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Solar Power On the White House

CartaNova writes "The Obama administration has announced plans to install solar panels and a solar hot water heater on the White House. The Carter administration had previously installed a 32-panel solar system at the White House — which was quietly removed during Reagan's tenure in office. Solar hot water and Photovoltaic firms had been campaigning on this issue for some time."

5 of 405 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Why do Americans have problems with solar power by Bemopolis · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    As He sayeth in the Good Book: Galt 3:16 "Yea verily, I was amortized for your sin taxes..."

    --
    "I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." -- Addison Bain
  2. Re:2012: President Palin removes solar panels by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Didn't Jimmy Carter install solar panels on the Whitehouse roof, only to have Reagan remove them for ideological reasons immediately after his inauguration? (Or was that Clinton and Bush II?)

    Don't you feel stupid for posting that blindly partisan crap just a few seconds after this:

    He removed solar thermal panels, probably much less efficient than the evacuated tubes used today, when the roof was being repaired in 1986:
    http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A0DE2DF113BF937A1575BC0A960948260

    They were not reinstalled because of cost effectiveness issue. I also heard maintenance was a pain. They were donated to a university, IIRC.

    Bush also had solar panels installed:
    http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/27/technology/how-it-works-from-a-white-house-roof-solar-power-proclaims-gains.html

    Many places are spinning this story politically no doubt.

    BTW, I think solar thermal and more insulation is a great, cost effective thing. PV, otoh, not so much yet.

    Funny how you didn't seem to know that George W. Bush actually installed solar panels.

    But that would fuck up the "Obama is the GREATEST" narrative, now wouldn't it. As if endemic 10% unemployment isn't enough - I guess we have to dig deep for Obama's positives, eh? Like tout the Obamessiah for doing the same thing that was ignored when George W. Bush did it.

  3. Re:How does it get any light? by sco08y · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    ah, another simpleton who doesn't get my meta-ironic subtletisms...

  4. Re:solar hot water by acoustix · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Not sure how much it will help in Washington, but worth it in So Cal, especially with the govt kicking in a large tax credit

    So, in other words, this technology isn't worth installing unless it is heavily subsidized.

    Got it.

    --
    "A plan fiendishly clever in its intricacies"- Homer Simpson
  5. Re:solar hot water by pixelpusher220 · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Unknown and impossible to quantify, but thanks for playing.

    I assume you don't use planes since flying was once impossible for people? We have a pretty damned good idea that fossil fuel use is causing changes in the world. While an *exact* accounting may not be possible, it is possible to say 'this is bad' and encourage people to move to other forms of technology. Heck, even the Pentagon is trying to get off fossil fuels; or are they just green hippies too?

    You mean the stuff that I'm breathing out right now? Good luck with that.

    No I mean the CO2 from millions of years that is being released over the course of a couple hundred years. It tends to have effects on the equilibrium when you push a million years of effect into a single century.

    Your 'output' is part of the normal and natural cycle, just like leaves growing and falling off the trees. You took in that carbon during the same timeframe you're outputing it so there is no measurable change in the system.

    Thank you for playing 'be the idiot'! you're doing great!

    --
    People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people :-D