Wind/Solar Power?

[Grogybear]

Can anyone give me a satisfactory answer to what use wind or solar power are if it is too windy or not windy enough and if its dark?

Assuming you have a vast amount of windmills or solar panels you would generate a bit of power but what if its not windy when everyone turns on the kettle?

[simple simon]

that's why you also have a bank of batteries to store the power when there is no wind or sun ...... it is very difficult for anyone to be completely off the grid

[Dieval]

Quote by: Grogybear Can anyone give me a satisfactory answer to what use wind or solar power are if it is too windy or not windy enough and if its dark? Assuming you have a vast amount of windmills or solar panels you would generate a bit of power but what if its not windy when everyone turns on the kettle?

That's why you don't rely solely on 2 types of energy....You left out hydro-electric, geothermal, and nuclear...I'm sure there are others 2...but they can be used in places without much wind or sun and don't rely on night or day.

[Grogybear]

ah you see... Im all in favour of nuclear. The thing is... if your going to need backup power... nuclear and hydro being the most practical... what is the poin in using wind or solar? They're expensive and don't produce an awful lot of power.

[Dieval]

Quote by: Grogybear ah you see... Im all in favour of nuclear. The thing is... if your going to need backup power... nuclear and hydro being the most practical... what is the poin in using wind or solar? They're expensive and don't produce an awful lot of power.

While as far as I know your points are valid, to me, solar and wind would be the easist technologies to develop, build, put in to action, and essentially just let them do their job without much in the way of support.
Hydro, you're looking at building a damn, supporting it, storing as much water as needed, releasing it on queue, etc, etc...nuclear needs fuel, requires lots of close monitoring, etc...i'm sure geothermal takes some work too...

[gela]

there is always wind next to the ocean at dawn and dusk.
Because the temperature of the land gets cooler when the sun gos down, while the ocean stays warmer for longer because water takes longer to change temperature.
So wind is always a given - however I have heard that the cost of maintaining a fan outweights the profit.
Solar power is a good option. I think a panel should be put on every roof; It might not take care of all our energy, but it will drasticly reduce our reliance on fossil fuels.

[Grogybear]

Again thats only if it happens to be sunny when you need it. If not, you have a rather expensive and pointless thing on your roof.
Who wants to cover all their coastline with windmills?
Yes Hydro is really expensive to set up and requires a body of moving water so its not always viable.

For me its nuclear all the way.
People moan about the waste and all that but so what. Whats wrong with burying it?

And then you hear greenpeace threatening legal action against the British Government when they announce plans for more nuclear... sigh..

[Jubloz]

Grog, as has been pointed out, other fuel forms must be used in addition to solar energy, whether that be hydro-electric, nuclear, etcetera. Like you said, solar energy obviously won't work if the panels are not being exposed to sunlight, but that doesn't mean there won't be enough sunlight in most conditions to benefit from panels. Though, yes, solar panels are initially pricey, they can save you a good sum of money in the long run. I don't have panels, so I could be wrong here, but I think they actually do a pretty decent job of forming energy during overcast conditions, although not quite on the same level as during sunny conditions (for obvious reasons). Also, keep in mind that deriving energy for solar power is a developing technology and, like anything else, is bound to become cheaper and more efficient with time (one of the benefits of consumerism).

I'm actually a bit torn on nuclear energy. It's a very efficient way of producing a lot of energy, but the waste is problematic. Unfortunately, waste from nuclear power has an extremely long decay time, which means that the sites being used as dumps can't be used for other purposes, such as urbanization.

[Compugasm]

I heard that in China, every 10 days they build a powerplant that could power a city the size of San Diego.

[gela]

I think nuclear is an unecessary risk.
Its mainly fulled by big business - Nuclear energy employs the miner, whoever transports the stuff, and people who work at the power plant.
Solar and Wind energy only employ in maintanance (for the ongong power).
Thats why governments are all for nuclear. Which I find to be very short sighted - but then again, all politians are only looking at the next election.

With a decent amount of research, I know wind and solar could be very economical.

Btw; solar energy absorbs energy all day, and then stores it. So it will still work at night time.

[Grogybear]

Heres an interesting statistic... To power the world, if it was operating at full capacity all the time, you would need to cover an area nearly the size of Texas with solar panels

The thing is... can enough power be created by wind and solar to make them useful? Im from ireland and i no that about 4 reactors would be enough to power my entire country whereas it would take about 1000 windmills i reckon... and thats only if they were running at optimum capacity all the time.
That really is the stumbling block with me for wind power. Unlike fossil fuel or nuclear power you cant simply turn up the power...

[gela]

hmm.. well mabe the mode of power should depend on the natural resources your country has.

Im from Australia, its sunny about 80% of the time here.

Also, we have an area about the size of texes of empty (very sunny) desert.. problem is that its a long way away from any cities.

The fact that our government is looking at nuclear power seems completely stupid to me. Just stick a solar panel on every roof, and some massive solar pannels on the desert for back up power.
We have both the space, and the sunlight.

[Derach]

Quote by: Grogybear Heres an interesting statistic... To power the world, if it was operating at full capacity all the time, you would need to cover an area nearly the size of Texas with solar panels ..

I don't know whether the incredibility of this statistic, or the vagueness to which side of the solar power argument it defends is more troubling. If you could power THE WORLD .... AT FULL CAPACITY ... with an area as (relatively) small as the great state of Texas, with a 100% percent renewable, environmentally neuteral, dependable energy source, You'd do it in a heartbeat. I don't know if we're taking the storage and distribution into account, but you could easily build facilities the size of texas in the Sahara, Austrailia, and even antartica and the artic if we could harness more of the ultra-violet spectrum of light for power conversion.

Anyway, the point is that solar, wind, and any alternate power source should be examined and invested in if there is a reasonable chance to produce relatively efficient energy. My local power company has just announced plans to build 200 very high-tech windmills across N America ... with things like automatic clutching mechanisms to better control turbine velocity and elaborite electronic airfoil control of the 'blades' ... we're not talking about dutch windmills made of cloth and wood. Many of the windmills will also act as cell phone towers and have other uses (like water pumping stations) and pay fair leases to landowners.

It's seems like Groggybear has s zealous desire in nuclear-only energy ... you Iranian? ... Seriously, there are drawbacks to nuclear ... 'just burrying waste' is not as easy as you propose, and the dangers and risks are real ... doesn't mean nuclear shouldn't be an option, it should be part of the equation ... just like wind and solar. Lots of people in my neck of the woods use solar efficiently to heat water.

[GHook93]

Quote by: gela there is always wind next to the ocean at dawn and dusk. Because the temperature of the land gets cooler when the sun gos down, while the ocean stays warmer for longer because water takes longer to change temperature. So wind is always a given - however I have heard that the cost of maintaining a fan outweights the profit. Solar power is a good option. I think a panel should be put on every roof; It might not take care of all our energy, but it will drasticly reduce our reliance on fossil fuels.

Aussies are leading the way on renewable clean solar power. This is the wave of the future. Now if we can only get out cars off of oil, we would be set (Russia, Venezuela and the ME would be screwed, but we would be set).

EnviroMission Ltd.

[nerdvincent]

Quote by: Grogybear Can anyone give me a satisfactory answer to what use wind or solar power are if it is too windy or not windy enough and if its dark? Assuming you have a vast amount of windmills or solar panels you would generate a bit of power but what if its not windy when everyone turns on the kettle?

Do you know something called batteries? Fuel cells?
You make hydrogen with your solar/wind power, you stock the hydrogen and you use it in fuel cells when it's cloudy/not windy.
Satisfied?

[nerdvincent]

Quote by: GHook93 Now if we can only get out cars off of oil

Cars? I don't want to hear this word again. Biofuel, hydrogen, electricity...those won't be able to power all the cars on this world. Bus, subway, train, bicycle are the way of the future. Don't even ask if we will be able to produce the amount of energy we produce today with "clean" energy. We won't, exept if we can manipulate nuclear fusion. So meanwhile we've got to learn how to live with ten times less energy: crash your lightbulb, buy LEDs, sell your car and buy a bike.
Dot, period.
And living this way is far from being expensive.

[GHook93]

Quote by: nerdvincent Cars? I don't want to hear this word again. Biofuel, hydrogen, electricity...those won't be able to power all the cars on this world. Bus, subway, train, bicycle are the way of the future. Don't even ask if we will be able to produce the amount of energy we produce today with "clean" energy. We won't, exept if we can manipulate nuclear fusion. So meanwhile we've got to learn how to live with ten times less energy: crash your lightbulb, buy LEDs, sell your car and buy a bike. Dot, period. And living this way is far from being expensive.

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[gela]

Cars? I don't want to hear this word again. Biofuel, hydrogen, electricity...those won't be able to power all the cars on this world. Bus, subway, train, bicycle are the way of the future. Don't even ask if we will be able to produce the amount of energy we produce today with "clean" energy. We won't, exept if we can manipulate nuclear fusion. So meanwhile we've got to learn how to live with ten times less energy: crash your lightbulb, buy LEDs, sell your car and buy a bike. Dot, period. And living this way is far from being expensive.

ahh nooo!
Not bikes.. Im surrounded by steep hills where I live.. and Im too remote to get a regular bus.

I heard that an electric car was developed.. but the petrol comanies bought all the rights to it, so it would never get out their and ruin they're business...
Can't recall wether this was fact or a conspiracy theory..

[simple simon]

Quote by: gela I heard that an electric car was developed.. but the petrol comanies bought all the rights to it, so it would never get out their and ruin they're business... Can't recall wether this was fact or a conspiracy theory..

are you referring to Chevy's EV1 ?

[gela]

I have no idea. I just have a vague memory of hearing something about petrol companies buying out eco-friendly cars.