SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Solar power grew faster than any other source of fuel for the first time in 2016, the International Energy Agency said in a report suggesting the technology will dominate renewables in the years ahead.
The institution established after the first major oil crisis in 1973 said 165 gigawatts of renewables were completed last year, which was two-thirds of the net expansion in electricity supply. Solar powered by photovoltaics, or PVs, grew by 50 percent, with almost half of new plants built in China.
"What we are witnessing is the birth of a new era in solar PV," Fatih Birol, executive director of the IEA, said in a statement accompanying the report published on Wednesday in Paris. "We expect that solar PV capacity growth will be higher than any other renewable technology through 2022."
Solar Grew Faster Than All Other Forms of Power for the First Time
International Energy Agency
Solar power will only work until the sun burns out, but dinosaurs are forever.
(Score: 2) by Aiwendil on Thursday October 05 2017, @12:53PM (11 children)
Thanks, interesting to see its progress. But still expensive for utility scale (when viewed globally when considering capacity factors and backup, but at nameplate it is cheap)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday October 05 2017, @01:35PM (10 children)
I also wonder what maintenance costs are (cleaning dust and bio-fouling from the panels) in various regions.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Informative) by fyngyrz on Thursday October 05 2017, @02:06PM (8 children)
Located on the Montana plains here. Lots of dust. I have multiple ground-mounted systems.
Once a week during non-freezing weather, I wash my panels with a hose. Once a year I wash them with a mild vinegar solution to get rid of mineral deposits from the somewhat hard weekly water washings and what little rain we get. They look brand new, even the ones that have been out there for ten years.
The only "bio-fouling" we see is the occasional dollop of bird poo, which washes right off. It's really not been an issue. I have not gotten the impression that birds like the panels.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday October 05 2017, @02:35PM (1 child)
Well, while I tend to agree that it's a small price to pay for electricity, rinsing the panels once a week is a whole lot more work than your average homeowner does to keep the A/C running.
Here in Florida (and anywhere along the Gulf coast) black mold seems to grow on just about anything that doesn't have a fresh coat of anti-mold agent on it.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by quacking duck on Thursday October 05 2017, @04:01PM
Since sunlight and circulating air tends to kill black mold, I would've thought mold wouldn't do well on open-air surfaces designed to be hit with direct sunlight. Some might grow underneath the unit or other shaded area, sure, but that wouldn't impact the efficiency of the PV panels themselves.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday October 05 2017, @04:34PM (5 children)
How many panels do you run, and what's their rating? Do they supply 100% of your monthly kwhs or do you have a grid tie? Did you buy them piecemeal out-of-pocket and hook them up yourself, or did you get a home equity loan and hire it done?
Just curious about your real-world experience. I've been thinking about doing the same thing for a long time, but it's all theoretical calculations.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by fyngyrz on Friday October 06 2017, @07:09AM (4 children)
20, nominally 100 watt panels. They're allocated as 2, 2, 4, and 12 across four systems.
No, it's nowhere near a whole-home system (our home is huge and we're profligate power users; that's not really in the cards for us unless they really boost panel efficiencies.) Instead, I have four independent small systems. Two are relatively conventional, that is, batteries and PV and inverters plus AC chargers, one is 12.6vdc with pV and batteries, and one is 12.6vdc with ultracaps. Each system powers a separate set of things - and no, none of them are grid-tied in the conventional sense, though the two larger systems have grid-sourced chargers that generally run things. The two systems that produce AC do so on isolated lines; their outputs are not tied to the general house AC. The 12v systems are obviously independent.
I bought everything piecemeal, out of pocket, and put them together myself. I designed and built the ultracap-to-12.6v system from scratch; they don't have discharge curves like batteries and require conversion electronics to keep the output at 12.6v. This system was an experiment; it works very well, but the amount of space and the cost for an UC based system far exceeds that of batteries, and it's not something I'd recommend as yet. Costs are coming down and capacities are coming up, but we're really not where we need to be, unless you're just screwing around as I was. Although I have to say, now that it's set up, it beats the heck out of a battery based system in every other way. When they do get into a reasonable price/performance range, I will happily say goodbye forever to batteries. I do use UC's as current boost sources on all four systems, but only the one is all-UC.
These systems support our refrigerators, freezers and furnace (12 panels); our aquariums (4 panels); my indoor ham radio setup (2 panels); and the UC system runs my portable trailer ham radio setup (2 panels.)
The two systems that are running the food storage and furnace and aquaria are charged from the AC line - sort of the opposite of a grid tie. When the AC goes away, the batteries can keep things going for a few days, or quite a bit longer if it's nice and sunny. The AC for the clients on those systems comes from inverters, which gets around the whole grid-tie issue rather handily. No switches to throw, no power interruptions at all, no risk to anyone fooling with the AC either in the house or out on a pole. It's fair to describe them as huge uninterruptible power supplies with dual AC/solar charging capability.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday October 06 2017, @08:06AM (3 children)
Interesting, thanks. Did you get your components retail, or were you able to hook into a wholesaler (that you'd be able to mention)?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Friday October 06 2017, @12:24PM (2 children)
I got the panels and cabling for them off of EBay on an as-needed basis, and I had the most of the components for the power conversion and so forth here already. I picked up the ultracaps surplus. Lots of that on EBay as well. I built all the mounts and other physical infrastructure (in fact, I built the entire interior structure of our home... it's an old church, and when we bought it it was basically a very large, empty cube. As a result it's more than a little bit... eclectic. :) I do all the structural stuff, and my sweetheart does the finish work.)
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday October 06 2017, @02:43PM (1 child)
That's awesome. Have you thought about adding wind turbines to the mix? Where my family is, not too far from you, the wind always blows; so I've wondered if it would be worthwhile for a person to throw a turbine up on a mast and win that way. I've read a lot about residential wind turbines with their different designs, but they never seen to net out to a positive ROI except in places like yours.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Saturday October 07 2017, @09:00PM
I've thought about it, but I'm not all that fond of propellers on poles. :)
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 05 2017, @04:55PM
That has been automated, at least for large solar panel farms.
https://phys.org/news/2013-12-robot-wiper-tackles-solar-panel.html [phys.org]