the rest. Solo versus agriculture is another big talking point
Speaker 1: that I think it's probably more talking point than a
Speaker 1: real conflict right now. It's certainly been a feature of
Speaker 1: the UK recent leadership elections. I don't know why, because
Speaker 1: very little of the UK. Agricultural land is used for
Speaker 1: solar anyway, and there's not a massive boom and solar
Speaker 1: even planned in the UK, but people are concerned about
Speaker 1: food versus fuel issues in the long run and making
Speaker 1: up solutions such as agricavoltaics, which will be combining solar
Speaker 1: panels with agriculture on the same land, which sometimes probably
Speaker 1: makes sense but probably also sometimes not. There are some
Speaker 1: crops that flourish undercover, some ways of tending those crops
Speaker 1: that can work under solar panels. My suspecials were going
Speaker 1: to find a lot of ways that don't work, but
Speaker 1: there probably are something to okay, So the land use
Speaker 1: question and ends up coming to the floor. By the way,
Speaker 1: I love the quote that everyone loves solar, I mean,
Speaker 1: Jenny Chase. For those who know you well and I
Speaker 1: think it worked with you for a while, they will
Speaker 1: know that you are quite pragmatic about the industry. You're
Speaker 1: not known for putting any sort of sunshine in roses
Speaker 1: where they don't belong on anything. So this is by
Speaker 1: far one of the most optimistic on solar rollout conversations
Speaker 1: I think I've ever had with you. So it really
Speaker 1: says something so everyone take take Jenny's optimism. Maybe optimism
Speaker 1: is not even the word. Maybe you're still equally as pragmatic,
Speaker 1: and this is just what is happening. I think that
Speaker 1: is the point that I was trying to make. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't love solar. I hate solar years you would
Speaker 1: too if you had. Okay, well, let's talk about the
Speaker 1: companies that are involved in this space at the moment,
Speaker 1: because you know some of the things that you're talking
Speaker 1: about in including domestic manufacturer of solar in the US,
Speaker 1: or build out of different projects in India, or even
Speaker 1: just the you know, massive scale that we see growing
Speaker 1: in China in already robust market. What are some of
Speaker 1: the companies to watch as you see it at the moment. Oh,
Speaker 1: they're there are hundreds of them. I think a big
Speaker 1: beneficiary of the i m A will be First Solar,
Speaker 1: the world's last remaining thin film manufacturer of any significance,
Speaker 1: which does manufacture in the U s. And it's also
Speaker 1: from its fact threes outside the US is not subject
Speaker 1: to restrictions in future, and there is the risk that
Speaker 1: the US will reinstate restrictions on sales and models from
Speaker 1: Southeast Asia coming into the US, which will make everything
Speaker 1: more complicated in a year and a half or so.
Speaker 1: There's always the big Chinese manufacturers. So long aging go
Speaker 1: j A Solar, Torna Solar, Canadian solar handword. Solar is
Speaker 1: working with US silicon maker. Are we see silicon to
Speaker 1: bring back some of the old silicon factories in the US.
Speaker 1: That's one to watch. The developers. Every country has its
Speaker 1: own phalanx of solar developers that are looking to get
Speaker 1: permits and and get grid connections, and those will probably
Speaker 1: just benefit from the expanding market, particularly advices dropped for modules,
Speaker 1: which will give them a little bit more margin. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there are lots of solar companies. Alright, let's look under
Speaker 1: the third a little bit, and let's go really d
Speaker 1: by one specific part of the data world, and something
Speaker 1: you don't normally spell out in a market outlook is
Speaker 1: kind of an explanation of a specific piece of methodology,
Speaker 1: kind of in the meat of it. In this case,
Speaker 1: it was the Altmands score, which is something I had
Speaker 1: not heard of, but I know many of our clients
Speaker 1: in the solar industry. You're definitely asking for detail. Line,
Speaker 1: can you lane with the altman Z scorers? End? Why
Speaker 1: the solar industry watches it, so I should have looked
Speaker 1: exactly who Altman was and when he did his research.
Speaker 1: But Altman was an economist and he produced some academic
Speaker 1: research while ago of manufacturing companies and manufacturing companies he
Speaker 1: found you could predict their publicity of bankruptcy by looking
Speaker 1: at some fairly standard financial ratios that are disclosed by
Speaker 1: public companies on stock markets. And this looks at their
Speaker 1: their assets, their liquid reserves, their market information basically about
Speaker 1: how well they're performing related to their debt. And he
Speaker 1: found that an Altman zed score above one point eight
Speaker 1: meant a manufacturing company was fairly unlike to go bankrupt
Speaker 1: in the next two years, whereas below one point eight
Speaker 1: there was actually a pretty reasonable risk, and solar companies
Speaker 1: go bankrupt all the time. Historically. This chart of Altman's
Speaker 1: scores has a lot of companies below one point eight
Speaker 1: in it, and it still has a few. They didn't
Speaker 1: all go bankrupt. I mean, being below one point eight
Speaker 1: is a risk of bankruptcy, it's certainty. What we've seen
Speaker 1: in the last year is pretty good profits for the
Speaker 1: solar industry, particularly for polsilicon makers and glassmakers, and some
Speaker 1: of the big manufacturers, and so a lot of these
Speaker 1: companies have moved into quite positive helpment c schools, which
Speaker 1: suggests their fairly good financial health. So Daco, Shine, Longi, Tongwei, Almonton,
Speaker 1: First Solar, basically this has improved a bit and most
Speaker 1: of the companies are in decent financial health, which is
Speaker 1: unusual for solar manufacturers. You're mentioning it's a super fragmented market,
Speaker 1: maybe a reasonably low barrier to entry. I do identify
Speaker 1: a bunch of those in this research note and kind
Speaker 1: of throw companies and names of specific projects out there
Speaker 1: that you know definitely are kind of taking off. So
Speaker 1: we have some visibility on what's happening in the nearer term.
Speaker 1: You mentioned thin film solar, So I think the question
Speaker 1: that I want to get to, and I think maybe
Speaker 1: could even be its own podcast, what's in the world
Speaker 1: of weird and wonderful tech that's happening in the sol
Speaker 1: their space, Because of course we know over a benaff
Speaker 1: that the utility grade projects and then of course the
Speaker 1: rooftop solar projects are where most of the you know,
Speaker 1: new installed capacity is coming from. But what about the
Speaker 1: solar roof tiles that people were talking about there for
Speaker 1: a bit, or the thin film solar or the solar
Speaker 1: that ends up going on. You know your windows, what's
Speaker 1: in the weird and wonderful category that you are watching.
Speaker 1: You can't see me rolling my eyes, Diana. The whole
Speaker 1: point of solar is it's not weird and wonderful, it's
Speaker 1: just normal. You buy solar panels, you probably don't need
Speaker 1: to think too much about what sort of solar panels
Speaker 1: they are, and you put them somewhere which vaguely faces
Speaker 1: the sun. Yes, there were there were gimmicks like solar
Speaker 1: roof tiles and solar blinds, and some people will even
Speaker 1: buy them. In the past, when you see a thin
Speaker 1: film company saying that they're going to pivot to bespoke
Speaker 1: solutions like that, you know they're about to go bankrupt,
Speaker 1: because that's the last pretense that the product is actually good.
Speaker 1: They're just going to go for, Oh, we're not good,
Speaker 1: We're just going to be pretty. A good solo module
Speaker 1: generates electricity. What it looks like is relatively unimportant, but hey,
Speaker 1: there are people who will pay extra for special black
Speaker 1: modules with a black frame, and probably also for solar
Speaker 1: blinds and solar roof tiles and if they want to,
Speaker 1: they should go right ahead. But the point of a
Speaker 1: solar model is a blue electricity, so it is deeply
Speaker 1: a function over fashion moment, and Jenny, I could feel
Speaker 1: you rolling your eyes, so even if I couldn't see it,
Speaker 1: I could feel it. On that note, thank you very
Speaker 1: much for joining us on the show today, and we
Speaker 1: will have you back to do something more detailed on
Speaker 1: the solar industry. But it was high time that we
Speaker 1: had you on the show to just suit a crash
Speaker 1: course on what is happening at the moment given all
Speaker 1: of the discussion across the interconnected web of the energy
Speaker 1: industry and what's happening with price volatility. So thank you
Speaker 1: for joining us. Thank you, Dana. Today's episode of s
Speaker 1: sched On was edited by Rex Warner of gray Stoke Media.
Speaker 1: Bloomberg an f A is a service provided by Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Finance LP and its affiliates. This recording does not constitute,
Speaker 1: nor should it be construed as investment advice, investment recommendations,
Speaker 1: or recommendation as to an investment or other strategy. Bloomberg
Speaker 1: an e F should not be considered as information sufficient
Speaker 1: upon which to base an investment decision. Neither Bloomberg Finance LP,
Speaker 1: nor any of its affiliates makes any representation or warranty
Speaker 1: as to the accuracy or completeness of the information contained
Speaker 1: in this recording, and any liability of this reporting is
Speaker 1: expressly disclaimed