Oh, this also lets the school function as an emergency shelter in case the power grid fails? How much is THAT worth?
And it provides enough electricuty for 188 homes? That sure screws up somebody's earlier post about how a system like this compares to his home usuage! Only off by a factor of 187! LOL
Do you really believe that a elementary school uses the same amount of electricity in a year that 188 homes do? What purpose do you think it serves to post links to fluff pieces with no real hard data?
Undoubtedly that facility could be provided via conventional means more cheaply, too...
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None I've seen yet says anything at all about the overall $/kwh to the (local) grid. And, using political clout to get net metering at retail as opposed to generation rates is another artificial subsidization as well.
Where's the actual cost data if one wants to try to make an economic argument?
And even before that you have to define what constitutes a cost.
There should be a new symbol created that signifies the price/cost in units other than just dollars. Reducing everything to dollars gives solutions that are only figured in dollars and allows people to weasel around with the 'conversion' rate.
I disagree vehemently. Dollars _is_ the universal, underpinning. It incorporates cost of raw material, labor, legislative mandates, everything required to produce the end product, whatever that may be.
Economical solutions will win in the long run over those that aren't and resources far more rapidly reallocated to those w/ better returns than via edict.
No, I'm asking what the actual $/kwhr are for the installed capacity of the project(s) you're extolling.
Those are all apparently research papers; the first page was virtually all fuel cells for automotive application w/ only what appeared a theoretical analysis for small-scale residential projects in one.
Not useful for the current discussion.
Somebody indicated that the overall power plant project was $6.5M from Federal funding but there was no breakdown of what that entailed nor whether that was the whole thing or only a sub-project to compare to what the alternative choice would have been.
Register this in your mind. A 200KW energy source is incapable of supplying the realtime needs of 188 homes. I don't give a rat's ass who makes that claim, it's simply untrue. Why do you think they put a service capable of 48KW into a typical home today? That's right, if you could do a bit of math, instead of relying on fluff, you'd see that a 200amp service can supply 48KW of power to ONE home. If each house had a mere 1KW load on at the same time, which is actually quite modest, you're close to the maximum capacity of the fuel cell. Turn on the AC and see what happens.
They get that number by assuming the fuel cell runs 24/7, producing a lot of it's power in the middle of night, like 3AM when no one needs it. Who uses NG to produce electric in the dead of night? Answer: only a fool or someone who is enjoying a subsidy that someone else is paying for. In the rest of the world, NG is used to meet PEAK demand, not run 24/7.
Pretty simple. Publish a RFQ for a turn key fuel cell installation that also includes say 15 years of full maintenance. One of the bid conditions is that no subsidies can be used. Step two compute the cost of electricity for the next 15 years.
Not necessarily...there are a number of NG-fired baseload units, too...
The local unit here is 55 MWe (1974) NG-fired steam turbine w/ a 15 MW combined-cycle plant serving the He separation facility and peaking.
In NG-rich areas, they've been the choice for some time and w/ the present paranoia and railing against C, are likely the near-term answer elsewhere as well.
Poor choice, but what ya' gonna' do, given the current situation????
Sunflower Electric has plans and is intending to go forward for a new coal-fired unit, but whether they'll actually manage to get it built is still tbd...
A traditional genset would be dead cost as it has no everyday utility. You build it and then maintain it wheter you use it or not. That is VERY expensive. Any ide how much a genset that makes 1.5 million kwh annually would cost to install and then maintain for 30 years, at which time it would need replacement?
Subtract all of that from the cost of the fuel cell which provides all of that as a "free bonus"
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