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skimming the article it looks like this excludes transmission, construction, and disposal costs
by dingnuts 1y ago
skimming the article it looks like this excludes transmission, construction, and disposal costs
- epistasis 1y agoDo you think those are significantly different for solar versus other technologies? Seems they would be right in line with anything else...
- DamonHD 1y agoCapacity factor for renewables is generally lower than thermal plant, so some transmission costs may be higher. Though batteries firming output mitigates that for example.
- epistasis 1y agoRight, and the majority of solar is getting installed with batteries these days because the really profitable hours are in the evening. Something like 60% of new solar in 2024 in the US had batteries on site.
- DamonHD 1y agoWind + solar + batteries at one site can be a good combo.
- epistasis 1y agoDepending on when the wind blows! (Which in most of the US is more at night, IIRC?)
- DamonHD 1y agoFor the UK there is more wind in the winter, solar in the summer. Intraday anti-correlation is there, but it's more complicated: https://bmrs.elexon.co.uk/generation-forecast-for-wind-and-solar https://bmrs.elexon.co.uk/generation-forecast-for-wind-and-s... The US picture varies a lot over the contiguous states, I think, but often, again, there is anti-correlation in general.
- pstuart 1y agoLet's not forget the cost of carbon emissions which are not normally accounted for in pricing fossil fuels.
- epanchin 1y agoIn the UK, wind is primarily in Scotland away from most of the population - people don’t build where it’s windy. So transmission of solar should be less, as the sun shines everywhere, and people like to build houses where it shines the most.
- epistasis 1y agoHopefully coal is not built close to the population either...
- DamonHD 1y agoThere is no coal-fired electricity generation in the UK now. But no, neither coal nor nukes would be welcome in cities just to reduce transmission costs!
- rsynnott 1y agoNot now, certainly. But back in the day... There are a number of disused coal power stations in big cities. The Tate Modern gallery in London is an old coal-fired power station, say.
- DamonHD 1y agoWe wouldn't site coal (or nuke) generation there now because (a) we can do long-distance low-loss transmission (in GB, transmission losses are ~2%, distribution losses ~5%), and because we know about the bad effects of the air pollution etc.
- rsynnott 1y agoThey knew to some extent about (b) when what's now the Tate Modern was built, but regulation was relatively weak until the 1950s, so there was nothing stopping them building it. _Knowing_ there's a problem is insufficient; making rules based on problems is required.
- numpad0 1y agoIt is. Output of solar panels are proportionate to areas and they contain all sorts of heavy metals.
- epistasis 1y agoNo, solar panels do not contain "all sorts of heavy metals," they leave the land open to all sorts of use afterwards (unlike fossil fuel infrastructure) and disposal is no more difficult than shipping the panels somewhere. When a site is repowered with new panels, the old panels are often reused, as well, and there's a robust secondary market for panels. In short: disposal costs are well in line with other technologies, at least according to this consultant (top hit on a web search): https://thundersaidenergy.com/downloads/solar-power-decommissioning-costs/ https://thundersaidenergy.com/downloads/solar-power-decommis...
- numpad0 1y agoSolar panels are photodiode arrays. Photodiodes are made by lacing mid-purity Si with ultra toxic metals. More neurotoxic the better is the basic rule of all high-performance opto-electronics semiconductors. The less toxic you make, the worse they get, and less they responsive to longer wavelength lights. In, Ga, As, P, Si, Zn, Se, Ge, Cd, Te, Pb, etc. The duh materials. Sometimes the whole panel is thin crystals of GaAs. You have to melt that down to recycle.
- epistasis 1y agoKey word here being "lacing." Tractors, trucks, and cars with lead acid batteries are far more dangerous to have out in a field than solar panels. Usually lead used the solder, if there is lead, is the biggest risk!
- numpad0 1y agoThose metals are not like Mo additive on greases. The machines that contained those came with warnings long before Prop 65 or EU RoHS simply by toxicity. And deploying PVs is to scale that out into the fields. It's mildly insane thing to do. Even nukes are more eco friendly, even if you include things Fukushima, maybe Chernobyl too. The elephant foot is going to passivate itself before the collapse of human civilization could occur. I don't know same can be said about panels blown away in rainstorms.
- fred_is_fred 1y agoIs there a form of power that doesn't have these? A coal plant has all these plus fuel costs, workers to run the plant, parts for the turbines, and ash disposal to deal with.
- hvb2 1y agoTransmission is more of a problem with the centralized forms of power generation? So transmission should be a net positive for solar? Construction and disposal I'm not sure to be honest, intuitively I don't think those are much more expensive.
- rsynnott 1y agoTransmission's somewhat more expensive for solar per kWh, because you're not producing at night, and you need to handle the full load during the day. That said, as batteries get cheaper they can alleviate this.
- TacticalCoder 1y ago[dead]
- adrianmonk 1y agoIt doesn't exclude construction. The abstract says they analyzed levelized cost of electricity (LCOE). LCOE includes investments, operations, and fuel, so it includes construction.
- PunchyHamster 1y agoAlso storage