Behind Every GOP Governor Cooperating With Obamacare Is An Industry Lobby Profiting From Obamacare

Another GOP governor has pledged to go ahead with Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, and once again, industry was standing right there with him. AP reports on West Virginia:

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — West Virginia will expand Medicaid as called for by the federal health care overhaul, through a plan unveiled Thursday by Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin that would extend coverage to an estimated 91,500 uninsured low-income residents….

U.S. Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., joined Tomblin for Thursday’s announcement at Charleston’s St. Francis Hospital along with chief executives of several hospital systems. Expanding Medicaid is expected to help the state’s hospitals, which face a scheduled in federal reimbursement payments, by providing coverage to thousands of residents now treated at hospitals without compensation as charity care. The financial analysis cites studies estimating the annual savings to hospitals at $20 million to $30 million.

The same thing is happening in Ohio and Missouri. In Idaho, the GOP governor and legislature decided to build an Obamacare exchange thanks to industry pressure.

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Industry and EU clash over medical devices regulation

* Europe revisits rules after breast, hip implant scandals

* Manufacturers fear new regulations will delay approvals

* Debate centres on overhauling decentralised EU system

LONDON, Feb 20 (Reuters) - One year on from a breast implant scandal that shook confidence in Europe's light-touch system for regulating medical devices, lawmakers and manufacturers are at loggerheads on ways to protect patients from shoddy products.

Companies that make implantable devices such as new hips and heart stents accept the need for change to the current set-up but oppose a radical overhaul, arguing that would delay the launch of new devices by years and stifle innovation.

The European Commission, the bloc's executive arm, has proposed a new level of scrutiny, and some members of the European Parliament want a whole new system of pre-market approval that would raise the bar still further.

National governments also take differing positions, with France arguing EU laws must be "radically redrafted", while Britain opposes big changes.

The issue will come to a head at a European Parliament committee on Feb. 26, where officials, industry leaders and doctors' representatives will argue over the way forward.

Dagmar Roth-Behrendt, the German lawmaker chairing the panel, is convinced Europe needs a more rigorous system for testing medical devices before they are approved.

"We absolutely need that," she told Reuters. "We don't need it for every medical device, but for certain medical devices, without any doubt, we need a more stringent prior authorisation system."

Like some top doctors, she believes the current system built on around 80 Notified Bodies - mainly private firms scattered across Europe - is simply not up to the job.

Panos Vardas, president of the European Society of Cardiology, said there were "major deficiencies" in the current system and a more coordinated approach was vital. Cardiologists are big users of medical devices, ranging from stents that prop open arteries to pacemakers and artificial heart valves.

The negotiation process between governments, parliament and the Commission is likely to be lengthy, and new legislation may not come into force across the EU until as late as 2019.

NEEDLE IN HAYSTACK

Critics say Europe's weak regulation is partly to blame for allowing France's Poly Implant Prothese (PIP) to manufacture for up to a decade substandard silicone breast implants that were used by hundreds of thousands of women around the world.

But EU trade group Eucomed, representing some 22,500 device companies, argues no system could stop a fraud like PIP. It also questions whether a different regime would have stopped risky metal-on-metal hip implants reaching the market, given such hips were also approved under the more stringent U.S. system.

A key debate is whether Europe should shift to a centralised system as in the United States, potentially by folding devices regulation into the European Medicines Agency (EMA).

EMA boss Guido Rasi, who will address the Feb. 26 meeting, said in an interview last year there was an "urgent need" to regulate devices as tightly as drugs, although whether the EMA should play a role was up to politicians.

That notion alarms Eucomed's CEO Serge Bernasconi.

"If Europe were to switch to a centralised system, we expect that, once the new system is up and running, patients will experience a 3-5 year unnecessary delay in receiving medical devices compared to today's situation," he said.

And getting such a system up to speed could cause an additional delay of one or two years, he added, undermining Europe's leading position in devices innovation.

An analysis by Boston Consulting Group last year found high-tech medical devices were, on average, made available in Europe 43 months before reaching the U.S. market.

The European Commission's answer is to reform the current decentralised system by allowing a new Medical Device Coordination Group to request additional assessments - such as longer or larger clinical trials - for some so-called "Class III", or high-risk, devices.

Manufacturers, however, fear this approach will be random and akin to looking for "a needle in a haystack", with little chance of picking up problems.

Major makers of medical devices include Johnson & Johnson , Medtronic, Boston Scientific, Abbott , Allergan and Smith & Nephew.

The industry backs the Commission's goal of improving standards at Notified Bodies, but would rather this was done by selecting only the best ones to approve higher risk devices, rather than introducing an extra layer of scrutiny.

More than 500,000 medical devices are sold in the EU, ranging from bandages, dentures and wheelchairs to pacemakers.

They are regulated under the Conformite Europeenne system, which is also used for gadgets like toasters, though getting a "CE mark" for a medical device is tougher than for such household appliances.

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Slow approvals put India's drug trials industry at risk

MUMBAI/NEW DELHI, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Slower government approval for testing new medicines is threatening India's aspirations to be a fast-growing, low-cost hub for clinical trials, and has prompted some drugs firms to shift operations elsewhere, adding to their costs.

While India's drug regulator and the health ministry's medical research body deny any slowdown, interviews by Reuters with pharmaceutical companies, lobby groups, industry watchers and healthcare activists tell a different story.

Drugs firms complain that sluggish bureaucracy in New Delhi and a lack of legal clarity on how to conduct clinical trials have created a climate of regulatory uncertainty in the market.

That has been exacerbated by a high profile case in the Supreme Court between the regulator and health activists, who allege that companies used poor people as human "guinea pigs" to trial unsafe drugs without their knowledge or consent, and without proper state scrutiny. They have asked the court to suspend all trials for new chemical entities (NCEs) - substances that may be turned into a new drug after tests.

Drugmakers, speaking on condition of anonymity, say the case has made government officials more cautious in considering new approvals, asking more questions and being tougher to convince.

"The situation was never quite easy in India," said Siddhant Khandekar, a healthcare analyst at ICICI Direct brokerage in Mumbai. But with the Supreme Court case "the scenario has worsened and getting new approvals has become more time consuming," he said.

"ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD"

The legal case has prompted Piramal Enterprises Ltd , a $1.8 billion Indian drugmaker, to look abroad to trial new drugs, its vice chairperson Swati Piramal told Reuters, warning that India was losing its "innovation edge".

The approval time for initiating drug trials in India typically stretches to 6-8 months, compared to just 28 days in Europe and Canada, said Piramal. "Post the Supreme Court case, certainly companies like us will look anywhere in the world to see if we get good trials," she said.

Lupin Ltd, India's fourth-largest drugmaker by sales, said it had wanted to conduct an NCE trial in India last year, but the $5 billion firm eventually went overseas as the approval process was too slow and made more uncertain by the ongoing Supreme Court case.

"I think the intention is right but the implementation is so slow, that it's hampering in the near term," said Nilesh Gupta, Lupin's group president. "For NCEs in particular in India, the process is extremely long."

ECCRO, a contract research organisation that focuses on India, sees global drugmakers turning to Russia and Brazil for their trials as they struggle to get approval in India.

But moving drugs trials abroad could raise the cost for Indian companies. The $20,000 cost of trialling a drug in the United States is 10-20 times that in India, said Deepak Malik, a healthcare analyst at Emkay Global.

INDUSTRY "AT RISK"

The relatively low cost of conducting trials and a fast-growing population of 1.2 billion should make India an attractive destination for companies to carry out tests. It is already a generic drug-making powerhouse whose exports to Latin America and Africa have earned it the sobriquet as "the developing world's pharmacy".

The domestic drugs trial market was worth about $485 million in 2011, according to consultants Frost & Sullivan, who predict that could double to $1 billion by 2016.

But the regulatory fog surrounding clinical trials means Asia's third-largest economy has failed to fulfil its potential to become a testing hub, companies and analysts said. Less than 1.5 percent of global trials take place in India, according to the Indian Society for Clinical Research (ISCR).

"We are concerned by delays in approval of clinical trials, and ambiguity in the processes, over the past two years," said a spokesman for MSD, the local unit of U.S. drugmaker Merck & Co .

ADDED LAYER

Two groups of activists filed cases last year alleging firms illegally conducted trials, exploiting poor people by testing potentially harmful drugs on them. The cases are being heard simultaneously in the Supreme Court.

"Putting patients first is at the heart of everything we do, and our clients share this same commitment to patients and their safety," said Quintiles, a clinical research services provider to various drugmakers around the world, including India.

"In the event of an injury in a clinical trial, the need for compensation for the patient and/or their dependent(s) is taken very seriously, and is handled by the sponsor of the trial in accordance with all applicable regulations and guidelines," Quintiles said in an emailed response to a Reuters query for this article.

The Supreme Court last month ordered the health ministry to supervise all clearances for new drug trials, creating an added layer of decision-making.

Two activists told Reuters they believed the cases had stymied new drug trial approvals as senior government officials were too nervous to take decisions. "Unofficially they have decided not to sanction new clinical trials," said activist Amulya Nidhi.

However, G.N. Singh, the drugs controller general of India, said there had been no changes to the approvals process. "There hasn't been any halt in approving new clinical trials," Singh told Reuters. "We cannot suddenly wake up one day and decide 'Ok, no more clinical trials in this country'."

V.M. Katoch, the head of the state-run Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), which advises the drugs regulator on approvals, also disputed that approval times had slowed.

Referring to the allegations made in the Supreme Court, he said trials conducted without the patient's consent were a small number of aberrations. "That creates the impression that everything is wrong all around, which is not true actually," he said. "The ethical practices every year have become stronger and stronger."

However, Katoch acknowledged that recent negative publicity around drug trials in India had put the government "on the defensive" for a while.

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The Meat Industry Consumes Four Times The Amount Of Antibiotics As Sick Americans Do

The meat industry uses a considerable amount of antibiotics to fight bacteria on its livestock farms — so much so that it actually far outpaces the amount of antibiotics used to treat sick people in the country. According to FDA data compiled by Pew Charitable Trusts, the livestock industry is consuming almost four-fifths of the total amount of antibiotics used in the U.S.:

And, as Mother Jones points out, that points to a dangerous trend in the meat industry. As livestock in close quarters breed bacteria, and the industry uses more and more antibiotics during their production in order to contain those pathogens, common bacteria are developing a resistance to drugs. For example, more than 75 percent of the salmonella found on ground turkey in 2011 was resistant to at least one antibiotic used to treat it — and over half were resistant to three or more different antibiotics. Unless the meat industry changes its practices, the FDA will have a difficult time keeping up with ensuring their products are safe to consume.

And even though Americans are consuming considerably fewer antibiotics than the meat industry, antibiotic resistance isn’t just an issue among lifestock farms. Diseases that affect humans — such as whooping cough, tuberculosis, and gonorrhea — are also growing increasingly resistant to the drugs used to treat them. Since testing and marketing new antibiotics isn’t as profitable for the pharmaceutical industry as selling the drugs that are already on the market, production has lagged behind over the past few decades, and global health officials warn that an impending “antibiotic apocalypse” could make even the most common infections incurable.

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Money In the 'Death Care' Industry

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Gun Industry Aims To Sell Youth On Assault Weapons

Responding to Americans’ declining interest in shooting sports, gun manufacturers are developing programs to market their products to younger children. The National Shooting Sports Foundation trade association and the industry-funded National Rifle Association spend millions of dollars annually to recruit kids as gun enthusiasts. And those efforts increasingly focus on pushing semi-automatic assault weapons, including the very model used by the shooter in the Newtown, Connecticut tragedy.

The New York Times reports:

The pages of Junior Shooters, an industry-supported magazine that seeks to get children involved in the recreational use of firearms, once featured a smiling 15-year-old girl clutching a semiautomatic rifle. At the end of an accompanying article that extolled target shooting with a Bushmaster AR-15 — an advertisement elsewhere in the magazine directed readers to a coupon for buying one — the author encouraged youngsters to share the article with a parent.

“Who knows?” it said. “Maybe you’ll find a Bushmaster AR-15 under your tree some frosty Christmas morning!”

The industry’s youth-marketing effort is backed by extensive social research and is carried out by an array of nonprofit groups financed by the gun industry, an examination by The New York Times found. The campaign picked up steam about five years ago with the completion of a major study that urged a stronger emphasis on the “recruitment and retention” of new hunters and target shooters.

Federal law prohibits the sale of rifles to those under age 18. But through programs at Boy Scout camps and 4-H clubs, the NRA trains children on how to safely shoot single-shot rifles. And, according to the report: “Newer initiatives by other organizations go further, seeking to introduce children to high-powered rifles and handguns while invoking the same rationale of those older, more traditional programs: that firearms can teach ‘life skills’ like responsibility, ethics and citizenship.”

This effort seems eerily similar to the marketing strategy employed by the tobacco industry in the 1980s. Recognizing that the number of smokers in America was declining — and dying off — cigarette companies sought to addict underage children to ensure a continuing market for their product. A now infamous 1981 Philip Morris corporate memo noted that “[t]oday’s teenager is tomorrow’s potential regular customer, and the overwhelming majority of smokers first begin to smoke while still in their teens. In addition, the 10 years following the teenage years is the period during which average daily consumption per smoker increases to the average adult level. The smoking patterns of teenagers are particularly important to Philip Morris.”

One gun-industry study noted a similar need to “start them young,” observing that “stakeholders such as managers and manufacturers should target programs toward youth 12 years old and younger… This is the time that youth are being targeted with competing activities. It is important to consider more hunting and target-shooting recruitment programs aimed at middle school level, or earlier.”

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ANALYSIS-Drug industry bets on new blockbusters in 2013

* R&D improving as steepest part of patent cliff passes

* Cancer, diabetes, MS, hepatitis drugs in focus in 2013

* Big year for GSK, Roche, Lilly, Biogen, Gilead, Novo

LONDON/NEW YORK, Jan 15 (Reuters) - Drugmakers are betting that a new wave of medicines for cancer, diabetes, heart disease, multiple sclerosis and hepatitis will shape up as tomorrow's blockbusters in the coming 12 months.

With the industry regaining some of its swagger after winning 39 new drug approvals last year - a record only beaten in 1996 - there are signs the improving trend could continue through 2013.

Roche, GlaxoSmithKline, Eli Lilly, Biogen Idec, Gilead Sciences and Novo Nordisk are among those with important new products reaching a critical point in development this year.

The industry needs a winning streak after delivering poor returns for years due to a wave of patent expiries. Now companies are emerging from that patent "cliff" and the balance of losses to new opportunities is improving.

European drugmakers, for example, have the potential to deliver new drugs from 2013 to 2015 with peak annual sales of $64 billion (or $27 billion after adjusting for the risk of failure), while fresh patent losses in the period will be only $12 billion, according to Deutsche Bank estimates.

Simon Friend, global pharmaceutical leader at PricewaterhouseCoopers, agrees the picture is improving. But he warns it is still too early to say that drug companies are out of the woods, especially with governments and insurers taking an increasingly tough line on paying for new medicines.

"Productivity is starting to turn the corner - but the other big issue is whether the industry can get the prices it needs for new products," he said.

Still, analysts say interest in the sector from growth funds is now picking up and investors are taking a closer look at drug pipelines - a trend to watch as Johnson & Johnson and Novartis kick off the reporting season next week.

BIOGEN AIMS FOR BEST IN CLASS

A number of key research and development bets on potential multibillion-dollar-a-year products will play out in 2013.

One of the most highly anticipated approvals of the year, likely to come in the first quarter, is for Biogen's multiple sclerosis (MS) drug BG-12.

It will be the third oral MS drug to market after Gilenya from Novartis and Sanofi's Aubagio, but many investors already see it as best in class. That has helped Biogen shares nearly treble over the past three years.

"It's going to be priced very high, it will have a rapid market uptake and it's going to have a timely approval because the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) can't afford to keep a drug like this off the market," said Raghuram Selvaraju, head of healthcare equity research with Aegis Capital.

Doctors treating diabetes are also likely to have new drugs before the year is out, with a new class of medicines that work via the kidneys seen entering the fray.

The SGLT2 inhibitors for type 2 diabetes had a setback when dapagliflozin from AstraZeneca and Bristol-Meyers Squibb was rejected by the FDA over safety concerns.

But Johnson & Johnson is likely to get an FDA green light for its canagliflozin after an expert advisory panel last week recommended its approval, and Morningstar analyst Damien Conover sees a SGLT2 market of around $7 billion by 2020.

Novo Nordisk, meanwhile, is banking on a new ultra long-lasting insulin, Tresiba, to keep it out in front as leader in diabetes care. It also has a major chance in the obesity market, if it can prove its existing medicine liraglutide is safe and effective in weight loss.

The picture should become clear this year for regimens to treat hepatitis C without the need for injections, as closely watched Phase III data from Gilead and Abbvie reveals long-term cure rates for the liver disease.

An all-oral therapy with a high cure rate and low relapse rates would be sure to garner billions in annual sales. Gilead's sofosbuvir, acquired with the $11 billion purchase of Pharmasset, is seen as the clear leader in a crowded race but Abbvie has also had impressive early data for its products.

Cancer - the disease with the highest R&D investment - offers openings for a number of companies, with particular excitement centred on Lilly's ramucirumab, which could be filed to treat gastric cancer this year and has a far bigger commercial potential in breast cancer.

Lilly is a prime example of a pharmaceutical company that has the wind back in its R&D sails. While still facing the daunting December patent expiration of its nearly $5 billion a year antidepressant Cymbalta, Lilly now has 13 drugs in Phase III development - the most at any one time in its history.

Roche's aim to consolidate its position as the leading player in cancer looks within reach in 2013 with approval expected for new breast cancer treatment T-DM1.

The Swiss group may also start to show its promise in neuroscience, with pivotal trial data due in 2013 for bitopertin, a new kind of schizophrenia drug that analysts estimate could generate sales of more than $3 billion a year.

GLAXOSMITHKLINE'S BIG YEAR

GlaxoSmithKline perhaps has the most riding on 2013, with six new drugs submitted for approval in lung disease, diabetes, cancer and HIV, as well as Phase III clinical results due on two high-risk, high-reward projects in heart disease and cancer.

Darapladib, designed to fight clogged arteries in a different way to statins, could, in theory, become a $10 billion-a-year seller, while MAGE-A3 may prove equally revolutionary for lung cancer and melanoma. But in both cases GSK is pushing the scientific boundaries and the chances of success are considered below average.

Drug development still remains a risky business.

Last year's tally of drug approvals was lifted in part by a large number of niche drugs for rare diseases. Success in drugs for common diseases was more elusive, as highlighted by the failure of clinical trials for two experimental Alzheimer's drugs.

"The industry has done a lot to try and improve productivity and has corrected a lot of past mistakes," said Deutsche Bank analyst Richard Parkes, who highlights fewer failures in final Phase III testing as a key measure of success.

"It's too early to say whether this is going to be a sustained break-out from the trend but the efforts that have been put in place should at least improve the efficiency of what is being spent."

(Editing by Peter Graff)

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The Year In Solar Power: Prices Crash, Sales Soar, Industry Restructures, Saudis Leap In, CSP Suffers

Financial Innovation and Collaboration Takes the Solar Cake

If you ask Tom Kimbis what he thinks was one of the most important developments of 2012 for solar energy, he may tell you something you didn’t quite expect to hear. Kimbis, VP of External Affairs for the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), says that much of the credit for what’s being seen as a landmark year for downstream solar growth belongs not to technical innovations, but financial innovations — the kind that are making it increasingly possible for people everywhere to be able to afford solar without having to take out a second mortgage on their homes.

“Innovation can take place throughout the entire value chain,” Kimbis said. “We’ve seen phenomenal innovation with the various leasing and third party ownership models that have driven the markets in the U.S. forward more than the increase in cell efficiency.”

According to the U.S. Solar Market Insight Report, which was released by SEIA and GTM Research, 2012 has seen total installed solar capacity in the United States reach 1,992 MW. This far exceeds the annual total capacity reached in 2011, which was 1,885 MW — a not inconsiderable accomplishment, considering that 2012 isn’t even over yet. There were 684 MW of solar capacity installation in the third quarter of 2012 alone, and in that same time frame the residential PV sector installed over 118 MW of capacity.

Kimbis credits the biggest quarterly growth yet for U.S. residential PV to an increase in third party solar leasing options for consumers, which he likens to financial options that car buyers have — where instead of having to pay cash, leasing or financing options help make ownership a possibility. “Overcoming that first cost issue is what the third party ownership’s all about,” Kimbis said.

Upstream financial collaborations also led to the green lighting of numerous global projects in 2012, including the Letsatsi and Lesedi solar farms in South Africa. Both were made possible by dollars from U.S. developer SolarReserve and two local companies, Intikon Energy and Kensani Capital. In Peru, OPIC came together with Latin America’s development bank CAF and investment firm Conduit Capital Partners for the funding of two solar projects that will result in a combined solar capacity of 40 MW.

Oversupply Goes Up, PV Cost Goes Down

Despite a boom in solar demand in the United States in 2012 and a growth rate which SEIA estimates will be at about 70 percent over last year (compared to 14 percent global market growth), the reality of global PV panel oversupply remains an issue of concern.

In 2012, that oversupply led to a showdown between Chinese solar manufacturers and the United States Department of Commerce. Chinese manufacturers were accused of dumping their oversupply into the U.S. market at such low prices that they injured the ability of US-based solar manufacturers to compete fairly. This ultimately led to a decision by the International Trade Administration to levy tariffs to levy tariffs on the importation of solar modules using cells manufactured in China. In the final ruling, it was announced that the tariffs would range from 24 percent to 36 percent.

Alas, the old adage about every cloud having a silver lining may be very true, especially if you look at it from a global perspective. In 2012, oversupply led to low cost, which in turn drove an increased global expansion in development among wealthy and developing nations alike, all eager to capitalize on the low cost of materials.

Marc Norman, lawyer for Chadbourne & Parke LLP and director of the Emirates Solar Industry Association (ESIA), called this a possible case of “creative destruction” that’s given developing countries an opportunity to enter the solar game.

Norman said that the low cost of solar PV could enable developing countries in particular to benefit from solar technology without even being connected to the power grid. “Solar technology can be applied off-grid,” Norman said. “For example, in rural areas where there’s a lack of infrastructure. There’s a golden opportunity for more bottom-up market evolution, as opposed to a more traditional top-down approach.”

Kimbis agrees, noting the inherent irony: “Falling pricing is a double edged sword. It’s great for deployment, it’s great for the consumer, and it’s caused greater amounts of solar installation. On the other hand, falling prices have yielded smaller margins for manufacturers, making it tougher to survive in a very competitive climate.”

Industry Jobs and Widespread Bankruptcies

In the United States, 2012 showed evidence that growth in the solar industry occurred at a much faster rate than other industries. According to The Solar Foundation’s National Solar Jobs Census report, U.S. employment in the solar industry grew at a rate of 13.2 percent and the sector added 13,872 jobs in 2012, while Bureau of Labor statistics indicated that solar accounted for 1 out of every 230 jobs created.

This information may seem to fly in the face of the numerous solar company bankruptcies and consolidations that have taken place globally in the last year, but according to Kimbis, that’s par for the course in an emerging industry.

“It’s just like any other industry,” Kimbis said. “Competition is extreme. This is something that the industry has known about for awhile; companies have been bracing for global competition for the last several years. It’s a story which has repeated itself through everything from personal computing, to telecom, to the automobile industry.”

Job outlook, while encouraging within the United States, was not so rosy in China in 2012. In November, it was reported that Suntech Power Holdings (which is the world’s biggest maker of solar panels) would be shedding some 1,500 jobs in China to reduce operating costs and ratchet down on solar cell capacity.

Saudi Arabia: The Dark Horse

When discussing landmark events in solar, it’s impossible to ignore what took place in Saudi Arabia earlier in 2012. In May, the King Abdullah City for Atomic and Renewable Energy (also known as K.A.CARE) established the goal to develop 54,000 MW of renewable energy capacity by 2030.

Why is an oil-rich nation like Saudi Arabia concerned with adopting renewable energy? Quite simply, to limit the local consumption of oil so that exports can be increased. With low cost access to oil and unchecked usage, it’s believed that Saudi Arabia could find itself entirely out of the oil exportation business by 2030.

Under K.A.CARE’s proposed plan, 41,000 MW of the total 54,000 MW capacity will come whole from solar: 16,000 MW from photovoltaic (PV) projects and 25,000 from solar thermal projects. As a first phase, 700 MW of utility-scale projects are set to be undertaken by the end of 2013.

Norman calls the K.A.CARE program “a massive game changer for the global renewable energy industry, and particularly solar” and says that it could also have a beneficial impact on the local job market in Saudi. Unemployment is estimated at around 10 percent in the Kingdom. “The government sees this as an opportunity to create a global center of excellence for renewables, in addition to job creation.”

Norman explains that Saudi Arabia will require a certain percentage of local content on all renewables projects; this is seen as a means to stimulate the local job market.

2012’s Impact on CSP

With the low cost of solar PV panels, some may wonder what impact 2012 had on the solar thermal market, of which concentrated solar power (CSP) is a big part. Did CSP suffer due to the comparatively low cost of solar PV? It depends on who you ask, really.

The answer to that question, according to Norman, is obvious. “As a result of the reduction in PV prices, CSP has taken a hit in the last few years,” Norman said. “But they also have an advantage that can’t be overlooked, and that’s storage. Some developers have devised CSP plants that can store energy. That’s something that PV technology can’t measure up to at present.”

Not everyone sees 2012 as having been a good year for CSP. Jigar Shah, partner at Inerjys Ventures, predicted the death of CSP as far back as 2007 and calls it a technology that’s officially punched the big ticket. “I think in 2012, CSP basically died,” Shah said. “Siemens shut down their CSP plant. Areva is building one unit in Morocco,  but they shut down CSP plants in Australia and a few other places. BrightSource wasn’t able to go public, so they’ve got an existing utility contract they’re honoring with an existing DOE loan guarantee — and I don’t think anyone believes that they’re going to get a second contract. CSP is dead.”

While the aforementioned U.S. Solar Market Insight Report mentioned several large scale CSP projects underway in the United States, it was reported that the third quarter of 2012 saw no new capacity installed in that segment.

Additional Solar Highlights from Around the World in 2012

In June, Chile brought its largest PV plant online. Although modest in comparison with the scope of other global projects, the 1 MW Calama Solar 3 was an important step that has since resulted in increased interest among developers and investors. There were other notable Latin American solar developments in 2012, including two Peruvian solar farms (the already operational Tacna solar farm and the still in production Panamericana solar farm) whose combined generating capacity will reach 40 MW.In Germany, a 145 MW solar park in Neuhardenberg, Brandenberg, was constructed in a record-breaking five weeks. The solar park was finished just under the wire to beat the expiration of subsidies for PV installations greater than 10 MW in size. The construction of Neuhardenberg solar park, which is scheduled to be fully operational by the end of 2012, helped push Germany’s total installed solar capacity for the year to over 7,000 MW.8minuteenergy Renewables, a solar PV developer located in southern California, received the financial stamp of approval in November to proceed with construction on a project that, once in operation, will be the largest PV farm in the world. The Mount Signal solar farm, which is being constructed in Imperial Valley, will generate 800 MW (DC) of utility-scale energy.The Charanka Solar Park in Gujarat, India, is home to numerous independent solar power stations, occupying approximately 2000-hectares of land. While many the park’s solar stations remain in production, 2012 saw its combined total output capacity reach nearly 700 MW.In an effort to shore up their enormous oversupply of solar panels, China decided in 2012 to underwrite a $1.6B loan — through the China Development Bank (CDB), which is seen as the engine behind the country’s economic development — to essentially create downstream demand within its borders. The loan was given to Shanghai-headquartered Sky Solar, which earlier in 2012 broke ground on two PV projects in China: one 800-MW project in the Xinjiang Province, and another 50 MW plant in the Qinghai Province.

Vince Font is a professional freelance writer specializing in the fields of renewable energy, high tech, travel, and entertainment. Read his blog at www.vincefont.com or follow him on Twitter @vincefont. This piece was originally published at Renewable Energy World and was reprinted with permission.

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