Is the Future of Silicon Valley Solar?

Noryungi writes "In this provocative article, Brian McConnell argues that Silicon Valley, instead of staying in the saturated IT field, should apply its resources (including its chip-producing plants) into Solar Power/Renewable energy. Intel branded Solar Panels, anyone?"

Comments

A small mistake in the article

[Cyberax]

"Solar electricity can be produced by means of photovoltaic arrays (based on the photoelectric effect discovered by Albert Einstein) or by using conventional heat engines whereby solar energy is used to power a turbine. Solar heat is simpler still, requiring only a blackbody and a mechanism for storing and transferring heat"

Einstein didn't dicsover photoelectric effect, he has EXPLAINED it (and earned a Nobel Prize for it).

Re:Intel

[rxmd]

Intel and AMD both still run their own production facilities. In fact, Intel makes sure that the layout of the fabs is identical, so that production parameters are transferable from one fab to another. As a result, their fabs are designed for producing microprocessors, and making major changes in this general alignment would be rather difficult. IBM, on the other hand, runs a more diversified system of fabs.

You are probably confusing this with companies such as ARM. They are merely a chip design and intellectual property company now, however in spite of the "merely" this is still an enormous economic asset in today's tech arena.

Astropower

[mercuryresearch]

FYI, this is already done in a way, as far as Intel helping to build solar panels goes.

Astropower is a US solar panel manufacturer that gets many of its solar cell silicon wafers through recycling programs with Intel. TI, etc. See here. They basically take bad/test wafers, clean them up, and use them for silicon solar cells.

I'm building a 100% solar home and already have a kW of capacity installed, and went with Astropower for several reasons, the above included.

Energy Efficiency

[standards]

The article goes on and on about how Silicon Valley can capitalize on the solar energy business (and other forms of high-efficincy energy production). There are a couple new and exciting renewable energy companies in the valley.

The first order of business for an energy consumer should be to minimize energy consumption. The economics are simple: a reduction in demand will reduce costs.

Many people are shocked when they learn that it's very easy to save $1000 in energy costs a year by spending less than $100 and an hour's worth of time. This guy and this guy seemed to do just about nothing for 50% energy savings.

Even though it's always exciting to look at the state of the art in the energy business, it's more useful (but less exciting) to look at how it impacts you personally.

More details on the history

[totoanihilation]

Here's an excerpt of a paper I wrote a while back:

The physical phenomenon responsible for converting light to electricity -- the photovoltaic (PV) effect -- was first observed in 1839 by French physicist Edmond Becquerel, when he noted that two identical electrodes in a weak conducting solution would produce a voltage if one of the two electrodes was iluminated [1]. Later, W.G. Adams and R.E. Day (1877) observed the effect in a solid, selenium [4].

Re:Nor Intel or Solar Power will solve the problem

[Shao Ke]

Actually, solar panels last decades without deteriorating significantly.
Also, the payback myth is just that - a myth:
http://www.otherpower.com/otherpower_solar_ new.htm l
I have 6kw on top of my house, and I expect they will probably be working even after I'm gone. I'm only 34 now.
It also sells electricity back to the grid during peak consumption times. Perfect.

Solar Cells DO recoup their energy costs!

[hmbJeff]

Please stop repeating these urban myths about solar panels. They in fact do recoup their manufacturing energy input relatively quicky.

As quoted in Home Power Magazine

Some skeptics of solar energy claim that it takes more energy to make a photovoltaic module (PV) than it can ever produce in its lifetime. The truth is that PVs typically recoup their embodied energy in two to four years. According to an article published by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), today's single and multicrystalline modules have an energy payback of about four years, and thin-film modules about two years. Most PV modules in the field are made from hyper-pure crystalline silicon. Purifying and crystallizing the silicon consumes the most energy in making these PVs. Thin-film PVs are made from considerably less semiconductor material, and therefore have less embodied energy in them. Most of the energy consumed is in the thin-film surface. The aluminum frame on any PV accounts for about six months of its payback time. Solar energy is an amazing technology considering that PVs go on to produce clean, pollution-free energy for at least 25 to 30 years after they have achieved payback.

For more information on energy payback, see the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's Web site (www.nrel.gov) and Karl Knapp & Theresa Jester's article titled "PV Payback"in HP80. --Eric Grisen eric.grisen@homepower.com

Also, concerns about lifetime and hail resistance are red herrings. Most panels are warranted for full rated output for at least 20 years and most have performed well beyond those timeframes. Also all panels are UL tested to meet UL hail resistance specifications (which I believe covers hail up to 2" in diameter).

Finally, no one bitches when a gas-fired generator fails to recoup its energy cost of manufacture--it requires billions of additional therms of natural gas over its operating lifetime to produce electricty and never pays back its manufacturing energy cost. It is disingenuous to ask that only of solar (and odd since solar can actually do it!