Solar

A stream of highly charged particles from the sun is headed straight toward Earth, threatening to plunge cities around the world into darkness and bring the global economy screeching to a halt. This isn't the premise of the latest doomsday thriller. Massive solar storms have happened before - and another one is likely to occur soon, according to Mike Hapgood, a space weather scientist at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory near Oxford, England. Much of the planet's electronic equipment, as well as orbiting satellites, have been built to withstand these periodic geomagnetic storms.

That ray of light you see peeking through all the clouds darkening California's future? That's the sun. More specifically, solar power, in which California is the hands-down national leader. The state's installed solar generating capacity of about 1.2 gigawatts - the equivalent of two big conventional power plants and enough to fill the electrical demand from nearly 200,000 homes for a year - easily outstrips the next 10 highest-ranked states. It's also the fastest-growing solar market in the country.

SolarCity, the Bay Area company that is the leading provider of residential solar systems, shook up the renewable energy industry by pioneering a financing program that made solar panels accessible to more than rich eco-fans. The company ? founded in 2006 by brothers Lyndon and Peter Rive ? has completed or is working on more than 10,000 solar projects and is expanding to the East Coast. The company has ballooned to more than 1,000 employees, even though progress was stalled during the recession, and it has raised more than $700 million in project financing.

The newspapers and websites were full Monday morning with stories about Sunday's eclipse: finely done accounts with facts, figures, quotations and on-the-scene reporting. Will any win the Pulitzer Prize? Only time will tell. But if so, there is precedent: The 1924 Pulitzer Prize for reporting went to Magner White, a reporter for the San Diego Sun, for his account of a noontime solar eclipse that occurred Sept. 10, 1923. White's account, in the lean, vivid prose of the day, had weird gusts of wind hitting the city, circus animals pacing and roaring, prostitutes falling to their knees and vowing to change their wicked ways, and San Diego residents exchanging "ghastly smiles, pale lilies they are. " The Sun's story was on the stands within minutes of the eclipse becoming total.

'Wonders of the Solar System' Where: Science Channel When: 9 p.m. Wednesday Rating: TV-G (suitable for all ages)

When the moon blots out the sun's blinding rays on Sunday, a sliver of the Earth's surface will be plunged into eerie darkness. Travelers who have crossed thousands of miles to witness the celestial show will gaze at the sky and, for a few minutes, see a thing most people never get to see: a halo of fire — the sun's corona — flickering around the edges of the silhouette of the moon. But Jay Pasachoff, over on Easter Island, may be looking down more than up — calibrating his instruments, checking for technical glitches, peering through lenses.

Sen. Barbara Boxer on Thursday urged Southern California Edison to expedite interconnection agreements with national parks and forests, where renewable energy projects have been sitting idle for years while federal agencies wrangle with the utility. In a letter to SCE President Ronald L. Litzinger, Boxer chastised the utility for delaying projects that were intended to reduce electric bills at national park and forest facilities. The letter was in response to a Times story this week that detailed a number of renewable projects caught in the impasse.

California's Energy Commission approved plans for the state's first hybrid solar-power plant, helping clear the way for construction to begin this year. The 563-megawatt plant will be owned by the city of Victorville and will use a 250-acre array of solar collectors to augment the output of natural-gas-fueled turbine generators.

Terence Green's Sept. 1 column was in keeping with what I had come to expect on subjects relating to energy--interesting, informational and in this case, personally encouraging. Since 1978, I have been directly and totally involved in solar design and installation in active systems, and peripherally, in passive solar systems. The solar battle is far from over even though it may be in a holding action at this time. I'll continue to look forward to your energy articles. PETER C. KOCHIS West Covina

Solar A Novel Ian McEwan Nan A. Talese/Doubleday: 294 pp., $26.95 In 2006, Ian McEwan survived a minor scrape with the plagiarism police. A British newspaper pointed out the resemblance between passages in his celebrated 2001 novel, "Atonement," and those of a 1977 memoir by the late romance writer Lucilla Andrews. McEwan serenely dismissed the matter in the Guardian two days later. He hadn't copied Andrews, merely referred to her book for hard facts about a 1940 London hospital, and he'd cited it in "Atonement's" acknowledgments.

The annual solar eclipse in the West on Sunday might be considered a stage-setter for a another solar eclipse coming in the fall - and a reason to travel to Australia. Brownell Travel based in Birmingham, Ala., offers an 11-night trip that features the Nov. 14 total eclipse that will only be seen Down Under. The path of totality of the eclipse, which begins at dawn, is in the northern edge of the country. On the trip, participants will be near Cairns on a cruise to view the early-morning eclipse and later tour the Great Barrier Reef and Daintree Rainforest on the northeast coast of Queensland.

Placing surreal moment atop surreal moment - on Sunday at Staples, they were piling up like pancakes - the sun starts to vanish about 5:30 p.m. at L.A. Live. What they call an annular solar eclipse has begun, a cockeyed celestial event that looks as if it were penciled out by Picasso. First thought: They've assigned me to cover the Apocalypse. Second thought: Wow, the 110 is really gonna be a mess. Sunday was just another Sunday here in the City of Playoffs, except that you had this cosmic convergence of a major bike race, a hockey playoff game, a basketball playoff game and a playoff eclipse, all within hours of each other at L.A. Live, the softest spot in our city's stuccoed soul.

A rare "ring" solar eclipse is coming to California on Sunday evening - the first of its kind to be visible from the continental United States since 1994. From our vantage point in Southern California, the moon will block about 85% of the sun's diameter, leaving behind a crescent-shaped sliver. But those farther north will see the moon nudge its way into the center of the sun, leaving a ring of fire visible around the moon's edge. Scientists call this an annular eclipse. ("Annulus" means "ring" in Latin.)

WASHINGTON - The Obama administration ordered tariffs of 31% and higher on solar panels imported from China, escalating a simmering trade dispute with China over a case that has sharply divided American interests in the growing clean-energy industry. The Commerce Department announced the stiff duties Thursday after making a preliminary finding that Chinese solar panel manufacturers "dumped" their goods - that is, sold them at below fair-market value. The widely anticipated ruling, if affirmed by U.S. trade officials this fall, is expected to have significant implications for both the global production of solar cells, now largely in China, and the growth of the solar energy industry in the U.S., which employs about 100,000 people in manufacturing, installation and services.

The deepest partial solar eclipse in a generation is headed to Southern California this weekend. What's the best way to view it? Where are the best places to go? Check out this Q&A below. Q: What's the best place to view the eclipse in Southern California?  A: The partial solar eclipse will occur late in the day in Southern California on Sunday, beginning at 5:24 p.m., reaching its maximum coverage at 6:38 p.m., and exiting the sun's path at 7:42 p.m., just 10 minutes before sunset.

Despite strong opposition from environmentalists, the state Assembly on Thursday approved controversial legislation that allows a solar energy developer to bypass local agencies in seeking to build a large-scale power plant in a valley that is home to desert tortoises, golden eagles and bighorn sheep. The nation's leading environmental groups see K Road Power's proposed 663-megawatt Calico Solar plant as one of the most ecologically damaging renewable energy projects in the California desert.

Everyone knows solar power can heat homes and generate electricity. But on a rooftop in Downey, Southern California Gas Co. engineers are using solar mirrors to cool down their offices. Engineers are testing two technologies that use mirrors to concentrate sunlight onto pipes with water running through them. The heated water powers a thermal process in a chiller that cools the cold water used in air conditioning units. "When we tell people we heat water up only to cool it down, they don't get it at first," said David Berokoff, a technology development manager at SoCal Gas. "But all this technology has been around for a while.

Re "San Onofre may never run full bore," May 4 Regarding the $55 million to $65 million cost of returning the San Onofre nuclear power plant to service: How many homes could that money outfit with solar panels? How much energy would that expenditure put into the grid? What tax program benefits could Southern California Edison draw from funding solar installations? What would the return on investment be for such a project? San Onofre's federal license expires in only 10 years.

Re "Solar standoff in the Mojave," Editorial, May 1 The Times is correct about the Genesis Solar Project when it writes, "Solar power is a vital part of the move to clean, renewable energy as well as greater independence from foreign oil. " Genesis will produce enough electricity for nearly 90,000 average homes and avoid putting more than 300,000 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year. Sadly, the term "fast track," which once described a proactive, priority-driven approach to breaking bureaucratic gridlock, has now become unfairly associated with cutting corners and adverse environmental and cultural impacts.