Dutch Win World Solar Car Challenge

Sick Boy writes "The Dutch solar car Nuna II, using ESA space technology, finished first in the World Solar Challenge, a 3010 km race right across Australia for cars powered by solar energy. Having set off from Darwin on Sunday 19 October, Nuna II crossed the finish line in Adelaide in a new record-breaking time of 30 hours 54 minutes, beating the previous record of 32 hours 39 minutes set by its Dutch precursor Nuna in 2001."

Comments

Are solar panels really all that great?

[Dancin_Santa]

While it's nice that we can get power out in the middle of nowhere (and face it, most of Australia is "the middle of nowhere"), doesn't the environmental damage posed by the building and throwing away of these solar panels negate much of the benefits of having a non-fossil fueled car?

That said, you'd think that a country with more cloudy weather would do better at squeezing the last little bit of energy out of a solar panel than somewhere sunny like Holland.

Re:Doesn't sound that incredible

[questamor]

The area of the contiguous 48 states (which is what's relevant here) is almost identical to the area of Australia. perhaps 3-5% bigger.

If you include Alaska (which is about 1/5th the size of the 48) in the total that's quite a bit bigger again, but still doesn't bring the US near 3 times the size.

Techonology transfer.

[Anonymous Coward]

The only problem with these cars is that it is hard to transfer the technology to real cars. These solar cars are covered with panels and are streamlined to go as fast as possible. They also have to be as light as possible for the same reason. Which makes the transfer that bit harder. That is not to say the race isn't a good idea. It's a great idea which enables peaple to have fun while investigating the power of the sun.
Michael Harris.

Re:Hooray! Electric cars for all please!

[shrubsky]

"Again, I just cannot figure why we still persist with nuclear, oil, coal, with all the attendant problems (pollution, wars over oil, etc), when we could cover a small proportiion of the deserts of the world with solar cells, and the roofs of our buildings, and the coasts with huge offsiore wind farms (British Wind Enrgy Association page) & tidal turbines, and have all the power we need?"

There's a very good reason why, and it isn't politicians and evil oil companies. It's money. When alternative power sources become cheaper than fossil fuels people will use them more. Go visit http://www.bpsolar.com/homesolutions/ and see how long it would take for your solar panels to pay for themselves. If you don't live in a state like California who subsidizes the heck out of them (and coincidentally has a budget disaster in progress) then it takes 30 years. And that doesn't count the investment earnings you lose by ponying up $$$ for the equipment and installation.