EEVblog #632 - Solar Roadways Are BULLSHIT!

[ion]

More free data:

https://eosweb.larc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/sse/grid.cgi

"Parameters for Tilted Solar Panels" has solar radiation data for various angles between 0 and 90 degrees.

(For those interested, Sandpoint Idaho is Latitude 48.28, Longitude -116.55)

[Fungus]

They really are so clueless that they think there isn't any research on flat vs tilted solar panels! 
Their Facebook page seems to be a treasure trove of stupidity!

Isn't it just a simple cosine function, no "data collection" needed?

Why would the output be a simple cosine function? Are you confusing output with insolation?

I imagine (in my ignorance) that the output will be proportional to the cosine of than angle between the sun and a line perpendicular to the panel.

[Red Squirrel]

I wonder why Solar Roadways are even talking about tilted panels, are they planing on building tilted roads?  I guess I could see it for curves on race tracks!   

[Mr.B]

Solar Roadways - key sponsor to Nascar.   

[Someone]

Page 18 of this document gives output figures for PV panels at different angles, including horizontal for Ireland.

http://www.seai.ie/Publications/Renewables_Publications_/Solar_Power/Best_Practice_Guide_for_PV.pdf

Wow!
All that free data and Solar Sidewalks still think they need to pour money into their own research.

Thanks for the link BTW.

Still looks like theoretical data someone could put together at any time:
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/renewable-energy/tilting-(at)-solar-panels/

[daqq]

I assume that the next part of the "research" will delve into a most devilish problem that has caused much dispute in the PV community:

Should solar panels be facing upwards (to the Sun) or to the ground (the Earth) for optimal output?

A years worth of data from one panel facing up and one facing down should be most illuminating. Sound like a reasonable way to spend another 500k USD.

[cj]

In one of the video’s I saw a panel in which some of the glass seemed to be chipped. If glass chips are pulverized (multiple cars driving over it) it creates very fine and sharp particles, imaging what happens if you’ll get that in your lungs.
 
May be SR should start investigating invisible hover cars to increase panel efficiency (no cars shadows) and prevent panel damage.

SR

[amspire]

The ultimate way to do this would be to make the tiles out of synthetic diamond. Since diamond can be a semiconductor, you could also use it for the photocell and LEDS so you can build everything out of carbon. Alternatively, Rubrene (an organic crystal composed of carbon and hydrogen) can be used to make excellent LEDS and Solar Panels - in theory.

Diamond is also a better heat conductor then metal so it is perfect for melting snow using energy stored in ultra-capacitors made from diamond-graphene layers in the lower half of the panels.

The Indiegogo plan would be this. Energy from the Solar roadway is fed into a box that removes CO² and Water from the air and uses extracted Carbon and Hydrogen to make the panels. So once the process starts, it just keeps accelerating as more roadway solar power is available. The production of Solar roadway panels ends up being free and it solves global warming! The only by-product is oxygen.

Energy from the solar roadway can also be used to incinerate waste/damaged panels back into CO² and water so there is no waste at all.

The major problem I can see would be the creation of really good 3D graphics for the crowd-sourcing campaign.

[george graves]

I had a good laugh at the reddit comments for Dave's latest video.  Although I'm totally use to Dave's voice and speaking style by now, and it doesn't bother me one bit...but it caught some people off guard.

https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/58383o/this_is_what_turned_out_of_solar_roadways_after

[DrGeoff]

May be SR should start investigating invisible hover cars to increase panel efficiency (no cars shadows) and prevent panel damage.

Maybe they should petition the Guvmint to stop vehicles driving on them during daylight hours...

[LabSpokane]

Ouch. A scathing review from PV magazine:

https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2016/10/18/solar-roadways-yeah-still-not-a-thing/

Solar Roadways: Yeah, Still Not A Thing

A real PR and marketing firm could have advised Solar Roadways not to put a dog in a photo with their unproven technology. It was destined to make editors' jobs too easy.
Remember JaMarcus Russell? Former Louisiana State University quarterback who could throw the ball from one end zone to the other from his knees? Drafted No. 1 by the Oakland Raiders in 2007 and out of football three years later because, well, he really wasn’t that good?

Russell came to mind when I heard about the epic fail of the Solar Roadways unveiling in Sandpoint, Idaho, two weeks ago. The lesson from both is this: Don’t always believe the hype you’re hearing.

In 2014 and 2015, everyone was buzzing about the potential of Solar Roadways (and I do mean everyone). Slick marketing videos, combined with an almost unheard of (in the solar industry) social media blitz, had even the most uninitiated solar enthusiast convinced that solar roadways would power our futures.

Who knew the “breakthrough” technology could be foiled by a poor laminating machine? And once they’d “fixed” that problem, the flipped switch produced a light display that can only be described as Charlie Brown’s Christmas tree, pre-renovation.

So how do you spend two years hyping a product, only to have an unveiling that fails as badly as Solar Roadways? According to Leah Wilkinson, founder of Wilkinson + Associates, an Arlington, Va., based public relations and marketing firm with technology and solar specializations, there is often an extraordinary desire—  and almost visceral need — for technology inventors and entrepreneurs to talk about their new product/service, how fantastic it is and all the problems it is going to solve.

“On one hand, it is great to have an organization or a spokesperson that is passionate and ready to share their technology with the world,” Wilkinson says. “On the other hand, it’s very risky to ‘launch’ and be so vocal about a product or service before it is tested and available, from a marketing and PR perspective.”

And when overeager inventors start believing their own “champagne wishes and caviar dreams,” they can rush into unveiling their product and, as the Solar Roadways team found out the hard way, become the punchline to a searingly bad joke.

“You lose credibility — your company, your team, your investors, your customers and the public no longer trust in your word and your ability to deliver,” Wilkinson said. “Recapturing trust and credibility is one of the hardest hills to climb for an organization. This event is a great case study for why it is critically important to have seasoned communications professionals advising you.”

Can Solar Roadways recover from its recent launch fiasco? Only time will tell (but given what little I’ve seen from the technology, I have serious doubts). But the “Shambles in Sandpoint” won’t quickly fade from the public’s memory.

What’s most maddening is that the solar industry is at a critical tipping point in the minds of most consumers — and it didn’t need this overhyped, undertested pipe dream to embolden solar’s opponents to shade the industry with even sharper tongues.

Let’s hope Solar Roadways returns to the inventor’s shed until it can prove it’s actually worthy of the spotlight. As JaMarcus Russell will tell you, only tragedy can follow if it doesn’t.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own, and do not necessarily reflect those held by pv magazine.

[EEVblog]

The French Wattway update:
http://www.techniques-ingenieur.fr/actualite/articles/2000-euros-route-solaire-normandie-segolene-royal-37483/

[rolycat]

The French Wattway update:
http://www.techniques-ingenieur.fr/actualite/articles/2000-euros-route-solaire-normandie-segolene-royal-37483/

So the cost is around twenty times that of standard solar solutions, per watt. Despite the fact that this is not a small demonstration but a large project of over a kilometre.

And despite all this "The Energy Minister (Ségolène Royal) said repeatedly she wants 1,000 kilometres of solar road, which will cost 5 billion Euros on the basis of the project cost in the Orne.

The capacity of politicians to pander to populist causes while steadfastly ignoring basic physics and economics is apparently infinite.

[EEVblog]

The French Wattway update:
http://www.techniques-ingenieur.fr/actualite/articles/2000-euros-route-solaire-normandie-segolene-royal-37483/

So the cost is around twenty times that of standard solar solutions, per watt. Despite the fact that this is not a small demonstration but a large project of over a kilometre.

And that does not include prepping the road or sealing it afterwards 

[Fungus]

And despite all this "The Energy Minister (Ségolène Royal) said repeatedly she wants 1,000 kilometres of solar road, which will cost 5 billion Euros on the basis of the project cost in the Orne.

Yes but that's only the startup costs. After that it's basically just free electricity forever.

[daqq]

Yes but that's only the startup costs. After that it's basically just free electricity forever.

Free-ish. Add to that: Maintenance, replacement.

Also, if it's ~20 times more costly than a conventional solar solution of equivalent power, wouldn't it just be better to just build 20 times more solar power off road?

[Fungus]

Yes but that's only the startup costs. After that it's basically just free electricity forever.

Free-ish. Add to that: Maintenance, replacement.

Also, if it's ~20 times more costly than a conventional solar solution of equivalent power, wouldn't it just be better to just build 20 times more solar power off road?

Maybe they're building it for the same reasons they built Versailles - to show the world that the French are rich and powerful. Everybody who drives through France will see this and marvel. That won't happen with conventional solar.

[rrinker]

Yes but that's only the startup costs. After that it's basically just free electricity forever.

Free-ish. Add to that: Maintenance, replacement.

Also, if it's ~20 times more costly than a conventional solar solution of equivalent power, wouldn't it just be better to just build 20 times more solar power off road?

 This is what I don't get - how could even the most die-hard greenie support this? Even assuming the solar roadway was exactly as efficient as any other solar installation, why would any thinking person install a solar roadway when for the same expense you could build 20x the installation and get 20 times more power from solar? 20 times the clean renewable power, meaning an even greater reduction in need for other forms of energy. That's completely ignoring the science in this which only makes the difference inw hat you get for the price even greater.

 Ah - but the REAL proponents are the government and their cronies. Why spend that money on 20x the actual solar installations when you can skim 50% off the top and benefit you and your cronies and build a useless but feel good solar roadway? Too cynical? But how else do you explain this huge disconnect? 20x the cost even if you ignore the science and say it is otherwise equal in all ways - no one can be this blind, it HAS to be deliberate.

[rolycat]

Maybe they're building it ... to show the world that the French are rich and powerful stupid.
Everybody who drives through France will see this and marvel . That won't happen with conventional solar.

FTFY

[Red Squirrel]

For that bike path it would probably be cheaper and make more sense to build overhead supports to put the panels directly above the trail.

[Brumby]

.... and idea that has been implemented in other locations, as well as being suggested here .... on more than one occasion.


But - apologies - we are being too logical.

[number33]

Is it my imagination or is it always raining in Sandpoint.  That webcam looks like a Ridley Scott movie. 

[EEVblog]

Ah - but the REAL proponents are the government and their cronies. Why spend that money on 20x the actual solar installations when you can skim 50% off the top and benefit you and your cronies and build a useless but feel good solar roadway? Too cynical? But how else do you explain this huge disconnect? 20x the cost even if you ignore the science and say it is otherwise equal in all ways - no one can be this blind, it HAS to be deliberate.

For the previous video I tried to find if there were any links between the French minister and Colas in some way. Donations, family ties etc, but if was hard not speaking French.

[EEVblog]

And despite all this "The Energy Minister (Ségolène Royal) said repeatedly she wants 1,000 kilometres of solar road, which will cost 5 billion Euros on the basis of the project cost in the Orne.

Yes but that's only the startup costs. After that it's basically just free electricity forever.

Only after the payback period which is >20x longer than regular solar (which is already marginal payback) PLUS the maintenance upkeep.
It's the dumbest idea in history.

[LabSpokane]

Is it my imagination or is it always raining in Sandpoint.  That webcam looks like a Ridley Scott movie. 

It has been an extraordinarily wet fall here. It is very rare to get this much rain this soon