Why, when he opens his mouth, of course! This can be easily illustrated in the base of Berkley academic, Severin Borenstein in the latest issue of Technology Review. Speaking on the viabiliyty of solar power in regards to the market:

Will the stimulus bill facilitate that much-needed transition to more efficient technologies? Severin Borenstein, for one, is doubtful. Borenstein, the director of the University of California Energy Institute, says the problem with the stimulus funding is that when it comes to existing technologies, the DOE will need to pick which projects to support. "The worry is that the government will invest in the wrong technologies," he says; picking technology winners is something that "historically it has not been very good at."A far more effective way to promote the growth of renewable energy, he believes, is to put a price on carbon dioxide emissions through a carbon tax or a cap-and-trade scheme (see "Carbon Trading on the Cheap," p. 72). Either approach would provide market-based incentives for deploying renewables and would represent a more efficient and "technology-­neutral" government policy. At the same time, he says it is important for the government to fund research into new renewable technologies.

From an economist’s perspective, Borenstein says, government subsidies are justified to address "market failures": cases in which the market doesn’t allocate enough resources to the pursuit of socially desirable goals, such as reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. The government incentives then support efforts that are financially risky but are likely to provide a common benefit. In such a context, he says, the argument for public spending on research into new solar technologies is strong–but the case for subsidizing the current commercial technologies, particularly photovoltaics, is "really weak." Existing photovoltaics are expensive even compared with other renewables such as wind and solar thermal, he says, and they won’t necessarily lead to cheaper technologies, either. "You’re obviously going to get [solar] panels put in, but is that going to generate something that will have a lasting benefit? Will it help you build a solar industry? I think the answer is probably not."

Borenstein says direct government subsidies to support existing photovoltaics could in fact impede the development of more efficient technologies. "There is no question that there is what economists call ‘option value’ lost when you invest in the current technology," he says. "If the technology is about to get a lot better, and is about to get a lot better for reasons that don’t have to do with building out the current technology but because the science is going to improve, that’s an argument for waiting. You’re crowding out future investment by investing now. The money would be better spent five years from now on the new technology."

I hate to tell him this but “socially desirable goals” are like assholes; everybody has one. How does he rate solar power in relation to education? Or clean water? Or recycling? Or the preservation of whales? The answer is much simpler than he thinks. The market will rate all of these things and more seamlessly. But he does admit that present photovoltaic technology is not to a point where it would make sense to install solar panels just yet. Why the sudden onset of common sense? Could it be because he would like taxpayer largess to be spent on academics like himself?

Severin Borenstein, director of the U.C. Energy Institute, argues that state and federal subsidies for solar panel installations should instead go to increasing research and development budgets.