A new generation of environmentally-friendly solar power products seek to blend into your life instead of announcing themselves in the form of giant black panels.

• Companies that make photovoltaic cells are beginning to manufacture solar power equipment that’s meant to be incorporated into buildings, instead of installed on and around existing structures.
• These new products, often in the shape and style of existing roof tiles or shingles, are expected to be popular among the burgeoning green building industry. (Depending, of course, on how much and how quickly the economy begins to recover.)
• Though this kind of built-in solar power is very new to the U.S., government subsidies throughout Europe have made it an increasingly popular choice there.

Facts & Figures

• In California, a typical homeowner would pay approximately $20,000 to have her home outfitted with enough photovoltaic cells to generate half of her home’s power needs.
• Built-in solar products cost 10-20% more to install than conventional solar power products.
• In Europe, government incentives mean an investment in “building-integrated photovoltaics” pays for itself in five to seven years.

“The new materials are part of the building itself, not an addition, and they are taking photovoltaics to the next level — an aesthetic one.” – Alfonso Velosa III, Research Director at Gartner and Co-Author of a Report on the Market for Building-Integrated Photovoltaics