46. PAPER BY THE OFFICE OF ENERGY STATISTICS, FEDERAL ENERGY ADMINISTRATION, "THE QUESTION OF LARGE COMPANY DOMINATION OF THE SOLAR ENERGY INDUSTRY" Federal Energy Administration THE QUESTION OF LARGE COMPANY DOMINATION OF THE NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION CONTRACTS AND GRANTS The National Science Foundation has released two lists of contracts and grants related to solar energy.* of the total of 149 contracts and grants, 53 went to private corporations, 75 to schools, 8 to non-profit organizations, to an individual, and 12 to Federal, state, or municipal government organizations. The 53 contracts went to 34 different companies, with one company receiving five contracts. Tables I, II, and III list these 34 companies in categories of large companies, small companies, and size unknown. The Small Business Administration's criteria of 500 emoiovees was used. Grouping the small companies and those of unknown size together it is seen that 40 contracts and grants and $8.7 million or 89% went to large companies, while 13 contracts and grants and $1.1 million or 11% went to small and unknown size companies. SOLAR ENERGY COLLECTOR MANUFACTURERS The Office of Energy Statistics compiled a list of companies that manufactured medium temperature, rigid frame solar energy collectors for sale during calendar year 1974. Of the 39 listed, seven shown in table IV were identifiable as large companies. The other 32 companies listed in table V are either small or of unknown size. *Lists are dated 9/74 and 12/1/74. (Note.--See Appendix VI-D.--Committee editor.) -2 SMALL COMPANY VIEWS OF GOVERNMENT SPONSORED SOLAR ENERGY It appears as though the solar energy collector industry is not dominated by large industry. that simple. Telephone contact with several manufacturers that have not received any NSF or other government contracts or grants Indicate that the small manufacturers are apprehensive that whenever the solar energy field looks lucrative, the large companies will be able to move in and capture the lion's share of the market. Further, the small companies are unhappy that the contracts and grants go to large companies and universities. They feel that extensive paper work and bureaucracy preclude them from trying for and from getting contracts and grants. The comment was made that large companies develop expertise on the research contracts that benefits them two ways. First, in any research report it is impossible to tell everything learned. Full detailed data of experiments just cannot be presented. The organization that does the research has the benefit of having all the data inhouse and of having the technical personnel that have performed the research and personally acquired the knowledge derived from that research. Second, for the data that is published, the research organization has the data several months before general distribution. For contracts related to application of newly developed -3 IV A REQUIREMENT TO MODIFY CONTRACT AND GRANT PROCEDURES It is felt that it would be highly desirable if procedures could be developed to extend contracts and grants to small companies In the solar energy industry. Precisely what these procedures should be and how performance should be monitored can not be suggested at this time. But the small business man in the solar energy industry currently feels that the system and the Federal government are not working for him. |