Estevan considered for solar power

[oneoff]

Getting distracted with battery arguments

[oneoff]

Cm'on tweety help us get that Powerhouse.ca Live Tracking up and running again. There really is all the information there to prove beyond a doubt that your ideas only work economically with 80 cent (or so) prices per Kwh for the package. On other fronts they make little sense at all. Somebody also has to pay for that 80 cent (plus markups, distribution losses etc)

And just how many regular homeowners were able to even finance 100.000 dollars set ups a fraction of nameplate output. You types will only catch on when you prove it to yourself

Are you people up to it...and if not what are your limitations or hangups preventing common sense prevailing. Maybe there is help needed from someone else

[AlbertaFarmer5]

Seems to be a lot of coal around, like 250 year's worth (similar to NG) at current consumption rates:

[URL="http://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=coal_reserves"]http://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=coal_reserves[/URL]

And that is before we even start to explore the energy potential from kerogen.

Seems to me that there is a lot of needless panic around the issue of fossil fuels supply. We grossly underestimate the power of human ingenuity, likely losing sight of it due to selfish, short-term thinking borne from nihilistic thinking such as that demonstrated by negativists like "Dr." Suzuki and the Goracle.

In other words, we are witnessing and experiencing the unhappy and injurious spectacle of politics leading "science".

And most of us underestimate the power of exponential growth.

[Hamloc]

Tweety, if you listen to the messaging of the left they simply want natural resources left in the ground. They are not worried about saving them for future generations.
Chuck2, if a grid tied solar system takes 25 years to payback at 10 cents a kwh what profit is there for a power company to build a solar farm and get payed 10 cents a kwh? My guess is they will want much more than 10 cents.
General question, in our climate do you have to plow snow in between the rows of solar panels to facilitate cleaning?

[tweety]

My experience with batteries is that good ones are really handy for cordless impact drivers and any remote use 6 feet or more from a utility electrical outlet. The last free ones were doled out by Radio Shack a free decades ago

Draining a battery isn't free. You do that for a thousand times or less and your're set up for replacing it.

Sigh, the battery is non renwable energy. Charging the battery is renewable energy. Zoomed right over the head lol.

[oneoff]

More batteries....my bad

[chuckChuck]

Hamloc, here is the answer below to your question about costs of various types of utility scale electricity in the USA. Estevan will have their own numbers. Look at how cheap wind is. Solar PV is not far behind.

Residential or farm scale costs for solar pv according to Boyd Solar are around 10 cents per kwh now. And will likely fall as efficiency increases. Exchange rates matter on some things but panels are manufactured in Canada.

I talked with a solar supplier yesterday. The ground mount panels are at 70 degrees in the winter and 20 degrees in the summer to maximize capacity . 90 degrees is vertical 0 degrees is horizontal.

Snow will not sit on a 70 degree panel unless it is wet. I expect 95% of the time there will be no snow issues as the panels also warm up and melt off as they are a dark surface with glass just a few centimeters between the glass and silicon.

Snow will be more of an issue on roof top panels. They will likely need to be cleaned some through out the winter. Adjustable ground mount solves this problem.

As with any system there will be maintenance required and systems will have to be designed to deal with it. I am sure Sask power knows this. Coal stations only run on average 85% of the time and require a lot of maintenance and upgrading.

Compare coal with CCS and the cost of wind or solar below. Which do you think is a better investment? Wind! Sask power is planning on 1600 mw of wind by 2030. Solar will play a smaller role.

http://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/pdf/electricity_generation.pdf
USA Average Levilized cots of energy (LCOE) for plants coming on stream in 2022 in USA in 2015 $/Mwh. No subsidies included.

Coal with CCS - $139.5
Natural Gas Conventional Combined cycle - $58.1
Natural Gas Advanced Combined cycle -$57.2
Natural Gas CC with CCS -$84.8
Natural Gas Conventional Combustion Turbine - $110.8
Natural Gas Advanced Combustion Turbine - $94.7

Advanced Nuclear - $102.8
Geothermal -$45
Biomass -$96.1

Wind - $64.5
Wind Offshore - $158.1
Solar PV - $84.7
Solar Thermal -$235.9
Hydroelectric -$67.8
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[oneoff]

Just contacted powerhouse.ca and reported their website live tracker seemed to be down. They weren't aware of it; but did confirm that it didn't work for the technician. Very nice chat

I was assured they'd check it out; so expect it will be back fairly quickly

Sorry for breaking it; but they should beef it up for rougher handling. LOL

[chuckChuck]

Oneoff I used a simple solar electricity calculator from the NREL and punched in Estevan and a 10 mw system with 1 axis tilt set at 45 degrees year round.

It said output is 18,730,101 kwh per year. At 11 cents per kwh which is what we pay it produces $2,060,311 worth of power in a year.

That would be an estimate. 10 mw (10,000 watts) is the maximum capacity of the panels when they are new and are pointing directly at the sun.

This is a simple calculator and will be an estimate. But this estimate is based on the solar resource at estevan.

[chuckChuck]

Saskpower says they are investing 25 -30 million for an estimated $2,060,311 worth of retail electricity each year from the 10mw at Estevan. At the high end of costs, the return on investment is 7% less the cost of operating, administration and depreciation. Again I have no way of knowing whether these are accurate numbers. See what Sask Power says.

[stonepicker]

" again i have no way of knowing if these are accurate numbers " ( chuck ) I give oneoff credit for being patient. Chuck, you've been shown reality time and again, yet you completely ignore the truth and go back to your generic web sites for brochure type information. Oneoff has done the math for you again and again but you refuse to acknowledge any value in what is presented to you. Amazing.

[blackpowder]

Extract "solar" and insert "cwb" and voila!!