Is Solar Power Really Practical?
Harnessing The Sun's Energy Is Becoming More Popular - But Experts Question Its High Cost
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Solar Energy Pays Back
Solar power is being harnessed to power more American homes and businesses than ever before. And as Bill Whitaker reports, the high price of solar energy is offset by its long term paybacks.
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Eye To Eye: Solar Power
Solar power consumer Diana Ungerleider talks with Bill Whitaker about the savings she's incurred by using solar energy in her home. Ungerleider also discusses her motivation for going green.
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Diana Ungerleider put solar panels on her roof last year, and now her electric meter is spinning - backward. But despite radically lower energy bills, she may have to wait about a decade for a real financial pay-off. (CBS)
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“It’s almost like putting 200,000 refrigerators … in one place,” said John Blazevich, CEO of Contessa Premium Foods.
And it’s powered primarily by the sun. An array of paper-thin solar panels rolled across a roof the size of two football fields has helped cut Contessa's energy use, CBS News correspondent Bill Whitaker reports.
“In half, which is significant for an operation that requires so much energy,” Blazevich said. “It can be done and we did it.”
Diana Ungerleider put solar panels on her roof last year. They not only got her meter spinning, but, as she says: “it’s actually spinning backwards, meaning that the electricity being generated ... is feeding back into the grid."
But her head spins every time she gets an electric bill.
“So, last year you paid $220 for a two-month period?” Whitaker asked.
“Right,” Ungerleider said.
“And this year only $14?” Whitaker asked.
“Right,” she said. “I’ve saved, like, I think, over $1,000 in one year.”
Known for fun in the sun, California more than all the other states combined, is now putting the sun to work.
At a Napa winery, the sun ripens the grapes and provides all the electricity.
“This is going to become a launching pad,” said Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Schwarzenegger recently announced the most ambitious program - Southern California Edison, the region's largest utility, installing solar cells on 65 million square feet of commercial rooftops over the next five years.
“When it’s complete, it will produce enough power for 162,000 homes,” he said.
Much of this sun worship is pie in the sky, say critics like U.C. Berkeley's Severin Borenstein.
“Solar energy is definitely not the magic bullet for high energy costs,” said Borenstein. “Right now, solar photo voltaic power is very, very expensive compared not just to fossil fuels, but compared to the other renewable sources that are out there."
And, as Ungerleider says, that’s the biggest downside. She paid $50,000 for her solar power.
But, she says, “my system will probably pay for itself after about 10 years. And after that, it’s just free energy.”
Solar and green technologies added 15 percent to the $40 million cost of the new Contessa food plant.
“I feel the smart businessman would be justified doing this, ‘cause it’s going to help them in the long run,” Blazevich said. “And it’s going to help the planet.”
Rising demand for solar technology should bring prices down eventually, but for now it helps to have green in your heart and in your pocket.
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See all 51 CommentsPosted by ubrew12 at 07:26 PM : Jul 07, 2008 "
So how do you lose thousands of miles of coastline "in the near future" How much have you lost so far ?
Read Jan 2008 Scientific American Magazine; for a proposal to build a solar power plant in the waste desert areas of the american southwest. We can have a new electricity solar plant and it only requires 30,000 square miles od desert wasteland; well theres'' that extra solar heat/steam plant that adds another 16,ooo squ miles.
Oh almost forgo; 30,000 square miles is exactly the size of that other desert wasteland in the news; often called ANWR; but they only need about 2400 acres of that to drill for oil. For the soalr plant; they need evberys single square foot of it, including having to kick out the millions of people who live there, and close to to human visitors for ever (too vulnerable to someone throwing rocks at the solar panels.
Dr Fred Singer asked"who''s going to clean 30,000 square miles of solar panels every now and then.
Waht balderdash saying solar is green.
Well his wife wrote a dull book about that.
30,000 sq miles = 10,237 GW of electricity from solar at 10% conversion efficiency, 0.85 W/in2 sun power.
Translation for you: *** are you talking about?! Do you even know yourself?
Wilson showed that Saddam hadn''t been trying to purchase yellowcake from Nigeria. That was a central contention of Bush''s State of the Union address and Bush had already been told it wasn''t certain. When Wilson outed Bush the Bush team retaliated. You know this, so why toss bvllsh*t on the rest of us? Is it just something you''ve gotten used to doing?
I am a strong supporter of solar electricity and would get the panels if I could afford them, but I know it would be for the greater good of the community rather than and personal saving.
You''re kidding, right?
Why would the US solar industry be different from every other US industry. In the US, demand only increases prices... to increase profits. It''s the American way.
Every time I read about a new breakthrough in the renewable energy industry, all I can think about is how much more the CEO of that company will get paid, insteas of how much cheaper energy will be. That would take faith in America, and I''m running out of that.
There are several companies closing in on the 50 percent efficiency mark in sterling solar generators... much more efficient then even the most expensive solar cell tech. and it''s a much simpler tech (in comparison).
One more time Earth, say it with me....
STERLING ENGINE!
Here%u2019s an idea: Put the existing low-efficiency solar cells in orbit as solar collection stations (and create plenty of high-tech jobs in the process), harvest 95% of the available power (no atmospheric filtration), beam it down to Earth as microwaves (there are many 1000%u2019s of square miles of unusable land just in the US southwest that would make dandy microwave antenna farms), convert it to electricity at these farms and then inject it into the existing power grid. You get limitless power & it''s non-polluting, other than the residual heat from the devices consuming the power. Now you have all the power you could possible need and you could power your electrical devices for literally pennies, even considering the subsidies required to bootstrap the entire conversion process.
Oh yeah %u2013 convert your home illumination to 12VDC & LEDs - save bunches of $$.
Oh, wait - this will never work cuz the oil companies (or the totally honest, completely uncorrupt government) won''t make any money off of it. Oops - I have to go now - the assassins are at the door to kill me for being an iconoclast.
Not original - proposed IN DETAIL by Jerry Pournelle in his "High Frontiers" series of essays.
It is not that solar power is too expensive, it is that we do not calculate the true cost of technologies that produce pollution and greenhouse gasses.
Ignore all posts by that user.
As a general guide, the only way to defeat SPAM is to NEVER, without exceptions, purchase anything as a result of SPAM.
Once SPAMmers realize their efforts are a waste of time, and that people will deliberately avoid their products because of SPAM, only then with SPAM stop.
Convert now,,and save some bucks for ourselves. If we all had solar power, look at all the power we would/could generate? Hell might be able to force out the utility companies.
At that rate it would take 50 years.
2006 number of housing units 127 million
times $30,000 for approx 3KW grid tie system
equals $4 trillion i.e. 4xthe iraq war cost (currently).
This is excluding saving due to mass production govt. backed endeavour (but knowing govt contractors a la $600 toilet seats)?
This would lead to complete energy independence. Imagine the savings to the USA and its people it would usher in undreamed of prosperity.
OK say we phase it in, right now for the cost of the Iraq war energy needs would be reduced 25%. That means all that money the citizenry spend on their electric bills would be a continuous ongoing consumer stimulus package, instead of going to rich oil potentates (yeah I know a lot of electric is coal genned, so imagine them green with envy).
Sure industry needs energy they can still get it from indigenous oil and coal and slowly as in the article they can also be converted too.
The flaw in the argument is of course the lack of imagination and will and the entrenched lobbies.
It would be affordable if the government for which we spend so much of our hard earned dollars gave us something in return instead of contrived wars costing trillions of longterm dollars.
This switchover should be subsidized if not paid for in full by our tax dollars- instead we let the oil companies walk away with trillions while they are taxed at a rate from 20 years ago. That''s quite fair you know, especially since our government is run by oil companies and lobbyists. When the oil companies can own the solar technology then we''ll see some movement in this area.
This nation and it''s leaders have learned a lot, a lot from Nero''s Rome.
Incidently every second the sun outputs enough energy that would supply the entire earths need for 37 billion years. Ergo: god has provided: there is no shortage, the only shortage is the will to fight the manipulators of scarcity logic, the fiends who would take away our freedoms and return us to practice animal enslavement, just so that they can retain their vain glories. Amen Jack.
A copy of my paper, which was presented to the 33 rd IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists Conference held in San Diego May 11-16, 2008, can be downloaded from the following site:
ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/4059527/4059868/04060199.pdf
Ed Simburger
A copy of my paper, which was presented to the 33 rd IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists Conference held in San Diego May 11-16, 2008, can be downloaded from the following site:
ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/4059527/4059868/04060199.pdf
A copy of my paper, which was presented to the 33 rd IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists Conference held in San Diego May 11-16, 2008, can be downloaded from the following site:
ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/4059527/4059868/04060199.pdf
A copy of my paper, which was presented to the 33 rd IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists Conference held in San Diego May 11-16, 2008, can be downloaded from the following site:
ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/4059527/4059868/04060199.pdf
And all of this doesn''t even take into account the fact that photovoltaic power is intermittent. It doesn''t work at night or when it is cloudy. These sorts of grid tie systems don''t have to take that into account because they use NG or coal power at night. If batteries or some other form of energy storage were included in the price, then the cost would be several times as much.
Another problem is that peak supply only coincides with peak demand in the Southwest. In the Southeast it is often cloudy and elsewhere peak demand is at night for heating.
And no one has taken into account the interest on a $50,000 loan.
I have seriously considered a photovoltaic system, and once you take into account all the drawbacks it becomes obvious that generating electricity with PV is like driving a Bentley. It is cool and a great status symbol for the well off, but it isn%u2019t realistic for the average person.
We just spent $1.5 trillion in Iraq so that ExxonMobil could have a no-bid contract to exploit their oil, and THAT''s not subsidizing? Over the years, the U.S. government has spent $1 trillion on nuclear fission research (for energy, not bombs, bombs was several more trillion), and THAT''s not subsidizing? Time and again, money for alternative energy research can''t be found, they are told: make it in the ''free'' world. There''s nothing ''free'' about your world. But go ahead and drive your SUV and think you made that choice all on your own. Several billion dollars in SUV advertising over the years says something different. Spend $600 billion a year on the ''free market'' for weapons systems, to protect yourself from a handful of bedouins armed with box cutters. ''Free market''? You''re being gamed.
Evidently you do not live in an area where energy conservation is very important. Southern California Edison has an inverted rate schedule where the more you use the more you pay for each KWH. Southern California Edison allows each homeowner to purchase about 350 KWH at their lowest tier rate of $0.13 per KWH. Once you reach 200% of that amount your rate per KWH increases to $0.32 per KWH. Thus if you lived in Southern California your electric bill would have been approximately $1300.00 for the 4660 KWH that you used. My total subsidy was around $21,000.00 making the total cost of the system about $50,000.00. The price of a new BMW of Mercedes. As for the comparison with the stock market I was trying to make the point that if you had to rely on the stock market to generate the same amount of money that would have been required you would need a significantly larger investment even without the subsidy. By the way the major part of the subsidy ($16,000.00) is supported by ratepayers through the California Energy Commission as a capacity charge against what it would cost to install peaking capacity on the Edison grid. Finally I have published this information without any grant on my own at my own expense.
any other source.
Not everyone wants to be threatened with getting shot for refusing to fund government-led projects -- no matter how good they are -- they are nonconsensual, period. If a program is enacted by violence, then I is believed by some that we will have Soviet-style failure. If that concern means nothing to you, then surely yours also means nothing. Good luck. Our environment can be protected by free enchange. Violent threats by greeny liberals will only make things worse. Those who think that is untrue will only cement further into place the behaviors of irresponsible people who really will damage the enviroment whilst blindly believing protection is simply the ''goverment''s job''. Government has failed. Wise and voluntary consumerism is our only chance.
Posted by dmw1167 at 11:19 AM : Jul 08, 2008
You''re right. However, I think what this article demonstrates is a major shift in energy priorities and not just demonstrating how much it costs. Hopefully this major shift will increase motivation and speed up the tech development.
Just because Rome wasn''t built in a day doesn''t mean you quit building Rome. Same thing here; just because the technology for cheap and clean energy hasn''t been fully realized doesn''t mean you quit or transfer your resources and manpower somewhere else.
America used to be the country of technological and social innovation. Unfortunately, that has been long gone due to the overall laziness of the general American population who can be simply described as ''If I can''t get it tomorrow, it''s just not worth trying to get.''
Just consider the following, folks:
The primary cost of solar panels is the energy cost. The materials are Silicon, which is basically SAND, and steel, which is basically DIRT (esp. Red Dirt). Put energy into SAND and DIRT, and you get solar panels. Then there''s the energy cost of transportation and installation.
So, WHY ARE SOLAR PANELS EXPENSIVE?? The energy itself should be cheap, if its SOLAR!! The reason solar panels are expensive is because there''s been no government-sponsored (socialist) ''Manhattan'' prject to develop autonomous solar panel producing plants that sit in the desert, scoop up abundant quantities of sand and dirt, absorb abundant quantities of the suns energy, and poop out solar panels. Why has there been no such project? Because the power-money is on oil and nuclear. It doesn''t want widescale adoption of solar. It just spent $1.5 trillion of YOUR tax dollars taking over the worlds second largest proven oil reserves, and it doesn''t like competition.
ENERGY is the primary ''cost'' of producing solar panels, and a solar panel producing plant comes with its own source of energy: the sun. Its that simple.
I think nuclear should be doubled in America. However, a nuclear power plant is god''s gift to terrorists. And there''s the waste issue.
Is Solar Power Really Practical?
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They said electricity would never be really practical because of the cost to run power lines to each house and the cost of wiring houses.
Telegraph then telephone service was never going to be practical due to the thousands of miles of line needed to be strung.
Same for municipal water, sewer, and storm drainage.
And lets not forget the boondoggle that the trans-continental railway was, I mean the cost of supplying water and coal to trains trying to travel all those thousands of miles will make it to expensive.
Point is, nothing new was ever inexpensive and practical.
Problem is, today unless something can show instant profit for a company no one wants to invest in large enough scale manufacturing to reduce the cost. The days of a company (and its stockholders)looking forward 10-20 years is over, profit NOW is the watchword.
Then there is the problem with location. Those in the northern states have short days and long winter nights when there is little sun for the panels when electricity is most needed, for heating, lighting and drying clothes. Places like the Sacramento valley can have pea soup fogs that can last for days.
For those living in Arizona with a large, flat roof it will be a great idea, but it makes it unfair to people living in other parts of the country if these people would be the only ones able to take up any government subsidies.
Solar power supplies enough energy to replace all fossil fuels and nuclear used in the world, including in this nation.
If 100 square miles of desert can turn sunshine into al the energy produced by all the power plants in the country, as is known, then we could shutdown all the coal plants and nuclear plants. Does not this have some value besides straight market trade value for just the energy unit?
If we could use another piece of desert to manufacture hydrogen from sunshine, and eliminate all the imported fuel used for cars, trucks, planes, and other transportation, wouldn''t this have a value beyond its straight market value of energy unit?
We live in a world that cries out about burning oil and climate change, but then do not have real value for those things when presented with other solutions.
Does having an abundance of energy, not shortage, of pure clean renewable energy, that could propel an economic growth surge, that we don''t have to pull from other nations, have some sort of value beyond the BTU per dollar that oil presents?
Wind, tide and nuclear are all more practical. Powering the entire country from the SW US would not work because of transmission losses. It could be done, but it couldn''t compete with other carbon free power sources.
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