A famous Haas trip (I wasn’t on) involved a simple question: Which is cheaper: Coal or Nuclear electricity. The solutions and in fighting still has not ended’¦even 10 years later. Well this process reared it head again as the CEO of my company asked how many square miles of land would it take to have solar panels power California?…I took up the challenge’¦and here we go. (If you want to argue my numbers ‘¦GO F*&K YOURSE’¦err’¦show me yours)

Two ways to go here’¦.Photovoltaic and CSP.
Photovoltaic uses panels to generate electricity – The photovoltaic effect is produced by sunlight of a particular frequency (color) causing silicon – that has been ‘œdoped’ with special impurities – to give up electrons. The part of the sunlight spectrum with a lower frequency doesn’t have the energy to cause electrons to be ejected. Energy from higher frequency solar radiation is largely lost to heat after it has done its job of ‘œkicking’ an electron. The problem of maximizing power from sunlight has been known for at least 30 years, and is primarily one of physical limitations, not engineering technology.
CSP (Concentrating Solar Power) uses mirrors to concentrate solar heat to boil water and spin a turbine (think the movie SAHARA)

Ok so’¦the key to understand these systems is the real estate needed to make it work. So I will use the Kilowatt /acre model.
PhotoVoltaic: 13KW/Acre
SCSP: 48kW/acre*
(*Now this is based on the current model SEGS in California’¦which cheats with a natural gas boiler to help during daytime and maintain during night. Not to mention last year it only averaged 13kw/Acre)

Other Sources:
Nuclear 1000KW/acre
Coal : 29000KW/acre
Do you see why were are a long way off?
This is production mind you’¦not land costs/ transmission / maintenance’¦etc.

Wind is a different story’¦.but has the same output as solar. You do need wind flow so you can’t put these things an acre apart, they need to be spaced’¦. So the rule of thumb is 50 acres per 1000KW’¦.or 20Kw / acre. Lets not forget about when it’s not windy. This system will work for farms and islands (offshore)’¦limited real estate needed’¦limited power consumption.

So with the current legislation to replace 10% percent of total electrical generation with (solar/Wind) by 2020’¦ Current peak usage (I’™m guessing August 1st at 3pm’¦.snicker) in California is 60 GW’¦that’s 60000MW or 60000000KW’¦’¦..so 10% of that is 6000MW of peak power. So that would be just under 500,000 acres of Solar panels or just under 1000 square miles’¦or basically Orange County

Doesnt seem too bad huh?’¦ok lets talk cost’¦.to setup 1000 Square miles (panels only) is a little over 1 Trillion Dollars($70 per square foot minus 30% land used up for spacing the panels). Double that for the infrastructure. Then just for fun’¦add in the cost of the land’¦.oh’¦and the solar panels life span is 15 years’¦.so hopefully that will go down in price when its time to do again. Oops… and the big one’¦ it only works for 6 hours a day.
Sign me up’¦NOT’¦.I’™ll take the 5 Billion dollar Nuclear plant with the 50 year lifespan thank you.

Not to mention do you really think the environmentalists that are telling you to do this are going to be happy putting all that metal, silicon and transformers in the desert?

Back in the day I used to think that Ed Begley Jr. was a nut case’¦.but it was because they only showed his off the reservation stuff’¦(having a funeral for the electric car’¦forgetting to mention they were leases’¦.and WHY they were leases)’¦not the down home practical stuff he does very well. He never supported using corn for Bio-Diesel’¦Corn is food’¦never use food’¦use the stalks’¦use the leaves. He scored a few points for that’¦.then he talked about he current technologies not enough to run a house unless you have no climate controls and now women. Huh?….sexist pig’¦.well you see personal wind farms and solar cells cant run a hair dryer or an air conditioner’¦.but adding these $10K-20K in green tech to your home can run lights an tv’s and a few rebates’¦and that can cut your electric bill in half. That’s is the selling point people need to use. Don’t worry about the 10 years it would take to pay off the investment, or the 15 year life span of the cells’¦.Oh’¦and don’t plug in your electric car it will overload the system.

Solutions’¦well first off get the facts’¦don’t let anyone tell you that you can power your house with just panels on the roof’¦.Plants love CO2’¦.Ethanol takes more energy to create it than it creates’¦.Coral is thriving at the bikini Atoll’¦.Nuclear is the safest, cheapest, and cleanest energy available’¦.There are more trees in the US now then when Columbus landed’¦wait..I got off track’¦damn hippies’¦.
As soon solar panels get below 25 cents a watt they will be a viable option for consumers’¦.right now they barely pay for themselves’¦if at all. And do we really want government buying into some thing that isnt viable?

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