Solar Arrays can supply U.S. with all Electrical Needs.

It has been determined that using current levels of Solar Technology that two 50 mile by 50 mile Solar Arrays based either in Nevada or Arizona and built just 3 to 5 feet off the ground can generate enough electricity to provide over 100% of the lower 48 States Electrical Needs.

Funny twist is that such Solar Arrays were in their planning stages when various Environmental Groups protesting the effects such an array would have upon various plant and animal life put o HOLD on the entire project.

AboveAlpha

 

As long as nobody in America has any plans to use electricity at night.

Seriously, while solar power is a perfectly viable part of our electricity generation structures, the idea that it (or any other single technology or scheme) is some magical solution to the entire issue is a foolish fantasy. If there was such an easy answer, it would have been done already.

 

The technology exists to build massive capacitors that can be used as a power storage system and this would be the way such a system would be designed but in all reality both Solar and Gas, Coal and Oil Electrical Generation Plants would be used as even if such Solar Arrays could only supply electricity for 12 hours a day...that would drastically cut our use of Fossil Fuels.

AboveAlpha

 

Abovealpha wrote: Solar Arrays can supply U.S. with all Electrical Needs.

Got a link to the source?

 

Yeah...bear with me....I read this in one of my Discover Magazines but I have not yet found a source.

AboveAlpha

 

OK...found it.

The entire State of California uses about 50,000 megawatt-hours of electricity per hour at peak time, and much less during off-peak hours: Sweltering California declares power emergency —Cal ISO expects record demand at 52,336 megawatts.
www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/2004-07-08_SUMMER_DEMAND.PDF size: 68 Kb
www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/2003-01-28_OUTLOOK.PDF size: 170 Kb
www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/peak_demand/2002-07-10_CHART.PDF size: 20 Kb

Suppose that California uses an average of 38,000 megawatt-hours of electricity per hour over a 24-hour period, then 24 hours x 38,000 megawatts = 912,000 megawatt-hours per day, multiplied by 365 = 333,880,000 megawatt-hours per year. This supposed average is too high because in 2005, California actually consumed 288,245,000 megawatt-Hours (MWh) for the entire year: www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/gross_system_power.html

A CSP farm large enough to capture the solar energy radiating on an area of land 100 miles long by 100 miles wide can produce about 50 times more electricity in a day than California consumes in a 24-hour period. For example, 50 x 912,000 = 45,600,000 megawatt-hours per day.

LINK....http://www.americanenergyindependence.com/solarenergy.aspx

AboveAlpha

 

they would be lucky if they got peak power 8 hours per day even using movable panels. Here is a link to a article that breaks down the math.

http://rimstar.org/blog/index.php/2010/12/09/can-100-miles-of-mirrors-solar-thermal-power-the-us

Only flaw in it I found is the author thinks that molten salt would last all night because it does not. 6 hours max and then it has to be kept in a molten state using gas burners until the sun gets in position to be usable again

 

That's 8 hrs less fossil fuel every day. So which is it? Do lefties want to use these supplemental power systems to help save the planet or not?

 

2,500 square miles? That is a whole bunch of solar panels.

 

So Solar Arrays can't supply the US with all it's electrical needs, which was my point.

We should be taking a much more holistic view of power generation (and use, if anything more important) but we also need a realistic and practical one too. All these hypothetical through experiments and interesting but they bare little relation to the practical realities of the situation and I think it's much more efficient to work up from where we actually are than work down from some "spherical chicken in a vacuum" concepts.

 

At what cost? Also, where is the electricity at night coming from? Even in Nevada or Arizona, in the winter time, the shortest day is only about 10 hrs. What do you do the other 14 hrs?

 

Coal plants and nuclear plants aren't good at "load following." They are best at a steady output rate. Oil is barely used for electrical generation. Gas can be used for "load following." Where in the world are those massive capacitors actually being used commercially?

 

Except on cloudy days, or at night.

 

the technologically aware would realize 1-energy can be converted and stored ...2-power demands drop at night...the solutions are there but political resistance from corporate entities (carbon based )who will lose profits if there is a large change to new technologies...

 

50x50 miles is a lot of environmental damage/disruption...divide that up into a number of smaller parcels and it would be more tolerable...

 

It's not this simple because solar voltaic panels take a lot of energy to construct and can last for only a few years at a time. They'll need to be regularly maintained and cleaned out in the desert as sand blows onto them. This would require them to be spaced out in such a way that it would be over 50 square miles. Then you have still other issues such as the heat generated by this many solar panels having an effect upon the local wildlife and the wildlife which passes over/through the area, possibly creating a "hot spot" that makes the solar panels wear out more quickly and greatly increasing the maintenance costs.

There's probably more challenges I'm not aware of. Such as what 50 square miles of solar voltaic cells will do to the market for silicon over the years. Then we have to consider how hard it would be to make energy storage facilities on a scale that can supply the entire country.

Long story short this idea is impossible.

 

50 x 50 square miles, times two such arrays, is 13 billion square meters. At peak 1 square meter can deliver about 200 Watts with current technology, so that's a cloud-free peak of 2600 gigawatts, times 8760 hours per year would be 22.7 trillion kWh at 100% capacity factor, compared to current actual US electricity use of 4 trillion kWh per year. Which means they're assuming a capacity factor of 17.6%, which is reasonable for solar.

The installed cost of that based on current prices ($2/W for utility scale) is $5.2 trillion. But that's a gross underestimate, because it does not include the cost of energy storage, which would be enormous in any all-solar grid. The plain fact is that it costs (on average) 4 cents to generate a kilowatt-hour of electricity, but it costs 38 cents (or more) to store that same kilowatt-hour.

Storage costs here are based on lead-acid batteries, still about the cheapest technology out there, where 1 kWh of batteries costs $150 and is good for 500 cycles before needing replacement. Storage cost is then $150/500 = $0.30, assuming an unachievable 100% round-trip efficiency; with a real-word 80% efficiency, cost would be 37.5 cents.

So how much battery do you need for the grid? Solar's dismal 18% capacity factor tells the story: it means that 82% of the grid power would be coming from storage, and only 18% would be coming from solar generation. Counting round-trip inefficiency, you would need 6 Watt-hours of battery storage for every Watt-hour of peak solar generation capacity. Or put it another way: at 18% capacity factor, the solar panels are working 100% of the time for 4 hours per day, and the remaining 20 hours a day the grid is battery-supplied. In order to charge those batteries, 82% of solar generation has to go into charging the battery, leaving 18% for supporting the grid. Since the solar capacity is 2600 GW, 458 GW will go to the grid and the rest to recharging. Which means those batteries will need 458 GW x 20 hours = 9160 GWh (9 billion kWh) of total capacity. And at $150/kWh, that will cost $1.35 trillion just for the batteries.

And you will have to replace that $1.35 trillion battery every 17 months.

The life of a solar panel isn't known for certain, but the National Renewable Energy Laboratory currently estimates 20 years. That's 10.6 battery replacements at $1.35 trillion each, plus the $5.2 trillion for the installed solar panels, for a total 20-year capital cost of $19.5 trillion.

Generating 4 trillion kWh per year for 20 years, or 80 trillion kWh total, capital cost for such a system would be 25 cents per kWh, assuming zero maintenance costs, zero operation cost, and zero systems cost: about 6 times higher than current generation cost (4 cents/kWh) with fossil fuels.

Now compare that to an all-nuclear grid. Nuclear can run 24 hours a day, so no storage is required. For a similar system, we would need 458 reactors of 1 GW each. The four AP1000 reactors currently being built in the US are coming in at $5.61 per Watt installed, and those reactors are designed to last 60 years. Total capital cost for an all-nuclear grid is therefore $2.6 trillion. But the lifetime being 60 years instead of 20, the total electricity generated would be 240 trillion kWh, meaning the capital cost would be 1.07 cents per kWh. Fuel costs would add 0.66 cents to that bringing the total to 1.73 cents per kWh, again counting zero for operation, maintenance, and systems costs.

So two fossil-free systems, one at 25 cents per kWh and one at less than 2 cents per kWh. And why is solar better?

 

Right, because we don't have any form of technology capable of saving electricity for future use.

 

surplus solar energy can also be used to convert water to hydrogen, which can burned in generators to produce power when needed...

 

Yes, but the round-trip efficiency is horrible: maybe 80% for the electrolysis step (if you're lucky) and 35% for the thermal conversion at the other end. Total round-trip efficiency is then a miserable 28%. You can improve that with fuel cells instead of thermal turbines, but their cost is astronomical.

 

HOLISTIC VIEW????

As in chanting and focusing on CRYSTALS and hope that they provide us Electricity???

Solar Power Arrays can without a doubt generate much more power than the U.S. uses in a day just within 12 hours of sunlight the issue is developing the capacitors and battery storage area to hold such power.

As well there are currently plans to make all roads and highways in the United States SOLAR ARRAYS in order to both generate electricity and as well to power any and all electric cars traveling upon them.

All such roads and sidewalks will be self heating in climates that have snow and this plan will be fully implemented as soon as 2036.

AboveAlpha

 

Capacitor and Battery storage.

AboveAlpha

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Such technology is being developed and it is not IF massive Solar Arrays will be built but WHEN.

AboveAlpha

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Again...that is what capacitors and batteries are for.

AboveAlpha

 

That was one plan.

I much more prefer the plan of making all roads and highways solar arrays which not only generate electricity for home use but as well will power electrical cars driving upon them and as well will be self heating to melt snow and ice on roads and sidewalks.

AboveAlpha

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Look into the currently RIGHT NOW being tested SOLAR ROADWAYS AND SIDEWALKS...that not only will generate all the electricity we need but as well will power the electrical cars driving on them and be self heating.

AboveAlpha

 

Because of what I do I can tell you with 100% CERTAINTY that the current existing state of Solar Technology is such that Solar Panels can convert sunlight to electricity at 3850% Greater than any currently on the market Solar Panel and such tech is advancing at 3 to 6 times it's current level of technology per year.

As an example in New England a company was testing SOLAR SHINGLES that are 2 Feet 6 Inches wide and 4 Feet long which were self heating and each had a built in capacitor.

Each Solar Shingle cost $32.80 if Government Discounts were taken into consideration and an average New England Home would need about 500 Shingles to roof the entire house.

At that cost of $16,400 for 500 Solar Shingles and a Government Installation Discount of $5000 for installation a total cost of $21,400 to roof an average home was greatly WORTH IT!!!

Not only would a Home Owner no longer have an electric bill they would also no longer have a Gas Bill or HOME HEATING BILL as all Oil and Gas Furnaces and Hot Water Heaters and Stoves are usually replaced with new High Efficient Electric Units.

As well SO MUCH electricity is generated by the Solar Shingles a Home Owner immediately begins selling ELECTRICITY back to the Company as they send all excess electricity generated back into the GRID.

Depending upon how how large a Home Owners Roof is....determines how quickly this roof pays for itself and as well a Home Owner NEVER AGAIN HAS TO WORRY ABOUT REPLACING THEIR SHINGLES OR ROOF!!

Unfortunately this Solar Shingle Company was BOUGHT OUT by a subsidiary company of what is believed to be EXXON/MOBIL although it cannot be definitively proven.

After this Solar Shingle Company was bought out the new company offered Solar Shingles for $190 PER SHINGLE and I have not heard anything about them since 2008..

AboveAlpha

 

The questions which are missing in this discussion need to ask what ultimately is our energy goal? Are we wanting to reduce bad pollution, and if so, by what percentage? Are we going to allow nuclear power generation growth? Coal is not only dirty but also finite. Should we have AC power transmission or HVDC power transmission? If coal fired energy is the 800 pound gorilla, yet coal is less expensive, then why can't we effectively scrub the dirty emissions? How much are we worried about cost? How much can we increase energy costs over the next couple of decades if necessary to introduce alternative forms of energy? Which forms of energy can actually service the peaks and valleys of electricity demand? Which environmental impacts are acceptable or not? US population is forecast to increase by about 90 million over the next 35 years...which energy sources allow easy expansion? Are we applying enough R&D funding to discover other alternative energy systems?

For example, it's a waste of time if Americans will not allow the proliferation of nuclear generated power. I think we're finally building a few more nuclear plants but will Americans allow 50-100 more of them? Probably not? Just a single nuclear mishap in the USA will shut down nuclear forever, or at least bring it to a snail's crawl...so this means risk of sustainability.

The comments in this thread are great! But I'm still wondering exactly what it is we are trying to solve?