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Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

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Re: Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

#111

Post by natmaka »

jacquesm wrote: post #78
kjksf wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that's the reason then those people are misinformed. Coal and gas plants are closing because they cannot compete on price with solar/wind + battery storage. The cost advantage is not true everywhere but the future is clear. Coal and gas will not become cheaper. Solar and wind is most expensive today it'll ever be. Storage in particular is so early in the cycle that we can expect the cost will drop at least in half…

> Storage in particular is so early in the cycle that we can expect the cost will drop at least in half. We've barely started making battery storage, the industry has 100x growth ahead. You can add at least two more zeros there, and possibly three or more. Storage right now is mostly dams and all the easy places have been done. Battery storage is really at the proof of concept state and if you take hydro out of the e…

A continental-scale mix (wind, solar...) is an efficient way to reduce the impact of intermittency on electricity production, and therefore storage ( https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/180592/european-cooperation-... ).

V2G ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle-to-grid ) and gas turbines burning green hydrogen (generated by water electrolysis using over-produced electricity) are ramping up.

Re: Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

#112

Post by hef19898 »

jacquesm wrote: post #101
hef19898 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good news! And since our house is pretty much running north-south, with an unobstructed view of the sun until around, say, mid-afternoon, the aide of our roof facing east should be quite suitable (to get more sun on it, we'd have to remove all the trees, moat of which are 30+ years old, something we don't want to do). One day, there will panels on that roof!

Neat, if you need any mounting tips let me know, I've had a few 'trial-and-error' runs at it.

as things are, that'll take a while (as in years!), but I'll come back to it!

Re: Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

#113

Post by jacquesm »

wkat4242 wrote: post #105
jacquesm wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And Windscale (whitewashed to 'Sellafield') and an endless series of near-catastrophes.

Oh yeah totally, they had a meltdown too. Though it was an idiotic operation at that time, with such a cavalier attitude to safety that I should hope will not be repeated in this day and age. They even opposed the air filters that were introduced anyway and reduced a lot of the contamination during the meltdown. I didn't remember to mention it because it was not an energy generation installation that melted down but…

In NL we apparently almost had a major incident at Petten.

https://www.trouw.nl/nieuws/bijna-meltdown-kernreactor-pette...

And that's the one that is public, there is at least one more that is still under wraps and possibly more than that. Nuclear is only as safe as the people running it and that is a major issue even before you bring in economics. You can't treat safety as a cost in installations like these and inevitably that's what happens. What I also find disingenuous is that in calculating the cost of electricity production from nuclear power capex required for the eventual dismantling isn't taken into account at all, and those costs are inevitably massive.

Re: Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

#114

Post by jacquesm »

natmaka wrote: post #111
jacquesm wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Storage in particular is so early in the cycle that we can expect the cost will drop at least in half. We've barely started making battery storage, the industry has 100x growth ahead. You can add at least two more zeros there, and possibly three or more. Storage right now is mostly dams and all the easy places have been done. Battery storage is really at the proof of concept state and if you take hydro out of the e…

A continental-scale mix (wind, solar...) is an efficient way to reduce the impact of intermittency on electricity production, and therefore storage ( https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/180592/european-cooperation-... ). V2G ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle-to-grid ) and gas turbines burning green hydrogen (generated by water electrolysis using over-produced electricity) are ramping up.

There is a good chance that with present day technology we could satisfy all of our energy needs using HVDC transmission lines. The main problem is that these are going to be easy infrastructure to attack in case of war or through terrorism.

Re: Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

#115

Post by tpm »

extraduder_ire wrote: post #84
tpm wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Millions? The number of daily non-compliant cars entering the ULEZ zone went from 36k in March 2019 to 12k in December 2020 according to Wikipedia. I seriously doubt the expansion did hit millions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra_Low_Emission_Zone

I think the implication is that wherever you have your car, it's worth less because it costs money to drive it in london, which directly affects its resale value. Pretty indirect though.

Sure, but that also applies only to pre-Euro 6 diesel cars, so pretty old anyway.

Re: Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

#116

Post by littlestymaar »

hef19898 wrote: post #92
stinos wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair enough perhaps, but in any case: please you point us to the numbers for that? Seeing the annual output of a typcial rather small 5kW peak home PV installation in Western Europe or even Denmark, it just seems unlikely that it would not offset whatever emissions it takes during its mining/production/shipment/installation during its lifetime.

Helsinki is around, judging from looking at a chart on a phone screen, 20-30% more expensive than Munich per kWh produced using solar.. And still, Helsinki still is cheaper by a factor of roughly 2 than the average spot market kWh prices in 2022. I linked to the source in one of my other comments. Also, Finland installed a ton of solar lasr year, so I guess if someone is doing sometjing someone else claims is impossi…

> Helsinki is around, judging from looking at a chart on a phone screen, 20-30% more expensive than Munich per kWh produced using solar.. And still, Helsinki still is cheaper by a factor of roughly 2 than the average spot market kWh prices in 2022.

The price doesn't have anything to do with the carbon footprint though…

> Also, Finland installed a ton of solar lasr year, so I guess if someone is doing sometjing someone else claims is impossible, it is possible regardless of what people say and believe.

Sure it is possible to install solar in Finland, if you're a politician and you want to do a PR move it's probably even a good idea, but it's not for producing electricity.

Re: Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

#117

Post by littlestymaar »

hef19898 wrote: post #55
littlestymaar wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll bite: the problem is that renewable in itself doesn't mean decarbonation: if you're importing solar panels built with Chinese coal and deploy them in Europe / Northern US, you're not actually decarboning anything, and instead you're increasing the carbon footprint but move it abroad. So there are things that are not just “not perfect” but actually harmful, and you can't just blindly deploy “not perfect” things.…

You zave no idea about energy consumption along a supply chain, if you actually believe any of this.

> You zave no idea about energy consumption along a supply chain, if you actually believe any of this.

This has nothing to to with supply chain, but with the fact that the Nederlands and Seattle aren't especially sunny places…

Re: Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

#118

Post by rypskar »

littlestymaar wrote: post #70
V__ wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not, it's not even close. It's better by a factor of 10 to 20. [1] [1] https://energy.utexas.edu/news/nuclear-and-wind-power-estima...

Your figures have nothing to do with deploying solar panels in northern US / Europe. These are average numbers, that includes the panels deployed in Arizona or Australia. Solar is a good idea when you put in it the right place (like a desert), but not when you put in in the British Isles or in Denmark, that's the point I'm making.

>>right place (like a desert)

The panels are less efficient when it is hot, so at summer Denmark is the right place. They are even using solar on Svalbard [0] with good results 9 months a year

[0]https://nordregioprojects.org/blog/2019/11/28/archipelago-of...

Re: Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

#119

Post by hef19898 »

littlestymaar wrote: post #116
hef19898 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Helsinki is around, judging from looking at a chart on a phone screen, 20-30% more expensive than Munich per kWh produced using solar.. And still, Helsinki still is cheaper by a factor of roughly 2 than the average spot market kWh prices in 2022. I linked to the source in one of my other comments. Also, Finland installed a ton of solar lasr year, so I guess if someone is doing sometjing someone else claims is impossi…

> Helsinki is around, judging from looking at a chart on a phone screen, 20-30% more expensive than Munich per kWh produced using solar.. And still, Helsinki still is cheaper by a factor of roughly 2 than the average spot market kWh prices in 2022. The price doesn't have anything to do with the carbon footprint though… > Also, Finland installed a ton of solar lasr year, so I guess if someone is doing sometjing someon…

Solar, once installed, has close to zero CO2 emissions (maintenance being the only source). And it is absolutely possible, and done. Not by politicians, but by people investing in the projects. And those expect, and get, returns. Funny, how otherwise reasonable people insist to argue against reality...

Disclaimer: Obviously, installing PV around the arctic circle is better during summer than winter...

Re: Unfounded concerns about photovoltaic toxicity and waste slowing decarbonization

#120

Post by okr »

theK wrote: post #20
hannob wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is certainly true, but it's not a full explanation. I recently was at an information event from our local electricity provider about wind energy projects. And there are those people... There was a conversation going on like: "The people I talked to don't want these things." Event moderator: "What are the reasons?" Guy: "They simply don't want them." And I am pretty sure that was no fossil fuel lobbyist. It was j…

I have a pet theory about that. The theory is that it is not the facts or the topic of Eco-Things. I think generally we are at a point where it is too easy for normal people to be against things and eco friendly things are just the lowest hanging fruit. Normal people nowadays are much more stressed with the world at large, overstimulated by doomscrolling all night, obesse or unhealthy, locked in some financial treadm…

It is easy to judge other people, why they have a nimby opinion. Show me your property, if it has windmills or photovoltaic on them. Then it would be an intellectually honest conversation.
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