We're going to need a lot of solar panels • Hacker News Board

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#351

Post by hgomersall » Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 6:15 AM UTC

dmitriid wrote: post #339

jnsaff2 wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With all due respect, looking at your numbers my hunch is that you need better insulation. I know a person who has about 10kWp installed on a passivhaus here in latitude 59N and says that having a heat pump is overkill for them.

> With all due respect, looking at your numbers my hunch is that you need better insulation. With all due respect these are the kinds of "tiny" details that renewable enthusiasts conveniently forget. Yes, this person's house needs better insulation. As does everybody else's . You can't just wave this away with "your math is wrong". These numbers reflect reality, not wishful thinking.

Well yes, but generally renewable enthusiasts are also saying "we need to improve our housing stock". That's another of the opportunities to improve people's lives that will come through necessary change.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#352

Post by Aeolun » Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 6:16 AM UTC

cycomanic wrote: post #338

WalterBright wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> All that lost value could have gone to line their pockets, but instead it’s being used for the good of society That is indeed the pitch the communists make. How is that working out for them?

Show me any large scale infrastructure project that has been realized by private enterprises without massive government subsidies. How is your privately funded highway or rail system working out for you?

> How is your privately funded highway or rail system working out for you?

Well, we get lovely toll gates about every 10 miles. Happily they’ve been automated so you can more or less just cruise on, but the constant “that’ll be $3, that’ll be $4, that’ll be $3.50” while you are driving can get on your nerves.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#353

Post by KingOfCoders » Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 6:21 AM UTC

My Casio watch is solar powered and the "panel" can't be seen becaue it's too small and incorporated in the design (btw. best watch ever, If you're thinking in "panels" you don't envision the future.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#354

Post by ngcc_hk » Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 6:22 AM UTC

3 important take

1. Is Solar economic viable?

Not sure “ Crude oil prices are between $60 and $100/barrel, indicating cost parity at between $10 and $17/MWh. There are already solar farms installed in some places that sell power at these prices, and between now and 2030 solar costs should come down at least another 60%.”. But $60 is high. Obviously not now but just months ago we talked about selling oil for loss.

Freaking is $40 somewhat I remember

2. The artificial Russian invasion of Ukraine

The tyranny of Russia need 10 years to resolve. And solar might work in this decade abd hope his learning curve continue.

3. Local game to play like river

The play like conversion of solar back to ch4 (methane) or sea to river etc only make sense in a few place. It is local.

In fact one wonder why Australia and Sahara desert is not more solar.

4. Transportation might be hard

1/3 lost to cable. Still as a guy demo you need a hugh solar plant farm to do one house. Still need solar farm and storage via many means.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#355

Post by stewbrew » Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 6:22 AM UTC

dmitriid wrote: post #339

jnsaff2 wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With all due respect, looking at your numbers my hunch is that you need better insulation. I know a person who has about 10kWp installed on a passivhaus here in latitude 59N and says that having a heat pump is overkill for them.

> With all due respect, looking at your numbers my hunch is that you need better insulation. With all due respect these are the kinds of "tiny" details that renewable enthusiasts conveniently forget. Yes, this person's house needs better insulation. As does everybody else's . You can't just wave this away with "your math is wrong". These numbers reflect reality, not wishful thinking.

How is this a tiny detail. We live in a passivhaus. We hardly ever heat. Improving insulation of old houses is an important aspect here. Reducing energy consumption is as important as generating and storing energy.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#356

Post by KingOfCoders » Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 6:23 AM UTC

dmitriid wrote: post #339

jnsaff2 wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With all due respect, looking at your numbers my hunch is that you need better insulation. I know a person who has about 10kWp installed on a passivhaus here in latitude 59N and says that having a heat pump is overkill for them.

> With all due respect, looking at your numbers my hunch is that you need better insulation. With all due respect these are the kinds of "tiny" details that renewable enthusiasts conveniently forget. Yes, this person's house needs better insulation. As does everybody else's . You can't just wave this away with "your math is wrong". These numbers reflect reality, not wishful thinking.

Not sure how "better insulation" is something "renewable enthusiasts conveniently forget". We need better insulation either way.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#357

Post by usrusr » Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 6:25 AM UTC

kragen wrote: post #156

acyou wrote: post #137

In general, increasing the concentration of any product in a closed system requires net energy input across the system boundary. Larger increases in concentration need more energy input than smaller increases of concentration. Concentrating atmospheric CO2 involves increasing the concentration from approx. 400 ppm, to a higher target concentration. That's 0.04%. There is no way around the energy input requirement wit…

It's curious that you didn't actually include the calculation of what the minimum energy requirement; instead, you just assert without evidence that it is "very, very, very high". In fact this theoretical minimum is not very high; as https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_air_capture#Environment... explains, it is only 250 kWh/tonne CO₂, or 900 kJ/kg in SI units. To remove the ≈60 Gt/year of anthropogenic CO₂ currently…

> Point source capture is of course much cheaper but it cannot get us to net negative CO₂ emissions.

But it certainly can: by capturing on a point source that burns biological fuel. Without the burning, all the CO2 emitted (or captured) would have cycled back to the air a short time later anyways. And if you mainly do it to have a cheap carbon source to make some intermittent energy source you already have storable/transportable (e.g. creating aircraft fuel), just about any low grade biomass will do. Grass. Leaves. Dried algae. Paper too dirty for recycling (or rather: any paper - does paper recycling even make any sense in an economy that also burns wood for energy?). When you start looking at incineration not as disposal and/or energy source, but as a source of concentrated CO2, almost anything turns into a useful resource. All that stuff contains carbon, and it's all going back into the atmosphere one way or another.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#358

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 6:26 AM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #325

Gibbon1 wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm more likely to be dubious about the free markets supposedly unique ability to solve problems than not. But buying electricity at $50/mwhr at noon and reselling it at $200 mwh six hours later.

Solar power gets expensive at night.

[deleted]

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#359

Post by pixiemaster » Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 6:26 AM UTC

in WW2, we moved to war economy to build multiple planes per hour, multiple landing ships per day etc, all while rubber, steel, oil, where in short supply.

we should do this again with solar panels.

a vast overproduction of solar energy would even allow for less distribution need, doing away with wasting time&energy on hydrogen and batteries.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#360

Post by betwixthewires » Sat, Jul 23, 2022, 6:30 AM UTC

All that gas and oil was once a massive biological solar panel, covering much of the ocean, absorbing sunlight, storing it, reproducing, growing only to get subducted and stored for us, like a battery. For a billion years.

When I hear people talk about building solar panels to convert water and CO2 into methane gas for its explosive energy potential to meet our needs, mining pits in the ground all over the world, razing landscapes to steal their sunlight, as if they're going to ever come close to the methane that's already there, and that without doing more environmental damage than our current state of affairs comes close to, I wonder how delusional or dishonest you have to be to pitch an investor. And I'm fearful of the mentality and the utter destruction of the environment this absurdity will lead us to. They would have us pave the earth to save it.

If you're worried about climate change, the only way stop it is to reduce the amount of energy consumed, the amount of plastic produced, the amount of ammonia made through the Haber Bosch process. This necessarily means killing, at a minimum, three quarters of the world's human population, along with the livestock that are alive currently that will feed them. And then you've got to get past the unbelievably massive spike in carbon dioxide as all these carcasses decay, carbon dioxide that was once locked up in oil as well, since all these living organisms are made possible only by way of the fertilizer they were fed that was made from oil.

It's not pretty, but that's the only way to do it. Do you think we should do it?