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Old 12-02-2007, 02:15 PM
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okiscopey (Mike)
Rocky Peak Observatory

okiscopey is offline
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Kandos NSW
Posts: 536
Quote:
Originally Posted by Karls48 View Post
... solar and wind energy as proposed by many today’s coverts is a just pipe dream. What is my qualification to make such statement? I have been engineer running 2MW power generating facilities on one of the resort islands off the Barrier Reef for two and half years. I have worked on electrical power distributions networks in Europe and I have designed and installed self-sufficient solar systems on few farms here in Australia. ...
Thank goodness, I've been waiting for a power engineer to join the debate and tell it the way it is.

Uninformed opinion, even if held by 80% of the population and pushed by pseudo-environmental groups, will not change the physics and economics of large-scale power generation.

Incidentally, Karls48's dissertation above reminded me of a researcher I knew once who worked on solar cell development. As soon as they'd perfected a new, higher output cell, it was rushed over to the ammeter and the results recorded and published. They had to do it in a hurry because the cell's output dropped dramatically after creation (presumably an exponential curve like radioactive decay?). I don't know however if this applies to all types of cells, whether it was an exaggeration, or even if it applies to today's devices - just an illustration of the sort of thing you never read about in the newspapers.
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