‘Energy independence feels practical’: Europeans building mini solar farms
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Re: ‘Energy independence feels practical’: Europeans building mini solar farms
#2Distributed energy production / storage is the key for resiliency in the future.
Every solar farm doesn't need to be China Size - it doesn't even need to be a "farm", just put them on roofs.
And don't let perfect be the enemy of good. Yes there are times when solar doesn't produce energy, but there are also times where it OVERproduces.
Re: ‘Energy independence feels practical’: Europeans building mini solar farms
#3A shame local companies where I am from have year long backlogs.
Re: ‘Energy independence feels practical’: Europeans building mini solar farms
#4The UK previously didn't allow small plug in solar panels (the kind that you just plug in to a mains socket) due to, I believe, safety reasons. This has changed within the last few days https://energysavingtrust.org.uk/solar-roadmap/
Re: ‘Energy independence feels practical’: Europeans building mini solar farms
#5to answer the first question in the article
"Many consumers want to know how long it will take them to make back the upfront costs of solar"
my answer is that the payback is imediate, right from the first moment watching as energy is generated out of thin air, and the sudden relief from getting off the energy angst missery-go-round, and the sheer borring inertness of solar pv as it does the thing with zero detectable effort, is gratifying and relaxing in a way that money never gives.
I will add that solar pv is increadably robust, and damage tollerant as well, you can drive a claw hammer through a panel, and while it does not improve the performance, the degradation is actualy not that much, and it will continue to function for years
Re: ‘Energy independence feels practical’: Europeans building mini solar farms
#6I once read an article that in Berlin the sewage system is flushed with fresh water because too many people have installed water saving toilet flushers. So plenty of people bought these water savers and now the price of water has gone up because the water that is directly flushed needs to be paid too.
The 'balcony power stations' are the same thing. They get subsidised, and you even get a fixed kWh price when pushing into the grid.
The problem is that in the end it will become more expensive for everybody because at times you have a surplus driving the whole sale electricity prices into the negative while still paying fixed prices for injection into the grid.
To make this economically viable, you have to have everyone paying spot prices. Everything else is just green ideology driven inefficiency.
Just to make it clear, I think renewables are an important option for the future. But to make them a viable option of the electricity energy mix, supply and demand, storage and grid capacity need to be taken into account.
Last not least, there is plenty of low hanging fruit to drive CO2 emissions down: drive up the truck tolls. Currently you have potatoes farmed in Germany, driven to Poland to get washed, transported to Italy to be converted to french fries and transferred back to Germany into the super markets.
Same goes for home office, during Covid it was possible for many workers to continue with their work. Does an accountant need to drive to an office every day? Nope. How many business trips could be replaced by a video call?
If the CO2 emissions problem is to be solved rather sooner than later, the money has to be spend efficiently as there isn't enough of it.
Re: ‘Energy independence feels practical’: Europeans building mini solar farms
#7The UK previously didn't allow small plug in solar panels (the kind that you just plug in to a mains socket) due to, I believe, safety reasons. This has changed within the last few days https://energysavingtrust.org.uk/solar-roadmap/
It hasn't changed... yet. The media noise is because the government has announced that they were reviewing current rules with the aim of allowing "balcony solar" by the end of the year.
Re: ‘Energy independence feels practical’: Europeans building mini solar farms
#8Fairly boilerplate article, but the bit that is news is the UK balcony solar permitting. Better longread: https://solarenergyconcepts.co.uk/post/plug-in-solar-uk/
Government press release with a long list of pull quotes: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-to-make-plug-i...
(I note that in the alternate universe where Ed Miliband became PM because he didn't eat a bacon sandwich, we could have had this a decade ago. It is embarrassing to be beaten on environmentalist regulatory efficiency by Germany)
Re: ‘Energy independence feels practical’: Europeans building mini solar farms
#9I once read an article that in Berlin the sewage system is flushed with fresh water because too many people have installed water saving toilet flushers. So plenty of people bought these water savers and now the price of water has gone up because the water that is directly flushed needs to be paid too. The 'balcony power stations' are the same thing. They get subsidised, and you even get a fixed kWh price when pushing…
> I once read an article that in Berlin the sewage system is flushed with fresh water because too many people have installed water saving toilet flushers. So plenty of people bought these water savers and now the price of water has gone up because the water that is directly flushed needs to be paid too.
What is this supposed to mean? You flush less water, therefore water price is more expensive, because flushed water needs to be paid too?
Re: ‘Energy independence feels practical’: Europeans building mini solar farms
#10I once read an article that in Berlin the sewage system is flushed with fresh water because too many people have installed water saving toilet flushers. So plenty of people bought these water savers and now the price of water has gone up because the water that is directly flushed needs to be paid too. The 'balcony power stations' are the same thing. They get subsidised, and you even get a fixed kWh price when pushing…
I have the curse of having an mom who was a smart CPA.
All this stuff root top solar, plug in solar costs at least twice what utility solar. And only makes sense when you have messed up rate setting schemes that enable arbitrage.
But it's not what you want if you want to get the most GW connected as fast as possible.
Like the requirements that new houses have roof top solar. You could get twice as much if you just invested the money in a conventional solar farm.