Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

reutersconnect.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 229 posts

Re: South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

#161

Post by httpz »

glenstein wrote: post #97
Aurornis wrote: post #6

The solar covered parking lots near me are great because they also serve as cover for your car when it’s hot and sunny. It’s not the most cost effective way to install solar, though. A tall structure designed to put the panels high up in the air and leave a lot of space for cars is a lot more expensive than normal rooftop solar or even field setups. This is basically a way to force some of the cost of clean energy as…

It's probably less expensive than field setups in large part due to siting near existing infrastructure. And it doesn't have to out compete residential, it just has to be a net positive investment on its own terms, out competing an otherwise unshaded parking lot that isn't leveraging it's airspace for anything. Rather than a tax on lots it's something that turns them into a source of revenue generation.

In places with a lot of flat empty land, solar farms are a lot cheaper. South Korea doesn't have any flat empty land though..

Re: South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

#162

Post by mirashii »

foobarian wrote: post #68
filoleg wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently was at the Vegas airport, and what struck me was the parking lot. It was the same parking lot I saw many years ago. But this time, instead of feeling sorry for the owners of the cars that were obviously getting cooked up, that whole are was shaded in bajillion solar panels. It seemed like such an obvious win-win for everyone, I expect it to catch on fairly quickly.

But, isn't the albedo of a solar panel farm still way dark? It means the radiation is still being captured rather than reflected back up.

You're not looking at the albedo of the solar panels in isolation though, you're comparing it to asphalt and cars. Typical solar panels have an albedo of ~0.3. Asphalt around ~0.05.

Re: South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

#163

Post by Leherenn »

dyauspitr wrote: post #148
bryanhogan wrote: post #72

Some more context as someone living in Korea right now, "cheap" cars in Korea are quite rare, especially in Seoul. Having a car is somewhat of a luxury and not needed for daily life. So I think this is trying to move some of the cost of clean energy towards those who can afford it.

Does Korea also not allow Chinese cars?

Usually the luxury part is not the price of the car, it's the associated costs, especially parking. Coupled to the fact that you don't actually need the car (and it's probably a hassle for day to day life, so you only use it for the rare out of town trips).

Re: South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

#164

Post by numpad0 »

First thing that came to my mind from title: how much flat parking lots there are in Korea, in the first place?

SK has population density of 530/sqkm(1.4k/sqmi), which is literally 14x over the US(37/sqkm or 96 sqmi). So I think it's likely that a lot of their public parking locations would be already in airport style multi level ordeal, and if so, erecting solar panels can be just the matter of laying out panels on already existing and likely less utilized top floor.

Re: South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

#165

Post by alwa »

Y-bar wrote: post #159
jerlam wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People would be unhappy with a charger that only worked slowly and during the day, even if it was free.

Why would I be unhappy? Consider this: I drive to the mall. I plug in the slow free charger (maybe ~3500W) as opposed to the paid one at >20000W. Two hours later I have, say, about 7kWh topped up on my battery. I now have restored about 40km range, so my 30km drive to and from the mall would be entirely restored.

Even better if we could somehow trunk my space’s 3500W of panels with the ones covering the combustion-driven car next to me. And the empty space to my other side…

Re: South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

#166

Post by ErroneousBosh »

Aurornis wrote: post #6

The solar covered parking lots near me are great because they also serve as cover for your car when it’s hot and sunny. It’s not the most cost effective way to install solar, though. A tall structure designed to put the panels high up in the air and leave a lot of space for cars is a lot more expensive than normal rooftop solar or even field setups. This is basically a way to force some of the cost of clean energy as…

> The solar covered parking lots near me are great because they also serve as cover for your car when it’s hot and sunny.

I would like someone better at maths than I am to work out how much petrol this saves drivers because you're getting into a car that's been parked in the shade and not running the air conditioning so hard.

I bet it's at least detectable, even if it's not much.

Re: South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

#167

Post by ErroneousBosh »

eclipticplane wrote: post #13
Aurornis wrote: post #6

The solar covered parking lots near me are great because they also serve as cover for your car when it’s hot and sunny. It’s not the most cost effective way to install solar, though. A tall structure designed to put the panels high up in the air and leave a lot of space for cars is a lot more expensive than normal rooftop solar or even field setups. This is basically a way to force some of the cost of clean energy as…

A better version for shade and city beautification is to force trees around/within the parking lot.

Why not both?

Re: South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

#168

Post by ErroneousBosh »

kijin wrote: post #135
gonzo41 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People always end up petitioning for them to be cutdown because tree litter inevitably falls on cars. The best solution for cars is dense multistory parking.

Dense multistory parking underground . In South Korea, you usually don't see parking lots the size of several football fields like in the U.S., even around venues that generally attract a lot of cars, even in suburban areas. Instead, there are several stories of parking lots under every large building. Above-ground space is simply too valuable to waste on parking. Unfortunately, you can't install solar panels undergr…

> Dense multistory parking underground.

I sometimes forget there are parts of the world where you can go more than about a metre down without breaking out the Kango hammer.

Re: South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

#169

Post by aziaziazi »

ErroneousBosh wrote: post #167
eclipticplane wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A better version for shade and city beautification is to force trees around/within the parking lot.

Why not both?

They both are in competition for surface exposed to the sun. The mall’s parking lot near my place used to have trees. When they installed the solar panel shaders last year they cut down all of them.

Re: South Korea Mandates Solar Panels for Public Parking Lots

#170

Post by blitzar »

Mawr wrote: post #144
eclipticplane wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A better version for shade and city beautification is to force trees around/within the parking lot.

An even better version is to do away with the parking lot part and just have the trees.

Touch a parking lot doesn't have the same ring to it.
Post reply on HN