Solar cheaper than nuclear
in [Design]
|
From: Nobody on 11 Aug 2010 21:30 On Wed, 11 Aug 2010 23:47:41 +1000, Sylvia Else wrote: > Your ultimate > backstop is presumably a fossil fueled generator, even if you hope not > to use it much. That should really be "hydrocarbon-fueled generator". Diesel engines will run on vegetable oil. Steam boilers will run on just about anything that burns (during the BSE crisis in the UK, there were serious plans for fuelling power stations with dead cows; the main obstacle was "PR" rather than anything technical). But I'd agree with the larger point, that solar + wind + wave + tidal still isn't going to be suitable to satisfy 100% of demand. Tidal is the only one which is predictable, and that's still intermittent (unless you're going to run terawatt cables half way around the world). But then neither is nuclear power. Nuclear is suited to constant load; although you can reduce generation when demand drops, you're really just wasting the capacity. If France increases its nuclear capacity any further, it's going to have trouble finding anyone to take the excess power off its hands at night. And there really aren't any storage technologies that are practical at large scale. Pumped hydro is useful for dealing with short spikes (e.g. when a popular TV program finishes and a million kettles get switched on at once), but not at the scale of storing a night's worth of electrity to use during the next day.
From: Rich Grise on 11 Aug 2010 20:37 On Sat, 07 Aug 2010 23:02:59 +0100, Dirk Bruere at NeoPax wrote: > On 07/08/2010 22:35, John Doe wrote: >> John Larkin<jjlarkin(a)highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote: >>> >>> The difference is that the US government subsidizes solar and >>> punishes nuclear. Nukes work fine in Japan and France. They >>> especially work fine at night. > > Of course, nuclear has never received subsidies... > >> The French have more courage than we do. Ack! >> >> And then there is the amount of surface area required to produce >> the same amount of power, it is unrealistic. The idea of windmills >> and solar panels as a primary source of power is sold to na�ve >> people. > > Lots of desert and windmills do not make farmland unusable. To supply the energy needs of the US, you'd need solar and wind arrays covering real estate about the size of Spain. Thanks, Rich
From: Richard the Dreaded Libertarian on 11 Aug 2010 20:39 On Sun, 08 Aug 2010 01:06:22 +0100, Dirk Bruere at NeoPax wrote: >> > OTOH sunlight is free and deserts aren't actually doing much at present. And the investment in the manufacture and installation gets paid back in what, maybe 100 years, if ever? Anything that's viable doesn't need subsidies. The nuclear energy industry would be burgeoning if the paranoid bureaucrats hadn't shackled them. Thanks, Rich
From: John Larkin on 11 Aug 2010 22:38 On Wed, 11 Aug 2010 16:18:49 -0700 (PDT), Bill Sloman <bill.sloman(a)ieee.org> wrote: >On Aug 12, 12:38�am, Jim Yanik <jya...(a)abuse.gov> wrote: >> Koning Betweter <Kon...(a)Stumper.nl> wrote in news:2010081115332791513- >> Koning(a)Stumpernl: >> >> >> >> > On 2010-08-10 15:15:53 +0200, Sylvia Else said: >> >> >> On 10/08/2010 9:59 AM, Koning Betweter wrote: >> >>> solar systems make consumers independent when they generate >> >>> their own energy. >> >> >> Let's see them disconnect themselves from the grid, and then we'll see >> >> how independent they are. >> >> >> Sylvia. >> >> > The grid in my country is getting more expensive by time. Every year I >> > have used the same amound of energy, but the prices is about � 100,00 >> > more. >> > With an of-grid installation, it's only a matter of time to be cheaper >> > as the energycompany. >> >> > It doesn't matter how you generate your energy, it's just cheaper to >> > use the energy around us like sun, wind or water. >> >> evidently NOT,because few people are doing it. >> Particularly with their own money. >> >> > You just need the space to build your plant and the money to invest. >> >> > If you're living in a big building with many other families, you >> > probably have no chance to generate your own energy, except methangas. >> >> form a co-op. >> If its so beneficial,then everyone in the building would join. > >Human nature doesn't work that way. > >> BTW,trying to generate practical,useful quantities of methane gas in a >> residential building might be a hazard to other occupants.(explosions) >> It might even be a nuisance.(odors) > >It is difficult to get methane to burn, let alone explode. Methane >itself is odourless, but some of the waste that can be fermented to >produce methane is smelly. Any system that collected methane safely >isn't going to let the malodourous contaminants leak out. We must have a different definition of "methane". Around here, it's CH4, and it lights easily, burns fiercely, and explodes at air concentrations between 5 and 17 per cent. We cook and heat with the stuff. I've never found it "difficult" to light. http://www.landfill-gas.com/html/landfill_gas_explosions.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_London_School_explosion A consequence of the explosive properties of methane: "The use of the title "engineer" in Texas remains legally restricted to those who have been professionally certified by the state to practice engineering" I recall a couple of residential natural gas explosions in San Francisco since I've moved here. John
From: Sylvia Else on 12 Aug 2010 01:51
On 12/08/2010 6:44 AM, untergangsprophet wrote: > On 11 Aug., 14:33, "keith...(a)gmail.com"<keith...(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> Are you suggesting that solar panel factories are really in the dummy >> manufacturing business? Hmm, I think you're onto something here. > > In Spain some were running diesel-generators 24/7 to generate "more" > solar power and cash the government funding. > And maybe neighbours are exchanging grid power turning it into solar > power. Or possibly not. Turns out there were some issues with monitoring equipment clock settings being wrong. I mean, if you wanted to commit solar energy fraud, you'd surely go to some lengths to prevent it from being obvious, and purporting to generate solar power at night is a bit of a giveaway. That said, there's obvious scope for fraud, and if one of your solar panels dies, and you know what you're doing, there are cheaper ways of restoring your feed-in tarrif payments than actually replacing the panel, while maintaining a pattern of generation that looks genuine. The whole subsidisation of solar power, including feed-in tarrifs, is a flawed policy. Sylvia. |