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See: http://www.desertec.org/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

http://www.desertec.org/ They tried to launch an initiative to build solar power in north Africa. However, they did not succeed so far. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

There are also proposals to put a large solar array several square kilometers in area in the Sahara Desert that could generate power for the entire planet. Then there's the Gobi Desert where it could also be done, the Mojave already has some solar concentrator sites with more planned (if they can fix the bird frying problem). So, there are ways for us to generate the electricity that we will need for a long time from renewable sources. I don't discard or disparage nuclear fusion research because it is also important going forward, but we do have other practical ways of generating electricity from natural phenomena, wind and tidal being two others that are coming along a lot faster than better fission and currently non-existent fusion reactors.

Wind and solar are unsuitable for base load due to variability

Sahara disagrees.
http://www.desertec.org/

Not a perfect solution but a start. There are issues with desert storms and keeping the panels clean (currently done with water, dry cleaning isn't quite there) but if you think about how cars were in the early 1900s... there's hope, to say the least.

You misunderstand, my bad.

By not doing too well I mean:

1) We're still burning fossil fuels. Period. Not cracking atoms and persuing renewables.
2) Decades of stagnation in development and deployment
3) Plagued by NIMBYs and doom mongers.

Not to mention the climate sceptics saying coal's fine and the enviromentalits demanding we all run off of a few wind mills and... coal until we build more wind mills?? Eh?

Bunch of idiots.
Bulldoze the lot, build nuke plants until fusion is ready.
It's the only way to be sure.

My money for long term sustainability is on:

ITER: http://www.iter.org/
Desertec: http://www.desertec.org/
Pelamis: http://www.pelamiswave.com/#5 (Oh look an inventor!! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Yemm)

Richard Yemm is the British inventor of the Pelamis Wave Energy Converter and director of Pelamis Wave Power, a company he founded in Edinburgh in 1998.

He spend years in a small (very big) shed (wave tank) developing a practical spin on the work of another incredible inventor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Salter
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salter's_duck

And Salter's duck was invented in 1974 as a result of the 1973 oil crisis.
So why aren't island nations now powered by the waves? It is after all 40 years later.
Because funding was cut off in the 80s after the oil prices came back down.
And becasue the british government employ ACTUAL PSYCHIC WITCHES they knew in the early 80s that there would never again be a shortage of cheap plentiful energy in the UK!!

Congratulations lads (and lass).

And that ladies and gentlemen, is why you don't drive a fission powered hover duck.

Er..

Doesn't look like its my bubble that's in trouble to be honest. So please, begin. Educate me, and these guys while you're about it.

To be competitive, the satellite needs to be around $1-2 million per installed megawatt. Given it weighs in the region of 1500 to 1900 tons, launch costs must be 90%+ of its $21 billion pricetag. Reducing these to a trivial sum means, as JAXA have said, it becomes competitive, and until we have further information, I'm prepared to take it that JAXA knows whereof they speak.

I've already answered the weaponisation question elsewhere in the thread, and its all on wikipedia too. As for large amounts of solar energy, take a look at this picture:

http://www.desertec.org/uploads/media/stage-start_en.jpg

That nice red square right there is the amount of surface area that would be receiving twice as much energy as usual, and thats after a century of unprecedented satellite building. Its not much energy and its not a large area, particularly since it will be spread out into small sites all over the world. Actually it should be a lot less space since rectennas are more efficient than solar cells, but you get the idea anyway.

There are a few Solar Power Stations in Spain that I know of, the UK will soon have more wind farms than any other European country and DESERT TEC is trying to build a solar station in the Sahara to power Europe.

http://www.desertec.org/

You forgot "hydroelectric, biogas, biomass, solar thermal with storage and ocean thermal energy conversion can provide baseload power." Certainly you have heard of Desertec, which Germany is a strong supporter of. Base load is part of their strategy.

"No reason for supply to go quarter to quarter"
It must be nice to live in a world where Lehman shock never happened . . . Seriously, financing projects longer than 2 years is getting harder and harder. That is why you need government backing, and we all know how great government taking downside risks from large banks has worked . . .

that's why europe is planning this : http://www.desertec.org/organization/

Well, no, 'europe' [sic] isn't plannig any such thing. A private foundation in Germany is stumping the concept, seemingly in hopes that someone will bumble along and fund them so they can continue their quest for more funding to support more funding for political lobbying and re-education of doubters and dissenters as the to value of their plan for more funding.

that's why europe is planning this : http://www.desertec.org/organization/

Please look at this: http://www.desertec.org/

All of your answers can be found here: http://www.desertec.org/ We are absolutely drowning in energy.

I even stated that was not what was beng proposed in the post you are responding to. This indicates to me that you have an agenda and are unwilling to listen to facts. However, in the event that you do remain open to persuasion, please reference the Desertec Foundation, and others who have run the numbers. This is not going to be an overnight process, it will take decades, but each year the amount of renewable capacity climbs. By 2100 our grandchildren will view the age of coal, gas, and oil in the same way we view the age of steam.

But it's already happening: http://www.desertec.org/

Yes,
but that is how it is. What you wanna change about it?
However the industry is switching to direct current lines with even higher voltages, to either cut losses on the existing grid or to be able to make even longer direct connections. (E.g. the desertec wants to connect the sahara with europe with DC high voltage lines, see: http://www.desertec.org/)

If this goes off, Germany won't have much trouble shutting down their nuclear plants.
Solar has the potential to power the entire world, even with current efficiencies. Direct conversion of solar to eletricity is good for small devices only, if you want to generate MWs with low cost and environmental impact you want to boil water and use the good ol turbines.

  What we need is good transmission lines (those guys want to do it with DC lines, but a hot superconductor would be ideal), political stability, and people willing to work in desertic areas.
As for the night time, there are ways of storing the thermal energy generated during the day.

Renewables are more expensive and pesky than oil, and it is not the magic bullet of fusion power, but yes, we can stop burning oil and coal and live just fine.

Solar can be a base load power generator. The weather in desertic areas is reliable enough, and the heat absorbed during the day can be stored in molten salt for the night time.

http://www.desertec.org/

Tidal energy, though with a much smaller potential, also is reliable enough for base load power generation. The energy generated during the tides could be stored by pumping water up some sort of container (just a walled portion of the sea).

There isn't enough solar to meet the demand, and we need to let some sunlight hit the earth's surface for those plants to use to photosynthesize.

Checkout the Desertec initiative. One of their slogans: "Within 6 hours deserts receive more energy from the sun than humankind consumes within a year." Now, I haven't gone and checked their numbers, but even if they're off by an order of magnitude or two, this remains a promising option. Maybe in the light of the northern african revolutions and general economic problems, this initiative will be in a good position to gain momentum, provide cleaner energy, and even help the local economies. Even if there are a lot of "but"s to this idea, it is definitely something worth exploring, and given the current events will receive a boost.

Firstly http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-voltage_direct_current if you actualy wanted to try it, see also http://www.desertec.org/ and secondly I said "No, I don't think we should actually do that, as mentioned elsewhere in the thread, its an example to underline the point."

as to, why aren't they planning on using solar thermal plants? Like this project.

And there was a European study reported in TheRegister awhile back, if you were to cover most of the Sahara with photo, you might be able to light up Europe..for now

Bullshit. A quick back-of-the-envelope calculation: Sahara area: 1e7 km2. Max solar input 1e3 W/m2. One km2 is 1e6 m2. So the total power striking a cloudless Sahara at noon is 1e(7+3+6) W, ie. 1e16 W. If we distribute that to 10 billion people (1e10) we get 1e6 W = 1 MegaWatt per person. Of course you have to factor in clouds, nights, cell efficiencies etc., but all in all, this map seems to be a good estimate. Now, covering the areas on the map with CSP/photocells will be quite expensive, but for now I'd say Saharan solar could be a good contribution to EU energy supplies, and powerful people seem to agree.

• French nuclear industry claims 96% of waste can be reprocessed;
• Currently reprocessing allows to conserve 12% of consumed U, expected to raise to 17%;
• France has to dispose each year of 220,000 tons of depleted U, 120 tons of used fuel and 330 tons of reprocessed but unused fuel;
• Nuclear industry claims this material will eventually be useable in 4th generation breeder reactors (which, like fusion reactors, are the technology of the future - currently 2040, out of their ass - and always will be).

• inefficient solar cells: the power plants do not use photovoltaic cells, they are thermal power plants using mirrors to heat up a special heating fluid, very efficient
• energy storage over night: this problem is addressed by huge salt tanks that can store heat with minimum losses over longer periods of time
• unstable region: this is North Africa, not Middle East. Also, plants will be distributed over several countries, and energy production is part of a larger plan that does not only involve solar power from Africa
• single technology: as said, the solar plants are part of a larger concept that also involves many different forms of renewable energy involving a Europe-wide "grid" that connects also with wind power in different parts of Northern and Western Europe and hydro power in the alpine regions of Central Europe

Lots of questions are also answered at Desertec's FAQ

Greetings, Sebastian

• inefficient solar cells: the power plants do not use photovoltaic cells, they are thermal power plants using mirrors to heat up a special heating fluid, very efficient
• energy storage over night: this problem is addressed by huge salt tanks that can store heat with minimum losses over longer periods of time
• unstable region: this is North Africa, not Middle East. Also, plants will be distributed over several countries, and energy production is part of a larger plan that does not only involve solar power from Africa
• single technology: as said, the solar plants are part of a larger concept that also involves many different forms of renewable energy involving a Europe-wide "grid" that connects also with wind power in different parts of Northern and Western Europe and hydro power in the alpine regions of Central Europe

Lots of questions are also answered at Desertec's FAQ

Greetings, Sebastian

Some of the issues rised here are answered on their FAQ : http://www.desertec.org/en/concept/faq (if anyone cares to check it out)

We are not talking about photovoltaics (i.e. the direct production of electricity from the sun), but about solar heat power plants.
The majority of power plants in this region will consist of nothing more than a whole bunch of mirrors to heat up some medium and a conventional turbine that uses the hot oil/water to generate electricity. This is a very simple technology, unlike solar panels used in photovoltaics.
Energy storage will be solved using molten salt or other liquids, but most definitely not electrical batteries. So all in all, this project is technologically very feasible. Please check http://www.desertec.org/

No the scam is not on you, you get cheaper heating. The scam is on everyone else, who pay more for the electricity than you pay for the gas you use to generate it.

OK, let's go back to start: These things are needed to provide short-term (in the order of minutes) backup for the highly volatile production of PV and wind energy, which currently make up around 7% of the total production and rising. We're talking physics here, not business.

Germany doesn't have many alternatives: Almost all suitable lakes already have dams. Gas plants produce CO2. Nuclear energy is too slow and not wanted (whether you like it or not) and even if it were it couldn't be increased in a few years anyway.

BTW: Nuclear fuel isn't unlimited; the Desertec Consortium speaks of 100 years of proven resouces (and four times more "expected" resources). If we increase the use of nuclear energy fourfold, Uranium is possibly gone or too expensive in 30 years.

So, if you compare a swarm of CHPs with the only viable alternative for short-term backup, namely a gas plant, they have a couple of advantages: they produce less CO2; they generate electricity well within the grid, i.e. they don't need any new high-voltage lines; they don't even need a single additional square meter of land; they help the car industry through the crisis.

This is a way of stealing the reusable energy subsidies while increasing CO2 output.

The subsidy on CHP in Germany is not terribly high: 0.23 c/kWh for small plants below 100MWh/y and 0.05 c/kWh above, which is funded by raising the price of each kWh consumed in Germany. If 1% (guessed) of the electricity comes from CHP country-wide it increases the price per kWh for everyone else by less than 0.0023 c. That's bearable.

Have you looked at the DESERTEC concept at all? It answers a lot of the issues you are raising with solar energy. True, it is visionary, but it is also backed by several studies and major institutions.

but i know you won't listen to reason, you've been spoon fed this nonsense for years. i'll just wait for your lights to go out.

Where is the "reason" you are offering? I could argue the same "spoon feeding" for your argumentation ("nuclear power is save"). Maybe we Europeans are more careful with such statements, being closer to Chernobyl. Even though I am thousands of kilometers away, it is still recommended to not eat mushrooms more than a couple of times a year, and I want a better future for my own children.

Regarding research spendings I could quickly find this resource, which has a really amazing chart: http://www.solarpowerrocks.com/solar-trends/a-sick-graph-iraq-war-spending-vs-spending-on-renewable-energy/, showing that US research spendings on solar energy are still only half of those on nuclear energy despite the fact that you claim that there is essentially no research on nuclear energy! ; figures are from National Council for Science and the Environment.

Nuclear power is inherently dangerous, we do not know how to deal with the waste, the nuclear fossil fuel will last only a couple of decades, and huge power plants are as inefficient as it gets because of the long distances electricity is transported. By contrast, distributed generation of electricity as proposed by the article is much more efficient, because it happens very close to the consumer.

Solar-based energy is technically possible for Europe even with a 24/7 load. The initiative "Desertec" is following this approach, and there are several studies showing the feasability, financed by the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conversation and Nuclear Safety, see http://www.desertec.org/en/concept/studies/ . The reasons why this initiative might still fail are purely political, and for me, this is no excuse.

Hm, some people seem to think that filling huge parts of earth with solar thermal plants is not only practical but also an opportunity to cash in.

That's why it will be not on rooftops, but in the deserts ... there is enough space and plenty of sun ... great for utility scale projects.

See also DESERTEC and
NEAL, is planning to build a 3,000 km-long (1,875 mile) power cable to Germany to

If you ask me, the Solar Thermal Millennium has eventually been unleashed!!!

Imagine the potential of water splitting and desalination combined with solar thermal power plants, as such build in Spain .

Solar thermal power plants are the most efficient way today to convert sunlight to electricity in large scale and utility scale.

Remaining process heat can be used for sea water desalination.

The desalinated water can then be used for hydrogen production.

The water desalination is essential, otherwise we'd have the biofuel against food fight again, but this time it's about water.

(n.b. High efficient PV for roof tops, needs metals like Indium, hardly available and the energy required to produce such cells is horrible.)