Bloomberg New Energy Finance this week is having its annual conference in New York. Among the tidbits making their way through the Interwebs, I found the following particularly interesting:

(1) Michael Liebreich, chairman of the research group, noted in a talk that he expects the cost of developing a solar power project to drop by half in the next decade, worldwide. New Energy Finance numbers suggest the cost of large solar photovoltaic (PV) projects to decline to from  around $3.00 per watt today to $1.45 per watt in 2020.

A reduction of that magnitude would make solar energy more competitive with fossil fuels. Note, however, that the cost of large-scale solar has always been — and will likely remain — lower than the costs associated with residential solar energy installations.

(2) Meanwhile, New Energy Finance analyst Chris Gadomski expects that plans to build more nuclear reactors in the U.S. will go forward, despite calls to scale back nuclear’s role in our energy mix.

“We’ll see a reassessment and reevaluation and then stay the course,” Gadomski said today at a conference in New York today. Plans to build the five reactors are already underway, he said, and “We don’t see that changing.”

You can follow the conference chatter on Twitter: #BNEF2011