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Tokelau Becomes First Country To Go 100% Solar
First time accepted submitter zonky writes "Tokelau has become the first country in the world to go 100% solar power generation, moving away from their entirely diesel power supply, which formerly supplied the energy needs of the 1400 residents of their small south pacific Island Nation. From the article: 'All three atolls in the South Pacific dependency, a New Zealand territory, will have their own solar power system by the end of October, despite a slight delay switching on the first system.'"
You are reading it wrong. Currently they don't have electricity 24/7 because they don't run the generators all night. Once solar is running they will have electricity available all the time thanks to battery storage.
It also means they are not reliant on incoming shipments of diesel to keep the lights on, and their power system is now distributed and far more redundant than when it was reliant on a small number of generators.
Overall this is a huge upgrade for them.
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SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
I think last year I had to hose off some bird poop once. And nobody I know has had an inverter fail. I would just mod you down, but I'd like to call attention to the fact that solidraven is full of bird poop.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Sorry but that's a load of crap. Solar panels don't require any maintenance unless you live in a very dirty environment and even cheap inverters will still outlive the return on investment duration. If your inverter breaks more often then once every 5 years then you need to seriously question about what brands you buy.
Also you've clearly never lived on a small island in the pacific have you? I have. The expectation was quite simple. At 10pm the power went out. If we were lucky there would be blackouts at dinner time too. This isn't some high tech civilisation who cry bloody murder when their broadband connection goes down.
Also cost effective is not questionable, not in the slightest. The case has been made. The plant cost $7.5m the annual expenditure on diesel is $1.8m. It would be paid off within 4 years without any kind of subsidy or assistance, except in this case the NZ government is providing the money. The country has just managed to pocket $1.8m / year which is 2/3rds of their national budget. That sounds like cost effective to me.