Will Trump's Mexican border solar powered wall pay for itself?
Dave runs the numbers to find out what the solar payback is.
Watched the video, wanted to share, link was broken, video gone, what happend??
Dave probably found something (or someone else did and let him know) - and he's doing an extra edit.
Making it private again stops whatever the issue was from being viewed by all and sundry.
Be patient. I expect it will be back within the next few hours, with a possible explanation from Dave.
Didn't Dave say sometime that he couldn't order something because he is at some American watchlist?
This seems to be happening a lot. Email notifications > click > Not available. Video is put back up 5 hours later with no mention of why it was inaccurate/re-edited/changed/deleted.
I assume that's a ton of wasted time from people clicking on emails.
Back up now. Minor but important technical edit.
I thought only Thunderf00t loved stepping on the right's toes. This is going to turn political really quick.
I thought only Thunderf00t loved stepping on the right's toes. This is going to turn political really quick.
I'm debunking a technical claim, I don't give a crap about the politics.
For Trump, the numbers making sense are irrelevant. He's just trying it out as a ploy to provide Congress a political excuse to fund the wall, since he's got no chance of getting Mexico to pay for it.
Most illegal immigrants get here by walking over on a tourist visa and simply failing to leave. Which makes building massive walls, once you get out into the boondocks where nature eliminates the casual crossing, an expensive symbol rather than an actual deterrant. By the way, a fair chunk of the existing "wall" is merely a vehicle barrier, so it doesn't really exist in the form Trump speaks of.
Might be time for President Trump to consider dealing with suspicious or incompetent 'technical' advisers with those famous two words...
"YOU'RE FIRED !!!"
I thought only Thunderf00t loved stepping on the right's toes. This is going to turn political really quick.
I'm debunking a technical claim.
That's moot when it comes to politics.
I thought only Thunderf00t loved stepping on the right's toes. This is going to turn political really quick.
I'm debunking a technical claim.
That's moot when it comes to politics.
Depends on whether you are looking at the subject on a technical/economic basis ... or not.
I certainly agree with your calculation here, the energy from solar will not pay for the wall. But I still like the idea and would not want to discourage putting solar on it.
Many of the concepts do look pretty schmick.
Many of the concepts do look pretty schmick.
Anybody spot the mistake?
Many of the concepts do look pretty schmick.
Anybody spot the mistake?
Haha, the sun doesn't shine from the north (at the mexican border at least)
[Edit] Aha, this must be
here, or one of the other places where the fractal geometry of the border turns it upside down.
I thought only Thunderf00t loved stepping on the right's toes. This is going to turn political really quick.
I'm debunking a technical claim.
That's moot when it comes to politics.
Only to people who get triggered by politics.
I certainly agree with your calculation here, the energy from solar will not pay for the wall. But I still like the idea and would not want to discourage putting solar on it.
It's technically a dumb idea.
If the goal is to get solar payback then build a normal concentrated array farm in the Texas desert.
The losses on this wall system will be large. It's not as dumb as solar roadways, but it's another example of a poor and inefficient implementation of solar technology.
The only technical difficult I see with this implementation is energy transport, there are many large stretches of border with no city or town near it. Apart from that the implementation is equivalent to a roof installation (?)
The benefit of doing it would largely be symbolic, and let's face it - the government won't be spending $1B on normal solar installations. But it can happen if it makes Trump look good.
The only technical difficult I see with this implementation is energy transport
I think getting enough panels produced before his/Congress's 4 years finish will be another big issue. It may well send panel prices through the roof.
I certainly agree with your calculation here, the energy from solar will not pay for the wall. But I still like the idea and would not want to discourage putting solar on it.
They'll probably put the panels on the USA's side of the fence to avoid the Mexicans stealing them.
(Is that joke too subtle?)
Not completely stupid, at least the panels won't have shit on top of them like roads and carparks would. And the location is quite conducive of effective solar energy. It would probably pay for the cost of the PV system alone in a few years, but never the wall.
But yeah, you'd be better off just concentrating the panels into a square/circular array somewhere and avoid all the logistics of transmitting power from a 3000km long array, vandalism, getting proper tracking, etc etc.
Anyway, it's clearly just a political stunt to boost popularity for the wall, because now it's 'green'.
Dave, you could have stated maintenance costs would be a magnitude higher... due to many factors (almost reason enough to build a railway line just to do the job). I would think easy vandalism from irritated dwellers on the other side would be reason enough to NOT build anything so delicate. But maybe his family is already buying into solar tech to plan for endless returns?
Recall the damaged panel on your own roof. Imagine a Mexican night-flight ejecting scrap-metal towards the panels! FAIL!!
I suspect three additional factors will make it even less likely to payback:
1) The $12B cost for the wall didn't include any infrastructure support for a solar array. Chances are, if you want to stick 1x2m panels on top, then the wall itself will have to change to support that loading (panels are light, but not when the wind blows!!)
2) The cost of large scale solar arrays, at the quoted $1.50/W is not valid for a distributed array. Costs for cabling, junction boxes, interconnects etc on a linear array will be far higher than for a typical concentrated array (which is what is normally built, ie, lots of panels in a broadly square layout). And of course, the transmission losses will be significantly larger too, as the source of your power is spread out over a huge distance.
3) What are you going to do with 580MW in the middle of the southern desert? Las Vegas2 anyone?? ;-) Otherwise you've got to get that power to someone who needs it, and that isn't going to be cheap!
3) What are you going to do with 580MW in the middle of the southern desert? Las Vegas2 anyone?? ;-) Otherwise you've got to get that power to someone who needs it, and that isn't going to be cheap!
Sell it to Mexico, then he could claim that they
are paying for the wall!