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179 Comments
- prisoner24601, on 10/12/2007, -5/+91What's amazing to me is how people always come out of the woodworks to say "it would cost a bazillion dollars to build that many panels" when they are just basing that "estimate" (to use the term charitably) on *current* panel costs.
That's like a pundit in 1908 saying "horseless carriages are so exceedingly expensive today it is plainly obvious that Mr. Ford's proposal that the common man would ever have one is preposterous!"
It's called "economy of scale" guys... - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -13/+83"ahem *Mr. Gates*"
what the ***** are you talking about? because he's the richest man on paper, he has the obligation to fund everything?
oh, and by the way, he's giving the majority of his fortune away upon his death. financially, he'll have donated more than anyone else in the history of humankind. but that's apparently not enough for you. - Blah_Blah_Blah, on 10/12/2007, -10/+73the fact that we AREN'T doing things like this or at least researching ways to get this to work really upsets me =[
- Gargot, on 10/12/2007, -8/+57Better than coal plants!
- muubam, on 10/12/2007, -2/+32If they made it a standard to install solar panel roof tiles on all new houses built in europe, north america etc. the overall effect of solar would be dramatic.
Especially here in the UK where there is a huge demand for new houses.
These are what I'm talking about: http://www.atlantisenergy.org/sunslates2.html
Of course, it would take a long time before it became financially viable... - digdigger, on 10/12/2007, -1/+29We don't really have to have it all concentrated in just a few dots.
- doctechnical, on 10/12/2007, -4/+30The sattelite idea is neither insane nor particularly novel. A major advantage is that you're by-passing the loss of energy due to weather and atmosphere. You don't need a long cable, you beam the energy back to huge dishes on the groun as RF.
The concept has been kicked around in SciFi for quite a while. - geometry, on 10/12/2007, -0/+24As I understand it the downfall to solar and wind power is the lack of good batteries to store the power. Current electrical systems are constantly creating power, there is no real storage tank for the electricity, it's generated as it's demanded. This is not possible with solar power, when the sun goes down the power goes off. Yes the solar panels could create enough power throughout the day to handle total consumption but currently there is no viable solution to store that energy.
Please somebody correct me if I'm wrong. I understand things can't continue for long how they are now, we need a viable solution. - geminitojanus, on 10/12/2007, -2/+24"@Prisoner24601"
Sure, batteries out there could store the power, but we're all overlooking the best natural battery source we have on the planet: Gravity. Build a water system with plenty of water towers, and all you need to do is pump water into them during the day, and let the water drain out through a generator during the night. The panels would keep a constant current stream and the water facilities would curb the spikes, just as capacitors do in a smaller scale. - merreborn, on 10/12/2007, -18/+39If you do the math, it comes out to several quadrillion dollars to build this array of solar collectors. Don't forget, there isn't enough production capacity in the world to do this currently, and silicon is already in short supply at current demand. Oh, and, if you localize them, as the map suggests, you have huge transmission losses to deal with.
Reality is a bitch. - Harabeck, on 10/12/2007, -4/+24Hey guys, here's a thought, maybe, just maybe, the only reason they were localized on that map was to give a good visulization. Hmm, ya think maybe that could be it?? In fact, if you read the first the comment in the article, there is an editor's note that says just that. Doh!
- poornbroken, on 10/12/2007, -6/+23there is the issue of distribution.
- Witchboy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+13I was just in Australia (Perth) and almost every other house (or so) in this one suburb had a solar panel unit on the roof. It was cool to see.
I'm looking into it for my new place in Austin.
Economies of scale will help drastically. Also, there's a similar effect in terms of efficiency: The more we use solar, the more it will drive the improvement of solar.
Regardless of your politics, why wouldn't you want to use solar? Clean and endless. Also, it would stimulate a ton of business. - prisoner24601, on 10/12/2007, -2/+14@ geometry
"there is no real storage tank for the electricity"
Everybody is used to thinking "batteries are pathetic today" because all of us want our laptops to run for 20 hours and they don't. There's an incredible amount of tech news all the time repeating the mantra "batteries aren't good enough" right? But don't let the limitations on *light and portable* battery technology confuse the issue that there are actually very good (but heavy and not portable) batteries out there that work perfectly well (and have long lifespans and are easily recyclable and can be manufactured in an environmentally responsible way) for a fixed home installation. - Sturmur, on 10/12/2007, -2/+14that is a quite the plot of land, seeing as that is a world map.
- prisoner24601, on 10/12/2007, -5/+17@ Revan01
"Not all products are viable on Economies of Scale, who knows if solar panels are"
The dramatic drop in panel costs in the last 20 years at a *bare minimum* makes it unmistakably clear that we are no where *near* to the bottom production cost. And ever if we were (which again, we absolutely are not) the cost of panels produced *today* is already well under the "breakeven" point anyway, assuming a very modest 20 or 30 year lifespan for panels coming off the line right now. Even in only moderately sunny climates, the panels *do* more than pay for themselves as it is.
Our lack of adoption is just a sad reflection of a common American "I'll just finance it" mentality. - twinklyJesus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10This is inaccurate. The article states that the disks represent the ideal locations, not the amount of land needed. It is just locating areas with in the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn with the most days of sunshine. (logical locations, anyway) This is really one of those BFO blogs (Blinding Flash of the Obvious) You know, "thanks, but I kinda figured that..." type of blurbs.
@lane:
"now if only some rich multi billionaire would come along and and spend his money so that we could merely have to afford the maintain the array. ahem *Mr. Gates*"
In other words "Daddy, buy me this...."
Why does someone who is rich have to buy our toys for us? If it was practical, truly, we wouldn't need to pick some billionaire's pocket to pay for it. It's really easy to demand something be put into place as a solution, when you don't think you have to pay for it. Find an affordable solution YOU can pay for, and make it happen. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -7/+17And how do you get that energy to where it needs to go? And what about redundancy? And at night?
What if one of the solar sites has to shut down?
It's a great idea, sure. But there are just too many problems for them to overcome.
Personally, I'm backing Nuclear. - turpenine, on 10/12/2007, -1/+11well you don't really put them all in one big splotch, that would be a dumbass move.
here, lets put out critical applications all in one spot, so if we ever get in a war we are so ***** major. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -4/+14http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/6804/arizonaqg6.jpg
the guy who said "omg arizona" isn't kidding so quit digging him down
It'll probably work if you distribute it around the country & all, but that's still a lot of land. - hobgobbler, on 10/12/2007, -8/+17@Splizxer,
I have an uncle at NASA who sent me some information about how they're trying to do something like that, but using many different satellites and instead of a big cable they're working on ways to wirelessly beam the energy to where ever it's needed.
His opinion was Big Oil in the White House is holding things up, and once they're gone things might start happening. - mrmcphee, on 10/12/2007, -1/+10Misconception: Solar panels take more energy to create than they generate in their lifetime.
Reality: This is no longer true. This MAY be true for high efficiency panels that use GeAs or monocrystalline silicon cells in the short run, but eventually pay for themselves in about a decade. Other slighly lower efficiency cells (we're talking difference of 20% for high to 8-15% for low efficiency) cost much less, even in terms proportional to the drop in efficiency. This calculation uses 8% efficiency which is on the low end of efficiency for which panels will be dirt cheap in the near future. High efficiency panels that use GeAs that aren't very cost effective are mainly used for solar concept cars (which are being bypassed in terms of viability by Hydrogen Fuel Cells) which need large amounts of readily available electricity hence the need for highly efficient cells. - wonderchemist, on 10/12/2007, -6/+15How much of that paradise is already paved with parking lots?
- CapeKid, on 10/12/2007, -6/+14Treehugger.com is the place to go when you want unbiased research. :-/
- mweels, on 10/12/2007, -5/+13
Lyph4 : there are lots of benefits of Nucleur as far as scale. But what do we do with the waste? - mrmcphee, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8@Prisoner24601
Also, other forms of "batteries" can be used other than Lead based that are popularly used. Fuel Cells are forseen as being the major way of storing day time or excess power for night time use. - pjhurst, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7As has been already pointed out on the original website and here, the "dots" were shown to illustrate the relative amount of land necessary to power the entire world using solar panels given the worlds current energy usage. It would be silly to put a bunch of panels in just one place for many reasons I don't care to go into. Clearly it would take up much less additional land mass than the picture shows, because many of the panels would be put on existing and future buildings, and because the efficiency of solar paneling has been increasing every year. This is a technology that has already been embraced by many people and businesses around the world. This evidence alone is enough to convince me that all of the arguments against the viability of solar power must be flawed. That is except for the possible environmental impact and the potential shortage of raw materials.
Personally I think solar panels, geothermal plants, wind farms, and hydroelectric plants can all be used in varying degrees, depending on the energy needs of what needs the power and the resources of who needs the power. The only way I can see solar panels not being used as a clean source of energy, is if it is shown that it would cause a dire environmental impact. The shortage of materials means it can only play a part in our energy needs, but shouldn't be entirely discounted. - holyskeleton, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7why does it have to be on land?
- Masterbaiter, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7direct link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Solar_land_area.png - muubam, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9Well, the higher the demand, the lower the price gets. 20 years ago, look how much silicon chips cost. Now you can get a gigabyte worth of flash memory for next to nothing.
Imagine how the world could change if the proportional cost of solar panels dropped just like pc chips have. I know it's not exactly a great comparrison, but the general rule still applies. - bpmox, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9Everyone talking about batteries... why can't solar panels be used to supplement just our daylight energy use? Ditch coal for solar and use nuclear power at night... I don't see why that wouldn't be feasible.
I've never heard of something like this before, but it seems to me like there ought to be a way to exploit parking lots and roads as thermal energy collectors. We already have them and will be making more of them, and they get hot as hell in the sun. You wouldn't be able to use it all the time, but we've already built them and it wouldn't take up any more space. How much of the back halves of Wal-Mart parking lots sit vacant in the sun each day every day? - mweels, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6ttupernine: Yeah, lets not make the same mistake with Oil.
TheGuruStud : What is this? Do you have a link or more information? - geminitojanus, on 10/12/2007, -7/+13"It's called "economy of scale" guys..."
Here's the problem. If we were to suspend all electronic chip production, and funnel 100% of polysilicon made into making solar panels, it would still take 20-30 years to make enough panels to fill that area. So, economy of scales works, until you hit a supply problem. Polysilicon is already in super-high demand, every chip company on the planet has staked out their share, and getting more of it is difficult.
Next plan: thin films. Thin films use a different technology altogether, but they require dopants, which are also shared with the Semi's industry, though there are far more of the dopants available. The biggest problem is, if you were to scale up production, these supplies would also dwindle pretty quickly and we'd be once again, at a supply standstill.
The best compromise possible would be country's producing polysilicon demanding that a certain amount of it goes to the production of solar panels, but companies like Intel, AMD, NEC, Chartered, IBM, TSMC, UMC, etc would have a fit if they realized they had to give up polysilicon. And the second best we can do is continue thin-film panel research. - timetoboogie, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6this is blog spam: Here is the full article:
http://www.ez2c.de/ml/solar_land_area/ - geminitojanus, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7"And you'll still need oil and natural gas as feedstocks for chemical industries."
Burning oil for generating electricity: bad for the environment. Pumping oil into making plastics, semiconductors: environmentally neutral. Throwing said semiconductors into the garbage? Bad for the environment. Putting said semis on a pedestal, pointed at the sun? Environmentally neutral for the most part (oh noes, we stop some of the light from hitting the ground, the poor germs and ants). - wonderchemist, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7The shortage is in REFINING facilities not raw materials.
- tamurlane6, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7I bet human farms like the ones found in the matrix would take up much less space.
- geminitojanus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5"I believe many PV panels are made out of silicon which is one of the most comment elements on the planet."
They're made from Polysilicon, a crystaline form of silicon which is not /too/ difficult to manufacture, but there are limited places in the world doing said manufacturing. [The main problem is getting the right purity sand, and the cleanliness necessary]. Right now, the companies that are doing p-S production are already at max output; everyone needs it because everyone's in a chip making frenzy. There's not a lot of excess supply to be had. In 2008, a few more processing plants go online, which should help damper the shortage some, but in no way will end it. In response, companies like Intel have decided to speed up the time table of getting to newer processes, doing more with less silicon. Other companies are following Intel's lead.
So yeah, silicon's the most abundant element on the planet. But choosing the right sand, building new facilities to deal with the sand, and then using the capacity to build solar panels just isn't economically viable; the company could make a huge deal more money selling their p-S to any semis company for chipmaking. It would be nice if more companies followed Sharp's lead and reserved a certain amount of their output for solar development, but hardly anyone can bother when profits are as high as they are right now.
And so is the way of doing business in semis, - supercooll, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I think they would need to construct at a more efficient level.
They have to think bigger. Australia already has the bigger solar plant.
http://ohcash.com/2007/02/10/worlds-biggest-solar-plant-for-australia/
If they could replicate even half of that achievement, it would not be to hard to propagate. - lieutenantmudd, on 10/12/2007, -4/+8"The sattelite idea is neither insane nor particularly novel. A major advantage is that you're by-passing the loss of energy due to weather and atmosphere. You don't need a long cable, you beam the energy back to huge dishes on the groun as RF."
And you don't have to clean the panels off regularly. If you ever wondered why the Mars Rover only had a lifespan of a couple months, it was because they knew the panels would get dirty and stop working. I can only imagine how huge of a chore cleaning off millions of panels would be. - lionslair, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4If those black dots are all its going to take then that is amazing.
- glmory, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Have a source to your random cost number?
- ivosilva, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6It might look like it takes little space, but by looking at those spots, each one is at least the size of my country - Portugal.
Now, that would be really nice if we knew how much it would cost (including distribution)... - TheWretched, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7I'd love to see a requirement imposed on new homes to have solar panels installed on their roofs. It may be expensive at first but the long term payoffs for everyone and the environment would be worth it.
- wonderchemist, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7I believe many PV panels are made out of silicon which is one of the most comment elements on the planet.
- lordmetroid, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6The problem is not actually collecting it all, the problem is to store the electricity for when you need it like say winter or nighttime!
- fatfinger, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Wow, that's amazing. I heard somewhere that a square inch of the suns energy hitting the earths atmosphere generates an insane amount of heat/energy. It would be interesting to develop a method of transfering this energy into a usable format here on earth.
- workisglory, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Nobody here has noticed that we no longer need silicon for solar energy, huh?
http://www.stuff.co.nz/4017784a13.html - mitrovarr, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Good luck.
Problems with mining the KBO:
1. The Kuiper Belt is a *long* way away. It's a 15 year journey to there for a probe launched from Earth. Heavy mining equipment would be far heavier and thus much slower. Most of your timeframe would be used up just getting to the KB and back once.
2. The Kuiper Belt objects are not only far away from us, they're a long way from one another. Unless you only plan on mining one KBO, you need to allow for 5-10 year journeys between them.
3. How are you going to power your mining robots? Solar power is a joke out at 30 AU. Are you planning on launching tons of radioactive fuel along with your mining probes? That's quite dangerous and incredibly expensive. However, you also can't depend on finding radioactives in the KBOs themselves.
4. Why not just go after carbonaceous chondrites in the much closer and more solar-friendly asteroid belt?
Problems with solar panels at L1:
1. If the sun flares badly enough, satellites can die, particularly ones that are outside the Earth's magnetosphere. One big coronal mass ejection could eradicate your entire solar network.
2. L1 is not geostationary orbit - your solar satellites will have to constantly retarget their beams. And what is the other side of the planet supposed to do for power?
3. L1 is unstable. It's not impossible to make things stay there, but a whole large network of solar satellites might be tricky.
Problems with microwave power transmission:
1. Won't sending huge amounts of power through the atmosphere affect it in some way? Water absorbs microwaves, after all, as does water vapor.
2. Lossy doesn't even begin to describe microwave power transmission. - dinkumator, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3@somasynth
they make these things called "batteries" which you use on cloudy days and at night -
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