Solar arrays can provide energy to pump water to watering troughs for cows, improving water quality on remote pastures and saving money too. Farmers can more sustainably manage their pastures if cows are not all clustered around small creeks, eroding the banks.

One example of a worst case scenario is Dick Lester’s Spring Valley Ranch in Cherokee County, Iowa. He had one tiny creek that his cattle were trampling to death, reducing their own water supply.
He needed to pump water 150 feet up the hill to three separate watering troughs so the cows would spread out and not trample the creek’s stream banks, fouling their own drinking water supply and reducing the flow by eroding the stream banks.

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One of the solar industry’s corporate giants, First Solar, announced recently that it expects sales for fiscal year 2010 to reach between TeX Embedding failed!2.9 billion. This is about TeX Embedding failed!500 million more than Wall Street expectations.
Despite the current economic situation, and a major recent let-down in L.A., this company is growing steadily and reflects the increasing strength of solar technology in the market today.
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A London-based green investment firm, Earth Capital Partners (ECP), aiming to create a €750 million ($1 billion) renewable energy fund, announced this last week that it had reached its first round fund-raising target. By November 2010, it hopes to reach its total goal of €750 million.
The company is happy with this progress and believes there is demonstrated investor interest in this topic now. Even without an international, legally binding agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and promote clean energy, investors are moving forward on this.
With the amount of capital ECP is raising, what types of energy this investment firm is specifically interested in is important. They seem to be aiming at specific sectors of the market.
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Electric vehicles (EVs) are great, but better if you are not charging them from coal-powered electricity. Solar-powered charging stations are beginning to pop up now to address this situation. Dell headquarters in Texas planted some “solar trees” recently to charge their employees’ EVs, Chicago got its first solar-powered EV charging station in April, and now, New York just got its first one as well thanks to sustainable energy company Beautiful Earth Group.
There may be more on the horizon as well. EVs are looking to boom across the world.
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