More Solar Power in TX Could Save Consumers Over $520 Million

[Political Junky]

More Solar Power in TX Could Save Consumers Over $520 Million, New Study Finds - CleanTechnica

As reported previously, Germany had about 21.6 times more solar power installed per capita at the end of 2011 than the US (301.47 MW per million people versus 13.973 MW per million people). In absolute numbers, Germany had about 5.63 times more solar power installed (24,678 MW versus 4,383 MW). These differences also translate [...]
More Solar Power in TX Could Save Consumers Over $520 Million, New Study Finds
JUNE 19, 2012 BY ZACHARY SHAHAN 8 COMMENTS

A new report released today analyzed how much electricity prices for Texas consumers would have been reduced in the summer of 2011 by adding solar capacity to the Texas electricity market. In total, it found potential savings of over $520 million for state electricity consumers. Additionally, the study found that additional solar capacity would help [...]
5 Solar Myths Busted (Infographic)
JUNE 19, 2012 BY ZACHARY SHAHAN 5 COMMENTS

One of the good folks at PV Magazine recently dropped me a note about a cool new solar infographic the team there created. While I generally love to share a decent solar infographic, this one created by folks focused on the industry every day is better than most, as it bust 5 common myths [...]
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[Old Rocks]

Texas is very lucky in that it is a very energy rich state, both in fossil fuels and alternative energy. More wind power than any other state, and I wouldn't be surprised to see them push for the lead in solar. Now if they just could trade the mid-Western states power for water, they would be in fat city.

 

[flacaltenn]

Optimism is sometimes a good thing. Realism is always better..

Solar Subsidy Sinkhole: Re-Evaluating Germany's Blind Faith in the Sun - SPIEGEL ONLINE

The costs of subsidizing solar electricity have exceeded the 100-billion-euro mark in Germany, but poor results are jeopardizing the country's transition to renewable energy. The government is struggling to come up with a new concept to promote the inefficient technology in the future.

The Baedeker travel guide is now available in an environmentally-friendly version. The 200-page book, entitled "Germany - Discover Renewable Energy," lists the sights of the solar age: the solar café in Kirchzarten, the solar golf course in Bad Saulgau, the light tower in Solingen and the "Alster Sun" in Hamburg, possibly the largest solar boat in the world.

The only thing that's missing at the moment is sunshine. For weeks now, the 1.1 million solar power systems in Germany have generated almost no electricity. The days are short, the weather is bad and the sky is overcast.

As is so often the case in winter, all solar panels more or less stopped generating electricity at the same time. To avert power shortages, Germany currently has to import large amounts of electricity generated at nuclear power plants in France and the Czech Republic. To offset the temporary loss of solar power, grid operator Tennet resorted to an emergency backup plan, powering up an old oil-fired plant in the Austrian city of Graz.

That's over $130BILL -- JUST IN SUBSIDIES.. Not counting the panel costs, installation, maintenance, grid connections, ect.. For less than 3% of the nation's power? And gone out to lunch for days, even weeks in the wintertime? Nothing for 10 hours a day? With that kind of availability, Texas better figure out what REAL power stations it's gonna need and consider solar as peak load reduction.. It works welll that way..

The germans aren't mincing words right now. The debate is on to slash subsidies. And the realization has hit that politicians are really pandering to German solar PV companies -- NOT the health of the globe -- in handing out the candy..

Solar energy has the potential to become the most expensive mistake in German environmental policy.
++++

Another critical voice, the German Advisory Council on the Environment, argues that far too much money is being invested in solar energy. "Solar energy has recently experienced nothing less than an extreme and even excessive boom," says environmental expert Olav Hohmeyer, noting that this jeopardizes acceptance of renewable energy even before the energy transition has truly begun.
+++++

Figures indicating the peak performance of solar energy systems are easily misunderstood, a report by the German Physical Society says. "Essentially," the report concludes, "solar energy cannot replace any additional power plants."

Stick a fork in it as "an alternative"....

 

[Old Rocks]

Texas is not Germany. Bigger and bit further south if you take the time to look at the map. Has a few more sunny days per annum, also.

 

[flacaltenn]

I'll tell you what doesn't have many more sunny days.. The list of "alternatives" that never were alternatives.

With some wise decision making -- Texas and other places where it's applicable will leave it the hell alone and let the market integrate solar to it's maximum viable capacity.. Don't need to make the mistakes that Germany made pushing it beyond any reasonable sense of engineering proportion...

 

[Political Junky]

China might build solar plant in Texas - Houston Chronicle


SAN ANTONIO &#8212; San Antonio is on the short list to become home to a solar manufacturing plant that would be built by a Chinese company, Bexas County Judge Nelson Wolff said last week.

Yingli Green Energy Holding Co. is the company that is searching for a plant site and has narrowed its choices to five cities, including San Antonio, officials said.

Yingli could invest $20 million in the plant, which would bring 315 jobs to the city, a source close to the negotiations said.

&#8220;We are working that deal, and we're excited about it,&#8221; Wolff said. &#8220;It's a company with new technology, and we think it would be a major breakthrough in a new green industry.&#8221;
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[whitehall]

"New study ....finds"? What do you expect a tax exempt green propaganda source to come up with other than promoting gigantic fields of glass that produce laughable amounts of energy? What about the environmental impact? It takes a football field of solar crap to keep a home supplied with energy. Junk in = junk out. You can find any study you want to support a crackpot theory.

 

[Old Rocks]

More bullshit from Whitey. Any house that has a south facing roof can put enough panels on the roof to generate all the electricity that the house needs.

 

[whitehall]

More bullshit from Whitey. Any house that has a south facing roof can put enough panels on the roof to generate all the electricity that the house needs.

It's easy to find. TLC answers the question "how many solar cells do I need" and the answer is laughable. It would take 285 square feet to power your refrigerator, lights and computer. You are on your own for heat and luxuries like a freezer.

 

[Wiseacre]

Solar energy usage will grow as th costs go down.

snippet:

Cheap and Efficient Solar Cell Made Possible by Linked Nanoparticles
ScienceDaily (Sep. 26, 2011) &#8212; Researchers of the Chemical Engineering department and the Kavli institute of the TU DElft have demonstrated that electrons can move freely in layers of linked semiconductor nanoparticles under the influence of light. This new knowledge will be very useful for the development of cheap and efficient quantum dot solar cells.

The current crystalline silicon solar panels are expensive to produce. Cheaper solar cells are available, but these are inefficient. For example, an organic solar cell has a maximum efficiency of 8%. One way of increasing the efficiency of cheap solar cells is the use of semiconductor nanoparticles, quantum dots. In theory, the efficiency of these cells can be increased to 44%. This is in part due to the avalanche effect, demonstrated by researchers from TU Delft and the FOM Foundation in 2008. In the current solar cells, an absorbed light particle can only excite one electron (creating an electron-hole pair), while in a quantum dot solar cell a light particle can excite several electrons. The more electrons that are excited, the greater the efficiency of the solar cell.

Cheap and efficient solar cell made possible by linked nanoparticles

 

[whitehall]

Yeah, nanoparticles might cure cancer and give us hot water in the future ....but it ain't happnin now. The junk doesn't work ...now. We don't need to listen to sciobabble while America is in hock to countries which produce oil.

 

[flacaltenn]

We've had 40 years of INTENSE research into solar PV.. We KNOW how to make them better. But as in ALL product developments, you can't include a 1.5lb bag of hummingbird hearts in each unit to make it function..

We could mine LOADS of arsenic and go GA-AS. We could use nanotech development, but not see volume production for 10 yrs because of cost and complexity.. The technology has actually peaked in terms of price/performance. We will get smaller more expensive panels for certain critical applications like space probes.

What we CAN'T do is promise $130Bill in subsidies like Germany has done to get 3% of our power.. During the day only and missing on some days every month. It's a peaker technology. To reduce the peak output of SOME OTHER RELIABLE source of power for 6 hours a day -- MAYBE....

 

[bripat9643]

More bullshit from Whitey. Any house that has a south facing roof can put enough panels on the roof to generate all the electricity that the house needs.

Really? What about when the sun goes down?

 

[Political Junky]

More bullshit from Whitey. Any house that has a south facing roof can put enough panels on the roof to generate all the electricity that the house needs.

Really? What about when the sun goes down?

The energy is stored.

 

[Political Junky]

China might build solar plant in Texas - Houston Chronicle


SAN ANTONIO &#8212; San Antonio is on the short list to become home to a solar manufacturing plant that would be built by a Chinese company, Bexas County Judge Nelson Wolff said last week.

Yingli Green Energy Holding Co. is the company that is searching for a plant site and has narrowed its choices to five cities, including San Antonio, officials said.

Yingli could invest $20 million in the plant, which would bring 315 jobs to the city, a source close to the negotiations said.

&#8220;We are working that deal, and we're excited about it,&#8221; Wolff said. &#8220;It's a company with new technology, and we think it would be a major breakthrough in a new green industry.&#8221;
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Well, the Chinese will profit from Solar panels in Texas, because Americans are not smart enough.

 

[loveenergysavin]

Alternative Sources of Energies save upto 70% electricity bills monthly. These sources are pollution free and easy to harness. Only it is a bit costly initially but very effective when it comes to monthly bills later. It is easy to harness and comes from natural resources. These are renewable and abundant in nature. It not only saves electricity but also saves environment.
Thanks

 

[Old Rocks]

More bullshit from Whitey. Any house that has a south facing roof can put enough panels on the roof to generate all the electricity that the house needs.

It's easy to find. TLC answers the question "how many solar cells do I need" and the answer is laughable. It would take 285 square feet to power your refrigerator, lights and computer. You are on your own for heat and luxuries like a freezer.

285 square feet. Such a huge area. In other words, a 10' by 30' rectangle on your roof. Let's see, a roof on a single story 1200 square foot house would be about 700 square feet on each side. So you have over double the area you state as huge. On a small house!

Every consider redoing grade school, Whitey?

 

[Old Rocks]

More bullshit from Whitey. Any house that has a south facing roof can put enough panels on the roof to generate all the electricity that the house needs.

Really? What about when the sun goes down?

Egad, Pattycake, do you always have to come off as the class clown? Ever hear of grid parrallel?

 

[Old Rocks]

We've had 40 years of INTENSE research into solar PV.. We KNOW how to make them better. But as in ALL product developments, you can't include a 1.5lb bag of hummingbird hearts in each unit to make it function..

We could mine LOADS of arsenic and go GA-AS. We could use nanotech development, but not see volume production for 10 yrs because of cost and complexity.. The technology has actually peaked in terms of price/performance. We will get smaller more expensive panels for certain critical applications like space probes.

What we CAN'T do is promise $130Bill in subsidies like Germany has done to get 3% of our power.. During the day only and missing on some days every month. It's a peaker technology. To reduce the peak output of SOME OTHER RELIABLE source of power for 6 hours a day -- MAYBE....

You know, Flats, you are completely full of shit. I heard this same song and dance ten years ago. Now there are manufactures that are making panels for less than a dollar a watt. And we have square miles of warehouse and commercial roofs that are already located on the grid.

 

[flacaltenn]

We've had 40 years of INTENSE research into solar PV.. We KNOW how to make them better. But as in ALL product developments, you can't include a 1.5lb bag of hummingbird hearts in each unit to make it function..

We could mine LOADS of arsenic and go GA-AS. We could use nanotech development, but not see volume production for 10 yrs because of cost and complexity.. The technology has actually peaked in terms of price/performance. We will get smaller more expensive panels for certain critical applications like space probes.

What we CAN'T do is promise $130Bill in subsidies like Germany has done to get 3% of our power.. During the day only and missing on some days every month. It's a peaker technology. To reduce the peak output of SOME OTHER RELIABLE source of power for 6 hours a day -- MAYBE....

You know, Flats, you are completely full of shit. I heard this same song and dance ten years ago. Now there are manufactures that are making panels for less than a dollar a watt. And we have square miles of warehouse and commercial roofs that are already located on the grid.

That's the point -- it IS MATURE.. AT a $/W (which I doubt unless they're crap) you've pushed it to the limit.. And if you've read what Der Spiegel said about Germany OVERINVESTING and OVERINSTALLING in solar -- then you'll get the picture..

If I'm full of shit --- then you better hire BETTER electrical engineers.. Because I don''t ANY who would disagree with what I stated..

With you shouting GRID PARALLEL GRID PARALLEL alll over the place.. You'd think that those panels are ACTUALLY PRODUCING POWER AT NIGHT or during rainy days.. You need to get off your GREENISH ASS and see that if Germany takes their nuclear plants offline and Japan keeps theirs offline -----

YOU ALTERNATIVE NUTS have no way to stop the planetcide that's gonna happen whenn the CO2 takes a HISTORICAL spike....
Because you have no ALTERNATIVE plan... Just some slogans like GRID PARALLEL...