solar panel

[David Nebenzahl]

On 10/21/2010 7:04 PM [e-mail] spake thus:

Some of it. Don't know exactly how much.

Myself, I don't mind paying it. I consider it money well spent.

[aemeijers]

People that grow flowers and such have been using solar power for hundreds of years. They are called greenhouses. They open and close vents and shades to fine-tune the temp as needed. A lot of the same principles can be applied to residences and commercial spaces, thereby reducing the electric/gas/oil they need to get by.

[Kurt Ullman]

Which, of course, is not generating electricity which is what the solar energy scam.. er... industry is being built on. Alternative energy GENERATION sources have to be in place by mandate, without regard to there actual usefulness (or heck in some cases without regard to the physics.) This is a whole different ball of wax that actually works. I use many of these at my house (I also have strategically planted trees). But these are also things that are really only gonna help at the margins.

[HeyBub]

Agreed. But greenhouses and the like don't scale to the city level.

[yetanothermickey]

False and intellectually dishonest argument based on a bogus premise.

[gfretwell]

There is a big solar push in New Jersey right now. One of my inspector friends has posted pictures of a couple of big projects going on in his city, at tax payer expense. Germany is also doing a lot of this and the cost per KWH is working out to be about .55 Euro. That works out to be a .44 Euro green tax per KWH on all the energy they create this way. Imagine quadrupling your electric bill for the same usage and you get an idea of the wonders of solar power. That is more than it costs to rent, buy fuel and run a 36 KVA diesel generator next to your house.

[yetanothermickey]

So, you prefer to keep funding worldwide terrorists? My feeling is that the cost of reducing oil usage is worth pretty much whatever we pay. Wars aren't cheap, and they really aren't effective for this problem, either. Solar power, even with what it costs right now, is a very cost effective measure to help defund terrorists by needing less of their oil.

[gfretwell]

That is a red herring. We import most of our oil from Canada and Mexico. Electricity doesn't really come from oil anyway. It comes from coal and natural gas, both that we have plenty of.

Even the idea that we are at war over oil is a lie too. The arabs would be very happy to swell us all the oil we want no matter what our middle east policy was.

[HeyBub]

I can be persuaded otherwise - just gimme the facts (I know maths is hard, but try).

[yetanothermickey]

Your problem is not math. Your problem is how you dishonestly approach the entirety of the issue.

Please explain why you insist that solar photo voltaics must provide all of our electricity in order to be a viable supplier of some of our electricity.

[HeyBub]

I d "My argument is it is impossible to run this [entire] country/state/city off of sunbeams."

For those applications where it is possible to run some piddly thing off of sunbeams, most of the time so doing is roughly equivalent to using mahogany to toast marshmallows.

[yetanothermickey]

There. You just said it again.

[gfretwell]

As well he should ... unless it doesn't get dark where you live.

[yetanothermickey]

Don't you have batteries where you live?

And why the thick-headed insistence that in order to be useful, solar power would have to supply all power used, day and night?

[aemeijers]

You ain't listening, Bub. Not all applications require electricity. Just as a trivial example, a coil of black pipe on a garage roof makes a dandy pool or house water pre-heater, so the regular water heater doesn't have to work so hard. Yes, you do have to remember to take it out of the circuit and drain it when winter comes, but that can be as simple as turning a couple of valves if you do it right. Very popular up here in frozen north, to extend pool season a couple of weeks. No, solar will never replace all other energy sources, especially those that require the very convenient but luxurious form of energy known as electricity. But there is low hanging fruit out there, for people who will open their eyes.

[gfretwell]

Yeah I do, they are very expensive, a toxic waste site when you need to get rid of them and a way to make a marginal idea like solar PV ridiculous. That is why all of the systems the government will help you pay for are grid tie.

Unfortunately all you can possibly save is the fuel charges since we still need all of that generating infrastructure at night or even on a cloudy day. If any significant number of people start using solar energy, they will still find a way to bill you for that infrastructure. It is really about half of your electric bill.

[HeyBub]

Your trivial example is, indeed, trivial. Millions of trivials add up to (let me think, mumble-mumble, carry-the-three) ah, here it is... trivial.

I agree there are applications that nibble at the margins. But thinking in terms of solar water heaters and walkway lighting and kitchen sunlights is extremely parochial. Just ONE Aluminum foundry on the edge of a town of

50,000 homes uses more electricity than the rest of the town! Even if no one in the town had solar water heating!

[The Daring Dufas]

I'm thinking a big problem is a "green" storage solution for storing the solar power. There are solar energy plants that store the power in a heat bank where the heat is used to vaporize a working fluid to run turbine generators. I remember reading something about a system that had combination solar energy collectors that utilized solar cells and heated oil as a working fluid to store heat energy. Perhaps solar energy could be used to pump water into a reservoir where it could be used to run turbines when the sun isn't shining. The problem is, how do you capture and hold on to a sunbeam for later consumption? 8-)

TDD

[Herb Eneva]

Just remember---The country that has most of the oil also has most of the sunshine.

[The Daring Dufas]

Canada? 8-)

TDD