The Market Value and Cost of Solar Photovoltaic Electricity

[dandoran59]

Holy cow am I that ignorant you talked way over my head and I have a college education whaT WAS THE POINT OF YOUR SPEACH?

[derlambic]

Mr. Borenstein states that production of PV systems should not be supported, but money should flow to R&D to get the prices down.

The idea that you can just do research until you have a robust, efficient and cheap PV system is ridiculous. Real technology development is a gradual process with small improvements in design, production & installation. Some of the improvements can only come from R&D, but many can just be found by actually producing. That is why we need to produce now.

[rjamesgoebel]

GREAT closing comment ! I now understand your overall argument. Very nicely done and I enjoyed it.

[rjamesgoebel]

Sorry, didnt read a little further.

But what?! Your response to the peaker plant, I don't understand your logic at all. Are you saying that because the PV array is on grid or providing power all the time, that it cannot be compared to that of a peaker plant? That really does not make much sense. If PV is a better option at peak times compared to other (used) peak options, then why not use it. Your response to that criticism was a bit off I think.

[soylentgreenb]

"But what?! Your response to the peaker plant, I don't understand your logic at all."

Peaker plants are used sparingly; only when they're absolutely necessary. Much of the power produced by a solar cell will necessarily end up replacing baseload because there is no peaker plants to replace.

If you pretend that all electricity that is produced by a solar cell replaces peaker plants you're massively overinflating the value of solar PV.

[rjamesgoebel]

This guy knows a lot more than me. But at 37minutes, there's hint of just the costs of the technology now. When it comes to the technology's efficiency (for panels), they ARE affected by the market's scale. There's no reason to think that they aren't, and there is some real research going on in that arena. You don't even mention that!!!!!!

[soylentgreenb]

"When it comes to the technology's efficiency (for panels), they ARE affected by the market's scale. There's no reason to think that they aren't, and there is some real research going on in that arena."

Traditional silicon PV panels are very mature technology; they're not becomming cheaper to produce or more efficient.

Cheaper panels require technological breakthroughs and if you want to hurry them along you shouldn't subsidize installation of crappy panels, you should spend money on research.

[rjamesgoebel]

Putting PV as distributed resources were transmission is constrained makes sense, but mention that it is competing with other generation options there too. We design traditional diesel gensets for distributed generation and based on what you've presented, I doubt that PV would be a better option.

[Trillion08]

Also, when people talk about costs and efficiency, they need to take this into account:

After a solar photovoltaic system is installed, the total amount of natural resources used from it through the next 25-30+ years is ZERO. It will continue to generate energy with ZERO wastes and byproducts. Other than very occasional routine maintenance, it takes ZERO dollars to generate energy from it.

[soylentgreenb]

"Other than very occasional routine maintenance, it takes ZERO dollars to generate energy from it."

Solar panels are very costly and it doesn't help that you have to pay that massive cost up front.

[Trillion08]

It's going to continue to grow and continue to improve. BTW it's hilarious how he says since the technology is improving, we should "hold off" until it does get better. How retarded is that! Look at computers - should I have held off on last years laptop purchase because the ones this year have twice as much memory and run for $200 less than what I played? And what am I gonna do in the meantime - use a pen and notepad?

[soylentgreenb]

"How retarded is that! Look at computers - should I have held off on last years laptop purchase because the ones this year have twice as much memory and run for $200 less than what I played?"

Red herring. He's saying you should buy the Intel or AMD processor(wind turbines, geothermal HDR etc.) and hold off on the crappy VIA processor until it is actually competitive.

[Trillion08]

Even the CA Solar Initiative has major issues and is weighed down with excessive bureaucracy. But the solar industry is still going to continue to grow, just dont wait around for the govt or big utility to truly back it (no matter what they say).

Renewable/sustainable energy is just another way Americans can reclaim some of their indepence from big govt/big utility. Almost every consumer who has installed a photovoltaic system absolutely loves it and feels it was one of their wisest investmen

[Trillion08]

No matter what this guy says, the solar industry has been growing at an average rate of 32% a year: "uring this time, PV market value is forecast to more than triple from US$14.5 billion to over $50 billion with an average annual growth rate of 32% with the strongest growth

predicted in the next couple years."

Sure we are way behind countries like Germany who's govt give huge subsidies.. but when was the last time you depended on our govt to "do the right thing"?

[Iconoclast421]

Wow this is one nice hit piece on solar! What wonderful presentations paid hacks and shills can come up with these days! I love how he says we can just import LNG. Never mind the fact that nat gas in north america will be totally wiped out in less than 10 years. The rate of decline is staggering. But dont worry, the world wont decline, so lets just import gas till its all gone and then crawl under a rock and die because we didnt build out the infrastructure for hi-volume solar PV production!