Solar Powered Planet

[BO7H B4RRELS 2,453]

http://www.businessinsider.com/map-shows-solar-panels-to-power-the-earth-2015-9

 

Solar energy is a seriously underrated resource.

 

More power from the sun hits the Earth in a single hour than humanity uses in an entire year, yet solar only provided 0.0039% of the energy used in the US last year.

 

Visionaries like Elon Musk think that solar will become the biggest energy source by 2031, according to an interview with Tim Urban on Wait But Why.

 

But what would a world powered by solar look like?

 

The Earth would probably be littered with solar panels, right?

 

Wrong.

 

If solar is 20% efficient (as it has been in lab tests) at turning solar energy into power, we'd only need to cover a land area about the size of Spain to power the entire Earth renewably in 2030.

 

This map, from the Land Art Generator Initiative, shows just how little space that really is:

 

 

 

And while it's useful in the map to show the solar installations as a square bunched together, this area could actually be spread over more space, with solar panels tucked away on rooftops and spread across deserts.

 

To figure this out, the folks at Land Art Generator did the following math:

 

678 quadrillion Btu (the US Energy Information Administration's estimation of global energy consumption by 2030) = 198,721,800,000,000 kilowatt-hours (simple conversion) divided by 400 kilowatt-hours of solar energy production per square meter of land (based on 20% efficiency, 70% sunshine days per year and the fact that 1,000 watts of solar energy strikes each square meter of land on Earth) = 496,805 square kilometers of solar panels (191,817 square miles)

 

Remember, that's if we only relied on solar — no fossil fuel-guzzling oil, coal or natural gas. Now we just have to work on making that happen.

 

 

 

I thought this article/graphic was pretty interesting.  

 

Anyone have any thoughts on this?  

 

Anyone have a solar panel to power their home?  

 

 

[Sennex 1,903]

Solar is awesome. With the current breakthroughs using carbon tubes, to get cells to reach 40% efficiency, it demolishes most every energy generation out there except nuclear.

 

And it beats nuclear, because no waste byproducts.

 

Couple some Barrell style wind generators, and BAM! power regardless of weather conditions.

 

A large number of European countries are taking oil and coal generators off line permanently these days because of the solar farms they have

[Drifter 851]

One of my friends that lives in California owns a very large and successful solar company. I've talked with him a few times about solar and about why more people are not going to it. His reply is that it is still way too expensive (the initial investment) for your average everyday middle class person, plus even as efficient as the panels today are, they would still take up a large amount of land just to fully power an average home. Most of his customers are very well known movie stars out in Cali because they are pretty much the only ones that can afford the really good systems from what he says.

 

Another thing to keep in mind is ....nothing is free when it comes to the Government. So while it sounds good in theory for society to go solar to save money, that most likely won't happen. Just take a look at how many states are now starting to tax hybrid cars. The state/Gov will make sure that they get their cut of the pie no matter what. So if more people start going solar and less money is funneled into the power companies or state/Gov channels then I would bet there will be "solar taxes" down the pipe, if there aren't some already.  

 

The above is in reference on the consumer level only, I don't really have any thoughts about it on a larger level because I haven't read much about it beyond consumer level.

[Sennex 1,903]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-06/solar-wind-reach-a-big-renewables-turning-point-bnef

 

~~Make the jump as the below copy/pasta doesn't include the graphics.~~

 

 

 

Wind power is now the cheapest electricity to produce in both Germany and the U.K., even without government subsidies, according to a new analysis by Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF). It's the first time that threshold has been crossed by a G7 economy.1

But that's less interesting than what just happened in the U.S.

 

To appreciate what's going on there, you need to understand the capacity factor. That's the percentage of a power plant's maximum potential that's actually achieved over time.

 

Consider a solar project. The sun doesn't shine at night and, even during the day, varies in brightness with the weather and the seasons. So a project that can crank out 100 megawatt hours of electricity during the sunniest part of the day might produce just 20 percent of that when averaged out over a year. That gives it a 20 percent capacity factor.

 

One of the major strengths of fossil fuel power plants is that they can command very high and predictable capacity factors. The average U.S. natural gas plant, for example, might produce about 70 percent of its potential (falling short of 100 percent because of seasonal demand and maintenance). But that's what's changing, and it's a big deal.

 

For the first time, widespread adoption of renewables is effectively lowering the capacity factor for fossil fuels. That's because once a solar or wind project is built, the marginal cost of the electricity it produces is pretty much zero—free electricity—while coal and gas plants require more fuel for every new watt produced. If you're a power company with a choice, you choose the free stuff every time.

 

It’s a self-reinforcing cycle. As more renewables are installed, coal and natural gas plants are used less. As coal and gas are used less, the cost of using them to generate electricity goes up. As the cost of coal and gas power rises, more renewables will be installed.

The virtuous cycle has begun.

 

Source: Bloomberg

 

Wind and solar have long made up a small fraction of U.S. electricity—about 5 percent in 2014. But production has been rising at an exponential rate, and those two energy sources are now big enough to influence when coal and natural gas plants are kept running, according to BNEF.2

 

There are two reasons this shift in capacity factors is important. First, it's yet another sign of the rising disruptive force of renewable energy in power markets. It's impossible to brush aside renewables in the U.S. in the same way it might have been just a few years ago.  "Renewables are really becoming cost-competitive, and they're competing more directly with fossil fuels," said BNEF analyst Luke Mills. "We're seeing the utilization rate of fossil fuels wear away."

 

Second, the shift illustrates a serious new risk for power companies planning to invest in coal or natural-gas plants. Historically, a high capacity factor has been a fixed input in the cost calculation. But now anyone contemplating a billion-dollar power plant with an anticipated lifespan of decades must consider the possibility that as time goes on, the plant will be used less than when its doors first open.

Capacity Factors Take a Sharp Turn3

Source: Bloomberg, Data: BNEF

Most of the decline in capacity factors is due to expensive "base-load plants that are being turned on less because of renewables," according to BNEF analyst Jacqueline Lilinshtein. Plants designed to come online only during the highest demand of the year, known as peaker plants, play a smaller role. In either case, the end result is that coal-fired and gas-fired electricity is becoming more expensive and the profits less predictable.

The opposite is true of wind and solar, as well as new battery systems that can be paired with renewables to replace some peaker plants. Wind power, including U.S. subsidies, became the cheapest electricity in the U.S. for the first time last year4, according to BNEF. Solar power is a bit further behind, but the costs are dropping rapidly, especially those associated with financing a new project.

Latest Solar Costs by State

 

Source: BNEF, Annotated by Bloomberg

The economic advantages of wind and solar over fossil fuels go beyond price.5 Still, it's remarkable that in every major region of the world, the lifetime cost of new coal and gas projects6 are rising considerably in the second half of 2015, according to BNEF. And in every major region the cost of renewables continues to fall.