As part of the Energy Department's SunShot Initiative, which
is working to make solar energy competitive with other forms of energy without
subsidy by the end of the decade, the Energy Department today announced the
start of a new competition to make it faster, easier, and cheaper to install
rooftop solar energy systems. The SunShot Prize makes a total of $10 million in
cash awards available to the first three teams that repeatedly demonstrate that
non-hardware costs, or price to plug in, can be as low as $1 per watt (W) for
small-scale photovoltaic (PV) systems on American homes and businesses.