Posted on 02/12/2019 1:15:19 PM PST by Liberty7732
The Democrats’ Green New Socialism proposes blanketing the U.S. with solar panels and wind turbines so as to replace all reliable forms of power generation with unreliable, intermittent sources. Everyone knows that solar panels don’t produce electricity at night, but there is another problem: they don’t produce electricity when it snows, either.
A friend took this photo and wrote:
I was up in Ramsey [Minnesota] picking up my camper, and next door is this fantastic $30,000,000 brand-new solar installation.
Doesn’t look like they’re making much electricity today, but it sure is going to make for good union jobs clearing the snow off these things.
(Excerpt) Read more at powerlineblog.com ...
Not sure why I’m included in the “TO:” line...
(Those panels in the pic should be more vertical I would think...)
Anyway, the limit from the inherent intemittancy of solar is an aspect that fans of “100% renewable!!” don’t get.
I think that link explains it well.
Solar has certainly done better than many, incuding myself, expected. Would like to see the subsidies dropped now.
Wow, you have a lot of money!
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Well I have a lot less now than I did when I started doing solar.
Different people call a “lot” a different amount. I ended up putting around $50k out and did all the installation myself. Remember the Federal government paid back about a third of that $50k.
Most people pay about half of what they pay for installation so that it is easy to run out of money pretty quickly. I bought a “kit” from Wholesale Solar. They run kits on sale from time to time. If you watch them carefully it is easy to save a good 8-10G’s by getting a close out kit.
A kit generally consists of Solar Cells, the mounting hardware, Combiner boxes and breakers, over voltage protection, Battery Controller, Battery wiring, Inverter(s) and control computer. You provide battery, wiring and junction boxes. It takes a lot of wire.
I have a large home so my electricity costs were often over $400.00 per month and I figured I could kill two birds with one stone, I could get security and lower costs by having solar.
I had already replaced nearly all my incandescent lighting with florescent lighting. When I started calculating my loads I decided it would pay to get rid of my florescent lighting and use LED. The LED is really miserly on using electricity and helps me get the most mileage from my roof. I still have the florescent lamps, I don’t expect to ever use them but to throw away perfectly good lamps was something I just couldn’t do.
I lot of people do it differently, they just lower costs by feeding the meter directly from the PV’s. That is a lot less expensive to do but then you don’t have power in an outage. You could always pay a few grand and get a nice automatic start generator and have your back up. I did the generator, it was overkill big time. What I really wanted is when you know what hits the fan power that would outlast gas supplies.
If you don’t have battery backup you automatically get a 20% advantage in energy production. You gotta figure the battery eats that much. A battery charging eats electricity, low voltage wiring eats voltage so that you need to plan to make at least 20% more than you currently use. If you don’t have a battery all that just goes to the meter. Here in Kentucky the electric company won’t pay you for your extra but they will (at least for now) hold it for you indefinitely and give it back when you need it. The Utilities are all trying to get that changed. I’m grandfathered in now even if they do change the law.
Making my own power is something of a hobby for me now. I have too many hobbies. I play the piano and organ, I am into photography in a big way with Nikon D810 and nice fast lenses and doing my own printing. So all I needed was another hobby.
I do enjoy sharing my experiences with solar with others, it can really be difficult to find much help for whole house solar power, most just want a little backup to keep the freezer and TV going. I like A/C and hot showers.
Great info!
I’m in the mountains too.That morning mist akes quite a difference!
Colorado currently has 1,700,000 households
47,000 households is 2.8% of that, not to mention Colorado is adding over 25,000 new households every year.
so ONE windfarm like that is nothing but a drop in the bucket
btw, i just can’t WAIT to see what the constant massive hailstorms we have here do to those solar farms and then there’s the dust from all the winds that blow on the prairies all the time ... they’re gonna have to hire a bunch of solar panel sweepers ...
oh, and of course we still need the same amount of fossil fuel power plants no matter how much solar is built because the sun don’t shine at night or often during the day during the wingter, which means WAY higher total power bills the more solar that’s installed ... solar is nothing but a total scam for leftist obama-lovers ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uGex_wGa7s
http://www.google.com/search?q=fresnel+lens+solar+cell+site:freerepublic.com
https://www.solarnovus.com/mirrors-vs-fresnel-lenses-for-concentrating-solar-power_N7202.html
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/02/140210101945.htm
http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/fresnellens/index
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/search?m=all;o=time;q=quick;s=Solar
You need to accept the reality that renewable energy is replacing fossil fuel. Every year the price of solar and wind gets cheaper
...
The windmills are getting gigantic which is more efficient.
actually the laws that force the utilities to buy your power are a boondoggle of its own.
Florida has had Solar for water heaters for generations; my parents did. Just run the water through black collectors on the roof, and then store it in your hot water tank. Only use a little electricity to run the pumps. Much more sensible than using photovoltaic cells to produce electricity, which you use to heat the water. Photovoltaic cells produce plenty of electricity when the sun is shining, but the problem is storing the energy for when it is not. That and maintenance. No system is maintenance free.
“...did all the installation myself...”
Well, that’s a problem for me. I can’t even change the batteries in a flashlight without killing the thing.
Plus I’m too old now to do much assembling, siting and wiring. Especially if I had to install the panels on my roof.
What surprises me is that so few people talk about geothermal power. That doesn’t pollute, and unlike solar and wind power, it’s available constantly. Here in Kentucky we don’t have volcanoes, but I have been told there’s enough geothermal energy under the state to heat our water, at least.
actually the laws that force the utilities to buy your power are a boondoggle of its own.
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I would be the first to agree with the above statement, but agreeing with it I also realize that a tax deduction for purchasing a house or for deducting interest on a credit card or car loan are all boondoggles of the same nature. Most of us take advantage of tax laws if we can, I did too.
Probably not true. The warmth to heat water to 120 degrees is about a mile down (80 degrees per mile). Are you going to dig a well that deep? And pump water down and back? No.
Inevitably when people say "geothermal" they mean a network of wells, usually a few hundred feet deep that they pump water down and back. With enough wells the water stays lukewarm all year. Without enough wells, the ground will cool and they will lose efficiency. Then they pump the lukewarm water into an ordinary electric heat exchanger. They get the exact same efficiency as an air-warmed heat exchanger on a 50 degree day. On a zero degree day the geothermal would have the same 300% or more efficiency as the cool weather day. So the magic of geothermal is that it improves the heat exchange efficiency on very cold days. Otherwise it's like any other heat exchanger sitting on a concrete pad nest to a house.
Hate to break it to you but one cannot deduct cc interest or car loan interest.
House interest, so far it is holding. Will be gone soon.
forcing ratepayers to subsidize your games is just like forcing ratepayers to subsidize and guarantee returns to crony corporations for wind and solar farms.
My money.
I've never heard of a heated solar panel. OTOH there are diesel generators on every wind power site to spin the turbines, deice them, heat the oil, etc. There's clearly fossil used to create and maintain any kind of renewable. But there's also free input from sun and wind that we can tap into.
In 50 years or so, there will be solar everywhere. Wind is primitive and it will be phased out.
Putting solar on rooftops really only makes sense in treeless areas like the desert SW. Otherwise, it’s better to build a solar array in an open field somewhere.
I have more than a dozen panels and take careful measurements. Not only will snow block the sun, but even snow over a portion of the panel will greatly reduce the panel output. Your salesman is clueless.
“...did all the installation myself...”
Well, that’s a problem for me. I can’t even change the batteries in a flashlight without killing the thing.
Plus I’m too old now to do much assembling, siting and wiring. Especially if I had to install the panels on my roof.
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I was too old too but did it anyway. It was a real chore.
I hung 36 panels, each panel weighs about 60 pounds and is 6-1/2 feet tall, that was the hardest part, getting them all up on the roof. I was a little over 65 years old when I installed them.
The electrical was a little challenging. You can find you tube information that will cover most of what you want to do. I likely did more than needed because in the process I also installed a backup generator with an automatic transfer switch. the utility company made me change out the electric meter, to me that was the scariest thing. I had them come out and shut off the power to the house from the pole so I didn’t electrocute myself. I had to have a county inspector check everything before I could leave my system on line. He looked at it and couldn’t make heads or tails of it and asked me if it worked, I told him it did and he put a sticker on it.
To say installation was fun would not be quite true. It was a lot of work but it was VERY satisfying to have it completed. I do know my system well now and can repair most any part of it. It is a real pleasure to go downstairs and hear those inverter fans going to town. In the winter feeling the warm air coming out of them is an added bonus. In the summer the warm air has to be removed by the A/C but then it only produces warm air when it is producing a lot of electricity.
With the exception of laundry day my load is normally only a killowat or two until the A/C comes on. The A/C is 4 ton, perhaps another half ton would be better but we do ok with that. When running the A/C pulls 5-6KW depending on the temp. When the electric dryer is on that is another 6-7KW. There are times even on sunny days that I don’t make enough to handle all my load but then again that is why I’m still hooked up to the grid and pay a $12 a month fee for the privilege.
Solar is expensive, it is not terribly reliable and requires attention from time to time. Solar isn’t for everybody. One thing I don’t have to worry about is not having power.
I’m glad I have my solar.
That matters. Part of the 'costs' of solar in Northern States is the energy involved in maintenance, repair, and replacement.
Once those costs are factored in solar might be like ethanol - cost more energy to produce than energy we get out of it. (yes, tractors, fertilizers, processing, manufactruing and transport of panels etc are all part of 'costs'.
Thank you for this. I am keeping this for when I decide (or it is decided for me.....no joke) I will have this available. I sincerely appreciate this.
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