Sun Edison - Solar Energy is too expensive?

[The Conservative]

You still don't understand.

You can't produce more energy than you use, I understand perfectly. You choose to be a doubting Thomas, I'll keep trying. It took Thomas Edison how many tries to make a functioning lightbulb?

If my idea works as I think it will, I won't be breaking any "natural laws"...

[Montegriffo]

It's not just efficiency. They produce badly formed power that require enormous investment to stabilize. It's not worth it.

If we are talking about a satellite, then solar is great. If you just want to power some light bulbs in a hunting lodge, sure. But you can't do anything serious with that kind of power.

The trick with PV is to use low voltage DC for everything. You could use most things in your house on 12v and only need the grid for high use appliances like washing machines and electric kettles.

[Ex-California]

Lets take this into consideration, rigs have been around for how many decades?

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 0/abstract

Lets also look at this abstract:

Altamont Pass Wind Resource Area, California: 888,000 bat and 573,000 bird fatalities/year (including 83,000 raptor fatalities)/year in 2012...

You do the math...

What's your point? That orders of magnitude are killed more by wind than solar?

The point is that if you want to feel good about "not using coal" you better feel bad about killing hundreds of thousands of birds and animals that are required to keep the natural ecosystem in place. People are so desperate of saving they planet by "going green" they kill the planet by destroying the ecosystem around said plants.

Sorry, but either find a way to do it without destroying the ecosystem around the area, or hang up the idea till you can.

Sure, I agree with you.

Therefore, build more nuke plants. Problem solved

[Ex-California]

Oh that just makes it so much better

Yes it does. Far less impact on wildlife and more efficient energy production. Plus added bonus of being able to store excess heat in huge salt vats to be used after the sun goes down.

Also the deaths caused by wind turbines are due to inappropriate sites such as valleys being chosen due to the regular flow of wind conflicting with the flight patterns of birds.
Most of our wind generators are situated out at sea where they have much less impact on birds and have the added bonus of providing safer breeding grounds for fish because trawlers are prohibited from fishing around them.

That's good, but still we have too many variants out there, and until we work on a standard, we have 1.3 Million animals dying a year in CA alone...

That's the wind plants by Palm Springs and Livermore. The solar plants are only killing 6000 birds.

I don't know if you've ever been to that site, but it is basically devoid of life. That's why its called a desert

[SuburbanFarmer]

Yes it does. Far less impact on wildlife and more efficient energy production. Plus added bonus of being able to store excess heat in huge salt vats to be used after the sun goes down.

Also the deaths caused by wind turbines are due to inappropriate sites such as valleys being chosen due to the regular flow of wind conflicting with the flight patterns of birds.
Most of our wind generators are situated out at sea where they have much less impact on birds and have the added bonus of providing safer breeding grounds for fish because trawlers are prohibited from fishing around them.

That's good, but still we have too many variants out there, and until we work on a standard, we have 1.3 Million animals dying a year in CA alone...

That's the wind plants by Palm Springs and Livermore. The solar plants are only killing 6000 birds.

I don't know if you've ever been to that site, but it is basically devoid of life. That's why its called a desert

[Speaker to Animals]

It's not funny anymore. This anti-nuclear nonsense is going to really hurt us down the line.

[Montegriffo]

It's not funny anymore. This anti-nuclear nonsense is going to really hurt us down the line.

Not all greens are anti-nuclear. Nuclear is really expensive though and there is still no real answer to the problem of the waste.
Nuclear energy needs to be seen as a temporary stop gap until there is enough renewable capacity to supply our needs. Fossil fuels are the enemy of the greens not nuclear.

[Speaker to Animals]

It's not funny anymore. This anti-nuclear nonsense is going to really hurt us down the line.

Not all greens are anti-nuclear. Nuclear is really expensive though and there is still no real answer to the problem of the waste.
Nuclear energy needs to be seen as a temporary stop gap until there is enough renewable capacity to supply our needs. Fossil fuels are the enemy of the greens not nuclear.

Thorium.

That's your answer.

[Okeefenokee]

I don't know if you've ever been to that site, but it is basically devoid of life. That's why its called a desert

Deserts are not devoid of life, just rainfall.