Solar Energy: Large Scale Production

Key is to connect facility to the power grid and sell power to the consumer at a competitive rate:

• Current costs are about 1$ per KWH for Solar Generated Electricity
• Average price for the country from coal, hydro, nuclear,etc is about 13 cents per KWH

De-Centralized vs Centralized Mythology

• Decentralized idea --> individual rooftops of homeowners and businesses decouple the community from the power grid

• Centralized --> large facility in sunny climate is connected to the community via transmission lines (e.g. Eastern Oregon sends power to Willamette Valley)

Because transmission losses are low (approximately 1% per 60--100 km) a solar PV facility that is within a few 100 km of the community is a more cost-effective investment than the decentralized model.

How Can Solar Large Scale Production Then Occur?

• Subsidize the industry so that the goverment absorbs most of the costs
• Wait for technological breakthrough --> amorphous silicates; thin films ??
• Make the consumer pay the real costs of energy generated by other means
• TAX fossil fuel consumption !

What Large Scale Facilites Are There?

California has 90% of the current world's solar electricty production!
• Solar Thermal dominates over Solar PV production
• Capacity is currently 371 Megawatts
• A new coal fired plant has a capacity of 1000 Megawatts
• Total capacity requirements of US are about 100,000 Megawatts
• Current solar production is thus 0.4% of total

  How much is 370 Megawatts?

• 300,000 KWH over an 8 hour period
• Typical Home would use about 10 KWH in this period
• So 30,000 homes could be supplied with power

What about PV production facilities?

• Capital costs are huge
• Operating costs are trivial
• Therefore its difficult to meter the product - electricity
• PV power is not subject to price fluctuation like fuel-based power generation
• Reliability is high; Annual variation in insolation is about 1% and failure rate of PV's is known an an be compensated for.
• In many respects a large scale PV facility is like a hydroelectric dam --> high capital costs, low operating costs, river flow subject to fluctuation due to precipitation --> but Hydro is 15 times more efficient than PV panels (so KWH costs are 15 times less!)
• PV facility is ideal for supplementing the power grid
• PV is a decreasing-cost technology as the price drops by about 30% when manufacturing output doubles --> suggests that one should invest in this technology now
• Polluting technologies have enormous hidden costs which PV's don't
• PV plant's do fit in the corporate hierarchy!

  * PV cells are small, have no moving parts and do not require large organizations to maintain them and to schedule downtime and retrofits.

  * PV cells do not need organizational support to negotiate fuel contracts and to keep track of fuel inventories and purchases.

  * PV cells cannot be dispatched and hence do not respond to traditional decision-making authority.

  Hence, rate increases should never occur for PV supplied electricity!

Conclusion: PV technology is likely to offer improved efficiency and lower manufacturing costs over time. If subsidies can be used to offset initial capital costs then the price to the consumer becomes competetive.

Read More about PVs

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