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Donald
Joined: 16 Apr 2004
Posts: 493
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 Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2005 9:05 am Post subject: |
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Good design has been with us for centuries...without any solution to offer past solar and photovolatic cells...lets keep trying for another 10 years and we will all be designing our future lliving at peak oil standards of living.
Oh.....and another point about drilling in ANWR.
Did you know that the small section of the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge where some want to drill for oil was actually set aside for that specific purpose when ANWR was established! That's right! All we're talking about here is drilling for oil on a section ... a very small section ... of ANWR that was designated for oil exploration from the very beginning! What's the problem here?
Do you want to see the price of crude oil, and thus the price of gas at the pump, dive for the floor overnight? Just let the congress go ahead and authorize the exploration in ANWR. The Oil Sheiks will immediately lower their prices in order to forestall a rapid implementation of any exploration or oil recovery that could cut into their market share.
Remember, the goal of the eco-wacko group is not to keep the sand white or the brook trouts swimming or the porcupinecaribu roaming....it is to weaken the US....plain and simple. I guess this just isn't my week to feel warm and fuzzy toward the environmental crows. |
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Kevin
Site Admin
Joined: 13 Apr 2004
Posts: 1118
Location: Eugene, Oregon
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2005 10:53 am Post subject: |
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Always interesting to get a delusional paranoid prespective on things, thanks, Donald.
Counting was with us "for centuries" too before silicon (and other) chips were harnessed to provide widespread autmotated computing power. Your historical argument is specious. |
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Donald
Joined: 16 Apr 2004
Posts: 493
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2005 11:23 am Post subject: |
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| I guess this just isn't my week to feel warm and fuzzy toward the eco-wackos....as always, ANWR or bust! (you can think of it like the california gold rush)... |
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Kevin
Site Admin
Joined: 13 Apr 2004
Posts: 1118
Location: Eugene, Oregon
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2005 12:16 pm Post subject: |
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I'll be counting on getting a hug next week.
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Architorture
millennium club
Joined: 31 Jul 2004
Posts: 1376
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2005 6:05 pm Post subject: |
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| Kevin wrote: | It doesn't get sticky - it just takes some work to calculate and get real answers - and/or a few minutes with Google to track down enough research to get a consensus of solid sources.
For instance, photovoltaic systems - "solar panels" with the trimmings - do pay back their embodied energy, about twice over currently, with prospects of great improvement in the foreseeable future:
The Energy Intensity of Photovoltaic Systems
http://www.ecotopia.com/apollo2/pvepbtoz.htm
Andrew Blakers and Klaus Weber
Centre for Sustainable Energy Systems
Engineering Department, Australian National University
Canberra 0200
October 2000
Summary
"The use of photovoltaic systems on a large scale in order to reduce fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions requires that the energy associated with the construction, operation and decommissioning of PV systems be small compared with energy production during the system lifetime. That is, the energy payback time should be short. The energy intensity and cost of PV systems are closely related. At present the energy payback time for PV systems is in the range 8 to 11 years, compared with typical system lifetimes of around 30 years. About 60% of the embodied energy is due to the silicon wafers. As the PV industry reduces production costs and moves to the use of thin film solar cells the energy payback time will decline to about two years."
--
In design, a professional attitude calls for dealing with facts as such. In technical, factual issues, abstract speculation is no substitute for concrete data-driven findings.
I'm sorry if that sounds cranky. It just gets really boring to talk around and around solid technical issues as if they are impenetrable mysteries, when they are in fact eminently resolvable. Solving complex problems matter-of-factly is intrinsic to the competency of a good designer. |
so you are going to currently take 8-11 years now or maybe just 2 years in the future to produce the 'all green' solar cell...
i don't think you understood what i was saying... the PV might pay back in 8-11 years, but what is it paying back... it is paying back the DIRTY energy that was used to create it in the first place...that is the problem... you are only being 'less bad' you aren't being good
so in order to have a 'green solar panel' maybe you would use solar energy to create it... but as your information points out, it takes 8-11 years for it to repay the energy put into it...
so in order for that first solar panel to create its entirely green replacement, it is going to take 8-11 years...
solar panels don't do anything if you are pumping megawatts upon megawatts out of a coal burning plant to create those solar panels in the first place... what i am saying is right now there is no way you are going to make a solar panel without that DIRTY energy, so the solar panel as a solution is just less bad |
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SDR
millennium club
Joined: 02 Oct 2004
Posts: 1712
Location: San Francisco
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2005 6:42 pm Post subject: |
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Less bad IS one kind of "good." Absolutism ("either-or") is abstract, ideological and not grounded in reality. Relativism ("both-and") is the way the world actually works -- the natural world, and man's additions to it.
SDR |
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Kevin
Site Admin
Joined: 13 Apr 2004
Posts: 1118
Location: Eugene, Oregon
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2005 7:20 pm Post subject: |
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Architorture, your logic needs some serious work there. The thing about having to "wait" 8-11 years is just a bad joke - right?
Are you interested in ways to improve things, or do you want to hide behind that decrepit shed: reject any solution that doesn't immediately appear as perfect?
More later when I've got some time... |
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Architorture
millennium club
Joined: 31 Jul 2004
Posts: 1376
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2005 8:05 pm Post subject: |
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it is a way of demonstrating the bigger problem...
one PV panel cannot create enough energy to create another unless you dedicated that PV panel to the task for 8-11 years... that has very far reaching implications...if you are concerned with being green...
i don't understand why you think it is such a big 'joke'... we are running out of oil...people are trying to put coal on its way out... so where is the energy going to come from to create all of these PV panels that are then going to take as much as 11 years to able to generate the energy necessary to create another generation without the help of energy provided by increasingly expensive, scarce, or restricted resources...
the calculations have already been done on PVs using all of the most theoretical inputs... a square meter is only going to recieve 1100 watts of energy from the sun...that cannot be changed...that is the upper most limit...and no one has or ever will have a PV that is 100% efficient at converting that energy... so unless you are planning to cover the better part of the world in PV's they aren't a viable solution to the problem
i'm not trying to not find solutions, i'm just trying to point out that a seemingly great solution isn't always so...the only thing PVs are the answer to is small scale applications.... which although helpful, is not going to change the face of the energy issue... |
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Kevin
Site Admin
Joined: 13 Apr 2004
Posts: 1118
Location: Eugene, Oregon
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| Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2005 12:24 am Post subject: |
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Thanks for the sketch of your thinking. But its still too vague and too based on unreferenced assumptions to have much power of persuasion.
No one here is suggesting that all oil use will stop tomorrow. It's a huge system that would necessarily undergo a rolling transition. You've got to get that into your thinking.
But while oil spent on consumption is simply gone, largely into atmospheric CO2, oil spent building good photovoltaic systems (systems, not just panels) will pay back something more than twice over in net additional energy. Which use of oil moves us closer to a safe, sustainable energy system, driving around lone individuals in immense SUVs, or investing energy in photovoltaic systems? (Which of these uses currently gets a big federal tax break?)
Again, you really can't get anywhere with an unreferenced, disembodied psuedo-calculation like what you've said in leading up to "unless you are planning to cover the better part of the world in PV's". So let's get serious.
It turns out that the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, a DOE national laboratory, has a PV FAQ online addressing this question:
How much land will PV need to supply our electricity?
http://www.nrel.gov/ncpv/land_faq.html
Along the way, it explains:
"In the United States, cities and residences cover about 140 million acres of land. We could supply every kilowatt-hour of our nation's current electricity requirements simply by applying PV to 7% of this area-on roofs, on parking lots, along highway walls, on the sides of buildings, and in other dual use scenarios. We wouldn't have to appropriate a single acre of new land to make PV our primary energy source!"
And it concludes:
"We started by asking: What would our world look like if we used PV to produce significant amounts of electricity? The answer is that instead of our sun's energy falling on shingles, concrete, and under-used land, it would fall on PV—providing us with clean energy while leaving our landscape largely untouched."
Last edited by Kevin on Fri Mar 11, 2005 1:26 am; edited 2 times in total |
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SDR
millennium club
Joined: 02 Oct 2004
Posts: 1712
Location: San Francisco
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| Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2005 12:31 am Post subject: |
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Now, isn't that more convincing that a lot of baseless blather and -- yes -- hyperbole? Of course, it's also better news. Funny about that. . .
Thanks for shedding some "light" on the situation, Kevin.
SDR |
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Donald
Joined: 16 Apr 2004
Posts: 493
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| Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2005 3:00 pm Post subject: |
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This may also shed some light on the real issue of the thread - gas prices, as they are currently not the highest in history, as the media would have you believe. Not even close. Actually, as this chart shows...adjusted for inflation, gasoline has steadily declined in price since 1980:
http://www.chartoftheday.com/20030827.gif
But what about before 1980? Same trend...again, adjusted for inflation, prices have been declining or steady since 1920, as this graph from 2000 shows:
http://img.slate.msn.com/media//Slate247/000320_GasChart-c.gif |
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SDR
millennium club
Joined: 02 Oct 2004
Posts: 1712
Location: San Francisco
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| Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2005 3:24 pm Post subject: |
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Is there a divine right to a stable and indefinite supply of oil, as there is (rightly, I believe) such a right for clean air, and potable water?
One is a finite resource, while the others can and should be infinitely renewable, short of Armageddon.
As the finite resource becomes more difficult to extract, and while we are largely weaning ourselves off it (an inevitability, obviously), should we not expect to see the price rise? What, in pointing to the declining price (in real dollars) is your point, if any?
SDR |
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Kevin
Site Admin
Joined: 13 Apr 2004
Posts: 1118
Location: Eugene, Oregon
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| Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2005 3:39 pm Post subject: |
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| (Even _if_ you choose to accept news courtesy of Microsoft...) |
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Donald
Joined: 16 Apr 2004
Posts: 493
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| Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2005 4:21 pm Post subject: |
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| Moderator wrote: | | Posting in violation of forum guidelines blocked (bigotry, mass slander) |
Can't seem to see any other reason the left isn't rushing to the black gold rush.............must be those frozen porcupinecaribus.....when will one hand learn to feed the other? |
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Architorture
millennium club
Joined: 31 Jul 2004
Posts: 1376
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| Posted: Sun Mar 13, 2005 7:17 pm Post subject: |
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| Kevin wrote: | Thanks for the sketch of your thinking. But its still too vague and too based on unreferenced assumptions to have much power of persuasion.
No one here is suggesting that all oil use will stop tomorrow. It's a huge system that would necessarily undergo a rolling transition. You've got to get that into your thinking.
But while oil spent on consumption is simply gone, largely into atmospheric CO2, oil spent building good photovoltaic systems (systems, not just panels) will pay back something more than twice over in net additional energy. Which use of oil moves us closer to a safe, sustainable energy system, driving around lone individuals in immense SUVs, or investing energy in photovoltaic systems? (Which of these uses currently gets a big federal tax break?)
Again, you really can't get anywhere with an unreferenced, disembodied psuedo-calculation like what you've said in leading up to "unless you are planning to cover the better part of the world in PV's". So let's get serious.
It turns out that the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, a DOE national laboratory, has a PV FAQ online addressing this question:
How much land will PV need to supply our electricity?
http://www.nrel.gov/ncpv/land_faq.html
Along the way, it explains:
"In the United States, cities and residences cover about 140 million acres of land. We could supply every kilowatt-hour of our nation's current electricity requirements simply by applying PV to 7% of this area-on roofs, on parking lots, along highway walls, on the sides of buildings, and in other dual use scenarios. We wouldn't have to appropriate a single acre of new land to make PV our primary energy source!"
And it concludes:
"We started by asking: What would our world look like if we used PV to produce significant amounts of electricity? The answer is that instead of our sun's energy falling on shingles, concrete, and under-used land, it would fall on PV—providing us with clean energy while leaving our landscape largely untouched." |
i'll start by saying i don't agree with those numbers in that it appears that they have taken just the flat production of a high end PV and then divided US electricity production [not all US energy] by that number and come up with the figure 10 million acres... which doesn't take into account that you aren't going to have sunny days everyday and you aren't going to have the same amount of sun everywhere...especially in cities where you are plagued by smog which would interfere with the solar energy ever reaching the PVs.. and of course the number of acres the batteries would take up in order to have energy at night or off peak sun hours...
anyways, even though i don't agree with the figure and i am going to use it to demonstrate the ACTUAL point i have been trying to make all along...
okay so 10 million acres of land covered in PVs can meet annual US electricity production needs...which is somewhere in the area of 3.6 trillion kilowatt hours...
now you also have quoted a source saying that right now it takes a PV 8-11 years in order to payback the amount of energy needed to create it...
so if we wanted to create this 10 million acre PV farm today, it would require 28.8-39.6 trillion kilowatt hours worth of energy...or 8-11 years worth of US electricity production... that is a little startling isn't it?
you have also mentioned that this isn't going to just up and happen and that it will need to be phased in over time... alright lets try to imagine that scenario...we'll phase in this 10 million acre PV farm over 2 decades, that seems somwhat reasonable... besides of course the ability to produce 500000acres of PVs per year isn't quite available...but we'll set that aside
i'm also assuming the PVs will payback in 10 years just to make the multiplication and division a little easier... even though future PVs may payback in as little as 2 years, that has to do with the efficiency not the amount of energy needed to create them in the first place, which is really the issue here
in year 1 of this phase in you will create 500k acres of PVs...if we look back to the numbers above siting the amount of embodied energy in a PV... then 500k acres of PV's are going to require roughly 1/2 of the current annual US electricity production in order to create them...
so in year 1 you not only have to either reduce US electricity consumption in all other sectors besides PVs by half, or you have to create 50% more electricity[1.8 trillion kWh] then we currently do.... which of course will bring with it 50% more pollution than we already create in a year in the electricity industry...
so just to create 1/20 of the 10 million acre PV farm, you need to somehow get 50% more electricity then we currently have available and create 50% more pollution...
okay so here we are in year 2...
you are now creating 1/20 of the US electricity [.18 trillion kWh] with clean PVs...so you can take 1/20 of the DIRTY electricity production offline... but remember there is that 50% increase in production needed, so that 1/20 of clean energy hasn't had a positive effect yet...
also in year 2 you are once again going to have to make 50% more electricity than normal in order to bring the next 500k acres of PVs online...which of course means 50% more pollution than normal... although you will have slightly less pollution than year 1 since you that 20th of the PV farm completed...
i think everyone here can extrapolate the consequences of this...
yes at the 10 year mark you will be creating only as much pollution as we are today...and that number will continue to decline until year 21 when you will be creating no pollution....
but you will still have to be creating at least 50% of the pollution we do today right up until year 20, since you will always need that extra 50% of electricity production each year in order to actually create the PV's for that year....
i'm hoping this was a thorough enough demomstration of what i am really getting at, for why PVs are not going to be the answer for US energy concerns... especially since this number only takes into account for electricity production and doesn't even begin to consider fossil fuel use for other areas such as home heating or transportation...
so if you want to increase pollution levels by 50% in year one then slowly drop off back to 'normal' levels after 10 years at which point the lowest you will be able to go is 50% 'normal' pollution until year 21, then i guess PVs are the way to go...
of course i suppose you could say it will all be worth it after 21 years...actually you could say it was all worth it after 10 i guess, since you would be back to 'normal' levels and be under normal from then on....
but the major question is still there...
where do you get the energy needed to create all of these PV's??? and at what cost?
we can't just turn the dial to 150% on our energy production industry, obviously there are times when the US energy industry is on a fine line which was demonstrated a couple summers ago by the east coast black out...
this is why i think PVs are an impossible solution to US energy concerns, it isn't about their ability to PRODUCE energy, it is about the ability of the current system to find the energy necessary just to CREATE the PVs in the first place... |
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