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The True Costs of Renewable Energy
livescience.com — As utility costs mount ever higher, Americans now have real options to take home energy matters into their own hands with "green" systems that can pay for themselves in as little as a few years.
TalSiach- 606 diggs
- digg it
- 5needles5, on 10/06/2008, -2/+19what most people dont understant is that getting power from renewable sources is not big deal, but we dont have the technology to efficiently store energy :[
- DiscoUnderpants, on 10/07/2008, -0/+5Flywheels. We should really do more with lrage flywheels.
- xptoast, on 10/07/2008, -0/+3Flywheels in the form of inertia, Water Towers to store energy in form of gravity, Air tanks for energy stored by pressure, etc.
I prefer water towers for huge energy storage. For storage of momentary energy such as in cars a flywheel my be used when slowing down. It would be powered on during stops by electricity generated from braking. Then when you start moving again it would dump that energy back into the electric engine by generating electricity from the flywheel. Clutches would be involved of course. It would need to be a hybrid car as well. This way it could keep itself powered when not near a wall socket. That would be good for trips....
There are many ideas. I just wish we could do them without being crushed by corporate greed and such.
- xptoast, on 10/07/2008, -0/+3Flywheels in the form of inertia, Water Towers to store energy in form of gravity, Air tanks for energy stored by pressure, etc.
- Catchpen, on 10/07/2008, -0/+2...for rainy days.
- DiscoUnderpants, on 10/07/2008, -0/+5Flywheels. We should really do more with lrage flywheels.
- slvrbullet87, on 10/06/2008, -0/+6While the energy may pay it self off over time, the major issue with these set ups is the start up cost. If you add them when building a house you could easily add 50% to the cost of the loan. If you add them after wards you would have the loan completely paid off before you ever see the benefit.
- busybrain, on 10/07/2008, -0/+19You know what this town needs?
A Monorail!- shutaro, on 10/07/2008, -0/+4Monorail! Monorail! Monorail!
- RoboRay, on 10/07/2008, -0/+8That’s more of a Shelbyville idea.
- dsmx, on 10/07/2008, -0/+5But mainstreet is still cracked and broken.
- shutaro, on 10/07/2008, -0/+5Sorry, Mom, the mob has spoken!
- GawtMilk, on 10/07/2008, -0/+6Well, sir, there's nothing on earth like a genuine, bonafide, electrified, six-car monorail! What'd I say?
- JulioChavez, on 10/07/2008, -0/+5Is there a chance the track could bend?
Not on your life, my Hindu friend.- NolanFinn, on 10/07/2008, -0/+5Were you sent here by the Devil?
- sarcasm, on 10/07/2008, -0/+4No, good sir, I'm on the level.
- dsmx, on 10/07/2008, -0/+6The ring came off my pudding can
take my penknifemy good man
I swear it's springfields only choice throw up your arms and raise your voice
- zacharytelschow, on 10/07/2008, -0/+6Why build a monorail in a small town with a centralized population around a town center?
- dsmx, on 10/07/2008, -0/+5Well I could answer that question but only you and I would understand the answer.
- minorgods, on 10/07/2008, -0/+3this is exactly the reason I like digg..
- dsmx, on 10/08/2008, -0/+3But will a screen shot of this get to the front page?
- shutaro, on 10/08/2008, -0/+2@dsmx: We can only hope...
- shutaro, on 10/07/2008, -0/+4Monorail! Monorail! Monorail!
- Phalanxia, on 10/07/2008, -1/+5It's a pity that the only efficient one where I live (Britain) is wind, and domestically, it's next to useless. However, solar panels should be on every house.
- DiscoUnderpants, on 10/07/2008, -0/+4Saying there should be a solar panel on every roof is kind of the problem. When designing an energy generation system the bare minimum is to produce something that will generate more energy that it cost to create over its lift time. In reality it has to be at least twice the amount to be even vaguely close to being profitable(its usally much more than x2 with conventional power systems). If you create solar cells for roofs that generate two little energy over the course of the systems life time then you are contributing to the problem.
This is why people should study engineering more(particularly electrical or electronics engineering in this case).
Note that I am not anti solar. I just find blanket statements made with no energy budget kinda annoying - GawtMilk, on 10/07/2008, -0/+3I'm working on a bunch of different alternative energy projects for high school. The amount of research and development that various colleges and companies around the world do is amazing. The tech is getting better and better as time goes on; this article is going to be wildly inaccurate next year. The project I'm trying to finalize is using cheaper plastic lenses to focus light onto a solar cell that is a fraction of the current size. Since a plastic lens is cheaper than a silicone Solar Cell, you can get the same amount of power for a cheaper price in a smaller unit. So far, there is enough solar power to run a motor that will track the sun and reset it to the position the sun will rise in.
The problem I've run into is storing the energy. Chemical batteries are not efficient at all. I'd love to put some time into flywheels; etc. For those of you who laugh and say "you only create enough power to run the device", keep in mind I'm doing this alone and on a sub-$100USD budget. The problem with flywheels is that it is hard for a student to get access to magnetic bearings and a vacuum chamber.- ligius, on 10/08/2008, -0/+1This sounds interesting but currently the problem isn't that people don't invest in green energy, but the government that doesn't invest in innovation. PV solar panels are horribly inefficient, wind power is limited to some areas, startup costs are sky-high.
Now, if a cold war was to begin in which only the greenest country would survive, then we will see some changes.
- ligius, on 10/08/2008, -0/+1This sounds interesting but currently the problem isn't that people don't invest in green energy, but the government that doesn't invest in innovation. PV solar panels are horribly inefficient, wind power is limited to some areas, startup costs are sky-high.
- DiscoUnderpants, on 10/07/2008, -0/+4Saying there should be a solar panel on every roof is kind of the problem. When designing an energy generation system the bare minimum is to produce something that will generate more energy that it cost to create over its lift time. In reality it has to be at least twice the amount to be even vaguely close to being profitable(its usally much more than x2 with conventional power systems). If you create solar cells for roofs that generate two little energy over the course of the systems life time then you are contributing to the problem.
- HardSide, on 10/07/2008, -3/+6"reduced heating and cooling bills to break even in two to 10 years."
LOL talk about a stretch in time, why not just say you'll break even before you die.- Tediel, on 10/11/2008, -0/+0But there is no problem with a 30 year mortgage? Maybe think about resell value?
- shutaro, on 10/07/2008, -1/+2Everybody knows that the true cost of renewable energy is electricity that is infested with ghosts!
- ShyGuy91284, on 10/07/2008, -0/+7All I know is when I was signing up for my energy supply when I just recently moved, it offered the option of having 50% or 100% of my power come from wind power. Would I have wanted to? Yeah. But the cost difference per kwh was close to 10x as high for 50% wind power as opposed to the typical plan, which is something I can not in the slightest afford at the moment.
- zacharytelschow, on 10/07/2008, -0/+3That's because, at the moment, clean energy isn't cost competitive with conventional coal (and may not be for a while). Not wanting to switch doesn't make you some unenlightened prick; it makes you a realist.
- TunaTheFrog, on 10/07/2008, -2/+4But will it power my go kart?
- PleaseJustDie, on 10/07/2008, -0/+5Only if you paint flames on it. The flame paint amplifies power output.
- Lososaurus, on 10/07/2008, -1/+13I hear that nuclear stuff puts out a lot of power, can even reuse the waste over 99% of the waste.
- throop77, on 10/07/2008, -0/+11And guess how much nuclear waste is produced by 1 large nuclear power plant in a year?... 3 cubic meters of waste. And, 2 of those cubic meters of waste can be recycled. The remainder can be glassified, rendering it harmless to the environment. Oh, and its order of magnitude cheaper than wind or solar. Let's not do it though because some old nuclear plant design in Russia had a meltdown a long time ago.
- SanTe, on 10/07/2008, -0/+3"Oh, and its order of magnitude cheaper than wind or solar."
Other than the huge startup costs (~$3B per nuclear power plant, I've read), but yeah. Hopefully the cost of bringing new plants on-line will drop, but somehow I doubt it considering the redundant safety systems that are needed, the huge amounts of raw materials, and the labor costs of their multi-year construction. But I guess large scale wind and solar projects have huge startup costs too.
But I agree that nuclear is the future, and wish it was more rapidly becoming the present. - xptoast, on 10/07/2008, -0/+2Phttt....3 billion is nothing. The government gives that away in its sleep. $700 billion / $3 billion = 233 nuclear plants. Enough to power the world a couple times over me thinks.
- SanTe, on 10/07/2008, -0/+3"Oh, and its order of magnitude cheaper than wind or solar."
- boot20, on 10/07/2008, -0/+3This. Why we aren't converting to use FAR more nuclear power, I'll never understand. With the current technology (technologies?) nuclear power is our best bet for the next 100 years, then as we advance in other areas (solar, wind, etc), we can bring those online.
- zacharytelschow, on 10/07/2008, -0/+6"Uranium-235 can produce 3.7 million times as much energy as the same amount of coal." -- http://www.nucleartourist.com/basics/reasons1.htm
Seems pretty efficient to me. Or we can hope the wind will blow continuously and provide us electricity for $1/kwh. What a tough choice.
- throop77, on 10/07/2008, -0/+11And guess how much nuclear waste is produced by 1 large nuclear power plant in a year?... 3 cubic meters of waste. And, 2 of those cubic meters of waste can be recycled. The remainder can be glassified, rendering it harmless to the environment. Oh, and its order of magnitude cheaper than wind or solar. Let's not do it though because some old nuclear plant design in Russia had a meltdown a long time ago.
- perfectfire, on 10/07/2008, -0/+15Did anyone read the caption on the first image?
"Mark Vargas put solar panels on his home in Santa Clara, Calif., but they get blocked by his neighbor's redwood trees. Earlier this year, Vargas asked prosecutors to press charges against his neighbors for shading the sun. But the couple next door insisted they should not have to chop down the trees to accommodate Vargas' energy demands because they planted the redwoods before he installed the solar panels in 2001."
What a douche. Glad I don't live there anymore.- DiscoUnderpants, on 10/07/2008, -0/+5Indeed. You would think that he would have thought about the whole tree thing before he actually went ahead and installed the panels.
- nepidae, on 10/07/2008, -1/+3Yes, because I'm sure there is not a single douche where you live now.
- Wawin, on 10/07/2008, -0/+2i wonder what the scanner says about the power level in green energy...
- brandita, on 10/07/2008, -0/+2Maybe paybacks not a b*tch!
- dizilbdog, on 10/07/2008, -1/+3The Energy elite does not like wind solar or geothermal power, we need a change of consciousness that energy food should not be bought but should be available to everyone.
- glenn2041, on 10/07/2008, -0/+2We here in New Zealand operate mostly on renewable energy, and it sucks arse. As it's been a dry few years, the hydro lakes are low & power prices are through the roof. Wind farms are becoming more common place, but no one wants them anywhere near them.
Lets go nuke! - NonLeftistDiggr, on 10/07/2008, -2/+9Hybrid technology $$$$$$
Electric car technology $$$$$$$$$$
Green electricity generation research $$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Green electricity generation implementation $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Telling the middle east to **** OFF we don't need any, priceless - depro9, on 10/07/2008, -0/+3D.I.Y energy FTW
- DarkShroud, on 10/07/2008, -0/+2Lucky me class 3 wind. I have some open area around my home, if I was able to mount a few on my roof I could generate quite a bit of power. My solar average sucks though. Man is it great to live in Chicago.
- BESTenemy, on 10/07/2008, -0/+2The article mentions that the solar setup should pay for itself in about 3-14 years. What it fails to mention is that most of the current solar panels have a less than 10 year lifespan. Their efficiency drops over time. If batteries are used for storage, then their lifespan is even shorter, so the installation cost is a drop in the bucket compared to maintenance costs. For that reason small scale photovoltaic projects are far from being economically viable. The most cost-efficient alternative are industrial scale thermal-solar plants.
- GovernmentsGun, on 10/08/2008, -0/+1I'm not sure where you're getting that lifespan from. I've studied it some, and have some experience in the field. Many panels are rated at about 25 - 35 years, even though their efficiency does drop after about 15 years. But, it only drops a few percent; not a lot. In the field, some panels have lasted 30 years so far.
I'm not really being confrontational about this. I'm just curious where your data is coming from.- BESTenemy, on 10/08/2008, -0/+1Thank you for correcting me. I was looking at an installation that listed 10 years life cycle, but it was actually talking about the up-converter for the solar panel system and not the panels themselves. In reality, the solar panels do have 25-35 year lifespan.
- GovernmentsGun, on 10/08/2008, -0/+1I'm not sure where you're getting that lifespan from. I've studied it some, and have some experience in the field. Many panels are rated at about 25 - 35 years, even though their efficiency does drop after about 15 years. But, it only drops a few percent; not a lot. In the field, some panels have lasted 30 years so far.
- GovernmentsGun, on 10/08/2008, -0/+1I found panels on ebay for about $4/w last week. It's down quite a bit from the $9/w it was just a few years ago.
- charlietuna, on 10/08/2008, -1/+1Until you sit on a bicycle and try to light up a single 60 watt light bulb, you have no idea how much work it takes to live a modern lifestyle. Good luck giving everyone on the planet running water, a washing machine, stereo, clothes dryer and car.
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