From the end of World War II through the 1960s solar enthusiasts sought to shape public understanding of solar technology and to influence government policy toward it. During this period solar advocacy began to mature, with the establishment of research programs, professional and advocacy associations, technical journals, popular writings, and conferences. Within this growing group of advocates, consisting mostly of scientists and engineers, a core of experts emerged on whom the government could and did call for advice about solar issues. However, debates within this core about the potential for solar energy made it difficult for advocates to depict it as a technology that government policy makers should take seriously, especially given the framing of the broader energy debate.

SOLAR TECHNOLOGY: STATE OF THE ART AFTER THE WAR

Even before World War II some solar technologies enjoyed experimental or even commercial use. For example, by October 1939, Palmer Putnam, a consulting engineer and a central figure in solar energy circles, persuaded a Vermont electric utility and a turbine manufacturer to test his design for a large wind turbine that would feed electricity directly into the utility's grid. By October 19, 1941, they had finished a large, 1.25-megawatt wind turbine with 175-foot-diameter blades, sited on the top of Grandpa's Knob, a treeless mountain near Rutland, Vermont, and began generating electricity. The machine ran well for two years, until a bearing wore out that took two years to replace due to war-time shortages of such parts.