Postcard perfect now, June preview weekend

Today should be national "give your favorite weatherman a hug" day.

Chamber of commerce, picture perfect, jaw droppingly gorgeous weather continues this week. No need for your weather radio or hopelessly flawed weather app today. High pressure means bright blue skies of spring continue. Cool mornings. Mild afternoons. All is right with the world in Minnesota. Baseball weather.

True spring

For once we enjoy a true spring in Minnesota this year. This is how they draw it up. Too often the spring season in these parts is like a wild ride on Minnesota's weather Midway. Sunshine and 80s one day. Severe storms the next. Snow. Repeat.

Not this year.

Temperatures are running a good 2 to 3 degrees warmer than average in Minnesota so far in March and April. We finally get the spring we all visualize.

Seasonably mild high pressure drifts overhead with two more fine days today and tomorrow. A weak passing front triggers a few spotty showers Friday morning.

June preview weekend

Southerly winds and sunshine boost temps to mid-June levels this weekend. Temps may push 80 in the metro and southern Minnesota this weekend. An approaching system triggers growing chances for showers and thunderstorms by Sunday.

Here's another look at the approaching front. Spotty thunderstorms can't be ruled out this weekend, but the most likely timing for storms with meaningful rainfall appears to be Sunday night.

Wetter pattern ahead?

The maps look more like June by early next week. Waves of low pressure pump increasingly humid air north.

Dew point babble returns by Sunday afternoon as dew points climb toward the sticky 60 degree mark. Storms are more likely early and late next week. The early read on the maps is some could pack (welcome) heavy downpours. Severe weather could become a possibility by next week.

Here's a look at animated rainfall output from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Global Forecast System model for the next week. Heaviest rains appear to favor Iowa and points south of Minnesota.

Age old weather wisdom says when in a drought don't predict rain. But the maps continue to scream "wetter pattern" in the next two weeks.

Here's a look at the 16-day GFS rainfall output. Again, we look for trends in longer range data; not so much day to day specifics.

Signal from the noise.

Solar revolution in progress?

Some trends sneak up on you. Take the evolution of solar power. Not just a futuristic concept anymore, solar is changing the way utility companies do business, and impacting revenues.

Climate Central has an eye opening look at how the evolution in solar technology is making solar power cost competitive with traditional energy sources.

Inside a sprawling single-story office building in Bedford, Mass., in a secret room known as the Growth Hall, the future of solar power is cooking at more than 2,500 °F. Behind closed doors and downturned blinds, custom-built ovens with ambitious names like “Fearless” and “Intrepid” are helping to perfect a new technique of making silicon wafers, the workhorse of today’s solar panels. If all goes well, the new method could cut the cost of solar power by more than 20 percent in the next few years.

“This humble wafer will allow solar to be as cheap as coal and will drastically change the way we consume energy,” says Frank van Mierlo, CEO of 1366 Technologies, the company behind the new method of wafer fabrication.

Secret rooms or not, these are exciting times in the world of renewable energy. Thanks to technological advances and a ramp-up in production over the decade, grid parity — the point at which sources of renewable energy such as solar and wind cost the same as electricity derived from burning fossil fuels — is quickly approaching. In some cases it has already been achieved, and additional innovations waiting in the wings hold huge promise for driving costs even lower, ushering in an entirely new era for renewables.

Solar Surprise

In January 2015, Saudi Arabian company ACWA Power surprised industry analysts when it won a bid to build a 200-megawatt solar power plant in Dubai that will be able to produce electricity for 6 cents per kilowatt-hour. The price was less than the cost of electricity from natural gas or coal power plants, a first for a solar installation. Electricity from new natural gas and coal plants would cost an estimated 6.4 cents and 9.6 cents per kilowatt-hour, respectively, according to the U.S. Energy Information Agency.

Technological advances, including photovoltaics that can convert higher percentages of sunlight into energy, have made solar panels more efficient. At the same time economies of scale have driven down their costs.

For much of the early 2000s, the price of a solar panel or module hovered around $4 per watt. At the time Martin Green, one of the world’s leading photovoltaic researchers, calculated the cost of every component, including the polycrystalline silicon ingots used in making silicon wafers, the protective glass on the outside of the module, and the silver used in the module’s wiring. Green famously declared that so long as we rely on crystalline silicon for solar power, the price would likely never drop below $1/watt.