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We're going to need a lot of solar panels

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

#401

Post by tppiotrowski »

epistasis wrote: post #369
tppiotrowski wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't buy the political argument. If it made financial sense you could just build it and take all your profits to lobby the politicians but obviously the economics are not very profitable yet. Edit: How did Tesla succeed is GM and the oil companies were supposedly going to use politics to keep the electric car from succeeding?

Make financial sense to whom? If solar is cheaper than natural gas, how does a utility profit from charging less? They are highly regulated, and are usually allowed to take a percentage as profit. So it's in their interest to take the more expensive option, depending on regulations Saying that solar isn't cheap is just ignoring the past five years of cost data.

Natural gas runs on cloudy days and at night.

Taking a bus is cheaper than flying, but if you want to get somewhere fast you need to fly. Price is just one metric.

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

#402

Post by ncmncm »

eternityforest wrote: post #167
ben_w wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A global grid was my favourite solution until recently. The problem is that it needs the combined cables to have cross section in the order of a few (3?) square meters (at 640 kV), and that in turn is in the order of 52 years of global copper production (we make more aluminium than copper but Al is a worse conductor). Using even higher voltages makes everything much easier, and the cables’ combined cross sections may…

I doubt copper would be used in that kind of thing. It's worse, but not that much worse. Energy storage might not be an issue in a decade or so. There's no law of physics saying they can't make batteries without conflict metals. Eventually someone's going to invent a battery made of some cheap hydrocarbon you make by the tanker car, or that compressed Co2 turbine system will turn out to be the real deal, or they'll f…

A clear majority of utility storage will not be batteries, just because cheaper methods will be favored.

The cheapest will rely on E = Fx, where F is air pressure, or gravity, or buoyancy. But liquified anhydrous ammonia, despite being more costly to make, will be extremely popular because it is easy to transport and store, and is fantastically useful for many purposes.

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

#403

Post by beebeepka »

dmitriid wrote: post #386
lrem wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Much of eastern Europe, so not particularly rich or well run countries, went from zero (due to cheap Russian gas in Warsaw pact) to ~everything insulated (because trying to cut dependency on a mortal enemy) in less than two decades.

I'm from Moldova. No, they didn't go to "everything is insulated" even in the wildest dreams.

The EU paid for lots of insulation here in Bulgaria. Mostly blocks of flats, of course. They were ugly and really needed it. Hope you guys enter the union soon

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

#404

Post by ncmncm »

walrus01 wrote: post #176
lotharcable wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Money != Wealth You can go ahead and force every billionaire to sell off everything they own and hand it to the government and all you end up with is a one time boost to government tax receipts. That's it. One time boost. Next year those billionaires will be gone. There won't be new ones. And it won't create any more food. It won't solve shortages. It won't create more solar panels. It won't create 1 mile of copper l…

>Because when the government goes and says "I need 40 million acres of solar panels"... Who is going to do that? Where is that going to come from? 1) the empty arid land where we would put 40 million acres of solar panels is for the most part already owned by a state or national level government. go look at a map of how much of nevada is controlled by the BLM for instance. 2) governments already pay for electrical ge…

Arid land will soon be recognized as the worst place to put solar farms.

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

#405

Post by tppiotrowski »

betwixthewires wrote: post #392
tppiotrowski wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think solar panels are a bit more efficient at converting sunlight > electricity than the chemical process of sunlight > photosynthesis > decomposition > burning fossil fuel. Take the ICE that only coverts something like 20% of fuel into motion, the rest is lost to heat. The electric motor is far more efficient. You'd need to update your reasoning to take into account all the efficiencies lost in the fossil fuel cr…

No I don't, and I'll tell you why. The amount of energy hitting the surface of the earth is constant, assuming that the luminosity of the sun is constant. Photosynthesis as cyanobacteria/chloroplasts/chlorella perform it might be less efficient than a modern solar panel at converting the entirety of the spectrum to energy, but they did it and produced this fuel for hundreds of millions of years. Even if you get 10 ti…

I follow your logic but the sun is going to be hitting you for 70+ years. Your body surface area is probably equivalent to my 400W solar panel. That's a few KWh per day for 70+ years. How much oil will your decomposing body produce? How much energy will the vegetation in the Sahara desert produce?

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

#407

Post by benevol »

Helmut10001 wrote: post #320

People both underestimate and overestimate what PV can do. In summer and around noon, here in western Europe, there is so much PV-electricity produced that it is _almost_ enough to fulfill all demands. In winter, the amount is like a drop in the desert. I have built a 30 kWp PV at home 2 years ago - you would think this is quite big, for a private plant. It is not enough. If I want to power a heat pump (with drilled…

Have you considered https://www.KryonEngine.org ?

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

#408

Post by ncmncm »

thatcherc wrote: post #35
walrus01 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the $ per Wh cost from PV is extremely low it's also possible to use electrical heating elements to store heat in tanks of something that melts and stays hot for long periods of time (for building heating purposes). Or to use cheap mid day electric power when the sun is up to generate gigantic blocks of ice that can then be used with cooling loops to air condition buildings.

One of my favorite high(ish)-concept energy storage proposals takes the "store heat in tanks of something that melts and stays hot for long periods of time" is the "sun in a box"[0] idea: use excess electricity to heat silicon up to an incandescent 4500 deg F. Later, when you want to extract the store energy, just shine some of that incandescent light into some super efficient multi-junction solar panels! Sounds pret…

You would better pump in heat, and sell the cold.

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

#409

Post by m12k »

isoprophlex wrote: post #349
Helmut10001 wrote: post #320

People both underestimate and overestimate what PV can do. In summer and around noon, here in western Europe, there is so much PV-electricity produced that it is _almost_ enough to fulfill all demands. In winter, the amount is like a drop in the desert. I have built a 30 kWp PV at home 2 years ago - you would think this is quite big, for a private plant. It is not enough. If I want to power a heat pump (with drilled…

The catch is that power-to-gas tech described in the article will allow you to store the power produced in summer. Produce excess methane gas in summer, store with existing infrastructure, burn it for baseload/winter.

From the article:

"Just as converting chemical energy in the form of fuel into electricity endures 45-75% thermodynamic losses, converting electricity back into chemical fuels loses 60-70% of the energy in the process. Converting solar power into natural gas only to burn it in a gas turbine power plant could help with long term seasonal energy storage but is so much less cost competitive than other ways to stabilize electricity supply that we should expect this usage modality in, at most, niche cases."

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

#410

Post by magic_hamster »

beebeepka wrote: post #400
dmitriid wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wish you would expand and clarify the point you are trying to make. The problem with people enthusiastically proposing renewables as the cheap solution to our energy needs is the thousand "little" details like the one above. Whose only mention is in the comments like "your math is wrong, invest in insulation". No. The math isn't wrong. Bo, the consumption is correct and shouldn't "should be lower". Because it's d…

Venting is fine but but is there a point you are trying to make? Besides the "some people blah blah" strawman? I shouldn't put solar panels on my roof because it would not fix someone else's problems? What kind of logic is that?

I think they're trying to say that insulation (and probably other factors) is not just one person's problem but an issue of a huge scale, which is true. If solar works for you, then that's great, but for a lot of people (the majority?) it wouldn't work, or at least not without spending a very large amount of money to retrofit your house for it.

I think it's a good point even if stated quite poorly.

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