Solar panel made with ion cannon is cheap enough to challenge fossil fuels

Post by robomartin » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 8:47 PM UTC

ars wrote: post #85

robomartin wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would start with better home design and energy efficiency enhancing improvements before throwing a Carnot-limited solution at the problem. Last summer I ran an experiment. We live in a two story house in California. We usually see low temperatures at night (sub 70deg F) and highs in the range of 105+ degF during the day. At night I opened all of the windows downstairs and used a small industrial fan (about 2000CFM)…

That only works in desert type environments (i.e. little to no cloud cover) where the temperature goes up and down each day. Where I live if it gets hot it says hot, day and night. And most of the country is the same. Although, obviously, incremental improvements are great even if only some people can use them.

Post by ars » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 8:51 PM UTC

ender7 wrote: post #39

drucken wrote: post #37

It is not clear if glass as a protective cover is still used or required for final production of solar cells made with this process. Does anyone know?

Almost certainly. You could use another material, such as some clear plastic or epoxy, but the idea is still the same (and glass has the most desirable transmittance properties I believe).

Post by krasin » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 9:05 PM UTC

cma wrote: post #86

jstalin wrote: post #73

From the literature I've seen, the realistic maximum amount of solar energy that can be produced through photovoltaic cells is about 40-50 watts per square meter. Although solar is exciting, there's just no way it can be used to replace fossil fuels, no matter how cheap it gets to manufacture. It'll have to be a combination of renewables (why not more hydroelectric power) and greater efficiency (like LED's).

Not really a big crisis; we could shut down every nuclear plant in the US today if people switched from drying clothes in an electric dryer to hanging them outside. We live in a time of absolute plenty.

Post by danielharan » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 9:37 PM UTC

greedo wrote: post #110

danielharan wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only we're doubling production of wind turbines every 2-3 years. With each doubling, prices come down, as they do with every other manufactured artifact from computers to TVs to washing machines. Look out for 35 years. Is it still minuscule?

Considering how unpopular wind energy is in some areas due to either killing a large number of raptors, or "despoiling" the view from Martha's Vineyard, I doubt the production will continue to double indefinitely.

Post by count » Tue, Mar 13, 2012, 9:58 PM UTC

rmc wrote: post #15

saalweachter wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or only burning coal at night. Once solar is significantly cheaper than coal and demand pricing kicks in, a lot of time-shifting of energy use could occur. Right now, night-time electricity is cheaper because demand is lower at night, but if the supply of daylight electricity increases dramatically, any activity which currently benefits from cheap nighttime electricity could be shifted back to the daylight hours. Dat…

I'm now thinking of amazon EC2's 'spot instances' where you launch an instance, do some computation then shut down, but only if the price per hour is less than some choosen point. (Basically a stock market for computation). If solar took off, i can see a correlation between price per hour and sunny days, as more machines are turned on when it's cheaper to run, hence increasing supply, and decreasing price. :P