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The Solar Revolution!

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numbercruncher

numbercruncher

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Today Queensland opened its first fully solar powered Town - and apparently its the beginning of something huge. The next Town is already earmarked.

Inspecting a new solar farm at Windorah in far western Queensland on Sunday, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said the fund would stimulate the economy and reduce carbon pollution.

"It's time for Australia to begin a solar revolution, a renewable energy revolution and we've got to fund it for the future" he told reporters.
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Queensland Premier Anna Bligh said her government wanted to transform the Sunshine State to the Solar State.
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http://news.theage.com.au/national/rudd-announces-renewable-energy-funds-20081214-6y51.html


Looking good and Green ! Wonder if its a public company putting all these solar arrays up ? :)
 
Re: The Solar Revolution !

More political jerk offs.

Aus politicians have already let all the good Aussie solar technology go overseas through lack of EARLY funding, and failure to recognise the potential.

Ausra in California and Suntech in China and US, listed on NASDAQ are 2 examples.
 
Re: The Solar Revolution !

Not to mention imposing the means testing on solar rebates.

That killed it overnight.

Absolute dickheads.
 
Re: The Solar Revolution !

Southern pessimists lol !

We will sell you coal and keep building our Solar stations :D
 
Well... we were the first to have a state sustainability strategy... yeah... cop that... yeah... take it bitch.

Automatically means we are going to be the best environmentally innovative region in Australia.... surely.
 
Re: The Solar Revolution !

I read the article, and I think it's a great thing.

Who cares if it's late? Why not seize the opportunity?
 
sure, seize the moment, like 20 years to late.

Australia should be ashamed. We have so much sunshine in this country and we are LAGGING behind the world. Good god.
 
DB008 said:
sure, seize the moment, like 20 years to late.

Australia should be ashamed. We have so much sunshine in this country and we are LAGGING behind the world. Good god.
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We are ashamed and now weve thrown those free loading Liberal hippys out things might actually happen ?
 
I must point out that the amount of energy produced by this is roughly equal to the residential electricity consumption of a town that size (assuming average rates of energy use per dwelling etc).

Residential electricity represents less than 10% of total energy use. So the $4.5 million meets a tenth or so of the energy needs of 100 people. If it could be scaled up (technically possible but on an increasing cost curve as % of total energy increases) then that's $450,000 per person which is a bit of a problem.

Scaling this up to 100% of national electricity consumption would cost roughly $3,350,000,000,000 not including the (rather substantial) additional costs to make it work 24/7/365 without relying on diesel etc backup.

I'm not against it, just pointing out that you won't be seeing more than a tiny fraction of total energy from this means any time soon.
 
Abit off topic;

but i wish the government would make bigger contributions to;

nuclear and geothermal energy research.

These are the only two I know that in theory can be implemented to large populations at a reasonable cost, in the near future.

I dont really no too much about solar, but does anyone think its viable to run a whole country on solar energy anytime in the next few decades?
 
beerwm said:
Abit off topic;

but i wish the government would make bigger contributions to;

nuclear and geothermal energy research.

These are the only two I know that in theory can be implemented to large populations at a reasonable cost, in the near future.

I dont really no too much about solar, but does anyone think its viable to run a whole country on solar energy anytime in the next few decades?
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The economic utility of any energy source comes down to two things:

1. Technical feasibility (lots of aspects to this one).

2. Productivity of human labour employed.

It is the high productivity of fossil fuels, nuclear and hydro that leads us to use them in the first place. It is why there are coal mines surrounded by trees but we choose to transport the coal, but not the wood, hundreds of km to the point of use. PRODUCTIVITY.

Find a way to bring up the productivity of something else and it too becomes viable. That's a hard thing to do with anything that's dispersed (eg solar) but geothermal is far more concentrated so the potential is there. All those mirrors etc in a solar installation are ultimately there to concentrate the energy source, getting away from its decentralised nature, and by doing so raise the productivity of the overall set up.

When you think about it, coal, nuclear and hydro are pretty inconvenient energy sources really. One's absolutely filthy. Another is toxic beyond belief. And the third means going to the middle of nowhere in places where it's always raining and usually freezing cold as well. But they have high productivity and are able to be scaled up, hence they are how we generate over 80% of the world's electricity.

Work out a way to cut the labour required by an order of magnitude and solar will be a goer. That applies even if we end up with a depression and high unemployment - the whole basis of the economy depends on high productivity in energy so it's not an option to do otherwise.
 
Smurf1976 said:
I must point out that the amount of energy produced by this is roughly equal to the residential electricity consumption of a town that size (assuming average rates of energy use per dwelling etc).

Residential electricity represents less than 10% of total energy use. So the $4.5 million meets a tenth or so of the energy needs of 100 people. If it could be scaled up (technically possible but on an increasing cost curve as % of total energy increases) then that's $450,000 per person which is a bit of a problem.

Scaling this up to 100% of national electricity consumption would cost roughly $3,350,000,000,000 not including the (rather substantial) additional costs to make it work 24/7/365 without relying on diesel etc backup.

I'm not against it, just pointing out that you won't be seeing more than a tiny fraction of total energy from this means any time soon.
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I dont get what you mean Smurf - they said this Solar system supply homes and Business.

It was also on TV here , the locals love it and said they use massive amounts of electricity in the days for AIrcons as it gets so hot.

The money doesnt matter we have central banks to create that outta thin air these days for Government projects " deficit spending " its a new paradgim lol :D
 
Might be worth checking how green it is to manufacture the solar panels and the batteries needed for storage of the power.
 
Smurf1976 said:
I must point out that the amount of energy produced by this is roughly equal to the residential electricity consumption of a town that size (assuming average rates of energy use per dwelling etc).

Residential electricity represents less than 10% of total energy use. So the $4.5 million meets a tenth or so of the energy needs of 100 people. If it could be scaled up (technically possible but on an increasing cost curve as % of total energy increases) then that's $450,000 per person which is a bit of a problem.

Scaling this up to 100% of national electricity consumption would cost roughly $3,350,000,000,000 not including the (rather substantial) additional costs to make it work 24/7/365 without relying on diesel etc backup.

I'm not against it, just pointing out that you won't be seeing more than a tiny fraction of total energy from this means any time soon.
Click to expand...

How much would it have cost to pay 100% of the price of supplying, installing and grid connecting individual 3MW solar power panel kits for each and every building in the town. Assuming 2 pp home & approx. $40,000 per kit all up, (see ref http://72.14.235.132/search?q=cache...ome+solar+power+kits&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=au ) that would be a snip at a mere $2Million - a saving of $2.5 Million!!

Not only that, but such systems would feed back a significant oversupply of solar generated power (most homes would need only around 2.0-2.5 MW of power per day) into the grid to benefit whoever (as well as providing much-needed money in the pockets of the townspeople to SPEND - a laudable cause atm eh, Mr Rudd?).

Imagine that! FREE solar power with INCOME!!!

How's that grab ya'all!! :)

I'm well up for it.

GIMME NOW!
 
I was just about to put solar hot water in when the rebate in QLD got scrapped. And that was last year. Given the economic conditions at the moment, l won't be putting it in for a while now.
I don't know what rebates are on offer now, but it's a long shot away. If the gov was serious about creating more jobs and trying to turn Australia into a world leader in this field, up the rebates and make it more attractive to have solar for the working class families.
I can't see a working class family living in Penrith that is just making ends meet going out the way to put solar hot water in at the moment. Has to be more help from the gov, just my 2 cents.
 
DB008 said:
I was just about to put solar hot water in when the rebate in QLD got scrapped. And that was last year. Given the economic conditions at the moment, l won't be putting it in for a while now.
I don't know what rebates are on offer now, but it's a long shot away. If the gov was serious about creating more jobs and trying to turn Australia into a world leader in this field, up the rebates and make it more attractive to have solar for the working class families.
I can't see a working class family living in Penrith that is just making ends meet going out the way to put solar hot water in at the moment. Has to be more help from the gov, just my 2 cents.
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My thoughts would be that all new homes must have solar hot water.

And all existing homes sold must have it installed before sale. This is the same with in fill sewerage here some time ago, and car immobilisers. Eventually, all cars and houses have the required targeted upgrade.
 
I recently moved from a new home in QLD that had solar hot water.
While living in it my power bill was HIGHER than in the previous place that didn't have it. ($345 compared to $125)

By turning off the electrical part of the hot water system my power bill dropped, but it would not produce enough hot water for 2 showers a day, and the water was not hot enough for washing up.

I had ergon out to check the meters and the plumbers and leckies check the solar HWS as the house was still under warranty, but apparently nothing was wrong.

Now I am back in a place with a normal electric hot water system and the power bill is back down to a similar number like it was before. ($140)
 

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