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Kyocera has plants that are working after 30 years but they dont produce anywhere near their initial values.
The biggest problem Ive had is the glass coverings loosing their transparency due to abrasion of sand and dust.
I really havent had any trouble with snow. Actually the opposite. The colder the panels, the more they seem to produce.
So if a foot of snow is covering your solar array, it is so much more efficient due to being cold that the foot of opaque substance has no effect? Wow! IRL PV loses energy production over time, lifespan for PV is often 10 to 25 years. Fossil and nuclear power plants can run for around 100 years, power output by generators can be upgraded during that time.
So if a foot of snow is covering your solar array, it is so much more efficient due to being cold that the foot of opaque substance has no effect? Wow! IRL PV loses energy production over time, lifespan for PV is often 10 to 25 years. Fossil and nuclear power plants can run for around 100 years, power output by generators can be upgraded during that time.
The actual experience with pv arrays is that they don't stay snow covered. They do produce less energy during the winter months, but that's due to the angle of the sun. The reliability regions actually test for this. In the future, don't guess. It makes you appear ignorant.
You can tell me that, as your respondent I can tell you it was perceived as an attempt to slam nuclear power based on a singular bankruptcy. The title you chose was "For the Nuclear Power defenders".
Your premise for evaluation was bankruptcy of a company. My opinion is your premise is flawed, you did ask for comments.
In defense of nuclear, per your challenge, I pit your single private sector bankruptcy against thousands of bankruptcy's of renewable power companies often with taxpayer dollars invested.
Applying your standard against renewables, we determine renewables are a power source very very very very very very very (each an order of magnitude) inferior to nuclear.
My defense, is using your standard. My nearby nuclear plants are putting out as much power as usual today, but it's overcast in my area, with no wind. Guess which is producing power regularly, solar no, wind no, nuclear yes. This is the problem most often for green energy other than geothermal, tidal or hydro. When it gets dark, or there is no wind, consumers don't stop switching on lights or watching TV. Heck, it's an overcast, windless day, and he I am on Internet using a PC with a giant monitor. Thanks nuclear, thanks fossil, no thanks solar no thanks wind.
Actually my conclusion about the lack of viability was due to the horrendous cost overruns. It's not that the nuclear plants are terribly unsafe (though a solar or wind spill does much less damage than a spill of radioactive material), it's that they cost so much money that not even the largest companies in the world can afford the risk associated with building them. As Toshiba is finding out.
The handful (not thousands) of bankruptcies you see in pv are similar to the shakeout we saw in the 80s in personal computers. In a healthy, but fast paced industries like pv, there will be failures along the way. That's companies that could not keep up, it isn't a comment on the health of the industry.
It's dangerous to draw naive analogies about businesses that you don't understand.
Actually my conclusion about the lack of viability was due to the horrendous cost overruns. It's not that the nuclear plants are terribly unsafe (though a solar or wind spill does much less damage than a spill of radioactive material), it's that they cost so much money that not even the largest companies in the world can afford the risk associated with building them. As Toshiba is finding out.
The handful (not thousands) of bankruptcies you see in pv are similar to the shakeout we saw in the 80s in personal computers. In a healthy, but fast paced industries like pv, there will be failures along the way. That's companies that could not keep up, it isn't a comment on the health of the industry.
This was your post
Quote:
Originally Posted by DCforever
Toshiba, owner of Westinghouse Nuclear is about to be delisted from the Tokyo Stock Exchange due to massive losses building four nuclear units in the United States. Westinghouse Nuclear has already filed for bankruptcy.
Looks like nuclear is NOT coming back.
Sorry, your exemplar was financial issues with a single nuclear company. The benchmark you used was financial viability of a single company.
Your basis for acceptance or rejection of a power source due to a single bankruptcy is flawed in my opinion.
Using your standard solar is by far the largest failure by many orders of magnitude.
Suggestion, find a better benchmark, don't try to single out or cherry pick to support a favored power source.
EG: Nuclear is nice, but natural gas is best at this time. Due to the low construction cost, ease of disposal after construction, very long life of the facility, and reliability of electrical production. Not that any fracking company went out of business, or any nuclear company. We must look at cost over a lifetime per joule of electricity produced. Natural gas at this time has all the advantage. This was not true a few decade ago.
If Trump reduces regulation regarding construction of nuclear plants, they may be economically viable, however it is likely most electrical generation companies would prefer natural gas at this time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by DCforever
It's dangerous to draw naive analogies about businesses that you don't understand.
Sorry, your exemplar was financial issues with a single nuclear company. The benchmark you used was financial viability of a single company.
Your basis for acceptance or rejection of a power source due to a single bankruptcy is flawed in my opinion.
Using your standard solar is by far the largest failure by many orders of magnitude.
Suggestion, find a better benchmark, don't try to single out or cherry pick to support a favored power source.
EG: Nuclear is nice, but natural gas is best at this time. Due to the low construction cost, ease of disposal after construction, very long life of the facility, and reliability of electrical production. Not that any fracking company went out of business, or any nuclear company. We must look at cost over a lifetime per joule of electricity produced. Natural gas at this time has all the advantage. This was not true a few decade ago.
If Trump reduces regulation regarding construction of nuclear plants, they may be economically viable, however it is likely most electrical generation companies would prefer natural gas at this time.
Yet you refuse to heed your own advice.
Lots of fraqing firm have gone under. The big daddy of fraqing, Chesapeake Energy, is is still in business but it's stock went from $60 to $5/share. I'm not here to trash natural gas. It's a good fill in fuel when renewables can't meet demand. As you said, cheap to install and quite reliable.
The point is nuclear in the US is dead. The Vogtle and Summer experience will have killed any enthusiasm for taking a flyer. It really doesn't matter what happens to Toshiba ultimately. It is too bad that they were naive enough to bet on nuclear.
So if a foot of snow is covering your solar array, it is so much more efficient due to being cold that the foot of opaque substance has no effect? Wow! IRL PV loses energy production over time, lifespan for PV is often 10 to 25 years. Fossil and nuclear power plants can run for around 100 years, power output by generators can be upgraded during that time.
Where I live, The winter solar angle is around 30 degrees. Snow just plain dosent stick. Just slides off.
mine are a little steeper than that. By the looks of it it is wet snow. Where I live the snow for most of the year is much more like sand. We do get feet of snow and worse than that we get drifts which could easily cover that whole panel. But most people mount their panels high on a fixed shed roof or on the roof of their house. And we have wind. generally Ive only sees snow stick either very early in the beginning of winter or during spring storms. But it melts off fast.
It almost unheard of to get more than a few inches of snow to stick to the roof of your house but very common for the snow to go completely up the the peak of your roof on the wind side of the house.
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