Why solar energy will never fulfill our national energy needs!

Do you want to have a serious discussion or not? I'll try....it wouldn't be primary it would be there to back up the solar for when they sun doesn't shine and whatever storage you have runs out. You've got to be able to provide all that power when the solar isn't working. But what happens when the solar IS working, you have a full scale, full capacity (it has to meet the 130% of demand) power plant just sitting there idle. Do you realize how expensive that would be to have it just sit there not producing product? And no there are not way to expensive as in an expense when they are running, they in fact make money. And can do so 24/7.

See above. Doesn't matter if they are existing or new. No company can make money by having HUGE capital investments sitting idle.

What about the employees to run the coal fire or natural gas plant? What do they do when the plant isn't running? You're going to pay them to sit around and do make work?

Business 101

 

Nope. They just show that's it's even more efficient in sunny climates. I'm not surprised you extended false conclusions beyond the data. That's what fossil fuel addicts do.

 

I think like anything in this world, and thanks to Moore's Law as the technology improves and the cost goes down it will be far more viable to Americans, especially those out in southwestern states. Also for something environmentally friendly to do well, there always has to be a cost motive to it. Take recycling for example, I remember back in the 90s as a kid growing up recycle this recycle that, it was a big deal and now its just mostly a thing people do now. It helps reduce cost, people get paid for it, and it helps out the environment. Same with hybrids, hybrids and the like will be the most prevalent vehicles 20 years from now thanks to cost going down, tech getting better, and people realizing that over time it is a very good investment, environment be (*)(*)(*)(*)ed.

 

One linked to the annual solar output and the other referenced just solar panels NOT solar thermal. How exactly would solar panels work at night? Do they lose efficiency in the cold? How much does harsh weather reduce their working life span? Without knowing the answers to questions like this, no more tax dollars should be spent on the New Edsel's.

 

I'd like a link to it reducing costs. I think people just got used to paying more, that's all. I recycle plastic and aluminum cans all the time just to get some of my money back.

 

Solar hot water isn't expensive.. 90% of the homes in Israel have it.. Its now law in Hawaii.

 

Yes.. I know.. I have never lived in Minnesota... but there are solar applications in Norway and Germany..

 

California is a broken state. And most of the citizens there live in a state of constant denial and NIMBY.

There are a lot of wind plants in SoCal. And I have diven many times through some massive wind farms, Palm Springs and Tehachapi Pass being big ones. But it is like every time a new one is proposed, Environmentalists scream it will impact on this butterfly and that bird.

And in the Mojave Desert, you do have Solar Power also, the 9 giant SEGS Power Plants. But all of these combined provide only a small amount of the power needed. All of the MEGS plants combined only make 350 megawattts.

And ther daily demand in LA alone is around 24 gigawatts. So 9 plants combined provide less then 1% of the power needed for just 1 city.

 

Simple solution; use and waste less energy.

 

Expensive and foolish for part time novelty power isn't it.

 

Los Angeles has a population of over 17 million people.

Sorry, but that is a fantasy land approach (like most things in California). Your solution would either be to force them to use less power (Greyout Davis tried that and got recalled), or maybe cut off all their water and power and foce everybody to leave the city.

Not gonna happen. And Power can't really be "wasted". It is either used when generated, or lost forever. You can't just "save" electricity and pull it out when needed. Even if routine power useage is lowered by 10%, you still have the times where useage peaks 10-20% above normal useage (extreme hot and cold weather for example). So you have to keep the average peak flow at around 24 gigawatts, with a maximum capacity of around 30 gigawatts.

 

......and this of course is the reason Regressives continue to deny there is a problem at all and advocate to do nothing as the cure.

 

Power generating plants are generally built to 130% of capacity. THAT is your backup, NOT a totally separate plant sitting there idle.

So you are going to build a huge coal or natural gas power plant and just have it sitting there idle for just in case you need it as a backup?

And the investors who are going to pay for this are that stupid? Any business that puts that much capital into a plant that is going to sit there idle will not be in business very long.

 

Bluesguy...lol... Always about scaring people with the idea of building a coal plant to make energy!

 

I continue to agree with Bluesguy that building coal plants to produce energy is "a stupid investment".

And he keeps using the word "huge" in reference to a backup source of power for a main source like solar thermal. "So much expense just to make a backup power source"...ignoring the savings that the majority of power produced with free solar thermal fuel would offset that idea.

And he also ignores that solar thermal plants are so versitile, they can literally be set up anywhere the sun shines for a significant part of the year. Even if the sun shined only for a total of three months, that three months of energy we would not have to produce with carbon. HUGE energy savings if you add it up across the US each year!!

And if you locate plants in sunnier locations, the savings just go up from there. Imagine cutting our national energy use even just in half over a year's time! WOW.

Yep, put those solar thermal plants next to existing carbon ones and we'll be energy independent in no time at all. We have enough coal and natural gas to flip the middle finger to foreign energy if we just marry it to solar thermal steam generators.

 

Have you seen how much Solar Thermal power stations produce?

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

I have driven by several of the SEGS plants. They are truely massive operations, and produce a relatively small amount of power. Covering over 1,600 acres, they produce only a small amount of the power needed for Southern California. In fact, they would not even provide enough power for the nearby Antelope Valley by themselves.

And with one of the sites costing $90 million to build and $3 million a year to operate, this is hardly "free energy".

This is among many other reasons I heap scorn on the modern craze of "green energy". Because almost all of them are nothing but shams and scams.

If you want to know what real "Green Energy" is like, go visit Idaho. They have been producing green energy for decades. Just one plant alone there has been generating 391 megawatts, 100% green since 1967.

 

I know right? The pseudo-solar thermal plants that folks like Brightsource [partners with Chevron..go figure..lol..] have designed...with flat mirrors reflecting on a very distant tower way the hell above, in some sort of ramshackle tribute to a gigantic mock-up of a true solar concentrating parabolic dish...hilarious, right?..lol..

No, I'm talking about the tube type located within mere feet instead of fractions of miles from concave parabolic focusers. As different from "today's solar thermal" as night is from day..

Look at the diagram again.

 

You are indeed correct, Mushroom!

Especially when you say, "Covering over 1,600 acres, they produce only a small amount of the power needed for Southern California. In fact, they would not even provide enough power for the nearby Antelope Valley by themselves."

 

I see you are unable to deal with the issue of being able to supply full power to the grid when the often times solar cannot and have nothing of substance to add to this conversation.

Oh well

 

You are totally misquoting me and I respectfully request you cease and diciest.

It is a stupid investment to build one to backup a solar plant in that it will sit there idle during the times the solar facility is producing power.

That you apparently cannot understand the economics is not my problem and you have yet to explain your alternative to the problem posed.

 

You are indeed correct, Bluesguy.

Many of the liberals in this group have absolutely no appreciation and absolutely no understanding of a corporate "profit and loss" statement.

If Obama and his team adopt the "green" energy ideas the liberals in this group think are so great and wonderful, his corporate "profit and loss" statement will show all LOSS and no PROFIT!

The liberals in our group love “solar energy” collection systems, but they do not have the slightest idea of how to make them profitable. By that's OK. They will just charge their economic losses off to the U.S. taxpayer!

 

To answer your OP question; because we have some darkness in every 24-hour period.

It is unlikely that solar energy can power a steel factory.

Thermal-solar, with mirrors to greatly heat a contained salt solution, in which this heat will sustain itself in darkness, providing energy 24/7, comes closer to fulfilling power utility needs.

But the bottom line is two-fold; First, solar energy, during some demands, can be 100%, but more likely needs to be considered supplemental energy. And second, knowing the Sun is a free energy source, it seems unfathomable that we don't take full advantage of this potential...

 

Just terrible this solar therma!..lol..

 

Cessna says:

Golly, you mean an employee would occasionally have to clean off a parabolic mirror? Egads! Or they'd have to be equipped with standard mundane sun-tracking devices? The horror! With moving parts that wear out??? You mean, like all coal and nuclear plants have anyway with their super-complex and expensive components?..lol..

I think even though these "horrible & super expensive" "flaws" exist...I think the FREE FUEL in superheated steam these plants provide will more than mitigate this phantasmagorically-impossible scenario of dirty mirrors and moving parts!



If this really, truly is the "opposition" stance to solar thermal, anyone with half of a brain reading this can cipher that BigOil and BigNuke are shaking in their shoes that the beautiful "free steam" princess has been released from the dungeon they've kept her hidden in all these years.. They're quick to point out the freckles on her lithe, slim 36-24-36 body and aquiline features to detract from the boils, snaggle teeth and cottage-cheese thighs so obvious in their own forms..