GC: n

CT: The USA Study also reports that:
For the first time solar power is beginning to reach cost parity with conventional energy sources. As solar prices decline and the capital and fuel costs for coal, natural gas, and nuclear plants rise, the U.S. will reach a crossover point by around 2015.
Installed solar PV prices are projected to decline from an average $5.50-$7.00 peak watt (15-32 cents kWh) today to $3.02-$3.82 peak watt (8-18 cents kWh) in 2015 to $1.43-$1.82 peak watt (4-8 cents kWh) by 2025
Solar power offers a number of advantages over conventional energy sources. Among them, the ability to deliver energy at or near the point of use, zero fuel costs, minimal maintenance requirements and zero carbon-based source emissions.
The investment to arrive at 10% solar in the U.S. is not small, reaching $450 billion to $560 billion between now and 2025, an average of $26 billion to $33 billion per year. However, given utilities’ existing capital costs such an investment is not prohibitive. To put the investment in perspective: Utilities spent an estimated $70 billion on new power plants and transmission and distribution systems in 2007 alone.

S: CE – http://cleanedge.com/reports/Utility-Solar-Assessment-USA-Study (last access: 9 December 2014)

N: 1. peak (n): “pointed top,” 1520s, variant of pike (n.4) “sharp point.” Meaning “top of a mountain” first recorded 1630s, though pike was used in this sense c.1400. Figurative sense is 1784. Meaning “point formed by hair on the forehead” is from 1833. According to OED, The Peak in Derbyshire is older than the word for “mountaintop;” compare Old English Peaclond, for the district, Pecsaetan, for the people who settled there, Peaces ærs for Peak Cavern; sometimes said to be a reference to an elf-denizen Peac “Puck.”
watt (n): unit of electrical power, 1882, in honor of James Watt (1736-1819), Scottish engineer and inventor. The surname is from an old pet form of Walter and also is in Watson.
2. The peak watt is defined as the maximum electrical power produced under a set of standard reference conditions defined by a reference total and spectral irradiance and reference temperature.

S: 1. OED – http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=peak&searchmode=none; http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=watt&searchmode=none (last access: 9 December 2014). 2. NREL – http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy06osti/38936.pdf (last access: 9 December 2014).

SYN:
S:

CR: photovoltaic cell, photovoltaic module, solar cell, solar energy, volt , watt , weber .