I confess to seeing a large residential PV solar system in New Jersey.

[NNadir]

People who are familiar with my posts are familiar with my dissent on the claim that solar energy is going to play a huge role if, as seems less and less likely, the global climate change crisis is going to be in any way ameliorated before the catastrophe becomes wholesale and historic.

Often my detractors post here all sorts of gibberish about the great surge toward solar energy in my home state of New Jersey. (Although the thinking of these people is something that is beyond my ability to comprehend - I'd guess that on occasion they're trying to "get my goat.") In turn, I often remark that if this solar surge is so huge, how come I don't ever see any evidence of it beyond press releases by companies like Johnson and Johnson, companies that cover the cost of these systems through their public relations budget?

Recently I founded my own company, giving me certain freedoms as to what I do and when I do it. Using this new freedom, as part of my environmental & health kick, I have taken to doing more bicycling. Today I took a ride through an community of some of the original McMansions in this area and came across a sprawling ranch house with a huge array of solar cells. Probably I'd guess there were several kilowatts (measured in magical solar "watts" and not physicist watts) of capacity up on that roof.

Of course, I don't live in one of those awful communities where people who don't have to burn cardboard boxes and sticks to live. I live in a community where people can afford to buy nice pellet stoves with romantic steel doors, or as I have in my own home, wood burning fireplaces with recirculating fans.

Still whatever the case, I can no longer claim that I see NO real evidence of the grand solar nirvana in New Jersey. I stumbled across it and I wasn't even looking for it as the result of some breathless link to some solar hype website somewhere.

Some caveats: The person who owns this home is rich by definition. You don't live where this person lives without having some significant scratch. Being an McMansion - even though it came from the dawn of the age of McMansions - there are no mature trees on the property, since McMansions around here generally are built on destroyed farm land or bulldozed woodland. It's a lot with a lawn. The house is situated so it has a large roof area facing to the southeast.

Wealthy people of course can help with to some extent in the active crisis by making alternative energy and energy conserving strategies seem sexy. I note that it probably helped the cause of the Prius or a Civic Hybrid - I forget which - when Cameron Diaz, the actress, who by what accounts I've read, has a personality as pleasant as her appearance, bought one, and crowed about it for the benefit of the paparazzi. Like I often say, it is better for everyone if wealthy people buy a solar arrays rather than Hummers. The person who owns this house should be commended.

[amerikat]

1. I did a 7kW install in NJ.

It was in Hopewell NJ. It was installed just prior to Y2K. It can't be seen from the road.

This guy was already for Y2K, pallets of bottled water, food etc.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

2. This is rather OT

but have you noticed an enormous increase in the deer herd on your rides in NJ?

[NNadir]

8. Increase?

It's hard to say. The deer are too numerous to count.

At this time of year it is possible to get a sense of the population by looking at the number of deer roadkill on the side of the road.

I wouldn't say it is more than usual; it's about the same.

Princeton some years ago was shooting dear wholesale, hiring a commercial company called "White Buffalo" to plug deer all night long at will for weeks at at time. I live in the neighboring town and noticed pretty much zero effect from this highly controversial practice.

A few good famines might change the situation. I'm a vegetarian so deer offer me little hope of famine relief.

[GCP]

3. I live in Massachusetts

And today was given an estimate over the phone of $24,000 for a solar-powered hot-water system. This seems ridiculously over-priced, do you have any idea of the range for this kind of thing? I'm talking a 4-bedroomed detached house with a large roof that has no shade.

[phantom power]

4. That sounds awfully expensive. That's more expensive than

a good-sized PV installation. Solar hot water should be cheaper than PV, not more expensive.

[amerikat]

7. Homepower Magazine has pretty good primer on solar hot water

http://www.homepower.com/

Always get three estimates for any construction job. Also verify the contractors credentials and ask to speak to some of his customers.

[GCP]

17. Thank you

I've got that link bookmarked.

[skids]

9. Yes, that's a total gouge. n/t

[GumboYaYa]

11. That is way over priced.

You can build one very easily for a tiny investment. Hell a few roles of black hose make a good solar water heater in the summer.

A full PV system for a reasonably-sized home would cost around $24,000.

[ret5hd]

5. Not to diss your observational skills...

but you do realize there are PV's that look just like shingles, don't you?

[skids]

6. Very big of you.

To wit, solar panel prices need to drop to 25% of their current market installed price to acheive signifigant penetration. (Something most PV vendors will gladly stipulate to.) So you aren't completely off the mark to label them as rich people's toys.

[necso]

10. Currently, PV* are largely for home

(business, public facility) use. In this use, they're a real estate improvement (one that could possibly loom large some day), an investment and a safeguard. (I've seen estimates where PV would supposedly save the owner money.) Such distributed production also can ease infrastructure requirements, is more robust, etc.

However, even in this use, price-performance and efficiencies need much improvement. But this is what should (and, generally, can) be expected of a growing, high-tech market. And it's a shame that there were not higher-efficiency, lower-cost solutions available -- and widely installed (correctly) -- during this current (and passing) real estate boom (one with very easy credit). But even in the actual circumstances, much useful production capability could have been installed for less than what was spent on unnecessary "improvements" -- and junk. (This is especially true in places with highly inflated real estate prices, and where much cash was pulled out of holdings.)

Conservation is our major, low-cost, end-user-expedient solution. However, for the foreseeable future, there will be a need for conventional electric production (transient renewables require on-demand backup; some storage is also good).

PV*: non-concentrated, non-tracking PV.

[necso]

12. A little more.

Demand for electricity isn't constant. And, in some areas at least, it peaks during the day. (Summer afternoons are typical yearly peak demand times here). So sunlight based sources have the potential to help "cut" the peaks off of the demand curve from other sources, decreasing what would've otherwise been the need for total capacity from these sources. (High demand and inadequate supply also tend to drive up prices -- and turn money that could have been used for consumer purposes (like capital improvements, other investments, or beer) into windfall profits for those very entities that shorted supply.)

Of course, the sun does not shine equally strongly on all receptors all of the time, even during the day, and some backup to make up for diminished solar production on low production days will be a necessity (unless some cost-effective storage capability and (over)production combination can be arrived at). But this is a probabilistic thing, and energy consumers should start thinking about managing their energy use not only over the hours of the day, but over days. ("It's sunny today, I'll do laundry." "It's cloudy and muggy today, let's barbecue outside or eat a salad". "Energy demand is less in predictable time blocks, and we can get better rates then, so let's shift production to those hours.)

Conservation (in all its forms, like energy efficient buildings, fuel efficient cars, utilized public transportation, etc), managing and shifting energy use over time, and moving to truly sustainable, distributed energy sources are all parts of the solution.

However, solar is a market that is going to need significant further nurturing in order to really get rolling, and without some means of dealing with uneven production (cheap, efficient storage -- or cheap, high efficiency energy form transition), it has rather constraining limits.

[amandabeech]

13. Peak use is frequently covered by natural gas turbines

(not combined cycle plants) and, sometimes, diesel generators. Obviously, the cost of both natural gas and diesel is becoming increasingly high, and both fuels have better uses.

Cutting down on the use of peak generators is a plus for solar power and really, imho (sorry NNadir), make sense in sunny climates. I had not put New Jersey in that category.

[NNadir]

14. No reason to be sorry. I agree with you.

Solar power is more expensive than gas even when gas is $13.00/MBtu, the enormously high price today, but only in direct (internal) costs. When you add the external cost, they are nearly competitive I think, at least at current gas prices.

My beef with the solar crowd really rests not with those who claim that there some niche applications for it, especially in sunny climates. I concede that there are some places where it can play a role, especially in meeting peak loads, especially the cases where those loads rise because of air conditioning demand. It's almost perfect, since a sunny day is likely to be a hot day.

However, represented as a solution to global climate change, solar is merely cute. In spite of much shouting and cheering of many decades, the impact has been trivial, and will remain trivial throughout the current climate crisis, irrespective of how that crisis ends, whether it be through climate stabilization or whether it ends with the destruction of most of the ecosystems on earth and much of humanity.

Solar power does not, and in my opinion cannot, address the important, in fact the most important load, constant load power. There are only two forms of energy production that are scalable and suitable for constant loads, nuclear and coal. (Gas is less suitable because of the sky rocketing price.) The latter has huge global climate change impacts and the former has trivial global climate change impact. The latter has huge external cost, the former has the lowest on demand external cost of any form of on demand constant load energy available. Coal will kill us a surely as a gun with six bullets in the chamber will kill in Russian Roulette.

I note that both coal and nuclear plants of current design are NOT suitable for meeting peak load demand. Nuclear power plants should always be run near full capacity with a minimal number of shutdowns. Physics issues do not allow nuclear reactors to be shut down and restarted frequently to meet fluctuating demand. Depending on reactor type, a nuclear reactor in cold shut down requires many, many hours, even days to restart, particularly if has been shut down during an existing run. Most reactors these days run for years without refueling or shut down. (CANDU reactors can be refueled during runs, and only shut down for maintenance.) Moreover the load of a reactor has bearing on the economics, including the important issue of fuel burn-up. The fuel gives far more energy per unit mass if it is fissioned at high load.

Coal plants require many hours to get pressure up in the boilers. This problem can be somewhat softened by the use of continuous moving bed combustion, but a coal plant is really still not all that flexible with respect to load. Gas turbines on the other hand, merely require flipping a switch, more or less.

The only role that nuclear can play for peak loads is if reactors that make gas equivalents (DME or methane) are available. These manufactured gases can be stored and then used to run existing turbines during peak demand times. If the world survives global climate change, reactors for the manufacture of such gases will be available, but they are not generally available now. If such reactors never become available however, I think that the events that follow as a consequence will make the issue of how much solar power can actually do (or help) moot. I actually am beginning to think that the actual outcome of global climate change will be far worse than the models (which are after all, merely models with certain assumptions inherent) have been predicting.

[Kolesar]

15. What if baseload-electricity is stored in flywheels for peak periods?

Evacuated flywheel motor-generators with magnetic-suspension bearings can be located in each town, or have several banks in a big city. They would be at full speed by noon, then start drawing off power as the localized peak demands happen. That would be earlier in the day on hot California summer days and later in the day when we Ohioans get home from work or school.

I also think a battery-powered automobile could and should be charged up in the wee hours when the peak load drops.

I really don't know how much peak load exceeds off peak load.

Another approach would be higher electricity rates during peak periods.

[skids]

16. Solar's answer to this is thermal storage.

Baseload solar is not of the solid-state photovoltaic variety, unless you buy into the silly hydrogen fad. Baseload solar will be in solar-thermal plants. This is done either through mass storage of thermal working fluid, or in designs that integrate thermal storage, like the solar chimney project in Australia.

Eventually energy storage will catch up though -- many of the relevant technologies are compared here:

http://www.electricitystorage.org/technologies.htm

(Incidentally since I mention the solar chimney, they recently made some design improvements that allow them to scale down to multiple 25-50MW chimneys instead of the single big 1km-tall 200MW design. That allows them to flatten out the price/capacity curve a bit so plants can be economically bootstrapped and sized to local need.)

http://www.enviromission.com.au/