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Florida To Build Solar-Powered City

Posted by samzenpus on from the sunny-side-of-the-street dept.

Mike writes "The sunny state of Florida just announced that they will begin construction this year on the world's first solar-powered city. A collaboration between Florida Power & Light and development firm Kitson & Partners, the 17,000 acre city will generate all of its electrical needs via a 75 megawatt, $300 million solar-powered generator. The city will also use smart grid technology to manage its power and allow all inhabitants of the community to monitor their energy consumption."

5 of 195 comments (clear)

  1. A new city? by Kokuyo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Do I understand correctly? They want to build a city from scratch?

    In that case, why build a massive solar generator instead of fitting the rooftops with solar panels from the start? It would have the added advantage that one 'incident' at the generator site would nut shut down the whole city.

    And it would probably save massive amounts of space.

  2. Air Conditioning? by Muad'Dave · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Unfortunately the sunniest places are also some of the hottest, requiring quite a lot of power-hungry air conditioning.

    Hopefully they'll take advantage of highly-efficient ground source heat pumps since the water table is probably very high in the Ft. Meyers area.

    --
    Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
    1. Re:Air Conditioning? by DerekLyons · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Unfortunately the sunniest places are also some of the hottest, requiring quite a lot of power-hungry air conditioning.

      Modern folks think they are required to have air conditioning, sure. But I grew up in Jacksonville (Florida) in the 60's and 70's - and houses with air conditioning were the exception, not the norm. People got along just fine without it. We didn't have older folk or kids keeling over from the heat. Nobody panicked when it got over 75 F.
       
      What changed in Florida was four things: 1) Cutting down all the shade trees when building new developments. 2) Building standard ranch tract houses rather than houses suited to the climate. 3) Massive waves of 'immigrants' and retirees from colder areas of the country who were unused to the heat. 4) Ongoing marketing by AC companies that AC was 'required' to be modern and up-to-date.

  3. Re:Why ground installation? by Spazztastic · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Photovoltaic systems are generally expensive overall. Usually when they choose where it goes it's been because they did extensive research and simulations to decide on which location to build it, which direction the panels will face, whether the climate conditions will cause problems, etc. If they chose to put it in one centralized location, it's because they did the fucking math and it will pay off.

    Disclaimer: My cousin sells photovoltaic systems for a living, I've learned a lot from him while assisting.

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    Posts not to be taken literally. Almost everything is sarcasm.
  4. Why? by spike2131 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Why build a new city in Florida when all the ones they already have are chock full of empty, foreclosed houses? Its a lot more green to live in the places you've already built than it is to build new places. Putting solar panels on your new city doesn't change that equation.

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    SpyDock: Scientific Python in a Docker container