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California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

latimes.com

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Re: California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

#171

Post by rlpb »

undersuit wrote: post #83
analog31 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my view, this is a problem if each side is making claims without any attempt at quantifying or disclosing the relative magnitude of effects. That's a case where a reporter could do a little digging and fill in those details. For instance, how much dust? How is it stirred up? And so forth. You can still make of it what you will, but with better information. I encounter the same thing dealing with engineers. They wi…

Exactly. Can the dust be mitigated? Maybe via replanting afterwards? Or maybe the panels need to be farther apart to encourage regrowth of plants? Is a square field of panels more destructive than a longer line of panels? Are there construction vehicles that can cause less damage to the existing plant life? If journalism can't be bothered to do research maybe the rise of AI created factuals is well deserved.

Like come other commenters here, I don't think it's a journalist's job to _do_ the research. However, the journalist can quite accurately report "X claims Y but says they haven't performed any research to quantify this claim".

The key is to ask the question.

Re: California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

#172

Post by theandrewbailey »

remarkEon wrote: post #15

What's the useful life of modern solar panels? Will these solar farms have to be decommissioned or retrofit in the future, and will we have to deal with a bunch of toxic material disposal say 30 years from now? I guess it certainly seems like a no-brainer to build these things in deserts with consistent sunlight, but I'm just curious if there are externalities we're not thinking of yet because we haven't had to.

From what I've read, solar panels slowly decrease to 80-85% of their rated output after about 20 years, then stop decreasing. Even 30 year old panels seem fine[0].

[0] https://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/article/testing-a-thirt...

Re: California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

#173

Post by usrusr »

moron4hire wrote: post #169
usrusr wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Solar panels don't have problem with glare You clearly haven't been on a highway leading straight towards a hillside panel cluster [1] at that particular time of day and year when the reflection trail of the panels passes over the road. It's much worse than going towards dawn or sunset because those are toned down do much by atmospheric attenuation. All you can do is blindly maintaining speed and hoping that nobody…

EDIT: I apologize. I misunderstood the statement. It's the same light from the sun that you say is attenuated by the atmosphere before reaching your eyes that is reflected from the solar panels. It is literally impossible for it to be worse. -->

When the reflection hits the sun is higher in the sky. The almost tangential rays at sunset/sunrise have a much longer intersection with earth's atmosphere.

Edit: no problem, maybe I could have been more clear :)

Re: California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

#174

Post by abecedarius »

triviatise wrote: post #164
analog31 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my view, this is a problem if each side is making claims without any attempt at quantifying or disclosing the relative magnitude of effects. That's a case where a reporter could do a little digging and fill in those details. For instance, how much dust? How is it stirred up? And so forth. You can still make of it what you will, but with better information. I encounter the same thing dealing with engineers. They wi…

This seems to be one of the most common logical fallacies, especially in politics. I dont know if it has a name, but I call it "qualification without quantification". It creates a logic chain that could happen, without any discussion of actual probabilities or costs. For example banning of assault rifles, discusses how it could save lives. People are surprised to learn that there are less than 200 deaths per year fro…

John McCarthy had a slogan for that: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_McCarthy_(computer_scient...

Re: California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

#175

Post by yostrovs »

adrianN wrote: post #159
tyu1000 wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These huge renewable projects do have major ecological impact, why lie about it? Due to low power generation density they take up a lot of space compared to fossil fuel/nuclear plants and that's not including the large amount of power lines that have to be run to all these new facilities. There are well known negative ecological impacts from the solar farms in this area that others have pointed out. Just because a de…

Well the alternative to more renewables is, realistically, more coal and gas. I think that covering up one or two percent of even the most valuable biomes with solar panels is no where near as destructive as climate change.

You conveniently forgot nuclear and your percents are off.

Re: California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

#176

Post by yostrovs »

Arn_Thor wrote: post #65
golemotron wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solar and wind will never be enough. https://quillette.com/2019/02/27/why-renewables-cant-save-th...

The whole takeaway from that is "it's difficult and I, the author, doesn't think it'll work because it's difficult". With lots of hand-picked examples of shortcomings of implementation loosely collected into a semicoherent justification for nuclear energy. I'm all for nuclear energy, if it can be done safely. (The cost might be too high for it to be commercially viable, but if it's worth doing the state can subsidize…

Nuclear is safe. It's safer than coal, solar, wind, and pretty much every other form of energy. And cleaner too. But it's "nuclear" and "radiation," which means half the public enters a state of paranoia.

Do investigate the relative dangers of energy production.

Re: California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

#177

Post by randysavage »

higginsc wrote: post #25

It's a fucking desert.

This thread opened my eyes a bit... I assumed most people understood desert !== a sterile sand landscape.

Here's a photo I snapped from my backyard just now. This is the Sonoran Desert in Phoenix, but much of the southwest is like this. Not exactly a dead ecosystem.

https://i.imgur.com/fBkMHBA.jpg

Re: California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

#178

Post by yostrovs »

pixl97 wrote: post #162
hyperbovine wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you live in this community? My guess is no. And that’s the crux of the issue, though the article buries the lede somewhat.

Right do you live in a community that loses mountains to coal mining? That loses the coast to sea level rise? That has a nuclear facility in their back yard? There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.

I live near a nuke plant. It pollutes about as much as my BBQ grill. It's quiet, the birds like it, and the fishing in the adjacent lake is excellent. Some people don't like its shape but I'm used to it and the steam rising is kind of charming.

Re: California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

#179

Post by adrianN »

yostrovs wrote: post #175
adrianN wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well the alternative to more renewables is, realistically, more coal and gas. I think that covering up one or two percent of even the most valuable biomes with solar panels is no where near as destructive as climate change.

You conveniently forgot nuclear and your percents are off.

I support nuclear but it's impossible to build enough in the current political climate and it takes too long to build and is terribly expensive.

I don't think my percentages are off https://www.energy.gov/eere/solarpoweringamerica/solar-energ... 0.6% according to that article, so probably in the single digit percentages in real life.

Re: California's San Bernardino County restricts construction of solar, wind farms

#180

Post by door5 »

yostrovs wrote: post #176
Arn_Thor wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole takeaway from that is "it's difficult and I, the author, doesn't think it'll work because it's difficult". With lots of hand-picked examples of shortcomings of implementation loosely collected into a semicoherent justification for nuclear energy. I'm all for nuclear energy, if it can be done safely. (The cost might be too high for it to be commercially viable, but if it's worth doing the state can subsidize…

Nuclear is safe. It's safer than coal, solar, wind, and pretty much every other form of energy. And cleaner too. But it's "nuclear" and "radiation," which means half the public enters a state of paranoia. Do investigate the relative dangers of energy production.

The Fukushima disaster almost got to the point where they had to evacuate Tokyo.

I support nuclear power, but to say that it is without risks and the public is just irrational is disingenuous.

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