When Will Electric Cars Become Mainstream?

[DougSpindler]

PV energy could be used to lift water and store it in a large reservoir for use in power generation as it flowed back down.

We have one system of hydroelectric dams that pump water up again at night, when the electricity is cheap. Something like that could be used for times of surplus generation, like surplus solar or wind, etc.
I think it is common technology. Even a single dam can have a lower, smaller reservoir, to be able to pump the water up again from there.

One idea for hydrogen cars, is to use surplus generation to produce hydrogen via electrolysis. It could also be used as storage and turned back into electricity, but i think that the efficiency is not good. No emissions, however.

You need to do a bit of research.  Hydrogen for hydrogen powered cars comes from fossil fuels.  It's too expensive to produce with electricity.  While the resevior system works, just look at how little electricity it actually produces for Germany.  I think I saw less than 3%. 

This is from eight years ago, "In the U.S., the existing 38 pumped hydroelectric facilities can store just over 2 percent of the country’s electrical generating capacity.  That share is small compared with Europe’s (nearly 5%) and Japan’s (about 10%). But the industry plans to build reservoirs close to existing power plants.  Enough projects are being considered to double capacity."

Want to guess how many for these "planned to be built" are actually being considered?  In California the answer is 0.  There are issues with fish, water for farmers and people.  I think California has close to 200, and we stopped building them for environmental reasons.  One of the last ones they were building is about 2 hours from me.  It's one of the ones the environmentalists never allowed to be completed.

While it might sound like it good idea, in practice it doesn't work out that way.

It's not economical vs producing it from natural gas, when using power from the grid at the standard price, but if you're looking for something to do with surplus solar or wind generation, that's a special case. Of course, unless the issue of mass production of hydrogen from clean sources is solved, i don't see how the hydrogen car can have any future.

Pumping water up the dam works here in the conditions it's done. YMMV.

This is the wikipedia article for this kind of hydroelectric dams: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity

This one is also interesting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage

Also very interesting. A map with different energy storage plants and projects: http://www.energystorageexchange.org/projects.html

No one is saying it doesn't work.  It's a 100+ year old technology which has been proven.  I live in California and we have around 200.  We've built all we can.  The terrain is such there are any other locations suitable for building any more.  Then we have water shortages and environmentalist who don't want to see them get built.


The mass production of hydrogen comes from fossil fuels.

While what you are saying is all good, the problem is we have built all we can, and there aren't any other sites suitable for building any more.

[DougSpindler]

Posting links to 4 videos which folks might be interested in if you would like to know how to make an atomic bomb. Or if you would like to understand how the Chernobyl meltdown occurred.  (It was a stupid design, no safety mechanisms.)

Prof. Richard Muller explains nuclear meltdown and Chernobyl
The Politics of Physics - Uranium, Bombs and Iran - Part 1
The Politics of Physics - Uranium, Bombs and Iran - Part 2
How to enrich Uranium - Periodic Table of Videos

https://youtu.be/UeVIzHEh7a4

https://youtu.be/eLrylcHtIS4

https://youtu.be/4nIL0-vvxfg

https://youtu.be/69UpMhUnEeY

[nctnico]

For now... within 15 years you'll see new nuclear power plants being built allover Europe.

Not credible any more. Too expensive considering clean alternatives.

Name the alternatives complete with a TCO analysis. Many people are talking about renewables but their numbers never add up to a solution which is financially and technically viable. 

[fsr]

PV energy could be used to lift water and store it in a large reservoir for use in power generation as it flowed back down.

We have one system of hydroelectric dams that pump water up again at night, when the electricity is cheap. Something like that could be used for times of surplus generation, like surplus solar or wind, etc.
I think it is common technology. Even a single dam can have a lower, smaller reservoir, to be able to pump the water up again from there.

One idea for hydrogen cars, is to use surplus generation to produce hydrogen via electrolysis. It could also be used as storage and turned back into electricity, but i think that the efficiency is not good. No emissions, however.

You need to do a bit of research.  Hydrogen for hydrogen powered cars comes from fossil fuels.  It's too expensive to produce with electricity.  While the resevior system works, just look at how little electricity it actually produces for Germany.  I think I saw less than 3%. 

This is from eight years ago, "In the U.S., the existing 38 pumped hydroelectric facilities can store just over 2 percent of the country’s electrical generating capacity.  That share is small compared with Europe’s (nearly 5%) and Japan’s (about 10%). But the industry plans to build reservoirs close to existing power plants.  Enough projects are being considered to double capacity."

Want to guess how many for these "planned to be built" are actually being considered?  In California the answer is 0.  There are issues with fish, water for farmers and people.  I think California has close to 200, and we stopped building them for environmental reasons.  One of the last ones they were building is about 2 hours from me.  It's one of the ones the environmentalists never allowed to be completed.

While it might sound like it good idea, in practice it doesn't work out that way.

It's not economical vs producing it from natural gas, when using power from the grid at the standard price, but if you're looking for something to do with surplus solar or wind generation, that's a special case. Of course, unless the issue of mass production of hydrogen from clean sources is solved, i don't see how the hydrogen car can have any future.

Pumping water up the dam works here in the conditions it's done. YMMV.

This is the wikipedia article for this kind of hydroelectric dams: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumped-storage_hydroelectricity

This one is also interesting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage

Also very interesting. A map with different energy storage plants and projects: http://www.energystorageexchange.org/projects.html

No one is saying it doesn't work.  It's a 100+ year old technology which has been proven.  I live in California and we have around 200.  We've built all we can.  The terrain is such there are any other locations suitable for building any more.  Then we have water shortages and environmentalist who don't want to see them get built.


The mass production of hydrogen comes from fossil fuels.

While what you are saying is all good, the problem is we have built all we can, and there aren't any other sites suitable for building any more.

Well, yes, you cannot build a dam in any place you want, but it's not the only option for energy storage. Take a look at the link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage . Some interesting technologies there.
Maybe you don't need to store that much, if the grid is large enough to transport the energy where the demand is.
With solar, half of the earth is lit and half is dark at any time. Not so easy to transport such large amounts of energy, of course, or to make a grid so large, but maybe that's what will be needed at some point. HVDC power transmission is an interesting technology for this.
Anyways, at some point, when fossil fuels get more and more scarce, changes will be unavoidable. A pity that most of the time, decisions are made with just money in consideration, and at short-term (because most politics don't give a damn about stuff that isn't immediately allowing them to be re-elected). Considering all the problems with coal, the fact that so much of it is used to produce electricity is a sad reminder of how slow are the world leaders reacting to the warnings that scientists are giving us from decades.

[coppice]

Well, yes, you cannot build a dam in any place you want, but it's not the only option for energy storage. Take a look at the link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage . Some interesting technologies there.

Note that most of the things listed on the page are just ideas that may or may not play out and have a bright future. The only thing with a proven track record seems to be pumped storage,

[apis]

It is great that there are more investments in renewable, and hopefully someone can create enough storage for it to take over completely (although I doubt it will be anytime soon).

Until they have replaced all the fossil fuel for electricity and district heating we should keep nuclear and even expand it so that we can get rid of fossil fuels as fast as possible (because of air pollution, greenhouse gases, ocean acidification, mercury, etc, etc).

Once we no longer produce any electricity by burning stuff, in particular fossil fuels, you can begin replacing the nuclear power plants.

[DougSpindler]

Well, yes, you cannot build a dam in any place you want, but it's not the only option for energy storage. Take a look at the link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage . Some interesting technologies there.
Maybe you don't need to store that much, if the grid is large enough to transport the energy where the demand is.
With solar, half of the earth is lit and half is dark at any time. Not so easy to transport such large amounts of energy, of course, or to make a grid so large, but maybe that's what will be needed at some point. HVDC power transmission is an interesting technology for this.
Anyways, at some point, when fossil fuels get more and more scarce, changes will be unavoidable.

The picture in the link you provided are very interesting.  Did you look at it?
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Energy-Units-01.png
A sense of units and scale for electrical energy production and consumption.

Take a look at how little solar and wind produces compared to just one nuclear power plant.

I have been to Hover dam.  Hard to belevive something that huge produces so little electrictiy.  With that said, I wonder just how large Itaipu dam is.
This might not be as great as a solution as it sounds.  Over the past 20 years the water level in Hover dam had dropped 200 feet.  What happens when we run out of water?

 

[fsr]

Well, yes, you cannot build a dam in any place you want, but it's not the only option for energy storage. Take a look at the link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage . Some interesting technologies there.
Maybe you don't need to store that much, if the grid is large enough to transport the energy where the demand is.
With solar, half of the earth is lit and half is dark at any time. Not so easy to transport such large amounts of energy, of course, or to make a grid so large, but maybe that's what will be needed at some point. HVDC power transmission is an interesting technology for this.
Anyways, at some point, when fossil fuels get more and more scarce, changes will be unavoidable.

The picture in the link you provided are very interesting.  Did you look at it?
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Energy-Units-01.png
A sense of units and scale for electrical energy production and consumption.

Take a look at how little solar and wind produces compared to just one nuclear power plant.

I have been to Hover dam.  Hard to belevive something that huge produces so little electrictiy.  With that said, I wonder just how large Itaipu dam is.
This might not be as great as a solution as it sounds.  Over the past 20 years the water level in Hover dam had dropped 200 feet.  What happens when we run out of water?

Yes, it seems like there aren't a lot of solar and wind turbines out there, isn't it? Only China has a 24000 MWh/day wind farm. The graph is a little bit outdated, as it lists Fukushima, and it didn't go very well back in 2011.
The graph doesn't really tells you much about the pros and cons of running different power plants, it's just a snapshot in time of the energy production, from at least 8 years ago, i presume.
Wind and solar are relatively new, evolving technologies. The Sun shines 1000 MW per square kilometer on the earth's surface. That's not too shabby. I'm fairly sure that as time goes on, we are going to see more and more of them.

[DougSpindler]

Well, yes, you cannot build a dam in any place you want, but it's not the only option for energy storage. Take a look at the link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage . Some interesting technologies there.
Maybe you don't need to store that much, if the grid is large enough to transport the energy where the demand is.
With solar, half of the earth is lit and half is dark at any time. Not so easy to transport such large amounts of energy, of course, or to make a grid so large, but maybe that's what will be needed at some point. HVDC power transmission is an interesting technology for this.
Anyways, at some point, when fossil fuels get more and more scarce, changes will be unavoidable.

The picture in the link you provided are very interesting.  Did you look at it?
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Energy-Units-01.png
A sense of units and scale for electrical energy production and consumption.

Take a look at how little solar and wind produces compared to just one nuclear power plant.

I have been to Hover dam.  Hard to belevive something that huge produces so little electrictiy.  With that said, I wonder just how large Itaipu dam is.
This might not be as great as a solution as it sounds.  Over the past 20 years the water level in Hover dam had dropped 200 feet.  What happens when we run out of water?

Yes, it seems like there aren't a lot of solar and wind turbines out there, isn't it? Only China has a 24000 MWh/day wind farm. The graph is a little bit outdated, as it lists Fukushima, and it didn't go very well back in 2011.
The graph doesn't really tells you much about the pros and cons of running different power plants, it's just a snapshot in time of the energy production, from at least 8 years ago, i presume.
Wind and solar are relatively new, evolving technologies. The Sun shines 1000 MW per square kilometer on the earth's surface. That's not too shabby. I'm fairly sure that as time goes on, we are going to see more and more of them.

Doesn’t matter that it’s from 8 years ago, the relative numbers have not changed.
You make a very good point about the sun’s energy hitting the Earth.  Just think if we could convert all of that 1000 to electricity we would be incomplete darkness and nothing would grow.  We would have to use the electricity we produce for lighting and to grow crops.  Better to let the sun do it.

Do you have any idea how much aluminum, steel and concrete is would be needed to provide one quarter of the world with electricity from solar with the current technology?  It would take all of the aluminum and steal that’s ever been mined and all of the concrete that’s ever been poured.

While what you are saying sounds good in theory, it’s the practicality that gets in the way.  Much like people who invent perpetual motion machines.  There’s that one issues that can’t seem to figure out....It takes energy to power the machine.

[fsr]

Well, yes, you cannot build a dam in any place you want, but it's not the only option for energy storage. Take a look at the link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage . Some interesting technologies there.
Maybe you don't need to store that much, if the grid is large enough to transport the energy where the demand is.
With solar, half of the earth is lit and half is dark at any time. Not so easy to transport such large amounts of energy, of course, or to make a grid so large, but maybe that's what will be needed at some point. HVDC power transmission is an interesting technology for this.
Anyways, at some point, when fossil fuels get more and more scarce, changes will be unavoidable.

The picture in the link you provided are very interesting.  Did you look at it?
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Energy-Units-01.png
A sense of units and scale for electrical energy production and consumption.

Take a look at how little solar and wind produces compared to just one nuclear power plant.

I have been to Hover dam.  Hard to belevive something that huge produces so little electrictiy.  With that said, I wonder just how large Itaipu dam is.
This might not be as great as a solution as it sounds.  Over the past 20 years the water level in Hover dam had dropped 200 feet.  What happens when we run out of water?

Yes, it seems like there aren't a lot of solar and wind turbines out there, isn't it? Only China has a 24000 MWh/day wind farm. The graph is a little bit outdated, as it lists Fukushima, and it didn't go very well back in 2011.
The graph doesn't really tells you much about the pros and cons of running different power plants, it's just a snapshot in time of the energy production, from at least 8 years ago, i presume.
Wind and solar are relatively new, evolving technologies. The Sun shines 1000 MW per square kilometer on the earth's surface. That's not too shabby. I'm fairly sure that as time goes on, we are going to see more and more of them.

Doesn’t matter that it’s from 8 years ago, the relative numbers have not changed.
You make a very good point about the sun’s energy hitting the Earth.  Just think if we could convert all of that 1000 to electricity we would be incomplete darkness and nothing would grow.  We would have to use the electricity we produce for lighting and to grow crops.  Better to let the sun do it.

Do you have any idea how much aluminum, steel and concrete is would be needed to provide one quarter of the world with electricity from solar with the current technology?  It would take all of the aluminum and steal that’s ever been mined and all of the concrete that’s ever been poured.

While what you are saying sounds good in theory, it’s the practicality that gets in the way.  Much like people who invent perpetual motion machines.  There’s that one issues that can’t seem to figure out....It takes energy to power the machine.

Do you have any source that support that information? It looks a little bit excessive.
The total amount of electricity consumed worldwide was 19,504 TWh in 2013. So, that's about 2.23 TW of average power. If we said that you have 1 GW of power from the Sun in 1 Km² on the surface of the Earth, that means that the power is available in 2226 Km², or a square of 47 by 47 Km. Double that, because half the earth is dark at any time. And there's the issue with the effciency also. But you clearly don't need to cover the whole world with solar panels and/or concentration solar plants, or anything like that.
Even when calculating from the total energy use (not only electricity), the result seems to be a smaller surface than one could think at first: https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/09/22/we-could-power-the-entire-world-by-harnessing-solar-energy-from-1-of-the-sahara/#7e7964a9d440
Of course, you won't rely completely in solar, you will also have wind, hydro, and nuclear. But let's try to build all the renewables we can, and supplement with nuclear. Not the other way around.

PD: Interesting table i found in one of the wikipedia pages. It lists electricity consumption per country divided as Fossil, Nuclear, and Renewables: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_energy_consumption#World_electricity_consumption_(2012)

[apis]

Do you have any idea how much aluminum, steel and concrete is would be needed to provide one quarter of the world with electricity from solar with the current technology?  It would take all of the aluminum and steal that’s ever been mined and all of the concrete that’s ever been poured.

Solar panels are made of mostly silicon, and there is an abundance of silicon on earth (sand is mainly silicon dioxide for example). As fsr said you only need to cover a few percent of a suitable desert to cover the entire worlds electricity demand. But we also need energy for heating and solar isn't well suited to that. In theory you could use electric heating I suppose, but we would need much more electricity then (~7x). Coincidentally nuclear produce a lot of heat that is often wasted because people have made it illegal to use it for district heating due to the irrational fear of all things nuclear.

The only problem with solar for electricity production (that I'm aware of) is storage, but that is a big problem that prevents it from being the final solution. Until that problem is solved we need alternatives that produce electricity when it's dark. Nuclear + solar would probably be enough to replace fossil fuels, but the problem is it takes a lot of time to build new nuclear and solar power plants. (As we have seen, people are doing the opposite shutting down nuclear power plants and building new fossil fuel plants so it's hard to be optimistic about the future.)

IMAGE: MAP SHOWING SOLAR RADIATION ACROSS AUSTRALIA.  THE SMALL RED DOT IN THE CENTRE SHOWS THE AREA OF AUSTRALIA THAT WOULD BE REQUIRED TO PRODUCE ALL OF AUSTRALIA’S ELECTRICITY USING SOLAR ENERGY.   THE LARGE GREEN DOT SHOWS THE AREA REQUIRED TO PRODUCE THE ENTIRE WORLD’S ELECTRICITY

https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/scienceshow/big-solar-%E2%80%93-australian-sunlight-could-power-the-planet/7451890

Solar areas defined by the dark disks could provide more than the world's total primary energy demand (assuming a conversion efficiency of 8%). That is, all energy currently consumed, including heat, electricity, fossil fuels, etc., would be produced in the form of electricity by solar cells. The colors in the map show the local solar irradiance averaged over three years from 1991 to 1993 (24 hours a day) taking into account the cloud coverage available from weather satellites.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_energy#/media/File:Solar_land_area.png

The Sun shines 1000 MW per square kilometer on the earth's surface.

Not quite. A clear day you can get about 1kW/m² on a surface perpendicular to the direction towards the sun, but not the surface of the earth (which often isn't perpendicular to the sun).

Outside the atmosphere sunlight have a fairly constant power of ~1.362 kW/m². About 26% of that is lost because of the atmosphere which leaves ~1 kW/m² on a clear day. Clouds reflect on average ~20%. The area of a sphere is 4πr² and the earths cross section towards the sun is a disk with area πr², so on average you get 1/4 the power per surface area. In total the average is about 1.362*0.54*0.25 = 184 W/m². However it depends a lot on the location, as can be seen in the plots above. Near the equator you get much higher average insolation, closer to 300 W/m². In northern Europe you unfortunately only get about 100 w/m². Still a respectable amount, but one has to remember that it is the yearly average, it will vary a lot with time of year and weather conditions. During winter (when energy demand is highest) production from solar drops to almost nothing this far to the north. Conversely, if you live in a warm climate near the equator, you might have higher energy demand during peak insolation because people use airconditioning to cool their buildings.

[fsr]

The Sun shines 1000 MW per square kilometer on the earth's surface.

Not quite. A clear day you can get about 1kW/m² on a surface perpendicular to the direction towards the sun, but not the surface of the earth (which often isn't perpendicular to the sun).

Outside the atmosphere sunlight have a fairly constant power of ~1.362 kW/m². About 26% of that is lost because of the atmosphere which leaves ~1 kW/m² on a clear day. Clouds reflect on average ~20%. The area of a sphere is 4πr² and the earths cross section towards the sun is a disk with area πr², so on average you get 1/4 the power per surface area. In total the average is about 1.362*0.54*0.25 = 184 W/m². However it depends a lot on the location, as can be seen in the plots above. Near the equator you get much higher average insolation, closer to 300 W/m². In northern Europe you unfortunately only get about 100 w/m². Still a respectable amount, but one has to remember that it is the yearly average, it will vary a lot with time of year and weather conditions. During winter (when energy demand is highest) production from solar drops to almost nothing this far to the north. Conversely, if you live in a warm climate near the equator, you might have higher energy demand during peak insolation because people use airconditioning to cool their buildings.
[/quote]
Agreed. Sun power varies with location, time of the year, time of day, and weather conditions.
The 1 kW/m² is often cited. Is it incorrect, or it's reasonable in certain conditions, like when panels are installed at an angle, so that they're perpendicular to the rays of the Sun?
As you said, there are deserts out there that are ideal for solar power, but to make the best use of them to power all latitudes would require an international grid, which would have it's technical challenges, and sadly, still bigger political challenges. In fact, if the grid is large enough, then storage would be less of an issue, because the sun is always shining somewhere, and there is always peak demand somewhere and valley demand elsewhere. But yeah, not the easiest thing to do.
But, if you have hydro and solar/wind, you don't need to use as much water when solar/wind is supplying the demand, at least partially. That could be considered some kind of energy storage, specially if the hydro can supply the demand when solar/wind is low, thanks to the fact that now you don't use as much water when the sun is shining and/or the wind is blowing.

Why do you say that solar isn't good for heating? There are some solar water heaters, and they say that they reduce a lot of the gas needed to heat the water:



When i traveled to some provinces in the north of my country, you see them everywhere. And i've seen some of them even here in Buenos Aires.

[DougSpindler]

What percentage of a solar panel is silicon vs aluminum?  Every solar panel I have seen has an aluminum frame.  When it comes to a large ground mounted then use steel and concreate.  The amount of steel aluminum and concrete is far greater than the amount of silicon.  It is the solar and wind turbine industry association and  which is saying we would have to use all of the steel and aluminum ever mined and all of the concrete ever poured. 

There’s a fault in the logic of these maps.  We don’t have the technology to covert all of the sun’s energy into electricity.  What the maps are showing is what is theoretically possible the only problem is we don’t have the technology to do it.

[vk6zgo]

What percentage of a solar panel is silicon vs aluminum?  Every solar panel I have seen has an aluminum frame.  When it comes to a large ground mounted then use steel and concreate.  The amount of steel aluminum and concrete is far greater than the amount of silicon.  It is the solar and wind turbine industry association and  which is saying we would have to use all of the steel and aluminum ever mined and all of the concrete ever poured. 

There’s a fault in the logic of these maps.  We don’t have the technology to covert all of the sun’s energy into electricity.  What the maps are showing is what is theoretically possible the only problem is we don’t have the technology to do it.

They don't expect that.
They quote 8% conversion efficiency.
What is the real killer is getting the Electricity from where it is made, to where it is used.

There are some things which ameliorate this problem, but which are (obviously) not the "magic bullet" to cure all ills.

What is done in Western Australia is that many remote (& we have some really remote ones), small towns produce their own power, either from solar, (with diesel for when the Sun isn't shining), or wind, or a combination of all three.
Even "Roadhouses" in "the middle of nowhere" have their own small "Solar farms".(They sell fuel, so they want to be able to keep the lion's share of their diesel fuel to sell, not burn it for no profit).

This saves the tonnes of steel & concrete which would otherwise be used to build thousands of kilometres of  electricity transmission towers to bring power from the larger population centres.

This way of doing things would work well in many African countries, & maybe already does.
OK, it isn't powering the World, but it is an effective way to supply power in very large, sparsely populated countries.

In cities, rooftop solar generation on individual homes is common.
Solar hot water systems are ubiquitous in Australia, & have been for years.
Both save a considerable amount of otherwise needed fossil fuel, over time.

OK, they aren't as effective in Northern Europe, or the Northern States of the USA, but many people live in countries with good levels of sunlight year round.

That said, the "powers that be" seem to have managed to stuff up electricity supply royally in the Eastern States of this country.

[DougSpindler]

What percentage of a solar panel is silicon vs aluminum?  Every solar panel I have seen has an aluminum frame.  When it comes to a large ground mounted then use steel and concreate.  The amount of steel aluminum and concrete is far greater than the amount of silicon.  It is the solar and wind turbine industry association and  which is saying we would have to use all of the steel and aluminum ever mined and all of the concrete ever poured. 

There’s a fault in the logic of these maps.  We don’t have the technology to covert all of the sun’s energy into electricity.  What the maps are showing is what is theoretically possible the only problem is we don’t have the technology to do it.

They don't expect that.
They quote 8% conversion efficiency.
What is the real killer is getting the Electricity from where it is made, to where it is used.

There are some things which ameliorate this problem, but which are (obviously) not the "magic bullet" to cure all ills.

What is done in Western Australia is that many remote (& we have some really remote ones), small towns produce their own power, either from solar, (with diesel for when the Sun isn't shining), or wind, or a combination of all three.
Even "Roadhouses" in "the middle of nowhere" have their own small "Solar farms".(They sell fuel, so they want to be able to keep the lion's share of their diesel fuel to sell, not burn it for no profit).

This saves the tonnes of steel & concrete which would otherwise be used to build thousands of kilometres of  electricity transmission towers to bring power from the larger population centres.

This way of doing things would work well in many African countries, & maybe already does.
OK, it isn't powering the World, but it is an effective way to supply power in very large, sparsely populated countries.

In cities, rooftop solar generation on individual homes is common.
Solar hot water systems are ubiquitous in Australia, & have been for years.
Both save a considerable amount of otherwise needed fossil fuel, over time.

OK, they aren't as effective in Northern Europe, or the Northern States of the USA, but many people live in countries with good levels of sunlight year round.

That said, the "powers that be" seem to have managed to stuff up electricity supply royally in the Eastern States of this country.

Interesting, thanks for sharing.  I know Russia's solution to providing power at remote locations was nuclear.  They powered (and maybe still do) power light houses, aircraft navigational aids with nuclear.  Liquid hydrocarbon fuels would be way too expensive.  And solar and wind would not be practical.  They found nuclear to be "best" solution.


In the United States it is very rare to see any houses or buildings with solar hot water heaters except for pools.  I recently priced one for my house and it was crazy expensive.  Fuel costs, natural gas prices are so low here it I would be paying an ernormous premium to use the sun to make hot water.  I don't live where it freezes.  But if I didn't the cost goes up even more.  A lot more.

Solar will never work in large cities with tall buidling for obvious reasons.  While they might work for remote road houses where you are, we aren't as sparsely populated.  I suspect where thouse road houses are hydroelectric is out of the question.

[vk6zgo]

[quote author=fsr link=topic=101254.msg2145658#
Why do you say that solar isn't good for heating? There are some solar water heaters, and they say that they reduce a lot of the gas needed to heat the water:



When i traveled to some provinces in the north of my country, you see them everywhere. And i've seen some of them even here in Buenos Aires.

They are very common in Australia.
Mine has an "electric booster", but it doesn't come on often.
One year, as an experiment, I left the booster turned off all year, & we got through with no problems.

Strangely, the only place I've seen them not perform well, is in the far North Kimberley region of Western Australia.

My old work decided the price of electricity was too high, so left the booster out of circuit.
In the "Dry" season, with 40C heat & cloudless days, it worked a treat, but then, the cold water was pretty hot too! ( pipes run on the surface of the ground).

In the "Wet" season, it rained heavily, & the sky was full of clouds.
We would come in after being drenched in a Tropical downpour, then have no warm shower.
OK, people will say "But it's the Tropics---it's warm rain".
Nope! It still makes you feel cold & miserable.

That said, there were reasonably sunny days from time to time, so you could occasionally get a nice warm shower.

[apis]

The 1 kW/m² is often cited. Is it incorrect, or it's reasonable in certain conditions, like when panels are installed at an angle, so that they're perpendicular to the rays of the Sun?

The number is correct it's just used in the wrong way here. 1 kW/m² is the maximum possible insolation under ideal conditions (if you have a clear day and the solar panel is directed perpendicular to the sun). So at the equator you could get 1 TW sunlight from a km² on a clear day, but only for a short time during noon when the sun is at zenit. During the morning and evening as the sun rises and sets the output drops and during night it will be zero of course. The solar panels only have an efficiency of about 20% at best so a 1 km² PV panel installation at the equator could have a peak output of about 200 MW, but the yearly average output would be at most about 55 MW (assuming 275 W/m²).

The 1 kW/m² is the global yearly average maximum value. I suppose that If the sun at a low altitude the light has to pass through a longer column of air and that value might be a bit lower, and conversely if the sun is right above you it passes through a shorter column of air and the value would be a bit higher.

When you calculate how much land area you need, it doesn't help to angle the solar panel since it will cast a long shadow on the ground. You can get more power out of the solar panels by angling them, so you should do that, but in that case you will have to spread them out more so they don't shadow each other, so you will still have to use a larger land area.

When calculating how much energy can be produced it's also wrong to use the 1 kW/m² figure, since that is just the maximum solar power you get under ideal conditions. You need to use the average insolation over the day (and year) and also take into account the average cloud cover. So calculating how much output you will get from a solar panel installation is actually rather tricky, but the second picture should give a rough idea of what amount of sunlight to expect at different locations. Then you also have to take into account that a solar panel is at most about 22% efficient, and you get additional losses in inverters and battery storage and so on.

As you said, there are deserts out there that are ideal for solar power, but to make the best use of them to power all latitudes would require an international grid, which would have it's technical challenges, and sadly, still bigger political challenges. In fact, if the grid is large enough, then storage would be less of an issue, because the sun is always shining somewhere, and there is always peak demand somewhere and valley demand elsewhere. But yeah, not the easiest thing to do.

Yes, absolutely. It also helps if you have a wind power farms at different locations, since it's less likely there are no wind everywhere. So that helps balance things a bit as well.

But, if you have hydro and solar/wind, you don't need to use as much water when solar/wind is supplying the demand, at least partially. That could be considered some kind of energy storage, specially if the hydro can supply the demand when solar/wind is low, thanks to the fact that now you don't use as much water when the sun is shining and/or the wind is blowing.

Sweden and Norway has a lot of hydro and it is being used that way. Denmark uses a lot of wind power and is basically relying on our hydro to act as storage for them. But hydro still has a limited capacity and the amount of of water that is available in the dams is weather dependent. I suppose they could add reverse pumps to the power dams as well, I don't think they have that at the moment, but I do not believe it would be near enough to work as storage for all of Europe. Sweden use nuclear power despite all the hydro and wind power, and we also have coal/gas for backup heating during winters.

Why do you say that solar isn't good for heating? There are some solar water heaters, and they say that they reduce a lot of the gas needed to heat the water:

That is great, but I was thinking of heating buildings here in Scandinavia during winter for example, and solar heaters wouldn't be enough (especially since there is very little sunlight in the winter). Old houses are often poorly insulated, so they need a lot of energy to heat up, and it is very hard to add insulation today since it causes moisture and mould problems. Newer houses could be built with better insulation but even so called passive houses have backup wood stoves for heating here.

There are also industrial processes that require a lot of heat (like cement making) and they typically generate heat by burning coal/gas today. It's hard to see how that could be done effectively using solar. You could use electricity to generate heat of course, but that would require a lot more electricity being produced.

[vk6zgo]

What percentage of a solar panel is silicon vs aluminum?  Every solar panel I have seen has an aluminum frame.  When it comes to a large ground mounted then use steel and concreate.  The amount of steel aluminum and concrete is far greater than the amount of silicon.  It is the solar and wind turbine industry association and  which is saying we would have to use all of the steel and aluminum ever mined and all of the concrete ever poured. 

There’s a fault in the logic of these maps.  We don’t have the technology to covert all of the sun’s energy into electricity.  What the maps are showing is what is theoretically possible the only problem is we don’t have the technology to do it.

They don't expect that.
They quote 8% conversion efficiency.
What is the real killer is getting the Electricity from where it is made, to where it is used.

There are some things which ameliorate this problem, but which are (obviously) not the "magic bullet" to cure all ills.

What is done in Western Australia is that many remote (& we have some really remote ones), small towns produce their own power, either from solar, (with diesel for when the Sun isn't shining), or wind, or a combination of all three.
Even "Roadhouses" in "the middle of nowhere" have their own small "Solar farms".(They sell fuel, so they want to be able to keep the lion's share of their diesel fuel to sell, not burn it for no profit).

This saves the tonnes of steel & concrete which would otherwise be used to build thousands of kilometres of  electricity transmission towers to bring power from the larger population centres.

This way of doing things would work well in many African countries, & maybe already does.
OK, it isn't powering the World, but it is an effective way to supply power in very large, sparsely populated countries.

In cities, rooftop solar generation on individual homes is common.
Solar hot water systems are ubiquitous in Australia, & have been for years.
Both save a considerable amount of otherwise needed fossil fuel, over time.

OK, they aren't as effective in Northern Europe, or the Northern States of the USA, but many people live in countries with good levels of sunlight year round.

That said, the "powers that be" seem to have managed to stuff up electricity supply royally in the Eastern States of this country.

Interesting, thanks for sharing.  I know Russia's solution to providing power at remote locations was nuclear.  They powered (and maybe still do) power light houses, aircraft navigational aids with nuclear.  Liquid hydrocarbon fuels would be way too expensive.  And solar and wind would not be practical.  They found nuclear to be "best" solution.


In the United States it is very rare to see any houses or buildings with solar hot water heaters except for pools.  I recently priced one for my house and it was crazy expensive.  Fuel costs, natural gas prices are so low here it I would be paying an ernormous premium to use the sun to make hot water.  I don't live where it freezes.  But if I didn't the cost goes up even more.  A lot more.

Solar will never work in large cities with tall buidling for obvious reasons.  While they might work for remote road houses where you are, we aren't as sparsely populated.  I suspect where thouse road houses are hydroelectric is out of the question.

 I can't see why solar HWS are so expensive in the USA, except, obviously, those areas where it freezes.
If you don't have to account for that, there should be no difference to Oz.
Maybe regulatory problems over multiple States?

Here, solar HWS are a little more costly than other types, but the quite small "premium" is soon paid for in savings in  gas or electricity use.

Very few city dwellers in Australia live in tall apartment buildings.
The normal type of house is a single or two storey detached house or group of attached houses.

All of these have plenty of roof area to place solar devices, either panels, or hot water systems.
Many people criticise this "urban sprawl" but it has advantages.
Even if you sprinkle a reasonable  number of high rise buildings amongst this sprawl, the likelihood of being shadowed is small.

In the Central Business District of each city, there are tall buildings aplenty, but the minority of people who live there don't burn as much fossil fuel travelling, so we can pretty much balance that against the fact they can't put stuff on the roof!

[apis]

It almost sounds like Australia uses lots of solar so I took a look at what Australia use to generate electricity:



ouch.

If you look at total energy use it gets worse:

Oil	37.7%
Coal	31.5%
Gas	24.7%
Renewables	6.2%

page 7: https://www.energy.gov.au/sites/default/files/australian_energy_update_2018.pdf

Something very strange is going on there, considering Australia are about as ideal for solar power as it gets.

[DougSpindler]

Here's what's we are being told in the States.

The Cost of a Solar Water Heater. A solar water heater is around $8,000 to $10,000 including installation, though the price tag could go well up from there depending on the size, quality, and complexity of the system. Figure it'll take two to four days to install.

The average homeowner spends $3,502 to install a solar water heater. There are installation and equipment considerations which put costs between $1,868 and $5,368. Higher-end models and components could cost up to $13,000.
The overall price is greatly influenced by the type of collector chosen. Bulk collectors are $500 while evacuated tubes and flat plates can be up to $2,500. The tank and parts will add between $500 and $1,500 to the equipment total, for a combined $1,000-$4,000 before labor and permits. Labor for this kind of work tends to run $70 per hour. Add up to and over $1,000 if a backup heater is necessary.

Now compare that to a natural gas water heater tank or tankless.  They run around $1,000.  Houses are already plumbed for tank and easily modifed for tankless.  A solar hot water heater quipment is $2,500 on Amazon.  Forget installation costs, just to break even on the equipmnet it would have to save me $1,500 or so in natural gas.  I think we spend around $25 for natural gas to heat the water.  That's about 5 years just to break even on the fuel.  Then you have to factor in the installation costs and the posibility of a premature failure or leak.  Now we are uptpo say 10 to 15 years to be cost effective. 

I've talked to a couple of installers and they just tell me it's not worth it/cost effective to do it.  (There are a few very rare excpetions.)  They also say I would need an insulated tank for night time and morning.  So why do all of the extra plumbing if you are going to have a tank?

I also looked into electric tankless.  Crud the the think need 4, yes FOUR 20a 220v breakers.  As I recal it needs 120amps.  And here's the crazy thing, with an incomming water temperature of 40 degrees F, the output is 85 F.  The water isn't even hot.  So much for that.

Wonder why it works so well for you?  Are your temps higher than ours?  In the winter outside air temp is maybe gets as low as 35F and as high as 100 in the summer.  Most of the year we are between 50 and 85. 

[DougSpindler]

It almost sounds like Australia uses lots of solar so I took a look at what Australia use to generate electricity:



ouch.

If you look at total energy use it gets worse:

Oil	37.7%
Coal	31.5%
Gas	24.7%
Renewables	6.2%

page 7: https://www.energy.gov.au/sites/default/files/australian_energy_update_2018.pdf

Something very strange is going on there, considering Australia are about as ideal for solar power as it gets.

Makes sense Australia is using so much coal, 75%.  There was a coal field 30 miles from my house which use to provide coal to San Francisco.  A 50 mile trip by ship.  That was over 100 years ago.  It closed in 1903 becuase coal from Australia was cheaper and of better quality.  Hard to beleive it was far cheaper to ship the coal 12,000 km/7,500 miles than the 50 miles.....  but it was.

[apis]

Well, Germany also has a shitload of domestic coal, yet they have a substantial amount of solar despite being located far north and has no deserts.
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/renewable-energy/when-will-electric-cars-become-mainstream/msg2139046/#msg2139046

[DougSpindler]

For those of you who think solar can power the world, here's what it would look like if we could convert all of the solar energy to electricity.

Want to know the future of battery technology in cars?  Ask a Materials Chemist.  This prof gave a talk at Standford on the Innovation in Stationary Electricity Storage: The Liquid Metal Battery.  Out of all of the posts on this forum about batteries, hydro, solar, fly-wheels, molton salt storage, etc. this guy does an excellent job of presenting what's possible and what's not.

Think Hydrogen fuelcell cars are the answer?  NOPE!  He explains why at (5:23) 

https://youtu.be/pDxegcZqx_8

[nctnico]

How old is this video? Platinum is already widely used in mass produced cars parts: the catalytic converter. And ofcourse he didn't mention that other people know this too and have developed work arounds to create hydrogen fuel cells with no or a minimal amount of Platinum.
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-platinum-fuelcells/platinums-days-as-fuel-cell-car-component-may-be-numbered-idUKKBN1GZ2KO

Again: be very carefull about taking bold statements at face value. This guy is trying to sell his invention and spreads FUD about the alternatives. IMHO a poor way of selling your invention because it takes a slightly intelligent person a minute to cut through the BS and wonder what else is this guy exaggerating? His results? If it is so great then why can't you buy these batteries yet?

Just to highlight one of the non-logical reasonings in the video: Restricting possible solutions to abundant materials may seem logical at first but you have to figure out how much you need first. Gold is also widely used in the electronics industry. So for some reason your phone is possible because chips are made from widely availabe silicon but how about gold then? According to the guy in the video platinum is as 'rare' as gold. Following his logic the phone in his pocket shouldn't be possible. Not to mention all the other rare elements used in the parts used in his telephone. My BS detector just triggered on this big time. 

[fsr]

Those liquid metal batteries do sound crazy, but it seems like they have very interesting characteristics.

The technology isn't new, it seems. They improved them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium%E2%80%93sulfur_battery

I wonder if they can be expected to be used in cars. I suppose that molten metal batteries wouldn't like to be shaken, and just how much heat do the batteries radiate? I suppose that they need to be very well thermally isolated, or you would be losing energy like crazy. Also, i don't want to be anywhere near a molten sodium battery, if the case gets broken.

For stationary storage, they look very good, however.