In February, Ramamoorthy Ramesh, manager of the US Department of Energy’s new SunShot Initiative and a UC Berkeley materials scientist and other solar leaders from the US and Europe will convene in Boston to discuss ways of overcoming the technical, political, and economic hurdles facing solar photovoltaic deployment on both sides of the Atlantic. The second PV Rollout Conference on Feb. 9 & 10, 2012, brings together solar policymakers, product researchers and developers, and system integrators to share success stories and lessons learned in order to address the key areas of development needed for large-scale deployment.

As the keynote speaker, Ramesh will discuss the SunShot Initiative’s anticipated role in lowering solar deployment costs. Other topics include a session on grid integration chaired by Kalejs; a risk management and financing session chaired by David Williams of CleanPath Ventures; as well as discussions on PV markets, module technology, inverters, and power plants. There will also be a pre-conference workshop on PV module durability testing with speakers Claudio Ferrara of Fraunhofer ISE, Christian Hoepfner of Fraunhofer CSE, and Martin Plass of CFV Solar Test Laboratory.

The conference, produced by OTTI, is cochaired by Fraunhofer ISE Director Eicke Weber and Juris Kalejs, CTO of American Capital Energy, with support from advisory council members including NREL, University of Chicago, RIT, EPRI, EPIA, Fraunhofer CSE, and others.