Israel is geopolitically isolated

from the Arab oil nations, so it’s something of a surprise that the country’s solar power industry has

lagged behind foreign countries. And a new government dispute threatens

to further impede Israel’s development of alternative energy.

New deregulation was originally

intended to ease tech development. The country’s Public Utilities Authority (PUA)

abolished a requirement that developers of high-voltage solar

installations first do overseas project in order to obtain licensing.

But local firm SBY Solutions,

which is currently reportedly working on solar projects in Eastern

Europe, is threatening

to sue the Israeli government as a result.

The one thing a foreigner

realizes when visiting Israel is that the weather is relentlessly

sunny (and, in Tel Aviv at least, staggeringly humid). Due to the

high price of electricity and gas, Israel has taken advantage of the

climate to place small

solar water heaters on top of homes and apartment buildings that

account for more than 3% of the country’s energy demands. But

compared to Europe and North America, large-scale corporate

development of solar is still in its infancy. Much of this is due to

bureaucracy that has stagnated the oil-poor but sunshine-rich

country’s solar industry.

According to Karin Kloosterman of the

Israel-based Middle East environment blog Green

Prophet, “solar for Israel is a survival tactic” with roots

in the country’s relative isolation from the Arab oil giants. Owing

to fears over Israel’s geopolitical situation with Iran, large-scale

solar power development in the country has stepped up in the past

five years.

Kloosterman notes that the Israeli

large-scale solar industry has had trouble. “Consumers don’t have

the confidence to buy into the idea. I’ve read reports that the

Israeli government is trying to back pedal on their commitments and

I’m not surprised. Bureaucracy in Israel is a nightmare.“

Haaretz’s Avi Bar-Eli alleges

that SBY claims they signed a large-scale

power deal with Germany’s Colexon Energy specifically in order to

have an experienced foreign partner. The requirement was extremely

unpopular among local businesspeople. As with so many other

bureaucracies in other countries, regulatory incoherence at the PUA

is hurting small Israeli firms: Solar power vendors operating in

Israel still need foreign partners for most bank loans and the PUA

still requires opinions from “international consultants” for much

of the product development process.