The timing couldn't have been better for vendors selling renewable energy products at the Valley Electric Association 2008 energy symposium at the Pahrump Nugget Hotel and Gambling Hall Friday and Saturday.

A package of renewable energy tax credits was just passed as part of the bailout plan approved by Congress and signed into law by President Bush Friday. The legislation provides a 30 percent tax credit for installing a residential solar system and removes a $2,000 cap.

Chris Brooks, director of Bombard Renewable Energy, said a homeowner installing a five-kilowatt, solar, photovoltaic system may invest $47,000, but it will produce 11,000 kilowatt hours per year -- a savings of $1,256 per year in energy costs at Valley Electric rates of 11.42 cents per kilowatt hour.

The system also would qualify for a tax credit of just over $14,000 instead of being capped at $2,000, he said.

"It's a very big deal for the solar industry and it's for eight years. So this is the first long-term bill that's ever been passed. Every year it's been year by year," said Dennis Vehe, owner of American Wind and Solar, a Pahrump company.

"Now the solar industry should be able to gear up for production, and the cost of those units should be coming down," Vehe said.

John Gurr, vice-president of sales for SunTrek, a Las Vegas company, displayed three four-by-10-foot solar panels to put on the roof of a home that can power a hot water heater. Gurr said the panels heat glycol, not water, which is similar to antifreeze. The $6,000 cost is offset by the savings of 15 to 18 percent of the annual electric bill, he said.

Across the room, Susan Zink and Norma O'Connor, representing E-Z Wind and Solar, were promoting a wind turbine installed for $16,500. The new legislation allows a $4,000 tax credit.

"This is wonderful. this is what we need. We're all so elated," Zink said of the new tax credit.

Zink also applauded a new Valley Electric Association policy on net metering implemented in June, which allows generators of renewable energy to sell any excess power back to VEA at the same cost.

VEA Ambassador David Sweetman, who powers 10 buildings on his 17 acre ranch in Fish Lake Valley with solar power, said in the third quarter of 2008 his solar thermal panels which power his hot water heater, therapy pool and other appliances, generated 14,744 kilowatt hours. His photovoltaic solar panels generated 5,484 kilowatt hours and his wind turbines 442 kwh.

But he didn't have many interested spectators at his booth.

"They're interested in what they're going to do rather than what somebody has already done," Sweetman said.

Some exhibitors promoted conservation devices rather than green energy.

Howie Fried, owner of H and M Pipe and Supply, had a more efficient, insulated hot-water heater on display.

On a larger scale, Brooks referred to the 14.2-megawatt solar array recently installed at Nellis Air Force Base.

"Annual energy from that system is the same as the energy from 76,000 barrels of oil a year and what that costs. It's the same as the equivalent, from a carbon offset standpoint, of planting 127,000 mature trees a year," he said.

While Valley Electric Association isn't bound by a state regulation to produce 20 percent of its power from renewable sources by 2015, Brooks said the cooperative could use the opportunity from that directive to buy and sell energy to neighboring utilities from proposed solar power projects.

"I think it will be expanded. I think it will mean a lot of work for a lot of people in Nye County based on the building here, maybe using Valley Electric transmission," Brooks said.

Southern Nevada averages 10 to 14 peak sun hours per day, he said, among the highest in the country.

"I don't think too many people would have come out on a beautiful Saturday like today, thinking the cost of energy was going to go down," Brooks told the audience at one of the workshops. "You're talking about a significant investment. I know, and am sure you are going to have a lower energy cost over 20 years if you build a renewable energy system."