#EarthDay Eve: #Solar Costs Sink While #Organics Sales Rise

Yes, the polar ice caps are still melting and the climate-deniers are still ensconced in Congress. But there is some good news, this Earth Day Eve: The resources that make our planet healthier are getting more affordable–and popular. 

At January’s World Energy Future Conference in Abu Dhabi, Paddy Padmanathan, the CEO of Saudi Arabian power company ACWE, predicted a 30% solar drop over the next decade, echoing a Deutsche Bank assertion that solar costs will drop 40% by 2017. According to the International Energy Agency, solar–which currently makes up less than one percent of the electricity market–could be the world’s biggest single source by 2050.

And it just gets better: “The electricity system is shifting to clean,” Michael Liebreich, founder of BNEF, said during a keynote address at the Bloomberg New Energy Finance summit in New York last week. “Despite the change in oil and gas prices there is going to be a substantial buildout of renewable energy.”

Meanwhile, the Organic Trade Association recently announced sales figures from 2014 topped expectations. Sales of organic food and other products added up to $39.1 billion in sales, up 11.3 percent from the previous year. In 2014, organic food accounted for nearly five percent of the total food sales in the United States, a growth of 11 percent as compared to the three percent growth shown by the conventional food industry, while the natural products industry as a whole is expanding at double the conventional rate.

As demand goes up in both industries, costs go down. Maybe I’m a glass-half-full kind of girl, but I would say that’s good news. Would you?