Solar Power Headed For 45% Annual Growth

mdsolar writes "USA Today is running a pretty good article on solar power that gives an overview of the current state of the industry. Highlight include production costs of $1.19/Watt for First Solar, 40% annual cost reductions over the last five years, revenues expected to triple in three years, and a prediction for 2014 as the year when solar photovoltaic power plants become cheaper than other forms of generation. From the piece: 'Like wind power, solar energy is spotty, working at full capacity an average 20% to 30% of the time. Solar's big advantage is that it supplies the most electricity midday, when demand peaks. And it can be located at homes and businesses, reducing the need to build pollution-belching power plants and unsightly transmission lines. In states such as California, with high electricity prices and government incentives, solar is already a bargain for some customers. Wal-Mart recently said it's putting solar panels on more than 20 of its stores in California and Hawaii. Google is blanketing its Mountain View, Calif., headquarters with 9,212 solar panels, enough to light 1,000 homes.'"

Comments

Dude, learn your math

[everphilski]

It's going to go from 0.00001% to 0.000015%. Great!

No, silly, its gonna go up to 0.0000145% :)

Lots of solar activity these last few years...

[It doesn't come easy]

Plus, there's the guys doing electricity by converting solar heat using sterling engines http://www.stirlingenergy.com/default.asp and the work converting heat into electricity using an intermediate sound conversion step http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/07060 3225026.htm.

Re:Lots of solar activity these last few years...

[It doesn't come easy]

Try this link for the heat to sound to electricity stuff: http://unews.utah.edu/p/?r=053007-1

Understatement

[fyngyrz]

Solar's big advantage is that it supplies the most electricity midday, when demand peaks.

Solar's big advantages are that it is essentially pollution free, doesn't up CO2, reduces petroleum requirements which means more lubricants, plastics and so on at reasonable prices, reduction of political leverage of oil rich countries, increase in ability to operate independently at every level from national to individual, and over the long term, it costs less.

Combined with ultracaps, hopefully to be seen as practical power storage come this fall (via EEStor), the power supply landscape may change significantly in the next decade or so.

Re:Understatement

[Seumas]

Of course, solar power only has advantages in certain environments. Almost no power source is universally producible. For instance, only some parts of America can provide significant natural gas resources. Only certain portions are capable of coal or oil. Likewise, there is a limitation on places that can provide significant resources for wind-power or solar-power.

This isn't to suggest that it isn't worth the effort, but I am unclear whether we have the potential to expand facilities in those appropriate areas enough that they could power the entire country well into the future. (For example, solar power in Portland, Oregon is relatively pointless for mass-consumption since you need actual sunlight to generate the electricity).

Re:Understatement

[polar red]

As production increases and technology improves, the northern limit of the area where it's economically viable to use solar cells, will expand more and more northward.

Re:Understatement

[Once&FutureRocketman]

Yeah, well said. But let me point out that increase in ability to operate independently at every level from national to individual, while a very real benefit (to society) of solar power is NOT seen as an advantage by the powers-that-be. The energy industry is still fixed on the big-central-plant-generation/regulated-utility-dis tribution model, and there is a lot of money and many careers that depend on the continuation of that model. Solar and other forms of small scale, distributed generation, not all of which is even renewable (e.g. cogeneration, aka. combined heat and power), are a very real threat to those vested interests. Which is one reason (of many) that adoption of these technologies has been so slow.

Re:Understatement

[Mr. Sketch]

I am unclear whether we have the potential to expand facilities in those appropriate areas enough that they could power the entire country well into the future. Yes, but we don't need a whole lot of solar plants placed everywhere. This map has just a handful of locations marked that if they had solar panels it would provide enough energy for the whole world:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Solar_land_area .png

Granted, those locations are huge, but consider all the empty spaces in the deserts of the world that get tons of sunlight but are otherwise useless. I have seen updated maps with smaller locations that assume a higher efficiency solar cell, since this map only assumes 8% efficiency, and normal panels have about 15% with research being done in the 30-40% efficient range.

Re:Understatement

[flyingfsck]

Solar energy isn't polution free - it just doesn't add to the horrible high energy radiation coming from that great big fusion plant in the sky. Go and sit outside for a couple hours over midday and see what the sun does to you. If someone was to invent the sun today, he would be sued up the wazoo for causing cancer and other problems...

Re:Understatement

[Dr Caleb]

"Solar's big advantages are that it is essentially pollution free, doesn't up CO2, reduces petroleum requirements which means more lubricants, plastics and so on at reasonable prices, reduction of political leverage of oil rich countries, increase in ability to operate independently at every level from national to individual, and over the long term, it costs less."

Excellent points, but it's advantage is also it's disadvantage. Imagine trying to run a steel foundry on solar power. Now, imagine running a third world steel foundry on solar power. That's the gripe many developing nations have with Kyoto - how are they supposed to enter the 20th century if they can use coal fired power?

Re:Understatement

[fishbowl]

I think there's a misconception about deserts. (They generally are not simply dunes of sand. There's a *lot* of plant and animal life in the Sonoran ecosystem, for example). Anyway, where I live, according to my local power company we have up to 17% solar power in the summer. I have two solar cookers which work really well for making soups and sauces. Exactly like these: http://solarcooking.org/images/hflame1.jpg
  I also have a roof-mounted solar water heater, part of a hybrid system (I have a gas water heater but it does considerably less work when the solar heater is working, which is almost all the time.) Yes we have hot water at night. The rooftop heater looks like a skylight. Okay, so I live in a desert city with 300 days of sunshine a year. Love it.

Re:Understatement

[mikael]

They are desert regions - presumably they will have lots of boulders, stones and pebbles, so depending upon the position of the sun during the day, at least half the surface area will be in the shade at any time. Having an array of solar panels shouldn't make that much difference.

Desert areas tend to cool down rapidly at night as well, due to the lack of humidity, cloud cover and foliage.

For a desert area to turn green, it would also need a steady supply of water and minerals.

Re:Understatement

[mgv]

Of course, solar power only has advantages in certain environments. Almost no power source is universally producible. For instance, only some parts of America can provide significant natural gas resources. Only certain portions are capable of coal or oil. Likewise, there is a limitation on places that can provide significant resources for wind-power or solar-power.

This isn't to suggest that it isn't worth the effort, but I am unclear whether we have the potential to expand facilities in those appropriate areas enough that they could power the entire country well into the future. (For example, solar power in Portland, Oregon is relatively pointless for mass-consumption since you need actual sunlight to generate the electricity).

You don't need to have good areas near you. You should build the power generators where they are most efficient, and send the power by grid. This applies to Solar, Geothermal, Wind, Tidal. Power losses using High Voltage Direct Current"(HVDC) are about 3% per 1000 kilometers. So if you would have more than a 10% increase power output by putting your renewable power source somewhere else, but that place is 3000 km away, you still can get more usable power at your end by doing so.

Obviously you don't have to do this, and with some forms or energy (eg wind) you may want generators everywhere just to load balance - Somwhere in the world, every day, the wind blows.

But could solar power cells in the desert power air conditioners on the coast? You bet. Could solar power cells in north africa power northern Europe? Certainly.

The technology for power transmission is here. The technology for power storage is not, as yet.

HVDC has the potential to make renewable power sources, such as solar, work. There is no reason why you cant even have solar power feeding the grids of cities during the night. And this is going to be very important when we start to look beyond fossil fuels to power everything.

Michael

Re:Understatement

[timmarhy]

Pollution free? have you ever seen the process of producing a solar cell? they are hellish toxic to produce. This is what gets me about greenies, they seem incapable of logical thought and of being critical of any process branded environmentally friendly.

Re:Understatement

[Rei]

It's not simply rainfall that determines how lush an area is. Example: northern Australia gets tons of rain, but has very little plantlife. The soil is just too depleted. Rainy areas require a carefully balanced ecosystem (like you get in, say, the Amazon) to rapidly return nutrients from dead plants into the system, or the rainfall will wash them away.

Rainfall is certainly a major factor, but not the only one.

In the desert case, a lack of rainfall is one problem, but a parching sun is another. By putting up shade, you're eliminating the major factor that's drying out the soil from what rain does fall. You're reducing available light for photosynthesis, too, but the lack of moisure is a much greater limiting factor in a desert.

Overall, it'd be a pretty dramatic change. Of course, there's absolutely no reason to "panel the desert", so to speak. With a proper regulatory environment, you can "panel the cities". Perhaps the new slogan could be, "A plug-in hybrid in every garage and a photovoltaic system on every roof."

Re:Understatement

[Paul Fernhout]

http://www.greenpeace.org/international/solargen/a bout-solar-energy/solar-electricity/production-and -recycling

"The environmental impact and the safety risk of solar cells are infinitesimally small compared to conventional sources of energy like coal, oil, gas or atomic energy. With the latter, the danger is global (emission of carbon-dioxide) and longterm (for example the problems of disposal of nuclear energy). This is regarding regular operation already. If we think about solar panels running for 30 years that don't produce any pollutants, the environmental damage is obviously kept very limited.

The process of production for solar cells is well developed and tested. From the chemical and toxin point of view, even a mass-production of solar cells will not implicate any significant environmental or health problems."

Where is your counter evidence?

Re:Understatement

[Anonymous Coward]

yes, you caught me, it was a troll.

because the desert is useless and if destroying the local ecology can reduce greenhouse gasses, then dammit its the right thing to do!
btw, remember that the north slope in alaska has oil in it, so that area is bad to develop.

posting AC because pointing out hypocrisy on slashdot is only for people and groups that the majority of slashdot agrees they dont care for.

Re:Understatement

[timmarhy]

For a start, why don't you come up with a less biased source then GREENPEACE.ORG... i mean come on give me some bloody credit.

If we were to try to convert to solar now, would end up with exactly the same problems you have with oil production - toxic chemicals released into the environment. solar requires silicon, and that silicon has to be produced in refineries (just google to see the implications of large scale silicon production). once you have the silicon you have to make the cells, which requries certain significantly toxic chemicals including arsenic. obviously i don't have any large scale disasters to point to, because the solar industry is still too small to be more then a blip on the radar. but if we ramped up production to the same scale as oil? you bet we would have a whole bag of new problems to deal with.

Re:Understatement

[mcrbids]

Imagine trying to run a steel foundry on solar power.

You mean, like these guys? Electricity is nothing more than an energy source...

Now, imagine running a third world steel foundry on solar power.

Ok. Where are you going with this?

That's the gripe many developing nations have with Kyoto - how are they supposed to enter the 20th century if they can use coal fired power?

What is the gripe? Unless you're implying (unsaid) that coal is inherently better. Well, for right now, it's still cheaper. But the price of solar cells continues to drop nicely, which is the point of TFA. And, using solar energy means you don't have to invest in Megabux power grids or railroads for the tons of coal to be used.

Re:Understatement

[Paul Fernhout]

No one (even Greenpeace) is saying potentially toxic materials are not involved or other risks (including people falling off of roofs). It's just that they are orders of magnitude less than for running, say, a coal plant for thirty years to make the same amount of power.
Here is a US government source which says essentially the same thing:
    http://www1.eere.energy.gov/solar/man_pro_implicat ions.html
"Because manufacturers use a wide variety of processes to make PV cells, a wide range of chemicals--some of them toxic or hazardous--are employed in PV cell production. In terms of worker safety and health, simple protective and administrative measures can be used effectively to protect those who produce PV systems. In terms of the environment, the PV production process produces small amounts of waste materials, but this is minimal relative to the emissions from conventional energy sources. ... Most of today's PV cells consist of crystalline or multicrystalline silicon. Silica particles can be released in the mining and refining stage, but these present a hazard only to workers--one that can easily be avoided. Silicon PV module production can include fluorine, chlorine, nitrates, isopropanol, sulfur dioxide, carbon dioxide, silica particles, and solvents. According to a report from Utrecht University, "Estimated air emission is maximally 0.16 [kilograms of fluorine] and 430 [kilograms of chlorine] per [1000 megawatt-hours] of electricity supplied by PV modules, which is orders of magnitude smaller than the corresponding emissions of a coal plant." ... Although crystalline silicon is the primary material used today to produce PV cells, a growing number of PV products are being produced from other materials. ... "

And all this is without even a lot of effort invested (compared to the hundreds of billions spent annually on conventional solutions). Overall, limiting pollution will only get better per unit as production increases and new manufacturing ideas come along (like using vegetable dyes or plastics for PV panels and so on).

Who benefits from FUD being spread about solar power?

Re:Understatement

[tshak]

For a start, why don't you come up with a less biased source then GREENPEACE.ORG.
Ad hominem at it's finest. "This fallacy is often introduced by phrases such as: "Of course, that's what you'd expect him to say."

It's okay for percieved bias to cause suspicion, but then you have to follow up with that by investigating the source's information. Bias does not make their information wrong. You have to show how their information is wrong or how they're misrepresenting the facts. The rest of your post goes on about how there could be a problem but you offer little more than speculation. This doesn't counter their findings which is based on research with real world data.

Political Power

[Doc Ruby]

Solar's big advantage is that it supplies the most electricity midday, when demand peaks.

I like the advantage (over petrofuels) that its fuel is free, without forcing the US to kowtow to foreign tyrants who sometimes try to kill us, and sometimes need to get rescued from people trying to kill them, and nearly always are at the center of global warfare.

Re:Political Power

[ikkonoishi]

Fuel for solar power isn't free. It is very expensive to expensive to extract it from the center of the sun.

And don't even get me started on the inefficiency of it. More than 99.9% of the Sun's energy misses the Earth entirely! I don't think solar power will ever really take off until we develop giant space based mirrors to cut down on the needless waste of the Sun's irreplaceable hydrogen reserve.

Solar is Limited due to its Low Energy Density

[Ron Bennett]

Many people tout solar as the solution to the world's energy problems - yet most neglect the issue of its low energy density ... it takes a lot of solar panels to match the power generation of even a small coal power plant let alone a nuclear power plant, etc.

Most people don't want to live in a place that's covered in solar panels and windmills far as the eye can see...

And on a related note, neither windmills nor solar panels are benign - they both have a subtle effect on the environment ... there's always a tradeoff with energy generation.

With all that said, for personal / household use solar has much promise, assuming the price can be reduced further, such as panels on roofs, etc to help people augment their energy needs.

Ron

Re:Solar is Limited due to its Low Energy Density

[MtViewGuy]

In fact, if you go to western Texas, wind turbines are going up almost as fast as weeds. :-)

But with developments in nanotechnology, we could see a drastic drop in the price of solar panels within the next ten years. A solar panel setup that costs US$30,000 now could cost as little as US$3,000, which would suddenly make home power generation very viable indeed. And with MIT and several private groups working on supercapacitor battery packs built from carbon nanotubes, that also makes it viable to store all that power generated in the daytime for use at night.

Re:Solar is Limited due to its Low Energy Density

[maynard]

While true, I think this argument misses the point. No doubt that a meter squared of sunlight does not match the energy density of a centimeter cubed in volume of enriched uranium or plutonium. No doubt, per unit space nuclear wins. But your argument takes that fact and then extrapolates a straw man:

> "Most people don't want to live in a place that's covered in solar panels and windmills far as the eye can see..."

Which is not how photovolatic deployments are envisioned. The roof on my house - in Boston, certainly not in a prime solar latitude - could easily offset 30%-40% of household electric consumption, which would be produced during peak demand. Thus, it functions to offset consumption though doesn't completely replace commercial power generation.

So... the only issues are: initial investment, projected return, and the rate of return. When the numbers add up for Boston, I'll buy in. Renewables will be deployed in conjunction with traditional power generation, because in certain locations they will be cost effective.

Re:Solar is Limited due to its Low Energy Density

[Chris Burke]

Most people don't want to live in a place that's covered in solar panels and windmills far as the eye can see...

As opposed to... suburban rooftops and utility poles as far as the eye can see? Are black shingles really that much more attractive than black solar panels? Are windmills so much more unsightly than utility poles and power lines running everywhere?

All the large-scale wind farms I've seen are in places where there's barely anyone living anyway. I really have to wonder who is complaining about it.

And on a related note, neither windmills nor solar panels are benign - they both have a subtle effect on the environment ... there's always a tradeoff with energy generation.

The only one that springs to mind is the industrial processes to manufacture solar cells, and that's bad but seriously, industrial pollution is rampant and people who act like the production of solar cells/hybrid car batteries are a deal-breaker never seem to account for the processes involved in mining coal, building a car, or whatever the status quo is in addition to the pollution created by using said coal plant or ICE car.

Or did you mean something like the solar energy being turned into electricity instead of warming the environment? Because it's all going to be released as heat in the end anyway.

Wind power I'll admit has a subtle effect, as you're taking energy from the wind... Frankly I find it hard to imagine we could put up enough windmills to counter the effect of all the trees we've chopped down, but of course that's just speculation and we aren't putting windmills only where trees used to be.

With all that said, for personal / household use solar has much promise, assuming the price can be reduced further, such as panels on roofs, etc to help people augment their energy needs.

Depending on where you live, solar panels are already a good option if you can afford the up-front investment; they will more than pay for themselves by the time they need to be replaced. Lowering the price will certainly make them even more appealing, and also I think we need to come up with better small (as in household) scale energy storage so that you aren't as dependent on the weather that day. There are a lot of folks working on both problems; neither seems out of reach at this point. I'm very hopeful about the future of solar power.

Re:Solar is Limited due to its Low Energy Density

[NerveGas]

But there are a lot more hot, sunny places than cold, sunny places. Say your efficiency drops by 15%, but your daily insolation goes up by 30%... you still win out.

Re:Solar is Limited due to its Low Energy Density

[Target Drone]

... it takes a lot of solar panels to match the power generation of even a small coal power plant let alone a nuclear power plant, etc. Most people don't want to live in a place that's covered in solar panels and windmills far as the eye can see...

True, but you can stick them on roof tops. The average suburban roof top can easily hold a few kilowatts of solar panels. You need about 7 square meters per kilowatt (75 square feet) based on current 15% efficient solar panels. So a million homes (not including businesses) could produce several GW of power. About the same as a couple nuke plants. Although granted the nuke plants run 24/7.

Re:Solar is Limited due to its Low Energy Density

[mdsolar]

You slipped the units. That should be 4.32 kWh/day. But, you also for got to tilt the panels: http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/us_pv_annual_may200 4.jpg. You want 5 kWh per meter^2 per day and at 17% system efficiency that is about 0.85 kWh/m^2/day. You need 39 m^2 of panels to get 33 kWh/day or about 6 meters on a side.
--
Rent solar power and save: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-users -selling-solar.html

Re:$/Watt

[NerveGas]

Nope, $/W.

It's how much it costs you to get a panel capable of producing electricity at a rate of 1 watt.

If your panel can produce 100 watts, and you spent $400 on it, that's $4/watt.

45% Annual Growth

[Anonymous Coward]

Great. So we're just going to use up the sun's energy faster.

I hope you bastards freeze in the dark.

It's been 30 years..

[QuantumG]

since the first serious calculations were done to determine the feasibility of orbital solar power plants. The results *then* indicated that it was the only economically feasible way to supply the world's future energy needs. Since then, both space and solar cell technology has improved dramatically. Meanwhile, billions of dollars is being sunk into fusion research and there's no expectation that a clean fusion reactor will be developed in the next 50 years.

Re:independence !

[LWATCDR]

Trojan 105's are a pretty favorite battery. Or, if your pocketbooks were enormous, you could go with submarine batteries. Single-cell, so 2.3V each, at 5000 or so amp-hours, and they're made to be maintained and kept going forever. Hook 24 of those up in series to your 48V inverter... Actually unless they have changed Submarine batteries are not meant to keep going forever. The Guppy and Sargo cells had a service life of around two years. They where made for high performance not really super long life.
Running light duty cycles they should last for a pretty long time.

Seriously

[Anne_Nonymous]

>> USA Today is running a pretty good article

Also, pigs soar above the frozen wasteland that was hell.

Where are PV cells from?

[abfan1127]

Oh, that's right. one of the worst factories ever with regard to the environment; an Integrated Circuit Fab. I like it when hippies talk about how perfect solar is. Let's not forget that we need nasty chemicals like Arsenic to make solar cells.

Re:Where are PV cells from?

[AJWM]

There's plenty of arsenic in coal ash. Probably orders of magnitude more than goes into making solar cells, but I'll admit to not having done the math.

Not on my roof

[StikyPad]

Investing in panel makers? Maybe. Investing in a home installation? Call me when the break even point drops below 10 years. How many people even live in their houses for that long anymore? Sure, it may add some equity to your home, but not much, especially if the prices DO fall and/or the efficiency of the panels increases significantly during that 10 years. Imagine trying to include your 5 year old computer as part of your home's equity. You're risking a very similar situation with solar.

You're also betting that grid power won't get any cheaper, which may or may not be a good bet, depending on the fuel source of your local power plant. If solar/microgeneration takes off, there could be an abundance of grid power, causing prices to plummet, especially if people start generating more power than they use -- unlikely, but certainly possible if panel efficiencies increase. The only advantage you have is that grid power can never drop below the cost of maintaining the plant and the distribution network, no matter how cheap the fuel. Nonetheless, my feeling is that there's no time like the present -- to put off a solar installation.

Re:Not on my roof

[NerveGas]

In areas with the highest electricity costs and the highest rebates/incentives, ROI can happen in 5 years.

In tiered markets, where the higher usage of electricity costs you much more than the base usage, a properly-sized solar outfit can do it in 3 years.

As for taking a loan on your solar outfit, look at it this way: Pay money to some electric corp every month, or spend the same amount of money on your solar cells. In the first case, you'll pay forever. In the second, you'll pay for a while, then get to enjoy the benefits. It's like leasing vs. buying a car.

Re:Not on my roof

[FudRucker]

i bought this house in 1980, why move when it is paid for, plus i like it here...

Re:Not on my roof

[bcrowell]

How many people even live in their houses for that long anymore?
Sure, if you're planning on moving in five years, then you're an idiot to do almost any work on your house. If in doubt, ask a realtor; I believe the investments that tend to help a lot with resale value are things like paint and landscaping, because they improve "curb appeal" a lot, and aren't expensive to do. Solar panels are no different from a kitchen remodeling job in this respect.

Sure, it may add some equity to your home, but not much, especially if the prices DO fall and/or the efficiency of the panels increases significantly during that 10 years. Imagine trying to include your 5 year old computer as part of your home's equity. You're risking a very similar situation with solar.
Apples and oranges. The USA Today article is overstating the rate at which the technology is improving. There's no Moore's Law at work here. It's not like the situation with a computer, where you're guaranteed that it will be obsolete in 5 years.

You're also betting that grid power won't get any cheaper, which may or may not be a good bet, depending on the fuel source of your local power plant.
Where I live (California), the historical trend has been steadily up, in real dollars.

If solar/microgeneration takes off, there could be an abundance of grid power, causing prices to plummet, especially if people start generating more power than they use -- unlikely, but certainly possible if panel efficiencies increase.
No way, not any time in the near future. The number of people who have residential photovoltaic systems installed is extremely small, way too small to lower the market price of power through supply and demand.

especially if people start generating more power than they use -- unlikely, but certainly possible if panel efficiencies increase.
Where I live, the way the deal works is that if you generate more power than you use over the course of 12 months, then you simply don't pay any money to the electric company, but they will never send you a check for the surplus. When you buy a residential PV system, they very carefully size it so that it will cover about 80% of your yearly use. If they sized it too big, it would risk wasting your money by overproducing, which you don't get paid for doing.

It's the grid that's the issue!

[plawsy]

Sure, PV modules don't convert all they see to useful electricity. Where they really shine (sorry) is that they generate that power AT THE POINT OF USE.

Look at the chart on p 8 (of 41) of this pdf from Lawrence Livermore National Labs.

Note that of the 38.2 quads (quadrillion BTUs) of electrical energy produced in the USA in 2002, fully 26.3 quads never get used! That's where the real power (sorry again) of solar is found.

Re:It's the grid that's the issue!

[plawsy]

Here's an easier URL for the chart:

https://eed.llnl.gov/flow/02flow.php

Dude, you're 30 years behind.

[Spy der Mann]

Oh, that's right. one of the worst factories ever with regard to the environment; an Integrated Circuit Fab. I like it when hippies talk about how perfect solar is. Let's not forget that we need nasty chemicals like Arsenic to make solar cells.

*ahem ahem*

Berkeley Scientists Synthesize Cheap, Easy-to-Make Ultra-thin Photovoltaic Films
40% efficient solar cells to be used for solar electricity
Titania nanotubes could boost solar cell efficiency
Pink solar cells provide green power on the cheap
Carbon nanotubes could help make nanoparticle-based solar cells more efficient and practical.
Quantum Dots Enables New Advances in Solar Cell Industry

Green and cheap enough for ya?

Re:Dude, you're 30 years behind.

[MarioMax]

I work in a wafer fab, specifically in Etch. Contrary to popular belief, it is NOT clean industry, but rather extremely dirty and toxic. Some of the chemicals used in my specific fab for etching alone (both wet and dry etch) include:

Liquid HF - one of the most dangerous liquids in existence, I might add.

Liquid HCl

Liquid H2SO4

Gaseous Cl2

Gaseous HBr

Gaseous BCl3

Gaseous SF6

Gaseous N2O

Gaseous CHF3

Gaseous CF4

Gaseous BF3

Liquid EKC - I believe EKC220 or EKC245, one of the nastiest liquids you can handle. That's just to start. There's even more exotic chemicals out there that are by no means clean. And let's not forget that photoresist is a known carcinogen, and smells really nasty to boot.

Re:Dude, you're 30 years behind.

[Jeremi]

I work in a wafer fab, specifically in Etch. Contrary to popular belief, it is NOT clean industry, but rather extremely dirty and toxic. Some of the chemicals used in my specific fab for etching alone (both wet and dry etch) include:

The question is, what happens to these nasty materials once they are used? Do they become part of the product and get shipped out the door? Do they get hosed off and recycled for the next batch? Perhaps they get neutralized somehow? Or are they just dumped into the local river?

How exactly are the toxic materials handled? And what is their final effect on the environment, especially compared to the effects of mining and burning an equivalent amount of coal?

Here's your call.

[Anonymous Coward]

10 years? I'm looking at a 5-7 year ROI in Southern California.
(Less if you figure the asset value in the house.)

As for betting on future (grid) energy prices, I'm going to bet that it's not going to get cheaper over the next 10 years. You are free to bet on the utilities lowering prices, alternate fuels being cheaper, overproduction of solar energy, and Unicorns.

Re:$/Watt

[Citizen of Earth]

So the reimbursement period is about (1190$ / 0.15$) ~= 8000h (less than a year).

Doesn't the 24 hours of sunlight per day you get in Europe interfere with your sleep?

22 years to replace net generation

[mdsolar]

There were 1.7 GW installed in 2006: http://www.solarbuzz.com/Marketbuzz2007-intro.htm bringing the world up to about 6 GW. At a typical 5 hours per day equivilent peak generation that comes to 11 billion kWh per year. World net generation was 16,590.6 billion kWh per year in 2004: http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/txt/ptb1116.html, so your fraction should be 0.07%, off by about 4 orders of magnitude. At 45% growth, how long would it take to replace world net generation? Somewhat less that 22 years since 1.45^22=3550 which would imply that more than half of the worlds net generation would be fabricated in the year 2028, with the rest fabricated prior to that year. Since panels last 25 years or longer there would have been little need to replace existing solar PV capacity by that time.
--
Rent residential solar power: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-users -selling-solar.html

Re:22 years to replace net generation

[tbischel]

Are you assuming stagnation in all other energy domains? I know oil, coal, nuclear, and hydroelectric grow at a much slower pace than 45% a year, but it seems like it could significantly impact the amount of time it would take to become primarily a solar society.

Re:22 years to replace net generation

[mdsolar]

I think the variations you are seeing at the Watson house are seasonal: http://256.com/solar/graphs/kwh_prod_mon.gif. Solar panels degrade over long periods mostly owing to cosmic ray induced defects. They can be recycled though. I expect panels built today to be in service 30 years from now and on slate or tile roofs much longer. When people reshingle though, I think there will be a good chance that they will put on new panels, just for peace of mind, and it will be a toss up if the old panels end up producing somewhere else or end up getting refurbished first. I was really just winking at the joke about exponential growth. We will surely see $0.50/Watt silicon at least with refurbished stock because the energy costs will be so much lower compared to fabricating it from scratch and there is still much room for improvement of the efficiency of thin films so they may get to $0.25/Watt. That is a tenth of the cost of nuclear plant construction. As solar pushes prices for energy down, its own fabrication cost goes down so there is a bit of a virtuous circle as well.

If you're buying from your electric company...

[benhocking]

If you're buying from your electric company, you don't buy power at all. You buy energy (which would be Joules, Watt-Hours, or, typically, Kilowatt-Hours). If you're buying your own power generation source, then you're very likely buying based off of how much power can be delivered — which is measured in Watts.

Relocation

[benhocking]

If we promise to relocate the scorpions to Michael Vick's jail cell, I think we can cut a deal with PETA.

You misinterpret the chart

[RecessionCone]

The grid is actually remarkably efficient for an energy distribution system - it loses only 9% of its energy input. The vast majority of the electrical losses in this chart come from converting heat energy to mechanical energy to electric energy. Converting energy between its various forms is always expensive (those pesky laws of thermodynamics!!)

45 percent of 0.1 percent is not much

[WillAffleckUW]

Meanwhile, while we waste ten times in dollars as the Iraqi oil we're trying to steal on a civil war that we have no reason to be involved in, the EU is on track to achieve 25 percent of their total energy supply from alternative energy.

If we were serious you'd be seeing increases of 1000 to 5000 percent every year.

Re:independence !

[TooMuchToDo]

Believe it or not, back in high school I built a fairly large battery bank out of (wait for it) kegs. We used salt water as the medium. Does it scale? Probably with some research, but we were able to drive a fairly big CO2 laser with it for 20 minutes.

Re:$/Watt

[jafac]

Ah - but it DOES have a meaning.

Or it WILL have a meaning.

Currently - the economic terms are based on how much oil we can pump out of the ground in a given time-frame.

When oil (fossil fuels) ceases to be the primary driver of economies - it looks like solar is poised to take over as the #1 technology (with wind/nuclear/geothermal coming in somewhere next); and solar will likely be a function of square-footage-of-sunlight-per-year. The more land a person owns, in a sunny energy-producing region, the more wealth, over time, that person can create. Simply by covering it with solar panels, the more efficient, the better, and praying for sun. Electricity will be a market, there will always be buyers. Locale will probably produce different market rates, because of transmission losses. People will eventually start floating solar farms at sea, and putting them into space (though those, apparently don't scale DOWN well, you need a certain MINIMUM to beam the power via microwaves, efficiently).

But you're right. The $/kw-h calculation looks quite silly when you have solar power. There was a lot of FUD about solar about 5-10 years ago, that solar cells had a reputation for "wearing out" after 10-15 years, or losing power over time. This caused some solar-opponents to create a $/kw-h calculation; how much power you could expect to get out of a solar cell over the lifetime of the cell. Some even claimed that they cost more energy to manufacture than they'd ever produce. This was dead wrong then, and it's dead wrong now: there were some specific kinds of solar cells made in the 1970's that had defects, with dyes that turned brown, etc. Other solar cells went "bad" when their glass enclosures cracked, or their solder joints failed, etc - all things that could be repaired, or engineered for better longevity. These are no longer issues in any modern solar technology. We don't know about these new nanotechnology or thin-film based solar panels. Only time will tell. But it's not likely that they're going to "wear out" like this. For all effective purposes - you manufacture a solar cell, and it produces electricity "forever".

bucks

[zogger]

if you don't mind having to move a big weight, look into getting electric forklift battery packs instead. A much better deal dollar wise there than trojans or rolls-surrettes, etc. The smaller batteries can be hand moved (although they are still quite heavy), but the cost is significantly higher. The forklift battery packs are already wired with welded busbars as well, so it saves a little more there, too, parts plus labor. You mentioned an electric fence so I will assume you are a rural guy like me and can handle moving stout stuff with your equipment.

Anyway, solar works, and well, within its limitations. Once you have it up and installed the only remaining question you will have is why did you wait. The first time your grid juice goes down and you still have full power, you'll *really* smile about it. Maintenance is pretty easy, occasionally clean the panels off and top off the batts with distilled water. I used good disconnects and actually covered the panels before, or did the maintenance at night on new moon nights when the least amount of power is being generated. Also wait for the batts to cool down a little before opening them up, and pour in the fresh water slowly, and you can read up how to build a proper battery bank housing unit with ventilation, which is required, you use a small DC fan as an air PUSHER into the unit with an exhaust someplace safe, you don't PULL the gassy air out. big PVC pipe is fine, the bottom of your storage bank container gets lined with sintra and put some baking soda down there on the bottom, just in case. I found a bright headlamp worked good for battery maintenance, keeping my hands free,(and goggles of course and rubber gloves, cheap insurance) and a big turkey baster for the last little bits into the cells to get it "just right". Just remember, you got a LOT of amps sitting there, you don't want to weld yourself!

Oh ya, on the batts. Double size your battery bank (or a lot more than what you think, whatever). Figure out what you need, get double, then they are always shallow cycling and they will last a long time, plus install a "desulphator", you can google that up and see which one you might like, they work pretty well from my experience, the batts I have one on are from 98 and still working fine.

Re:Care to bet

[QuantumG]

Point is, for the billions of dollars they are being poured into fusion research, without even the promise of a commercial reactor in the next 50 years, we could have solar power plants running next year.

B.S. about price dropping

[SiliconEntity]

Everyone likes to think that solar is getting cheaper every year just like computers and disk drives, but it's not true. Look at this chart:

http://www.solarbuzz.com/

You will see that solar panel prices bottomed out back in 2003 and have been rising ever since. Demand is exceeding supply thanks to ever more generous subsidies, especially in Germany, which have driven up worldwide price. The truth is that solar costs more today than it has for several years, and costs are still rising slowly. It is a myth that solar prices are constantly coming down.

Lead by example

[MrSteve007]

Good timing on this story. I'm in the final phases of installing a 10kw solar array at my workplace in Seattle, Washington. It's one of the largest privately financed projects in the state. I just created a gallery for the pictures of the install. The payback time for the array is about 7 years. It was pretty easy to do, and just looks cool. http://www.jbdg.com/gallery/solarinstall/index.htm l

Re:Crap on...

[dwywit]

I live in Qld, Australia, approx 26 deg lat south. Off-grid, solar + petrol genset backup. Backup is only needed when 2+days of heavy overcast or rainfall. 12 x 55w panels, 12 x 80w panels, 12 x 2VDC 1100amphour lead-acid cells for a 24VDC system. Lights and refrigeration run off 24VDC. Lights are mostly halogen projector bulbs with a few old-fashioned incandescent bulbs (I can't stand compact fluorescents - I can see them flickering out the corner of my eye, and yes, I've tested quite a few). Inverter for 240VAC - it can run a TV, washing machine and 2 computers at once, so there's not much we don't have in the way of appliances. Solid fuel stove for cooking, heating and hot water. It's nice to come home and chop wood after staring at a computer screen all day long. System was upgraded in 2001 (new batteries, the 80w panels were added, and a smart regulator installed). The bill was about AUD$14,000 - with govt subsidies we paid AUD$4,000. Estimated total cost to install such a system today is AUD$25,000 to $30,000, although that could go higher if I wanted a larger battery bank, some smart power switching technology to run computers directly off regulated DC, etc, etc. Subsidy schemes are currently waiting on AUD$134 million to be released for use. I'll install some more panels when that becomes available. Compared to an estimated AUD$30,000 to get the grid connected. According to the regulator's history function (30 days' storage of input and output) we use anywhere from 160 amp hours per day to 240 amp hours per day.

Re:Crap on...

[Goonie]

As it happens, I happen to know a fair bit about this, pal. I've done the numbers for myself, repeatedly, and no matter which way you slice and dice solar power is an economic loser at the moment, both for individuals and others seeking to reduce their carbon emissions, and the sooner more people grasp this the more progress we can actually make at tackling the issues.

As a quick illustration of the point, one of these systems costs $22,610 before freight and installation, and (depending on where you live) puts out about 20% of its peak wattage over 24 hours. That's roughly 15 kwh per day, or 5475 kwh annually - or, in round figures, about $600 worth of electricity at retail price - and, at the typical surcharges for green power, around $800. The cost of borrowing the money, just for the kit, is around about $1600 a year.

Re:You're a special case

[dwywit]

True, it's not for everyone, and doesn't make economic sense if the grid's already available (i.e. runs past your front door). But it's nice to be (mostly) independent, e.g. "Blackout? What blackout?" The grid is only about 600 metres away from our front driveway, but apart from the initial cost of installation, it would mean a minimum quarterly bill whether we use it or not, blackouts, brownouts, spikes, AC voltage out of spec, cutting down a lot of trees to replace them with power poles (or ripping out large areas of tree root systems to put in underground conduits). Nah. The panels are great talking points, too - "And how do you wash your clothes? Really? You can use a washing machine?" Lots of wide-eyed wonder when I can show a TV AND a computer on at the same time.

Economic analysis

[maddriller]

I have never seen an economic analysis of solar cell production. Will a solar cell manage to produce more power than was required to make it in its normal lifetime? Hmmmmm.

Re:Crap on...

[swillden]

I don't usually get on the ghg emissions bandwagon, but isn't a wood stove pretty polluting in that regard?

It's carbon-neutral, unlike the coal or natural gas which probably powers your stove.