View Full Version : The Road To Hell Is Paved With Solar Panels – “Solar Road” fails miserably
The Road To Hell Is Paved With Solar Panels – “Solar Road” fails miserably (https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/04/04/the-road-to-hell-is-paved-with-solar-panels/)
And at that rate, the total of 246 kWhrs of electricity that cost $4,450,000 is worth about $36.86.
$2,350,000 of that was taxpayer money. I hate our government.
Grant H.
04-04-2018, 20:49
The fact that our .gov put money into this is sad.
I remember seeing the crowd funding thing, and thinking it was a waste, but people like to believe something that sounds good, even if it's too good to be true.
The fact that our .gov put money into this is sad.
...but people like to believe something that sounds good, even if it's too good to be true.
Unicorns and fairies aren't real? [dammit]
I'd like to do the math to see what the 50W solar panel on the roof of my van has produced over that time. I feel like it might be pretty close. I didn't even have a kick starter for my project.
How much would a conventional road have cost?
Great-Kazoo
04-04-2018, 22:57
Unicorns and fairies aren't real? [dammit]
Depends where in denver you're wandering.
BushMasterBoy
04-05-2018, 03:03
LOL kazoo
Fossil fuels are still the most efficient and inexpensive source of energy.
BPTactical
04-05-2018, 07:26
And the closest thing we have to truly sustainable and renewable energy is nuclear.
Hydro is also very efficient and sustainable. The best uses I've seen of wind and solar are in Europe where those energy sources are paired with Hydro. When the wind is blowing and sun is shining, the energy is used to pump water below the dam back above the dam. It's storing potential energy for when it's actually needed.
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Hydro is also very efficient and sustainable.
Most folks have no idea that Colorado Springs has about 25MW generated by hydro:
CSU hydro (https://www.csu.org/pages/hydro-r.aspx)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9RlQFYfVWU
The best uses I've seen of wind and solar are in Europe where those energy sources are paired with Hydro. When the wind is blowing and sun is shining, the energy is used to pump water below the dam back above the dam. It's storing potential energy for when it's actually needed.
Twin Lakes, South of Leadville has a pumped storage power plant.
O2
wctriumph
04-05-2018, 11:46
This stuff makes my head hurt. The corruption is so complete ...
Take away the government money and let it succeed or fail on its own merit.
Take away the government money and let it succeed or fail on its own merit.+1000
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Grant H.
04-05-2018, 13:49
Take away the government money and let it succeed or fail on its own merit.
Say goodbye to all large scale wind power.
But I completely agree with you.
SamuraiCO
04-05-2018, 14:41
And Tesla. They loose money on each of their $100k cars but tell us they will make money on their new $40k cars. Sham
And Tesla. They loose money on each of their $100k cars but tell us they will make money on their new $40k cars. Sham
...but....but.....Elon Musk is a GENIUS! Just look at the Hyperloop (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperloop). You get into a capsule that's in a tube and it travels really fast being driven by electricity. What could possibly go wrong? I'd feel safer in a passenger jet at 34K feet than being enclosed in a pipe that I couldn't get out of.
Tesla is not a stock to own right now. Tesla is a technology company that sells cars (when there's a promise of a hefty kickback of taxpayer funds). It's also not a car company. Big difference. They don't have the resources to meet commitments for their new "3", but they also just recalled more than 1/3 of the vehicles they've ever sold.
I have to admit that I like what they've done with SpaceX so far.
CoGirl303
04-05-2018, 20:17
Followed solar roadways for a few years now on twitter and facebook and instagram.
Like any idea, it is going to take time to work out the bugs. From what I've seen, it has promise but still a long ways to go.
If they can resolve issues, it could be a breakthrough.
Another company that makes similar panels in Europe is implementing it as we speak. I'll try to find the link later.
The solar roadway panels were originally spec'd to withstand 250,000 lb loads. I'd like to know at what weight these panels de-lamninated? Author did not specify.
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When you lay solar panels flat, they lose a lot of their efficiency. When you scuff the face of the panel, the efficiency drops even more. Those are 2 things you can't engineer your way out of. When you add in the very poor tractive surface of glass, the idea becomes untenable.
You'd be better suited to just angling solar panels on a frame, but even that has limitations. Until photovoltaic panels become much more efficient and storage is able to overcome its limitations, it's just not the answer.
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CoGirl303
04-06-2018, 07:11
When you lay solar panels flat, they lose a lot of their efficiency. When you scuff the face of the panel, the efficiency drops even more. Those are 2 things you can't engineer your way out of. When you add in the very poor tractive surface of glass, the idea becomes untenable.
You'd be better suited to just angling solar panels on a frame, but even that has limitations. Until photovoltaic panels become much more efficient and storage is able to overcome its limitations, it's just not the answer.
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interesting stuff.
The French had the same problem.
https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/194313-the-netherlands-has-laid-the-worlds-first-solar-road-we-go-eyes-on-to-investigate
https://www.theverge.com/2016/12/22/14055756/solar-panel-road-electricity-france-normandy
I think once there's a breakthrough in storage and power retention it'll be feasible, but until then not so much.
Solar Roadways has also been having trouble with the panels melting snow under heavy snow cobditions (2-3" per hour). The panels can't keep up, but they were working on a fix for that.
I'm very intrigued by the whole idea and the potential and possibilities are amazing...but they need to overcome cost and limits first so it can be reality.
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Why are so many excited by the idea of mankind not advancing or finding clean energy or generally bettering mankind? Isn't that akin to hoping the pilot of the plane you're on crashes because you found out he routes for a rival sports team? I get that some government programs are hugely inefficient and the money put towards that segment can be largely waste but this goes for everything that the government is involved with finance-wise. Why the focus on solar and clean energy? The idea is to spur advancement and just because the results aren't immediate doesn't mean we aren't going to benefit greatly in the not-too-distant future from what we learn from this that we otherwise wouldn't have learned.
There's a reason that the medical field is so good at treating sports-related injuries now that previously meant limited mobility and use: financial baking and lots of it. Pretty tough to argue that the rapid advancement of ACL treatments is a direct result of NFL wanting their franchise players back. I remember when a blown up ACL meant you were likely done playing professional football depending on the severity. These were massive financial hits to the bottom line of owners to have their franchise players gone in an instant. Today, we as a society benefit greatly from the massive money thrown at making professional players healthier for longer & able to return from injury quicker. As with most problems, throwing money at them can help over time and the only argument really is the ROI delta.
I digress...
In order for solar to be more viable we need the efficiency to be higher than it currently is to make it worth our while. Some early adopters claim it was already there but I personally didn't see the #'s to get too excited about it at the consumer level as a home-owner. That being said, the efficiency of solar panels has increased dramatically in the last several years. There have been notable increases in efficiency over the last decade or so and prior to that the efficiency of solar panels had remained unchanged since the mid 1900's.
In 1960 the efficiency of solar panels was 14%. This remained unchanged until 1992 when it went up a whopping 1.89% which spanned another 20 years. To summarize, that's a 1.89% increase in solar panel efficiency in over 50 years. Since 2012 we've seen massive leaps in solar panel efficiency with about a year ago bringing the efficiency to 29.8% or over twice what it had been for 5 decades since. Say what you will about government spending and it drives me nuts but if we all benefit from the advancements made then I guess it did it's job. We can argue just how much it would have advanced w/o some big bucks behind it but the technology is improving and I personally don't believe we'd see anywhere near the improvement if free market were just left to it's own devices.
Solar roadways aren't a technology that's currently feasible with anything like current technology. It's not an issue of just working out a few kinks. It's an issue of getting it to work would require the development of technologies that at our current development levels would be analgous to magic.
As for transportation, the future of that, like it or not, is electric. Telsa has proven that there's a market for electric cars that, in many respects, handily outperform similarly-priced ICE vehicles and aren't just shitty compliance cars built to specs mandated by people who hate cars, driving, and personal transportation.
Sure, there are currently shortcomings, but that's to be expected in the first generation of any new technology.
Sure, there are currently shortcomings, but that's to be expected in the first generation of any new technology.
This is first generation only if you ignore history - https://www.energy.gov/articles/history-electric-car . There have been many attempts to electrify vehicles prior to Tesla. Electromotive force is very useful for moving things, as has been demonstrated by the diesel electric (and now LPG/electric) trains used for decades.
The problem I have is with the technology not being ready and the government pumping money into subsidizing it. They're not "investing in the future". They're pissing good money taken from hard working taxpayers down what every thinking person knows is a hole.
Electric cars really don't drive the underlying technology. The batteries currently used in electric cars weren't developed for electric cars. Cars will leverage what is determined to be the best cost-effective battery technology available. Unfortunately, the Lithium Ion batteries being used in cars are also being used in your laptop or smart phone. The limited availability of cobalt has battery prices climbing and availability becoming restricted. When electric storage becomes more efficient, then electric cars will likely use it. The cart doesn't drive the horse.
I'm also not going to buy an $80K+ vehicle I can't drive from my house to our facility in Cheyenne and back without having to hypermile the thing worrying about every component that I have turned on that consumes power. I also would like to be able to drive 1000 miles in a day with minimal interruptions of a minute or two to top off my fuel tank and take a whiz.
Until that happens, I'm not their demographic, and it pisses me off when my tax dollars are subsidizing something that has limitations that are already known. When the government steps in, and they will, then we have other problems. If you don't think the .gov will get involved, just go looking for an incandescent light bulb for a specific application.
The problem I have is with the technology not being ready and the government pumping money into subsidizing it. They're not "investing in the future". They're pissing good money taken from hard working taxpayers down what every thinking person knows is a hole.
Yeah, like NASA and military tech.
Yeah, like NASA and military tech.
Were you looking to buy an F-35 or SLS rocket? Totally different venues. I'm speaking of dumping money into consumer fields that should be market driven or in doing something that you already know doesn't have a future, i.e. glass roadways.
It would make more sense to me if they could take the heat from an asphalt roadway and use it to drive a Stirling engine.
...that makes ice cream.
This is first generation only if you ignore history - https://www.energy.gov/articles/history-electric-car . There have been many attempts to electrify vehicles prior to Tesla. Electromotive force is very useful for moving things, as has been demonstrated by the diesel electric (and now LPG/electric) trains used for decades.
Yes, I'm well aware of the history of electric cars. Comparing those to what Tesla has built is like comparing Edison's landlines to modern smart phones. There's some basic functionality crossover, but the technologies that underlie them are so fundamentally different that trying to claim that one is like the other is ludicrous.
The problem I have is with the technology not being ready and the government pumping money into subsidizing it. They're not "investing in the future". They're pissing good money taken from hard working taxpayers down what every thinking person knows is a hole.
Tesla paid back their $465 million government loan 9 years early, with interest. Funny how the people who complain about Tesla sucking on the government tit rarely seem to have a problem with GM getting a $4 BILLION bailout.
Electric cars really don't drive the underlying technology. The batteries currently used in electric cars weren't developed for electric cars. Cars will leverage what is determined to be the best cost-effective battery technology available. Unfortunately, the Lithium Ion batteries being used in cars are also being used in your laptop or smart phone. The limited availability of cobalt has battery prices climbing and availability becoming restricted. When electric storage becomes more efficient, then electric cars will likely use it. The cart doesn't drive the horse.
You are aware of Tesla's partnership with Panasonic to develop and manufacture batteries useful for transportation, and the attendant Gigafactory, right? Tesla and Panasonic have developed battery technology specifically for transportation to include pack development, thermal management systems, software to run it, and the new chemistries required. On top of that, they're heavily focused on developing battery technology that can be easily scaled and brought to market.
Tesla vehicles haven't been powered by laptop batteries since the initial Tesla Roadster.
On top of that, Tesla has, as I understand it, already secured supply lines for raw materials for batteries, so I'm not particularly concerned with them being resource constrained due to cobalt. If other car makers begin to manufacture at scale, I fully expect the mining companies will read the market signals and expand lithium and cobalt mining operations in order to cash in on the demand.
I'm also not going to buy an $80K+ vehicle I can't drive from my house to our facility in Cheyenne and back without having to hypermile the thing worrying about every component that I have turned on that consumes power. I also would like to be able to drive 1000 miles in a day with minimal interruptions of a minute or two to top off my fuel tank and take a whiz.
Nor would I expect you to. Electric vehicles don't excel at all use cases, and long-distance road trips are arguably the one place where ICE-powered vehicles still hold a clearcut advantage. Like I said, it's still first gen technology. ICE technology has been under heavy R&D for well over a century. It has been fun to watch Alex Roy clock continually lower cross-country trips, though.
Until that happens, I'm not their demographic, and it pisses me off when my tax dollars are subsidizing something that has limitations that are already known. When the government steps in, and they will, then we have other problems. If you don't think the .gov will get involved, just go looking for an incandescent light bulb for a specific application.
Like I said earlier, no reason to be pissed off about a loan that was paid back nearly a decade early. Not sure what that has to do with light bulbs.
It would make more sense to me if they could take the heat from an asphalt roadway and use it to drive a Stirling engine.
...that makes ice cream.
That would be a pretty unique way to make Rocky Road.
BushMasterBoy
04-06-2018, 11:23
I could have used that Tesla car they shot into space, instead it is orbiting uselessly. And those panels could have been used to power that Tesla car. Now both products are worthless. It is shameful.
i can tell you're passionate about the issue based on the twisting of my comments into something I never said.
I never said Tesla was using "laptop batteries". They're using the same Lithium Ion battery technology, including the use of cobalt, which I'm finding via my job as a computer professional is limiting availability and increasing costs in computers.
https://www.teslarati.com/inside-tesla-model-3-2170-lithium-ion-battery/
The jelly roll of the Model 3’s battery cell features a lithium-nickel-cobalt-aluminum oxide that’s responsible for storing energy in the battery.
I also wasn't talking about a "loan" to Tesla. I'm talking about the tens of thousands of tax dollars in "subsidies" being given to each vehicle purchaser as an incentive.
ETA: CBS News finds children mining cobalt for batteries in the Congo (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cobalt-children-mining-democratic-republic-congo-cbs-news-investigation/)
I already knew that much of the cobalt was mined in the Congo, and that was the first hit checking up on the subject.
Something else that isn't discussed much is the disposal of the large battery packs used for vehicle/industrial use. That's some nasty stuff when compared to the trace pollutants and plant food that comes from the modern vehicle ICE.
There's nothing useless about making, quite literally, the best car commercial in all of human history.
I never said Tesla was using "laptop batteries". They're using the same Lithium Ion battery technology, including the use of cobalt, which I'm finding via my job as a computer professional is limiting availability and increasing costs in computers.
https://www.teslarati.com/inside-tes...m-ion-battery/
Yeah, everyone knows they're using Lithium ion batteries. It doesn't change the fact that the architecture used for those batteries is notably different from what's used in a laptop. As to increasing the cost of computer batteries, on a per-unit cost basis, I'd be surprised if that resulted in more than a dollar or two cost rise for an entire laptop.
I also wasn't talking about a "loan" to Tesla. I'm talking about the tens of thousands of tax dollars in "subsidies" being given to each vehicle purchaser as an incentive.
That credit will likely be phased out for Tesla vehicles within a year or so.
Interestingly enough, Elon has called for an end to that tax credit as well, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
ETA: CBS News finds children mining cobalt for batteries in the Congo
I already knew that much of the cobalt was mined in the Congo, and that was the first hit checking up on the subject.
If you want to fly to The Congo and fight for the plight of the miners, go right ahead.
Something else that isn't discussed much is the disposal of the large battery packs used for vehicle/industrial use. That's some nasty stuff when compared to the trace pollutants and plant food that comes from the modern vehicle ICE.
Tesla already has had a closed-loop battery recycling program since 2011. As to recycling electric car batteries, there's already an industry model in that something like 97% of current car batteries are captured and recycled.
CoGirl303
04-06-2018, 13:23
As for transportation, the future of that, like it or not, is electric.
In the early 2000's there was a program in Michigan...Detroit or Dearborn area called Switch2Hydrogen.
They developed a system that converted a gas vehicle from 1970 to present to hydrogen. The kit was about $10,000. It used 4 scuba style tanks in the trunk of a 95 Corvette and it got 650 miles to those 4 tanks.
In the late 2000's, the project simply vanished and so did the people behind it. Website was gone, the forum was gone, everything. It was really disappointing because it had so much promise. Never heard about it or them again.
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Pressurized fuels have higher risk when it comes to moving vehicles. The stronger and more damage resistant the pressure vessel/s, the higher the weight and increased size. There's also no existing infrastructure to distribute liquid hydrogen fuel.
I really don't hear so much about fuel cell vehicles any more either. Some of those were to be fueled by liquid hydrogen.
Jason, I'm not discussing battery form-factor, just storage chemistry. Let's just leave it at that.
CoGirl303
04-06-2018, 13:41
Pressurized fuels have higher risk when it comes to moving vehicles. The stronger and more damage resistant the pressure vessel/s, the higher the weight and increased size. There's also no existing infrastructure to distribute liquid hydrogen fuel.
I really don't hear so much about fuel cell vehicles any more either. Some of those were to be fueled by liquid hydrogen.
Jason, I'm not discussing battery form-factor, just storage chemistry. Let's just leave it at that.
they did a lot of testing with collisions to ensure they wouldn't blow up on impact. They also test fired bullets at them and all they did when impacted was smolder and go out. But the CPRC was acting little babies instead of reviewing the tests and letting science do the talking, they allowed their feelings and concerns to overrule further production. They were about to get past that hurdle when the whole project disappeared.
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Hydrogen isn't a viable power source because of the infrastructure that would be required to be able to safely manufacture, handle, and store it.
There are hydrogen fuel cell vehicles available, notably the Toyota Murai and Honda Clarity, but without an infrastructure to serve them, they're basically DOA. On top of that, fuel cell vehicles end up being a loser because you're sticking a middle man process into the whole thing in order to make it work.
eg, Electricity and natural gas are used to generate the hydrogen that gets put into the tank of the fuel cell vehicle, that hydrogen is then used to power an electric motor in the vehicle. From a systems perspective, this doesn't make a whole lot of sense; after all, if you're looking to use electricity to power the vehicle, just shove electrons into a battery and you can completely bypass the need for the hydrogen infrastructure (which isn't going to be built anyway, so who cares.)
eg, Electricity and natural gas are used to generate the hydrogen that gets put into the tank of the fuel cell vehicle, that hydrogen is then used to power an electric motor in the vehicle. From a systems perspective, this doesn't make a whole lot of sense; after all, if you're looking to use electricity to power the vehicle, just shove electrons into a battery and you can completely bypass the need for the hydrogen infrastructure (which isn't going to be built anyway, so who cares.)
...or you have something similar to a Chevy Volt where you use electromotive force + gasoline/diesel generator for range limited only by our current gasoline infrastructure.
Jason, I'm not discussing battery form-factor, just storage chemistry. Let's just leave it at that.
Form factor and chemistry are clearly unique in the Tesla vehicles, though. I don't pretend to understand everything that went into the development of the 2170 cells they're using now, but Tesla is claiming better energy density at a lower cost than any other cell type, and given that their vehicles all hit the specs they claim, I see no reason to doubt them when they claim they've managed to hit the sweet spot.
...or you have something similar to a Chevy Volt where you use electromotive force + gasoline/diesel generator for range limited only by our current gasoline infrastructure.
Right. So why would you bother with hydrogen then?
There would probably have to be a rash of EV caused house fires first. Not a bad thought though as insurance carriers are always interested in anything you do that increases risk (add a fireplace, pool, trampoline, pitbull, daycare, etc?).
Aloha_Shooter
04-06-2018, 23:24
Why are so many excited by the idea of mankind not advancing or finding clean energy or generally bettering mankind?
It's not a matter of being excited by or hoping for their failures. Any engineer worth his or her salt can tell you in 30 seconds all sorts of problems with the idea of solar roadways or parking lots. It'd be a whole other story if they used those panels as top for a covered parking but as the actual parking surface? Idiots.
As far as seeing improvement if the free market were left alone, there are dozens upon dozens of technologies that have shown the dramatic advances in technology and decreases in cost come when it gets to be a mass market item. The rationale for government funding was supposed to be to get certain technologies over a critical mass hump for public adoption but it's not government funding that really spurs the innovation. Rechargeable battery technology was pushed by government funding for the Apollo missions but skyrocketed when it because a mass market commodity for home power tools.
Depending on who you talk to , government funding initiated microprocessor technology for either cryptography or the space program but it really exploded and advanced when home computers became a thing. Similarly, when you note how solar technology has made massive leaps in efficiency since 2012, I will point to massive consumer electronic interest in solar technology since about 2008, increasing private sector interest in investing in R&D for more efficient solar panels before Obama even ran for President (officially). I bought a solar panel to ensure I could keep my Palm, digital camera, and MP3 player powered up for my safaris in Africa and sail across the Aegean in 2009. Since then, it has become popular for campers, adventure travelers, etc. to have solar supplemented gear. Government funding didn't drive the creation of mobile phone cases with solar panels on them.
Despite all of that, the idea of parking and driving on solar panels is still just plain stupid.
There would probably have to be a rash of EV caused house fires first. Not a bad thought though as insurance carriers are always interested in anything you do that increases risk (add a fireplace, pool, trampoline, pitbull, daycare, etc?).
As far as I know, there's only been one house fire traced back to an electric vehicle; the first gen Fisker Karmas had a defect that could cause the car to leak coolant onto the electronics.
More info on the subject here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plug-in_electric_vehicle_fire_incidents
BushMasterBoy
04-09-2018, 11:58
At least they didn't build an entire interstate of them. Now we know what doesn't work. Back to the drawing board, or CADCAM or doodle.
Stuving, do you have any idea how often rooftop solar installs may be related to house fires? We had a house fire down the street from us and it appeared to be near the solar installation.
Just curious, thanks.
I don't at all. I've not worked a fire and now that I'm not in an office, I never talk to my co-workers to hear what they work on either. DFBrews and Grant probably have a better idea of what would cause something like that.
Thanks. My neighbor came over tonight to chat and see how I was doing,. Energy saving came up and I mentioned rooftop solar and she brought up and confirmed that the house fire down the street was caused by their solar installation. There are a bunch of homes around here that have solar, so it doesn't seem to be a common issue.
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Thanks. My neighbor came over tonight to chat and see how I was doing,. Energy saving came up and I mentioned rooftop solar and she brought up and confirmed that the house fire down the street was caused by their solar installation. There are a bunch of homes around here that have solar, so it doesn't seem to be a common issue.
With how quickly solar was growing, I wouldn't be surprised to find out that there are a lot of warm bodies that were hired to fill installation crews. Now you've got me curious about the risk as well, since I plan on putting solar on a chicken coop, which is already a fire hazard when there is power present.
What do we think of this localized turbine generator.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiefORPamLU
buffalobo
05-01-2018, 06:53
Interesting, too bad nearest river is 14 miles from me.
I find it interesting that the animated demo shows a fish gently going through the turbine safely, then you see the video of an actual installation and it doesn't appear quite so serene.
A water wheel driving a gearbox which turns a generator would probably be easier and less impactful. Would probably be less susceptible to foreign material getting into the works as well.
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Interesting, too bad nearest river is 14 miles from me.
Well when they make that little cut out, they'll just have to do it a bit wider.
Interesting, too bad nearest river is 14 miles from me.
How close is the nearest fire hydrant?
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