Solar cost to rival coal in 10 years

[casstony]

By extrapolating current trends this author suggests that solar cells will be sufficiently efficient and cheap that they can compete outright with coal in 10 years.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=smaller-cheaper-faster-does-moores-2011-03-15


"In 14 and a half seconds, the sun provides as much energy to Earth as humanity uses in a day."

"What’s driving these changes? There are two factors. First, solar cell manufacturers are learning – much as computer chip manufacturers keep learning – how to reduce the cost to fabricate solar.
Second, the efficiency of solar cells – the fraction of the sun’s energy that strikes them that they capture – is continually improving. In the lab, researchers have achieved solar efficiencies of as high as 41 percent, an unheard of efficiency 30 years ago. Inexpensive thin-film methods have achieved laboratory efficiencies as high as 20 percent, still twice as high as most of the solar systems in deployment today"

"The cost of solar, in the average location in the U.S., will cross the current average retail electricity price of 12 cents per kilowatt hour in around 2020"

[Barrykgerdes]

Of course.

I love a nuclear power plant for generating electricity as long as it stays 300000000 kilometers away.

Barry

[CraigS]

How about fusion at say, a within a couple of hundred kilometers away ?

Cheers

[bojan]

10 years is a loooooong time... Lets hope the estimate is correct.
Because, it is all about money... and if nuclear is cheaper it will be an option (regardless of recent tragic events in Japan).
BTW, I lived 60 km away (downstream) from nuclear plant, from early '80-ties until early '90-ties.
This particular plant (built by Westinghouse) is still working with full capacity (Krsko, Slovenia) and for 30 years if its operation there was never a significant problem with it.

[casstony]

For me, the attraction to solar is it's simplicity, safety, the roof tops are ready and waiting, proximity of generation to consumer, and I get to make my own electricity.

Fusion would be great as a supplement to solar but solar should provide the bulk of our energy needs.

[casstony]

But it depends on humans to maintain the safe operation of the reactor. I'll support nuclear power when they bother to develop the technology to the point where it is intrinsically safe - ie. the workers down tools at any time and the plant is not capable of having a meltdown.

That solar power will provide the bulk of our enegy needs at some point in the future seems obvious to me - the energy is already delivered to us, we just need to collect it.

[mithrandir]

Just hope you never have a house fire during the day. The fire brigade can turn off the mains. They can not turn off your solar panels even if they can open the control switch or circuit breaker.

[casstony]

I imagine fuse/safety switches could be built into the supply to deal with such a problem. Worst case scenario - I lose a house. That's somewhat less troubling than the problems in Japan.

[bojan]

That is true..
But try the simple calculation, based on actual availability:
Solar constant is 1.4kW/m2, in space (above atmosphere).
Current commercial grade solar panel efficiency is 20%.
To generate enough power for domestic use this may be sufficient (and you don't have to cover the whole roof with solar panels) .. but the price is detrimental for wider use, even with government grant, which will stop one day - next financial year it will be decreased by 20%. (I am actually having it installed right now, $2.5k (after grant) for 1.5kW system is still sort of OK but $5k (next year) is definitely not).

For industrial use, solar power is completely different animal - and I doubt it will be viable very soon - you have to have it night and day, 24/7, reliably, and a lot of it (which means a huge areas covered with solar panels (useless for anything else) and huge batteries to store the energy for night or rainy days).
That is the very reason we have coal and nuclear and hydro power plants - the continuity of supply is a paramount.

ONLY when solar panels become cheaper than what we have now, they will be widely used (but I doubt they will ever replace conventional ways completely).
For now, they are just , well, curiosity for most (I know that I just opened the Pandora's box).

[casstony]

I agree with you 100% Bojan. The current subsidy for solar installation is a waste of taxpayers money. That cash could be put towards accelerating solar cell research so we can achieve mass installation of competitive solar power.

The fact is new cheaper/more efficient technologies are in development and it's reasonable to expect that the goal of competitive solar power will be achieved - it's a matter of when?

[bojan]

Yes.. but even then, I do not see the replacement of conventional power generation (including nuclear) as a real alternative.
Remember, 24/7...

[CraigS]

This issue is one of scale.

Its just like trying to understand some part of the universe when someone else only has the scale of the Solar System in their minds.

The disparate views seem to arise around the difference in views of the scale of the problem.

Some time kicking around the scale concept, might loosen up some firmly held views on both side of the fence.

My 2 cents/kilowatt-hour's worth.
:)
Cheers

[casstony]

I think solar can make a very large contribution. Some night time load can be shifted to the day, hydro dams can be re-filled in the day for use at night, we can reduce power needs for town lighting; natural gas can bridge the gap to fusion or safer forms of current nuclear reactors. Getting past vested interests and political nearsightedness is the biggest challenge.

[FlashDrive]

Tony has a good point there ... I agree with him.

[DJDD]

i only see large scale solar power as engineering problems, which are usually overcome if enough money is spent on it, and if there is political will and political/national stability.

storage mechanisms for energy are in development and under testing. is it viable now? maybe, maybe not but if we spent the dollars on it it probably would become viable in the short to medium term.

widespread solar collectors (or whatever you want to call them) and distributed power generation that overcome the issue of long-term cloud? well, that would be possible in Australia since we are a stable country but maybe not in some african or middle-eastern regions.



i often feel that the debate about solar always revolves around the problems but rarely do we hear discussion about solutions. We just need to make the decision to go for it in a meaningful way rather than only discuss why it is not possible (which is also my feeling about the public transport debate in melbourne).

[casstony]

That's right - we need the 'Jeff Kennet can do' attitude, get the job done, then make up what we need to from other power sources (whether that's fossil fuel, nuclear, matter/anti-matter or whatever).

[renormalised]

It wouldn't matter what way you generated power, the environmental movement would find some fault with it and protest against it. Then you'd have people scared of another viable energy source.

[DJDD]

well, yes, probably true to some extent however, i am fairly certain that the outcry by said groups would be far less for solar than for, let's say, nuclear or coal...

(BTW, I like the use of bold text :) )

[Kal]

I've lived for the last 30 years, and still live, 23 kilometers away from a nuclear reactor!

[renormalised]

There's already a hullabaloo over a solar plant in CA with env' concerns, because it will take up 2500 acres in an area with some rarish animals and plants. It doesn't matter where they put them, the environmentalist will always find something to go off about...some rare animal and/or plant

[DJDD]

i worked occassionally at lucas heights and was not overly concerned at the time but it is not a power station and serves a vital purpose that cannot be served by other means. i realise that nuclear power plants serve a vital purpose, too, but i think there are other alternatives.

i would not have worked at a nuclear power station as I am generally against nuclear power generation.

bring on large-scale solar power.

BTW, i am not trying to make this a "mine is bigger than yours" contest when I said I worked at lucas heights :) . Just putting in context for the rest of my comments.

[DJDD]

you just cannot please all of the people all of the time...

[bojan]

Well, that is what I am talking about.
The solar power plant must occupy a large area... and if we want to minimise the losses in the distribution network, the plant must be located reasonably close to where the majority of consumption is - usually where people live. Same applies for nuclear plant as well.

To match the average rated power of a nuclear plant (600MW), taking into account 20% efficiency of the solar panels, we must use the area that delivers 3000MW !!

This is 2142857 m2, or square the size 1.4km X 1.4km.
Actually larger by a factor of 1.6 (to compensate for Sun elevation. So, 1.4 x 2.3km.
And this is only for a sunny day... high noon.
Now, remember 24/7......

Obviously, a scale problem.

[CraigS]

Interestingly, from my experience, throwing money at engineering problems doesn't always solve them.

Frequently, I've seen it actually slowing down the solution to technical problems. Eg: the more minds you get .. the more ideas .. the more competition … the more politics .. the more process .. the slower the outcomes … and the resolutions, frequently turn out to be more a function of non-technical aspects.

Technical issues take time, patience and a lot of disciplined thinking.

The idea that they can be sped up by throwing money at them, is flawed.

Cheers

[DJDD]

that doesn't seem like a lot to me, even if solar power was only generated by solar panels, and adding some more area for the rest of the facility.

how large are coal-fired power stations and nuclear power plants overall?
all appear to be in that size range.

[bojan]

Quite right.

First, you have to have something to start with - not just blindly go into something that you know doesn't work.

[bojan]

My number are ideal and minimal.
So the occupied area will be probably 2x larger.
And I repeat, this is valid for ONLY high noon - maybe 5 hours daily, max.
And we need power 24/7.

Now, take into account the price....

Coal power stations are much smaller (100-200metres?) (yes, I know, coal mining takes more space.. ), nuclear are even smaller.

It simply doesn't add up.

What I am trying to say, only with numbers you will be able to change the current trends.

[DJDD]

even taking that generalisation and anecdotal evidence into account, which takes my generalisation into account :), spending more than the small amount we currently do on the problem of solar-power will, I believe, lead to outcomes.

I agree that "Technical issues take time, patience and a lot of disciplined thinking." but we have the last two in spades and the first can be minimised to some extent with more funding of research and technical innovation.

[bojan]

Can you elaborate in more details, why do you believe this is applicable to solar power?

[CraigS]

The more active elements in a system, the lower the reliability.

Multiple concatenated solar panels would lead to lower longer term reliability/replacement issues, as well as the Sun availability/power storage issue. There's more to this than just installing a bunch of solar panels and hooking them together. You need to consider all those known aspects .. and the others that haven't been considered.

Cheers

[casstony]

Offer cash to entities that are already working on the problem and are short of cash, offer cash to entities that would not otherwise take the risk of the research, offer a cash prize to the first company to achieve a certain target. There are ways to use cash productively.

[casstony]

Bojan, you are using a figure of 20% in your calculations. Efficiency will likely be some multiple of that in 10 years time.

[CraigS]

.. create competition and drive up development times and 'work around' solutions to bridge the timing gaps …

Tony and DJDD .. I have lived this life .. its not anecdotal evidence … technical innovation is a function of elapsed time.

Cash does not influence time !

It is not a manpower issue ..

Just ask Peter Garrett ..

Cheers

[DJDD]

I agree. But let's just put some more time, money, brains, political will, into it.

similar to solar there is more to nuclear power plants than getting some Uranium out of the ground and putting it ina big concrete box to generate electricity, but this has been done.

I feel that the same voices raising objections now would have been the ones raising objections years ago saying that 20% efficiency or 30% efficiency was just not possible.


i should be studyign and working! :)

[CraigS]

Based on what assumptions ?

[bojan]

Well, it will definitely not be higher than 100%.
Most likely, it will be 50-60%, 75% maximum... we have to take into account the loses by heat dissipation and re-radiation (in form of IR).

But in the future, the power consumption will also go higher.
Mind you , in Australia we don't have one child policy..

So when you do all your number crunching (including cost), the inevitable outcome is nuclear option.

I am not for/against nuclear by default, I am just saying numbers are such that point into that direction, like it or not...

[renormalised]

If they're going to go the nuclear option, then we should look to fusion and work to get that up and running. More money may help, but what we need is a bit more original thinking going on. The methods they're using now most likely won't result in a viable powerplant. What they're essentially doing in all experiments is trying to heat a very thin gas/plasma to 100 million K and keep it confined and they don't have the power to do it. They can only confine it for a few seconds at the most.

[FlashDrive]

Interesting debate we have here.

I have just committed myself to buying a 2kw Solar Array for my house.
Costing me in the order off $5630.00 after Govt' Rebates.

My electricity company has offered to buy the power generated by my Array at 52c per kW ... and I will buy back what I use at 19c per kW.
At my current electricity use and today's prices ... It will take 4 1/2 years to pay for it self.

After 20 years ... the Panels will only be around 75% efficient from what they were brand new.

It's an investment for me against rising power prices ... they go up again by 5.8% as of July 1st 2011.

I don't profess to be an expert in this field .... it's all about ongoing daily living costs to me.....I'm just hoping this will beat the Power Companies at their incessant grab for more money.

Cheers ..... Colin.

[bojan]

David against Goliath...

Don't worry, you (neither me or anyone else here on this forum ) will ever outsmart them.

[ballaratdragons]

We must be leading the way here in Ballarat and District with alternative power generation.

We have the largest wind farms in the Southern hemisphere providing large scale power, and last year they opened the new Solar power Station at Ballarat Airport, which is reportedly doing very well.

Also, I was horrified when I recieved a reply from Council about our Light Pollution Reduction proposal.
They sent me all the documents about councils power use.
More than 60% of the power used was just for street lights!
Yet there are Solar powered Street lights available and in use in some places, costing zero power useage.

There needs to be a lot of re-thinking from councils. Lots of small changes equal a noticably bigger change if all councils jump on board.
And they should be the shining example to us.
It's our rates that pay (and go to waste) on all that street light power.

[Karls48]

I don’t care how we are going to produce electric power, as long I can afford it. At present it is becoming big financial burden for me. I’m retired and living on pension.
When cost of electricity will become burden for rest of the population, all this controversy about solar versus nuclear, carbon and environment will become irreverent. Majority of people will want affordable electricity and if the government of that day is not able to provide it, it will get kicked out

[bojan]

Actually they do..
The problem is, they are getting only 1% or so back, to be used for the next shot...

So the efficiency of current installations if actually negative.

[bojan]

Ditto.

[FlashDrive]

I hear you Karl ..... I'm of the same mind.

[astroron]

I really think that is a shorted approach:shrug:
when you have the disasters like Japan I think it will take a lot more than the cost of electricity to convince the Australian public to go Nuclear.

[renormalised]

Which means they don't have the power to do it...they don't have enough to keep it running. Plus they have trouble sustaining the containment fields in the tokamaks (for precisely that reason).

[Terry B]

I've been looking at the viability of putting a ~5kw wind turbine on my property. We are in a high wind area and there are other turbines on surrounding properties. The big stumbling block is the cost of cableling. The best spot for the tower is about 600m from my house where there are no trees.
The supplier of the turbine quotes an approximate cost of $80/m for underground cable. Above ground would require cutting about 200 trees down so isn't a choice.
This would cost $48000 just to wire it in plus the cost of the turbine (~$30000). This makes it non viable and a similar output solar cheaper. The lifespan of the solar panels isn't as good as the turbine and they produce less consistent energy. I don't want solar so the end result will probably be that we don't get a turbine.

[GrampianStars]

Too Many naysayers here spreading their pessimistic attitude bringing a general sense of negativity to this discussion. :screwy:
!! Solar is doable and cost effective right now for every single houshold in Australia !! :thumbsup:
System payback periods are 5-15 years at todays prices.
Unfortunately,the majority of Aussie power consumers prefer to Consume more and buy up endlessly. Like a new Plasma TV, Air-Conditioner, Car, Caravan, Astronomy Mount, Telescope, Computer, I-Phone, ...etc, etc, :shrug:

The Australian Government hands out our TAX's to the dirty coal industry to the tune of $1.5 BILLION annually! :eyepop:
Invest that into solar energy instead and there will be a huge turn around in clean power! :thanx:

[renormalised]

The Australian public won't go nuclear because it was hoodwinked by a very successful scare campaign by greenies and anti-nuclear activists back in the late 60's and 70's. Most of whom hadn't a clue at what they were talking about. It's not to say nuclear powerplants don't have their problems and such but it's a safer industry than what it was made out to be, despite of what's happened in Japan.

[FlashDrive]

Bojan .... You could be right in your statement ..... but they need to get it in their heads ... that without " US " .... you and me and all the rest ....they would have NOTHING.

To price us out of reach of paying for power .....lowers their bottom line.

I for one .... will be happy to go back to candles .... I don't need a TV to survive or a computer .... my great grand father and those before him survived .... no washing machines or refrigerators .. etc.

It's all about determination to do without .... and what a person puts value on in life .... Can you live without your TV and all the so-called comforts of this modern age.

If it comes down to it.....I'm prepared to.

Cheers ... Colin.

[GrampianStars]

A 5kW 48-120V Westwind Turbine Price: Aprox $20,000
A 5Kw Turbine makes around $39,000 (todays prices) of electricity, or 180,000 kwh of electricity in average wind speeds of 5.5m/s. over 15 years.
So works out around $2,000 per year for power at todays prices

[Ric]

I'm looking to get solar and as much of it as soon as I can.

We have gas cooking and hot water on our farm but pay around $350 a quarter just to turn on the lights and watch telly. We also have to pay $65 a quarter for the availability charge.

It seems that every time I receive a bill the price has gone up.

[icytailmark]

why cant we use more hydroelectricity? we are surrounded by ocean why not use it?

[bojan]

I just tried to rephrase your statement ;)

[bojan]

But all the others aren't.

[bojan]

Errr.. how?

[renormalised]

It's not that simple, Rob. OK, we put solar cells on every house in Australia....what about the vast majority of where the power is consumed, by industry?? How are you going to power them 24/7, 365 days a year with consistent, reliable power??. Then, where are you going to get the all the silica sand needed to make these cells?? You need very pure silica sand to begin with to refine it to make the silicon, which requires a lot of power and is not an easy process. If you start mining where this sand is, you'll never hear the end of it from the conservationists etc. They're bad enough as it is about this. There's already problems in the US and such over solar powerplants and the env' lobby. And how much is it going to cost to mine this sand?? To do it reliably, you will need solar cells a lot more efficient than what's being used today, and to quote figures from labs is not going to cut the mustard because they're lab figures and not real world figures. Where is all this power going to be stored once it's created?? Batteries...hardly, especially with the technologies being used for batteries today. Then how long are we going to wait for an efficient, safe storage technology to turn up....5, 10, 15, 30 years???

Quite frankly I wouldn't prop up the coal industry either, but throwing money at solar isn't going to solve the problem either. It's not as cost effective as you might think. We need to approach the problem intelligently and with realistic expectations. Hobby horse solutions are only going to cause more problems than they solve and cost us more money than we can afford.

I would be the first person to say install a solar panel on your roof and so you should, but don't expect it to be the panacea of all our energy problems.

[GrampianStars]

Do you use an average 32.8 Kw a day ?
IMO I'd go smaller a Wind Generator say 3Kw + solar 1.5Kw for a more ballanced power generation. :thumbsup:
After all it's not windy every day/night or full sun every day ;)

[Kal]

Depends on how you approach the situation. Sydney, for example, has about a million and a half homes. Assuming a rather conservative house size of 100m^2, that provides 15 square kilometers of space above dwellings alone.

I don't understand why the 1.4 x 2.3km space you described needs to be a problem?

As efficiency improves, cost of installation comes down, and electricity prices rise, I think the trend to install solar panels on private dwellings will increase.

[astroron]

Carl Tell that to the people of Japan who are sitting on a possible time bomb
and also to all the dead and deformed people from the effects pf Chernoble
Safe if you believe that Accidents :rolleyes: don"t happen:screwy:
A Nuclear power plant would cost in the region of a couple of billion dollars and take at least 5-10 years to build , and the big stumbling block Not in my backyard:rolleyes:
Nuclear Power IS NOT SAFE :mad2: Ask those Japanese people who have been told to move 80kms away from the site of the power station:screwy:

[bojan]

Ron,
I am not trying to be insensitive here, but I feel it's not fair of you to pull those low blows to the industry that is actually quite safe.

It's the same thing to say air traffic is not safe because when plane goes down, everybody is killed.

We have to put all this into right perspective:
How many disasters (human deaths) per kWh generated?

You'd be surprised, nuclear power plant will have a better score compared to coal plant.
Not to mention pollution (CO2, smoke etc).

[astroron]

>Chernoble effected Thousands not hundreds as in a plane crash and made great areas of the landscape uninhabitable for both Man and creatures alike.
Lots of people across Europe and Russia where effected
As will probably be the result of this Japanese disaster if the thing goes really pear shaped
All as you are doing is putting the economic angle before the safety angle
when was the last time a conventional power station blew its top and caused such a major problemhttp://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/../vbiis/images/smilies/questionicon.gif
As the main focus to this conversation we are trying to focus the energy problem away from Dirty fossil Fuel's into Clean energy alternatives :thumbsup:

[renormalised]

Ron, please...2 extreme cases in an industry whose safety record far exceeds any other power generating industry and a lot of others as well. That's not to say it doesn't have problems, but you have to be pragmatic and realistic about what you say and not go down some emotive line when you look into something like this. If they never had the quake or tsunami, those reactors would be blithely putting out electricity and you'd have never heard hide nor hair of them. Any powerplant has accidents, nuclear included, but which power industry has had the worst accidents and the greatest number of deaths and serious health concerns over the years....I think you'll find it's conventional plants.

How much do you think a coal fired or gas fired powerplant costs to build and how long it takes to build one...it's just as long as a nuclear plant. How safe do you think they really are...and if you don't think there's any radioactivity, think again. One of the dangers of coal fired plants is the radon gas that is present in coal. But apart from that you have all the other problems associated with them, as is well known.

In any case, the problem in Japan is nothing like Chernobyl, not even close. The reactors are a different type and far more modern. Chernobyl was a disaster waiting to happen, plus a case of incompetency on the part of the operators. Japan is a case of being in the wrong place and not being strong enough to withstand a quake of this size. But then again how many structures would be.

[renormalised]

Best estimates put the maximum death toll from Chernobyl and it's after effects at 4000, over a 100 year period after the disaster. That comes from the leading medical experts.

As for the place being uninhabited, the trees are still growing, plants are thriving (actually the towns which were evacuated are being reclaimed by the forests there) and animals live there as well. Yes, there are problems still with the radiation, but nothing like the place being turned into some kind of wasteland/desert. It's unsafe for people and will be for quite some time, but if you want to see what happens after a long time, just take a quick look at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Both the bombs dropped on those cities put out far more deadly radioactivity than Chernobyl ever did, yet there's nearly 2 million people living in both cities. Where's the problems there, now??

[bojan]

No mate, I am not building nor I am selling the nuclear plants :P
I am just trying to present the balanced view/perspective here, and I am trying to be rational - because, at the end, this is what will determine the future of energy generation, being it solar, wind, fusion, fission or whatever..

Chernobil event is not a good example to illustrate the (un)safety of those installations.. The disaster there was caused by human error, not by technology per se. In Japan, it was possibly under-appreciation of tsunami and it's effects on systems other than nuclear reactors.

On the other hand, 60% of energy generated in France is nuclear.. I don't remember reading about problems there, and France is a bit more densely populated than Australia..

All in all, like it or not, we live in capitalism, where economy is a major (only?) player and we can't do much about it.

BTW, the Chernobil radioactive cloud passed over the city when I was there..

[astroron]

Carl there have been many more Accidents :question: in the Nuclear Power Generating Industry:rolleyes: Britain in the past had quite a few so did the USA (Three Mile Island comes to mind),but A lot of the Accidents Go Under reported with small bits of reporting down the back of the paper or the news
Big Question:question: why build Nuclear power plants in an earth quake prone area:question:
Big Answer Money:screwy:

[renormalised]

BTW, Chernobyl is Russian for wormwood, so if anyone wants to get prophetic about the disaster, here's your chance:):P

[Terry B]

Exactly, but when you add ~$40000 for cabling it is never viable unfortunately.

[bojan]

Correct answer !

[GrampianStars]

Terry
Thats around $2000 per year including your instalation ;)

[renormalised]

Yes, I know about Sellafield/Windscale and the others. They're high profile only because it's to do with nuclear energy. However, there have been far more accidents in coal and gas fired plants over the years and you hardly ever hear of them unless it's really major...even then many get hushed up. Then you have the ongoing health issue associated with the use of coal.

Where else are they going to build the powerplants, nuclear or otherwise?? Especially in Japan. Simple fact the islands were formed from crustal buckling and volcanic activity along a subduction zone means they'll inevitably be prone to earthquakes....money or no money.

[MrB]

lol, iPhones hardly figure into overall power usage.
Oh, and my iPhone IS solar powered ;)

[GrampianStars]

An estimated 100,000 killed every year globally on the roads....
and no body bats an eyelid to that :screwy:
OK we better go back to Horse and buggy as well then...
But wait........
Future food shortages will have all the horses eaten instead.....
So...... back to foot traffic only!
But wait....
NO shoes as No leather available from having eaten all the animals ....
Ah... a vicious enviornmental cycle Eh! :rofl:

[astroron]

Then I suspect that Geothermal should be a viable source of power:question:
I don't think there will be Nuclear power in Australia while I am on this mortal toil,but then I could cark it tomorrow :help:
We should be putting more effort and Dollars into Alternative Fuels,but whilste we have the approach that we have now of mainly Dollars and cents clean energy is always going to be a Big struggle to compete with the big Polluters and and the Fossil fuel industry:thumbsup:

[CraigS]

Yes Carl … I agree !

How many deaths happen in China as a result of poor Coal mining practices?

Thousands per year !

Cheers

[renormalised]

Speaking of which, apparently there are 25000 road accidents in Iran each year....the worst in the world!!!. They should ban cars:):P

[astroron]

That is a situation that is easily Fixed, better mining practices,:screwy:

[Terry B]

Interesting. The unit I had looked at is this one
http://www.edenpower.com.au/wind-energy/skystream-37/
There seems to be a bit of variation in price, performance and quality between turbines. More investigation is needed I think.

[GrampianStars]

Completely amazing On average 75K of raw material + 7.5Kw energy to make (1 x100g) phone!
Not trivial :rolleyes:indead

[renormalised]

That they should an I believe that they do have some small geothermal plants. Problem is they're very hard to maintain as the steam they generate from the water they use is highly corrosive. Unfortunately that seems to be a feature of geothermal plants everywhere. One good thing can come of it....the pipes the water/steam travels in are sometimes laden with things like gold and silver!!!:)

[CraigS]

Ron;

Whats the bet than once Japan gets over the present problems there, they go ahead and rebuild the Nuclear plants ?

Why do you think they might do that ?

Answer: They have no other choice !

For them, this is about long term survival of their entire country. Nuclear has fed and clothed them for countless years. The price has just gone up a little.

They are unfortunate in their geographic location, and their natural resource depleted state, and there is no other alternative for them. Same as the people who have no choice other than wood-burning fires in Africa !

Its easy for us to look at the world thru the rose coloured glasses which we are fortunate enough to posses. There are countless others, who have no such luxuries.

How dare we tell them how to live their lives based on our biased perspectives !

We need to get very realistic about this. This is not a hypothetical issue for millions.

[renormalised]

But that won't negate the problems....they still have accidents even in the mines with the best practices. Mining coal is inherently dangerous...coal dust itself is highly combustible, let alone any gas that is present.

[astroron]

Education is the answer here :rolleyes:

Originally Posted by GrampianStars http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/../vbiis/images/buttons/viewpost.gif (http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?p=699580#post699580)
An estimated 100,000 killed every year globally on the roads....
and no body bats an eyelid to that http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/../vbiis/images/smilies/screwy.gif

Governments Spend Billions of Dollars trying to combat this:rolleyes: To say no one bats an eyelid is Plain WRONG, ask the grieving relitives, and policmen and ambulance people who have to clean up the mess:sadeyes:
And all the taxes that you incure to try to eleviate this menace
This has nothing to do with the generation of power:shrug:

[astroron]

Which comes back to the tenet of this thread;) develop cleaner forms of energy and then we we wont need to put people through those situations :)
But Pigs might fly I hear you say:lol::lol::lol:

[renormalised]

Well, they do if the coal dust goes off:):P

[astroron]

That Japan went down the Nuclear road with the great assistance of Uncle Sam,They now have to live with these possible time bombs sitting on their doorsteps:sadeyes:
We will see if the people of Japan will be so quick to build Nuclear power plants on their door steps after this:question:

As for Rose Coloured Glasses, If you see someone going in the wrong direction, don't you try to steer them in the right direction:question:

Coming back home ;)
As I have said elsewhere I don't think we will in Australia have Nuclear power any time soon:thumbsup:
Cheers

[astroron]

But if the nuclear power station goes Bang the bacon will already be cooked when it lands.:P;):lol:

Cheers

[renormalised]

Microwaved:):P

[MrB]

Interesting.. that can be done with any product and I still think it hardly figures overall when compared to pretty much everything else. It's a drop in the ocean.
Out of interest, what are the figures for manufacturing a solar panel... or wind turbine... or micro-hydro system? (yes I realise that eventually these 'pay-back' the energy used to manufacture them)
Some of my solar and all my wind is made from salvaged parts, re-purposed and saved from the scrap-heap.

[astroron]

Agreed:thumbsup:

[GrampianStars]

Ah. Ron
In a basic sense: Car to death ratio via petrol, oil, steel, aluminum, plastic, adhesive, rubber, iron, nylon, felt, cardboard, wires, glass etc.
Heaps of ENERGY (POWER) consumption to manufacture each car!
Which by the way is fully subsidised in Australia by our taxes :mad2:
So IMO should go off shore immediately!
However cars generate another multi million dollar revenue stream via duty taxes,tolls and fines for the governments. :rolleyes:

[bobson]

Using sea waves:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/highlands_and_islands/8564662.stm

Not to mention Philip Island time/tides or similar around Australia. And some in WA that are natures gifts to man to use it for elec. power making.

bob

[jenchris]

Did anyonesee that new inventors with the new generation solar panel?

Actually a paint on system - pay back period without Gov Subsidy was 2 years.

Invented by a southern University - bought by Victorian Government and being worked on.

If we had sufficient roof space painted with this, EVERYONE would feed into the grid and there'd be enough power for driving electric buses as well.

Everyone works on the principle that nothing new will be invented. It's just so much rubbish.
When I was 17 I got my first car - 15-18mpg - 3 litres - I now have a car with more BHP which is 2 litres and I get 7 litres per 100k - about 40 mpg.
Progress of a sort - had we partaken of the Geneva Wheel engine, we'd probably be getting a whole different power to weight ratio.
No one wants to sell us efficient stuff - there's no profit in it.
It's only when we get to the crunch that "Suddenly" this stuff is invented.

[casstony]

We could demand that they shut down all their old, dangerous power stations and build newer, safer ones - it's our air/water too if they dump radiation into the atmosphere.

From general reading I've done there are proven nuclear power technologies that are much safer than is currently being used. But how about we give solar a go anyway - get as much as we can from the Sun.

p.s. I'm not forgetting the suffering inflicted by the tsunami, but we can consider more than one issue at a time.

[bobson]

So true. I witnessed a few great inventions in my life.

Sadly they just disappeared probably cos they are not profitable.

[Jules76]

Already being done at Garden Island, WA.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CETO_Wave_Power

More information here:

http://www.carnegiecorp.com.au/index.php?url=/projects/perthproject

Interesting technology. It has a dual function in that not only does it create electricity, but it can also pump seawater to a desalination plant at zero cost, replacing a traditional powered pump. Of course the desalination process itself consumes a lot of energy but at least it's something.

[Louwai]

I have had a quick scan thruough the thread & I can't see where anyone has discussed the current Solar Generation plans being under taken by the Australian Gov.

My company is currently involved in the design & possible construction of a solar generation power system in Qld.
Here is the web site for the project.
http://www.solarflairproject.com.au/2010/

To put it simply;
It does not use PV panels, it uses concave mirrors to intensify the sun's heat onto a pipe which is carrying "oil". The high temp oil then heats water into steam which turns the turbine.

In addition there is an underground "tank" which contains a substance that is also heated by the hot oil via a heat exchange system. This substance stores the heat & then after the sun goes down the stored heat is used to keep heating the oil. The heat storage substance is able to continue heating the oil for another 3hrs after the sun is gone. Enough to generate through the evening peak period.

The design will produce 150mw from 1.5hrs after dawn through to 3hrs after sundown. The mirror array covers approx 30 hectares.

[FlashDrive]

Isn't that the Truth...... Well said. :thumbsup:

[bojan]

What will be the efficiency of the system?

[Louwai]

Don't know. I'm not involved with the project. Idon't know the details.
Have a look through the web site. If it's not there list out your questions & I can ask the project Mgr that's looking after the project within our office.

[FlashDrive]

Great concept .... have read about this type of power generation.

On a lighter note ...... You better throw in a few pairs of Sunglasses if I'm going to live near by. Imagine the glare from a Solar Farm of Mirrors. :cool2:

Hey...I'm not knocking it ..... it certainly has potential ... !

[Louwai]

Yep. That's why they put it in the middle of nowhere. Have a look at the location map on the web site. It's beside the existing Kogan Crk power stn. Half way between Dalby & Chinchilla.

THemain reason for it being so close to the existing pwr stn was for the ease of connecting into the grid.

[jenchris]

Solar furnace technology has been around a while - it's simple and effective - low tech - easy to maintain.
Odd that it was left on the shelf from 1960 when it was first tested in Texas.IIRC
you don't need a CAD drafter with steam engineering experience do you???

[astroron]

This is a pilot Solar power station out in Windorah I saw in 2008
I don't know how far it has progressed or even if it is generating any electricity :question:
One of the things that annoy's me is the insistence that every thing must be Big.
Why can't smaller centers have their own power stations,be they Solar,Wind or any other method of producing power:question:
What we have is a country criss crossed with ugly Towers and power lines that cost millions to erect and are susceptible to every thing from sabotage to natural disasters:screwy:
Keep the big power stations to the major centers and give the smaller centers their own power stations.:thumbsup:
Cheers

[michaellxv]

This should cheer you up Ron. Wilpena resort has been running on solar for a while now. " It was commissioned in December 1998" http://www.wilpenapound.com.au/community-environment/

It can be done. Maybe not practical for big cities yet, but I think the technology will develop faster the more we use it.

[OICURMT]

This reality is what drives... http://www.iter.org/

Why harness the sun, when we can create the conditions here. In 20 years time, fission will hopefully be a thing of the past.

In the mean time, I guess solar panels will have to do.

[Paul Haese]

No matter how our civilisation approaches the problem of power, one thing is for certain. Power will need to be generated from several sources to maintain 24 hour operation.

Personally I like solar and wind power but also see that nuclear is the next best viable solution. If CO2 is a real problem why are we still pouring tonnes and tonnes of the stuff into the atmosphere via coal powered plants? Surely if the effects of climate change (I am not an advocate of manmade climate change) are to worsen as suggested in the coming century then one or two nuclear disasters will seem like a pinic by comparison. We really need to look at the big picture here.

Solar power should be installed free to all homes with the carbon tax and power companies should once again be owned by the state. It was stupid to sell off assets to private companies. Power costs are now too much for many of the elderly, next it will be us.

Choice is yours but I will be going with solar very soon at least if nothing else to reduce our power bills.

[renormalised]

The reason why.....the politics of greed (power, influence and money). In other words....the coal mining companies and the oil companies: Exxon, Caltex, BP, AGIP, Chevron, etc etc (notice who owns most of these companies), along with their government flunkies.

They really couldn't give a damn if this planet went to hell in a hand basket, just so long as they benefited from it they'd be happy.

Solar power free....that I totally agree with and it should be implemented as soon as it can possibly be done.

[casstony]

The technology is currently in a rapid development phase - I think wide scale implementation should be held off until it becomes more commercially competitive. I think governments waste far too much money on grand schemes then try to claw it back from impotant government services. For example, money was splashed around for shiny new school buildings, yet budgets are being tightened in support services that help kids with behavioural problems, autism, etc.

[DJDD]

just stolen this quote from the other thread (2 Japanese nuclear reactors may be in meltdown) (http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=73039)
as it seemed pertinent here.




so many people seem overly negative about solar power, whether solar panel or concentrating solar power programs, and I just wonder where their info comes from.

however, it seems that even the department of energy in the US thinks that solar has a big future as a major contributor to the US' power, if not the major source of its power.

http://www1.eere.energy.gov/solar/

i have been reading quite a bit from there, both the website itself and papers it references or internal papers available to the public. They go into detail on everything from the costs (not just of the panels, etc. but of the attendant components), maintenance costs, grants (US-based, obviously), power output, etc.

mostly, it seems a bright future (excuse the pun) in the US and it seems sad that Australia, with its obvious benefits, are seemingly behind the times.

If we can get a man on the moon, perform brain surgery and cure disease then it seems to me that the implementation of solar power in large-scale ways seems trivial.

[bojan]

This is all fine..
But the bottom line will be the price of generated kWh by particular method.

The cheapest (or most economical) option will prevail.
As long as kWh generated by coal is cheaper, we will have coal power plants.

If/when the solar generated kWh becomes comparable in price with coal (or hydro) it will become an option.

[renormalised]

If it was so good and simple to implement, then why hasn't all this technology been put to use?? Because all the talk isn't as good as the reality. Much of the technology upon which many of these studies are based is still experimental and far from being a commercial proposition, despite the picture sites like this present. You have to be careful about gleaning information from sites like this, especially government sites, because many of them in the US are promotional and funding "request" sites. That's not to say all the stuff here is bogus (it's not) but many sites turn out be more than just information sites. They're saying "hey, look what we're doing, give us more money".

The same dept' a few years back calculated that to power the whole of the US with solar technology, it would require a field of panels 1.5 times the size of Texas!!!. I doubt that sort of project would ever be approved. In Oz terms, it's a field of panels 45% the size of Queensland!!!!. The conservationist/environmentalists would have a field day with that!!!. That's with present best practice technology. Now, future developments will most likely see that size reduced by a factor of 3 or so, but that's still a huge area of panel. Even if you could supply very cheap panels for every home and building in the country, you'd still need a vast amount of panel to power everything else. Plus, the US doesn't receive as much sunlight as we do here in Oz, for any given year, so their panels per user in many parts of the country would have to be even more efficient than what they'd have to be here.

Powering a country like Oz solely on solar power would be difficult enough with present technology, the US would be totally impractical, if not impossible.

However, it could be done, but it would cost a vast amount of money and society would have to make quite a few changes. Much of the change would be resisted, especially by local councils and by private consumers.

[DJDD]

quite possibly, although i would be interested to see what the true cost of coal is without subsidies. This is based upon the assumption that teh coal industry receives subsidies, which seems to be widely reported but ignored. so, let's make it a level playing field, at least.




yes, i understand that you must be careful about what you read and consider the source. which is exactly what I was trying to suggest by my post. I suspectthat the reality is somewhere in between the naysayers and the proslytisers.

as for the comment about changes in the amount of available land and costs required- well, that is taken into account in some of those documents, as suggested by changes in efficiency, cost of the associated compentry (one comment was that most of the cost savings will come from the associated components and not the panels themselves).

society making changes? well, of course, which is why I hold out no hope for solar to become a reality regardless of my belief that it shoudlbe the furture and if investment was made to the same tune as the other industries then we would probably get there. further, it woudl be interesting to knwo how much investment has been made into nuclear research to get us to where we are today.

Why not make a real effort, and just like nuclear and coal, increase it as improvements are made.

in the case of Japan, and working from someone's comment that 60% ballarat's (or bendigo's) power was for street lights, could you imagine how mcuh energy wouldl be saved daily (or nightly) if Japan turned off a lot of their street and shop signs!

[Kal]

Those numbers look way off.

Looking at USA's electricity consumption (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electricity_co nsumption) and using bojans figures from earlier on in this thread, you can work out that 800 solar farms as calculated by bojan (the equivalent of 800 average nuclear reactors) would supply that amount of energy, which covers an area 40km x 40km (1600 km2). The size of Texas is 696,241 km2

[CraigS]

DJDD;

The site you reference would seem to have all the answers .. so they must also have all the funding. So research funding IS available. The next time I hear that Solar is not receiving research funding, I'll reference this site).

According to their mission statement:



We should wait for the outcomes, wait for their technologies to mature, and then pounce on it all.

I'd say that would be about … what .. about 15 years before its all working well enough to make it a winner in Oz ??

Why do we have to do anything on Solar in the meanwhile ?
Anything we spend on it now, will probably be redundant and superseded by the time its all ready to be cost effective ..

Cheers

[DJDD]

:)




yep, that's the way to ensure that when we cannot dig stuff out of the ground and sell it anymore we won't have anything else to sell.


perhaps we should disclose if we have any shares or financial interest in any coal, uranium or solar comapnies. :D

[avandonk]

I used to drive a 5.8 litre V8 and at home have the heater and airconditioner on FULL comfort. Those days are gone!
We all just need to cut back.
I honestly do not care for myself as the fan will be hit after I die.
My daughter and grandaughter will not be in this position.
If the argument is about cost it is because the polluters US and the UTILITIES never took into account the cost to our environment.
I have heard all the pathetic arguments from the AGW deniers. According to them I can just throw my rubbish on the street and piss and crap there as well as I am only a tiny percentage of polluters. Honestly it makes no difference!

Bert

[DJDD]

i agree. since I have no kids it will not affect me in the long run. i could probably take 10 minute showers, too! still, i have friends with children so I do think I shoudl think about them.

whilst I have taken a big part in this thread and am firmly in favour of less damaging power sources (immediate and future damage) I have pretty much decided that nothing will come of it until we have either run out of coal and uranium or polluted the earth so much that everyone needs to wear a mask or lead pants!

[renormalised]

That's given 100% optimum figures, as per Bojan's post (and then only around high noon...so +- 1hour/day). That's also dependent on the full 1370W/M^2 being available all the time with solar cells at 10-20% efficiency collecting the sunlight. It's also dependent on a reliable 24/7, 365 days/year supply and storage. Plus it's also dependent on how much electricity is being consumed, not on the generating capacity, which what we're talking about.

In any case 800 average nuke reactors (600MW generating capacity) is only 480GW of capacity....the US generates 1030GW annually (or 4100TWH), so your calculations are out by at least a factor of 2.5 or more. For an ideal situation.

But being beside the point, those figures weren't mine, they were from the DoE in the US. So if they stuffed up, that's their fault.

[renormalised]

Heavy and poisonous!!!:):P

Uncomfortable as well and a nuisance to wash and iron:):P

[Kal]

Just realised then that I used China's electricity consumption (which is actually greater than the USA's by about 13%)

I don't understand where you are getting the 1030GW number from. 480GWx24x365=4204TWh/yr which is greather than China's, or USA's, annual electricity consumption.

[avandonk]

At least with lead pants Superman could not see your willy. When we were kids my brothers and I always wondered why Superman did not check out Lois Lane with his xray vision!
We figured out he did all the time but never let on.

Bert

[Kal]

Carl, I have searched the web and the US Department of Energy websites and I cannot find any reference to the study you mentioned.

Could you kindly provide a link.

[renormalised]

http://nextbigfuture.com/2011/01/china-will-exceeded-us-electricity.html

http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epa/epates.html

Your figures are old:)

[renormalised]

She wore lead undergarments:):P

[renormalised]

Here's an interesting graph from the EIA....

To think that most of this (65%) is coal generated and they wonder why we have global warming!!!!.

[renormalised]

Here's another couple of interesting sites to do with solar power....

http://www.landartgenerator.org/blagi/archives/127

http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=741

[renormalised]

It wasn't a study....it was a figure quoted in an article that was mentioned in the DoE. When I mean a few years back, it was sometime around 2006-2007. As I said, if it's wrong, then it's their problem. I can't find the article either, but if I do find it, I'll let you know. Looking at the link I posted in the previous post, what they may have confused was in fact the world figure for the US figure, but I do distinctly remember the comparison being made.

[Kal]

My figures use the exact same source as yours? What's your point?

(In case you don't understand - on the wiki page I linked click on the reference source and one of the domains you linked to above opens)

[ballaratdragons]

Here's our local attempt at making a start:
http://www.gizmodo.com.au/2009/11/ballarat-solar-park-is-14993-square-metres-of-solar-goodness/

[OICURMT]

I'd like to make a few observations...

1) Politics of greed. Everyone is guilty, and I mean everyone... why? See 2)
2) Ownership of the "big" companies. Citizen investors (i.e. you and me)
3) Corporations and government are made up of people, thus you are stating that no one gives a damn :rolleyes:
4) Solar Power is not "free", even if it is given away by the government. I pay WAY to much tax, which in turn is wasted by government. I'd rather keep more of my money and make my own decisions as to how to spend it... (thus, I confirm and affirm (1) to be true)... :P
5) The amount of energy required to make a solar panel does not pay back (from a greenhouse gas point of view) for 3 years.

Final point does not relate strictly to the use of solar, but to the realization that petroleum will ALWAYS have a place in society. Don't believe me? Then I'd suggest you look online for wooden keyboards, wooden tires and wooden shoes... Keyboards, tires and most shoes are made with petroleum by-products, along with an almost infinite amount of other "everyday" items.

OIC!
<disclaimer: I work for an Exploration and Production Company, the one mentioned as "etc etc" :lol: and have investments in all of the others mentioned, except ENI (parent of Agip)>

FYI (semi-interesting facts... or maybe not...): Caltex is a Brand name of Chevron, not a "Company" per se. Exxon is actually the ExxonMobil Corporation, who's roots date back to "Standard Oil" of the late 1800's.

[GrampianStars]

Ah... Flash ... ;)
NO GLARE at all. The mirrors are parabolic with the light focused to 1 point above (that 's where the massive amount of energy is collected)