ABSTRACT
The multi-fold increase in the energy requirements of the global economy has made it a necessity to search for innovative sources of energy. There has been introduction of various new renewable sources of energy but the technological and fmancial viability are still in the infant stage. Market failures combined with unpropitious institutional, fmancial, and regulatory environments mandate government intervention to establish renewable sources of energy. Commercialization is a planned way by which technologies and innovations developed through research make their way to market. The commercialization of renewable energy consists the positioning of three generations of renewable energy technologies. The first-generation technologies involve hydroelectricity, biomass, geothermal power, and heat which have reached their maturity and are economically competitive. Second-generation technologies include photovoltaics, solar heating, wind power, modem forms of bioenergy and solar thermal power stations. These technologies have entered into the market almost a decade ago. Third-generation technologies are at infant stage and need continuous R&D efforts to mark its presence on global scale. These technologies mainly consist of ocean energy, advanced biomass gasification and hot-dry-rock-geothermal power energy. This chapter includes the recent developments 274in various sources of renewable energy like solar photovoltaic cells, solar heating system, solar distillation, biomass, biomedical waste, tidal energy, geothermal energy, wind energy, hydroelectricity, their commercialization and their impacts on customers, costing, environment, etc.
