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2010 10 Gigawatts Solar Power Install Expected

17 points by cwan 16y ago

deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
AndrewDucker 16y ago
That's a 575 increase in one year. Another 17 years and the whole planet will be solar powered! (Yes, that's a terribly naive bit of maths, and there are reasons why it won't be that simple. But still :-> )
lispm 16y ago
Half of that is here in Germany. Time to catch up.
- jbooth 16y ago
  Just saw a bunch of that riding a train there last week. Then spent the weekend in Madrid with friends who are grad students in this stuff, pushing the envelope and adding efficiency. Meanwhile, mention the idea of funding this stuff in the US and all you'll hear are a bunch of nonsequitors about Al Gore's waistline or maybe some dude in Holland published bad research once.
- ugh 16y ago
  Mostly because it’s a damn good investment in Germany. The price you can sell energy at is guaranteed (government subsidies). Your investment (maybe 100,000 €) will pay itself off in about twenty years (including insurance and the occasional maintenance). Modern solar panels have a lifetime of more than twenty years. Because of all this banks will be more than happy to give you credit and if you have the necessary space you would be stupid if you didn’t do it. It’s free money.
  - lispm 16y ago
    It's is not 'government subsidies' as one might think. Instead the next grid operator has to take the electricity and has to pay a certain government specified price for it. The electricity companies will sell electricity to the consumer and these will pay for it. So the end consumer pays the price. The goal is to reduce the price for renewable energy such that it is at the level of other electricity (from coal, gas, nuclear, ...). There is no tax money involved. The electricity consumers pay for it.
    - stoney 16y ago
      Of course the electricity consumers also pay taxes, so it all works out the same in the end! They've just introduced a similar scheme in the UK, with the price guaranteed for 25 years. It looks like around a 10 year payback period on the installation so a very attractive proposition if you've got the cash available and plan to stay in your current home for at least the next decade.
    - ugh 16y ago
      Ah! I really didn’t know that. Price setting, not government subsidies, interesting.
  - stoney 16y ago
    100,000 euros would buy you a very large solar installation (in the UK at least). For a typical family sized home closer to 20,000 euros would be closer to the mark.
    - ugh 16y ago
      My parents bought one for 100,000 € two years ago (two houses, so I probably should have said 50,000 €), that’s why I said 100,000 €.
sgt 16y ago
10 Jiggawatts is plenty for my flux capacitor.
pjscott 16y ago
That's peak, by the way. Typically, solar produces about 20% of that on average, so that would be an average production of about 2 GW. It's nice if you can soak up a bunch of extra power whenever the sun happens to be shining. If you want to power air conditioners, or charge plug-in hybrid electric cars, solar fits that niche nicely as long as you can build it cheaply enough.

17 points by cwan 16y ago

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

That's a 575 increase in one year. Another 17 years and the whole planet will be solar powered! (Yes, that's a terribly naive bit of maths, and there are reasons why it won't be that simple. But still :-> )

lispm 16y ago

Half of that is here in Germany. Time to catch up.

jbooth 16y ago
Just saw a bunch of that riding a train there last week. Then spent the weekend in Madrid with friends who are grad students in this stuff, pushing the envelope and adding efficiency. Meanwhile, mention the idea of funding this stuff in the US and all you'll hear are a bunch of nonsequitors about Al Gore's waistline or maybe some dude in Holland published bad research once.
ugh 16y ago
Mostly because it’s a damn good investment in Germany. The price you can sell energy at is guaranteed (government subsidies). Your investment (maybe 100,000 €) will pay itself off in about twenty years (including insurance and the occasional maintenance). Modern solar panels have a lifetime of more than twenty years. Because of all this banks will be more than happy to give you credit and if you have the necessary space you would be stupid if you didn’t do it. It’s free money.
- lispm 16y ago
  It's is not 'government subsidies' as one might think. Instead the next grid operator has to take the electricity and has to pay a certain government specified price for it. The electricity companies will sell electricity to the consumer and these will pay for it. So the end consumer pays the price. The goal is to reduce the price for renewable energy such that it is at the level of other electricity (from coal, gas, nuclear, ...). There is no tax money involved. The electricity consumers pay for it.
  - stoney 16y ago
    Of course the electricity consumers also pay taxes, so it all works out the same in the end! They've just introduced a similar scheme in the UK, with the price guaranteed for 25 years. It looks like around a 10 year payback period on the installation so a very attractive proposition if you've got the cash available and plan to stay in your current home for at least the next decade.
  - ugh 16y ago
    Ah! I really didn’t know that. Price setting, not government subsidies, interesting.
- stoney 16y ago
  100,000 euros would buy you a very large solar installation (in the UK at least). For a typical family sized home closer to 20,000 euros would be closer to the mark.
  - ugh 16y ago
    My parents bought one for 100,000 € two years ago (two houses, so I probably should have said 50,000 €), that’s why I said 100,000 €.

sgt 16y ago

10 Jiggawatts is plenty for my flux capacitor.

pjscott 16y ago

That's peak, by the way. Typically, solar produces about 20% of that on average, so that would be an average production of about 2 GW. It's nice if you can soak up a bunch of extra power whenever the sun happens to be shining. If you want to power air conditioners, or charge plug-in hybrid electric cars, solar fits that niche nicely as long as you can build it cheaply enough.