I am not asking for your money to invest in my scam but consider following :

Imagine that all the money you don't have you spent on Solar Panel farm far away.

I did this calculations before so there just reminder.

Imagine following scenario:
One day you decided:
- to sell your home appartment at CBD for $550 k
- throw you good job at near office that bring you $50k per year before taxes but waste 10 hours a day that you could spent in better place

NOW
you received free or cheap government grant on the land in the place nobody want to live. You will get 10 or even 100 years lease on the 10 hectares desert in the middle of nowhere !
Nobody want to live there, even me or you.. so you don't have to.
You just bought for all the money left for the sales $500k solar panels at the best price you could bargain today $0.5 per watt.
That gave you
$500,000 / $0.5 per watt = 1,000 kw of power in solar panel !!! to worry about
or 1 Megawatt own electricity plant that produce ZERO emission !!

Now you could walk and ask for million dollars grants, subsidies RECs and Carbon Fees to pocket it all ( in somebody else expense).

But you don't need this.
All you need is NO RED TAPE and free and fair market economy.

At today energy prices :

1,000 kw (your power plant) x 5 kwh ( output per day) x $0,06 (electricity wholesale price) x 365 day ( no allowance for rainy day given ) = $109,000 income per year

That is what your average city apartment is worth put to work.

You get around that problem by simply using the solar farm to charge batteries that are then transported by solar train to the cities.

d1 said...
Macro, the transmission infrastructure is the deal breaker. Transmission lines are all lossy - have you done the calculations? DC transmission is indeed more efficient - you are correct on this point for the wrong reasons, however, superconductivity at room temperature is a pie in the sky.

The second deal breaker is the peaky nature of solar. Good storage for PV-generated energy hasn't been developed yet. So, at night, you'll have to rely on an alternatively generated baseload energy. My pick for that would be nuclear - it's a great option for Australia, because the fuel cycle can be closed fully, and the carbon emissions are almost none.

-transmiting line - supplied by state or listing company
-output is 6kw per day from 1kw solar panel so I did account for 5kw only for safety
-Storage is next good business to do. If electricity prices vary from 6 cents to 20c in peak power , so allow me to buy at 6c during the low and sell for 20 at peak and I will build you the next molten salt battery to next city home sold.
That could be even better business that solar one.

I have available to me around five acres of land on the north side of a hill. This is on the mid north coast of NSW, so not a million miles from anywhere, and actually in the middle of a fairly well populated area with the largest power stations around 400 kms away in the Hunter Valley.

I would not mind doing something like this there. Sure you will get more cloudy days on the coast and sometimes it rains for weeks upon end. However its fairly sunny there plus much of the infrastructure is already closeby, decent roads and big powerlines.

I also have a flat in the city, not worth $500K but close to it. However half of that is owing on our mortgage.


Its either this, or planting macadamia nut trees.

Macroscien said...
Then there is smart trick that solar panel are build in aluminum frame already. That one could be used to carry the current also on the solar farm saving on copper connection cables.

That's not practical for a few reasons. One of them would be that the DC current will eat away half of the frame due to stray current corrosion.

Here is some more feed for you idea generator, Macro: 80% efficient PV, instead of the current 19% : arstechnica.com:443/science/2013/04/ibms-solar-tech-is-80-efficient-thanks-to-supercomputer-know-how/

Mobydisc said...
I have available to me around five acres of land on the north side of a hill. This is on the mid north coast of NSW, so not a million miles from anywhere, and actually in the middle of a fairly well populated area with the largest power stations around 400 kms away in the Hunter Valley.

I would not mind doing something like this there. Sure you will get more cloudy days on the coast and sometimes it rains for weeks upon end. However its fairly sunny there plus much of the infrastructure is already closeby, decent roads and big powerlines.

I also have a flat in the city, not worth $500K but close to it. However half of that is owing on our mortgage.


Its either this, or planting macadamia nut trees.

I have few acres myself in the middle of the city but covered by very big trees... so not much lucky unless I could buy some cheap dirt nearby to test my ideas...
I have also macadamias

I think that investment in solar could be reasonably safe as we do not:
- expect price of electricity to drop from existing 6 c per kw wholesale, most likely will rise dramatically
- the phase of sudden drop in solar panel is possibly behind - that what I was expecting and warning all those spending life time saved money say $30,000 on 1.5 kilowatt systems!!
-still exist some RECs and other government carbon incentive that could be cashed (at expense of those that don't invest in solar )

There still could be some small improvement on panel efficiency from existing 19% to maybe 30 but that at this moment increase price dramatically

Macroscien said...
you could bargain today $0.5 per watt.

Can you get $0.5 per watt installed (i.e. including inverters, cabling, mount rails + labour and connection to the grid)? I don't think so.

Macroscien said...

( no allowance for rainy day given )

well you should allow for rainy and cloudy days. Also for performance degradation due to high temperatures, panel degradation over time, and other factors.

If you want to get more realistic production figures for given location per year I suggest some solar design tools, for example Sunny Design by SMA (http://www.sma.de/en/products/plant-planning/sunny-design.html or web based version of the same www.sunnydesignweb.com/sdweb/SunnyDesign/Home)

There is lot of information about PV on whirlpool forums (forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum/143)

d1 said...

And talking about storage - Macro - you mentioned molten sodium.

Actually folks in US built a molten salt storage for their village.
Concrete silos at dimension of that average home.
And that is not for thermal storage but direct electro-chemical storage - so doesn't require steam turbine to operate, just direct current to the grid like your super sized battery.

That is were scale only may things cost effective.

IMO 1.5 kw solar systems as proposed and installed on roofs across the country today are TOTAL WASTE of money.

That is why such project should be carried as community or cooperative.

This way you are not also tired 24/24 to look after it 7/7.

Mobydisc said...
From what I understand of electricity generation in Australia is most of it is generated by coal fired steam turbines.

Once small producers come into the electricity market they will be treated and fought fiercely as competition by main players.
That is why I don't ask for 60c or privileges to small producers but at least same fair play rules that are strictly govern by authorities.
If rules are left to BIG companies they will try to rip off both end user customer to exaggerating price and small supplier by cuttig there profit.

In perfect world existing electricity market could be subdivided into smaller localized markets driven. Imaging a remote village that setup cooperative solar farm.
They could cut off of monopoly dominance separating their village grid and purchase from external grid when they need at the price they want to pay.
Remember than in few years time ALL homes will have Electric Vehicles plug in into their their grid and without any regret they could charge their own battery instead off selling electricity to the grid for penny or loss.
Then electricity will compete against petrol prices directly and that one will not drop for sure.

Macroscien said...
In real world your solar system 1.6kW is worth $1600 not $??? you and taxpayers spent on your installation.

it's mostly my money - I just had 5.5 kW system installed so I know how much I paid vs government rebate

Macroscien said...

$1 per watt including inverter is the real cost of the equipment at nowadays price and I don't want even know how much labour , certificates and other RED TAPE cost.
This is ready now out of the box solution that I could nail to my roof shed and don't need to spent any penny more.

I agree that cost of labour is high in Australia but don't mix safety and compliance with red tape especially where electricity is involved, approach like this gets people killed. The system needs to be installed and signed off by qualified people and that costs money

TRAIN GAIN

Imagine that electricity market is now open for all players.

Gina R must send her trains full of iron ore anyway from the mine to the port.

But then she decided not to this do at random but smart way.

She load and run electric train express at night at low electric traffic buying electricity to power her train to 180 km/h at 6 cents a kilowatt/hour.

Then the route is calculated to reach destination at peak power, then train instead of brakes employs the same motors to produce electricity back to the train grid.

Now selling it at 46 cents (peak power price)

Is it worth it or shouldn't be bothered at all?

For calculation we could use the biggest train BHP ever used - 100,000 tons in capacity. Speeding at 180 km/h ( or 50 m/s) and accumulated such energy

100,000,000 kg x 50 m/s x 50 m/s /2 = 125,000 Mega Jule

Now she is going to sell it at the gain

46c she is selling - 6c kwh she bought = 40 cents profit on 1 kWh

now to convert train energy to dollar $$

125,000 MJ / 3.6 (conversion to kwh) x $0.4 per kwh = $13,888 profit

Not bad, Just for synchronizing departure time and arrival time with best electricity prices for one train.

Now how many trains per year with iron ore are running every year ?

Then suppose all trains with iron ore in Australian are synchronized smartly from now on. What about coal may you ask ?
(It will be impractical to synchronize passenger trains even if you could run 350 km/h Who want to wait for departure till lower electric tarrif then wait for peak ?)

420,000,000 tones ( yearly export) / 100,000 tones (one train) = 4200 trains running full load from mine to the shipping port every year with iron ore only.

4200 trains x $13.8k profit on electricity on single train = $58 millions extra pocket cash on smart train timetables

Paradox said...

myusernam said...
you'll need a flux capacitor if you want to hook your dc straight into the grid

Nah - just use a theta-matrix compositor integrated into the articulation frame. Works every time.

No that the beauty of the Solar PV that you don't need flux capacitor at all to integrate DC lines in comparison to AC lines that do require a such.

Nobody is looking at this from the perspective of the local electricity utility.
They are trying to balance the supply and demand.
The demand is of course fluctuating so they want a steady supply like from hydro or coal, NG or nuclear.
As the supply comes more from wind and solar it becomes more intermittent as wind is gusty and the sun is subject to clouds.
Their paying customers raise holy hell when the power blacks out because the supply and demand fluctuates too much to keep the grid going.
Steady baseline power 24 hours a day is needed to keep the grid going.

Beaglebuddy said...
Nobody is looking at this from the perspective of the local electricity utility.
They are trying to balance the supply and demand.
The demand is of course fluctuating so they want a steady supply like from hydro or coal, NG or nuclear.
As the supply comes more from wind and solar it becomes more intermittent as wind is gusty and the sun is subject to clouds.
Their paying customers raise holy hell when the power blacks out because the supply and demand fluctuates too much to keep the grid going.
Steady baseline power 24 hours a day is needed to keep the grid going.

Americas (our also) power grid is designed to trip over ( or fail if you like ) at nearest bigger fluctuation. Like block of cards to collapse. AC synchronization could not be technically assured at extreme fluctuation demands or bigger capacity failure.

Time to switch to DC to avoid black nights nightmare in the metropolitan city .

myusernam said...
do you know anything about DC at all? like high school knowledge? Google it mate. there's a reason why we dont use it for transmission

There were reasons to use alternating current instead of direct good hundred years ago. Now with semiconductors invented things changed a bit .
Those years transformer was a God , now is inverter.

PS. High temperature superconductors are just around next corner, We should see them very soon.

I will tell you why existing technology based on AC is No1 enemy of all Green Power Sources.
For traditional generator that spin by water or steam turbine doesn't matter much you could create any AC format easy.
But solar panel produce static direct current that you need to transform into AC:
-using expensive inverters that add you your cost of home base Solar PV
- wind turbines spin at diferent rate depending on wind and synchronization with the grid is a pain
- you loose at least 10% in the changing DC to AC (from solar panel to the grid) then 10% again when you plug in your iPad then run on DC again.
Multiply this x1000 when you do plug in EV in nearest future not small iPad.

If your grid is DC than all your Solar panels -you plug in directly without all this problems above and associated costs., All you need is to match the voltage ( and polarization don't forget RED is positive !)

There are more tricks in the sleeve of solar panels.
Because every solar panel is build from single cells that produce a fraction of 1 volt, but there are plenty , millions of them like pixels in your LCD TV then
voltage could be VERY HIGH without any converting electronics when all connected is series .

jn1 said...
1) Macro: the "5 kwh" term in your formula I don't understand. Could you explain this formula ?
2) I would go with nuclear me personally..

- 1kw solar panel will produce only when sun is shining. During 24 hour day average total output is between 5 to 6 kilowatts hours. We are lucky to b here. We have much more then Europe or China that is always cloudy.

similar is wind power with the difference that is less predictable but statistically you could assume output at 25% on average to 35% for the windiest places. So Wind energy output from 1KW could be slightly higher but due to complex mechanical machinery I doubt that Wind could win the race against Solar. There is no bottom limit prices for solar panels, how much they could drop, but to build a tower and generator , blades put it together always need a lot of quality material and labor

-me too, even thermonuclear but that will kill .....the electricity business completely unless we find another use for electric power. Soon after implementation of first nuclear station there was saying that " electricity become too cheap to even meter ..."

beside before we have such abundant energy we have to learn to save it in first place ... turn off all light.. turn off aircon... build smarter energy efficient devices...
this simply seems to be right thing to do.