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Satellite powered estimation of global solar potential
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Re: Satellite powered estimation of global solar potential
#22This is a very impressive refinement of their existing tool, but is this type of advanced calculation of roof-pitch (etc.) still relevant? Haven't we more or less concluded that a million piecemeal rooftop installations of solar are about the worst way to do it? More complicated and expensive to permit and install, less efficient operation, difficult to repair, difficult to insure, difficult to upgrade, inefficient t…
One advantage of distributed solar is that it can at least come online right away and when installed with a battery, can get a home pretty close to being fully self-sufficient (depending on the climate/heating system), whereas the generally much more efficient solar pv power facilities have to contend with backlogs in connecting to the grid, insufficient grid capacity, etc.
But yes, distributed solar will not be the general solution to decarbonizing our energy systems as a whole. Does serve a meaningful role though and there is no reason to not do both.
Re: Satellite powered estimation of global solar potential
#23This is a very impressive refinement of their existing tool, but is this type of advanced calculation of roof-pitch (etc.) still relevant? Haven't we more or less concluded that a million piecemeal rooftop installations of solar are about the worst way to do it? More complicated and expensive to permit and install, less efficient operation, difficult to repair, difficult to insure, difficult to upgrade, inefficient t…
Or to put it another way: available with a rate of return that makes it sensible for average middle class home owners to say yes to, to the point dirty power sources are having to shut down in some markets (or fiercely lobby through the political system to be propped up).
One such example: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/sep/08/...
Perfect is the enemy of good
Re: Satellite powered estimation of global solar potential
#24Nice to see, I hope it helps people get more cheap energy. All I have are nits to pick: > 10.7k TWh globally This brings back memories of the time I almost shortened "thousand kilometres" to "kkm". Also, and this is not a criticism of Google, the IEA link on that text looks suspiciously like the IEA is still forecasting linear deployment of PV between 2025 and 2035, despite at least a decade of people pointing at it…
> 10.7k TWh globally Agree I hate this, but at the same time I don't know if I would have groked it correctly on first read if it had listed "10.7Pwh globally". We simply aren't exposed to numbers at that scale on a regular basis. Not sure what the correct solution is here.
SI prefix words are just kind of silly. We should just use the exponent as a number instead of having a different word for every 3 zeros. 10.7 E15 Wh or something similar.
Scales to everything, you do not need to know any mapping, and directly supports mathematical manipulation.
We should also do the same for large number words in general. No thousand, million, billion, etc. E3, E6, E9, etc. Now you can count and represent any meaningful number without needing to memorize a dictionary of words and they would precisely match the unit scale “words”.
Re: Satellite powered estimation of global solar potential
#25Nice to see, I hope it helps people get more cheap energy. All I have are nits to pick: > 10.7k TWh globally This brings back memories of the time I almost shortened "thousand kilometres" to "kkm". Also, and this is not a criticism of Google, the IEA link on that text looks suspiciously like the IEA is still forecasting linear deployment of PV between 2025 and 2035, despite at least a decade of people pointing at it…
Both linear and using the current exponent are likely to be wildly off.
If you assume it’s ~26% annual growth now, and drops by 2% per year so 24% next year then in 10 years you’ll see 4.25x last years installs and the cumulative initiation over the next decade is 2.8x a linear estimate.
IMO that’s probably a reasonable ballpark, though capacity factors are an open question as they could fall dramatically or maintain fairly steady depending on how much grid storage shows up.
Re: Satellite powered estimation of global solar potential
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even assuming 100% solar rooftop coverage is the goal, given limited capacity of raw materials, labor, infrastructure would still necessitate prioritization of when to allocate those things to which places.
But the audience isn't an omnipotent controller of PV panel allocation, it's emergent market participants. Presumably, the market emerges more plentifully in those sunnier places. It's hard to imagine the place where this data is useful to local construction firms who were previously not well-informed (potentially by just walking around with their eyes open).
There are several allocation opportunities I could think of. You’re a local government considering some subsidies for rooftop solar initiatives. How much bang for your buck will you get? You’re a regional grid operator and have some estimates for rooftop solar adoption. How do you translate that into plans for future grid capacity needs? You’re a rooftop solar installation company. What neighborhoods do you send your mailers to?
Re: Satellite powered estimation of global solar potential
#27This is a very impressive refinement of their existing tool, but is this type of advanced calculation of roof-pitch (etc.) still relevant? Haven't we more or less concluded that a million piecemeal rooftop installations of solar are about the worst way to do it? More complicated and expensive to permit and install, less efficient operation, difficult to repair, difficult to insure, difficult to upgrade, inefficient t…
I thought we may have concluded that shareholder efficient centralized single point of failure systems are the least robust providers of basic human needs in the face of natural levels of uncertainty.
Re: Satellite powered estimation of global solar potential
#28This is a very impressive refinement of their existing tool, but is this type of advanced calculation of roof-pitch (etc.) still relevant? Haven't we more or less concluded that a million piecemeal rooftop installations of solar are about the worst way to do it? More complicated and expensive to permit and install, less efficient operation, difficult to repair, difficult to insure, difficult to upgrade, inefficient t…
With rooftop solar there's a path towards mass deployment that other alternative electricity generation solutions currently lack. Rooftop solar for residential houses doesn't require permits or planning, and can be done by individuals within a reasonable budget, unlike solar farms or rooftop nuclear.
Re: Satellite powered estimation of global solar potential
#29There was a startup that was doing something similar, can't find it but their entire business was built on providing similar service.
hundreds of people do this at the moment worldwide, no surprise someone is productivising it, or many people are.
Re: Satellite powered estimation of global solar potential
#30Builders: optimize energy capture, put roof planes directed south (in northern hemisphere).
There’s not always a lot of freedom to control roof angles like that - it might eg be directly determined by the orientation of the street - and even if there is, it might come into conflict with other thermal considerations. For instance, perhaps orienting the building such that the roof midline is E/W and the surface is due south results in more windows pointed due south, which in turn drives much more solar gain on the interior and greater cooling loads as a result - maybe the increased solar output outweighs those gains, maybe it doesn’t. You have to run some thermal sims to check. On the other hand, you will have more solar gains in the winter, which will decrease your heating demand.
So it’s not universally applicable - but it is absolutely true that it will increase solar output!