Durham solar panel maker plans startling technology

I take it that this is some form of concentrating solar but without mirrors?

Company X could have a 75% efficient solar panel but if companies and families can't afford it then it's a worthless achievement, at least in terms of helping to meet our energy needs.

from my previous post:
Semprius Advantage

* Unique design and assembly - Low cost
* Many cells - Highly redundant, improved reliability
* Very small cells - Thermal management at no added cost
* Short optical path - Very high efficiency optics, thin and light
* Wide optical acceptance angle - Reduced tracker cost
http://www.semprius.com/cpv_products.htm
Photo of the unit here: http://www.semprius.com /

We need a ready supply of solar panels in this country that are good quality, reliable, and that most families can afford. As long as we chase the almighty percentage increase the only ones who will benefit are the wealthy, the military, and NASA.

But we need 100 gigs of solar.

And as far as Spectrolabs 39% efficiency, on a house's roof, we're talking about generating 250% 0f what the house uses, payback at twice the price (not 30k but 60k) is in 8 years. 165k for the next 22 yrs. Banks will look at these numbers very favorably.

I like this thermal management idea, but the bigger picture involves more than just cost, SO yes, how the financial community reacts is important too. Plus Having a 39% panel drives down the price of other older style panels. And Spectrolabs panels are 1000 suns too

http://fuelzilla.com/solar/Spectrolab-s-Two-Millionth-Solar-Cell-efficiencies-of-39-pe-17620-1.htm

Not bad Semprius panels are 36% efficient, very close to the Spectrolab panels. But in the Lab, it took Boeing over 2 yrs to get theirs out of the lab.

That scenario is why both centralized and decentralized generation is needed. That will prevent the need to have natural gas plants at the ready (expensive).

I agree with the 100 gigs of solar... actually 400 gigs of solar.
And 400 gigs of wind.
And 400 gigs of geothermal power.
And whatever we can get from tidal power and wave power.

...all feeding into energy storage of whatever type is most appropriate.

Don't forget that solar plants don't produce anything close to their label capacity over the course of the day.

The world's most agressive solar power program has been in Germany. They get a bit over 10% of their label capacity.

What I meant in my earlier post was actual capacity, not nameplate:

400 Gigs of solar... with storage adequate to provide 24/7 energy output
400 Gigs of wind ... ditto with storage
400 Gigs of geothermal power ... which needs no energy storage
And, of course as much tidal power and wave power as we can get... with storage if it is appropriate.

edit to add: this is a long term strategy, of course.

Probably lower in the current economy.

Of course solar capacity factors would also be highest around this time of year too... so 100 GW of solar plants might cover 3% or so of that.

SO I assumed 500 gigs.

as opposed to what it is "now".

But the point remains that there's a difference between a GW of hydro capacity and a GW of solar capacity... because the first can produce that capacity pretty much any time while the second only averages 10-20% of that amount.

It's interesting that you compare the OP with hydro.

With global climate change comes what... droughts and floods. Both of those can significantly reduce the output of hydro power plants.

If anything, global climate change will make solar power *more* important for our energy needs. CPV does not do well in humid climates but global climate change will expand deserts greatly and CPV will be one of the important solar technologies in those regions.

Efficiency measures how much of the sun's energy is converted to electricity. That's already included in the label capacity for a given unit. So that would impact how much area is needed to produce a certain peak production.

The capacity factor measures how much of that peak capacity is actually produced over the course of a period of time. That number is limited by the simple fact that the sun doesn't shine all day long (or evenly during the daylight hours).

Regular solar PV is between 15% and 20% (averages closer to 15%) efficient. Concentrated PV (CPV) has higher efficiency (this company says they are at 32% now but expect to be in the high 30s once they reach full production). Seems like almost doubling the efficiency should do something to the actual capacity factor.

And there are no blanket statements possible as in your earlier post, "the first can produce that capacity pretty much any time while the second only averages 10-20% of that amount." It depends on where in the country the solar panel/CPV is located. Refer to the solar map at the link below:
http://www.wholesalesolar.com/Information-SolarFolder/SunHoursUSMap.html
... also, you can select a city nearest you to find the number of hours of peak sunlight per day average and the high and low numbers for your area.

As you can see from the map, it makes the most sense to put a high percentage of our solar panels where they will make the most power (zones 1 and 2) versus putting them in zones 4 or 5. This, to me, is the flaw in the grand plan of the decentralized power generation crowd. Putting adequate amounts of solar generation in zone 5 versus zone 1 or 2 would cost double or triple the amount, take twice or thrice the time -- and that will slow down the process of getting off of coal by 2x or 3x.

We have enough smart people here in America to figure out the best places to put the various types of solar (CVP, Concentrating Solar Thermal, and regular PV) and where to put the wind farms and geothermal power stations that will enable us to end the use of coal. If we're smart about it we can end coal relatively quickly. If we buy into the distributed generation crowd's vision then it will take far longer... perhaps longer than we have before the catastrophic results of global climate change are irreversible.

Efficiency tells you how large a panel needs to be to produce a certain number of watts. So if you had an acre of PV panels at 20% efficiency and another acre at 40% (close to the current peak), the second one would be rated at twice the peak capacity. So if we imagine building out this 100GWs with more efficient technologies, they won't take as many acres to install them... but they won't necessarily have different capacity factors. If they both received comparable amounts of sunlight and had similar tracking systems, the first plant would produce half as much power, but as a ratio of the half-as-large peak capacity, the capacity factor would be about the same. Obviously this simplifies things somewhat.

And there are no blanket statements possible as in your earlier post, "the first can produce that capacity pretty much any time while the second only averages 10-20% of that amount." It depends on where in the country the solar panel/CPV is located.

Certainly. That's why I picked a really big range. Germany has done a better job with solar than any other nation, but they average just a whisker over 10%. This is primarily because of their lower insolation. Plenty of part of the US are much higher, but we wouldn't be installing all of our capacity in Nevada and Arizona (where 20% could be quite reasonable). So I grabbed the whole range.

As you can see from the map, it makes the most sense to put a high percentage of our solar panels where they will make the most power (zones 1 and 2) versus putting them in zones 4 or 5.

That's true... and not just because they provide the most electrical bang for our bucks (in terms of CF). It's also because those parts of the country have a high demand for electricity close to the time when solar power is peaking (though not exactly, so some storage would help). It's perfectly ok to have a comparatively high (say 20%) percentage of your generating portfolio be solar if the days when solar gives you next to nothing (cool cloudy winter days) are also the days when you have the lowest demand anyway. But that also means that we aren't using solar to help level out the variable contribution from wind in other parts of the country. You're not going to ship much power from Nevada to New York on a calm day.

Another reason to locate large solar farms in the desert southwest versus the Pacific Northwest or New Jersey, for instance.

"Seattle has only 58 clear days per year and usually in the summer
Tampa Bay usually has lots of sunshine
So does Los Angeles & Miami

Minneapolis, Denver, Raleigh, & Charlotte are about average on sunshine.
They see usually 250 days of sunshine a year.
Phoenix gets the most sunshine days of the year. Nearly 350 days
Washington & New York usually have 244 days of sunshine a year

Cleveland, Detroit, & Chicago get around 230 days of sunshine"
... from http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090316142716AAQKSOA
... I'm not sure those figures are exact but do seem close in my experience.

This page below seems to follow tougher criteria: no city gets more than 242 sunshiny days a year:
... http://www.weathertoday.net/weatherfacts/numbersunny_city_asc.php

What this tells me is that overcapacity and energy storage are even more critical than even I had previously thought. Also, that there is no one silver bullet to all our energy needs. We need all forms of solar, wind, geothermal power, tidal power, and wave power we can get.

And, no, I'm not forgetting about Nega-Watts (the watts you don't have to use due to efficiency improvements). I am a 100% proponent of electric vehicles (use only 20% the energy), High speed rail instead of flying (saves a lot but not sure the exact number), LED lighting (use only 15% the energy), Geothermal heating and cooling (uses only 20-30% the energy for heating and cooling), efficient building techniques like PassiveHaus and PNC SmartHome (use only 10 to 20% of a normal structure). We need as much effort put into efficiency as we do in renewable energy generation.

At some day in the future, our reduced demand because of efficiency will intersect with our increased generation of renewable energy and we will have wiped out fossil fuel use forever. Our descendants and the planet will thank us for having the courage and intelligence to end fossil fuels before it's too late.

There's no way to make this technology "safe". The government immediately went into coverup mode but we already know that dozens of people were killed... perhaps many more.

How many more innocent lives need to end before we realize that we're just caving to corporate profit pressures?

It's kind of unfair to paint high speed rail as dangerous because of its growing pains (not making light of the tragedy, just calling it like it is) in China. And, unlike in the United Corporation States of Amurrka, those responsible will be removed from their positions immediately, probably jailed and if those in charge knew of dangers beforehand they may be executed. Here in the UCSA the people who murdered our economy and caused millions to be tossed out of their homes got multi-million dollar bonuses and a free pass to $16 Trillion in zero interest loans.

You forgot about the high speed rail in France, Germany, Italy, Japan all operating with a good safety record.

As for Corporate profiteering, may I refer you to the past 5,000 years of greed and the worship of money. In short, it doesn't matter what we use for transportation... some greedy a-hole is going to make money off of it. Unless you think the airline industry is a charitable organization.

And have a poor sense of sarcasm. :)

I thought you were being serious. It's very hard to discern if a poster is kidding or serious without the smilies...
:hi:

Build 100Gw, you average 33Gw. Solar is probably not too far from that. SO build 300 gigs of wind, you'll see 100Gw, you wont know where or when for the most part.

I'm not sure but I think capacity would refer to the 1/3rd number, Have to look see what the industry uses.

Where did you come across the 33% output figure? Just curious.

Point #2, you are right that there will be great variability in output from each wind turbine. That is why I believe the US is foolish in its failure to use pumped hydro energy storage along with wind to store the energy whenever it is being generated and then use it when it's needed. The situation today has wind farms shutting down their turbines quite often because the utility company does not need any more power.

33% industry figures for new turbines, 23% sounds like existing installed wind turbines, which includes older designs, more likely being used in Europe. All new construction will be in the 3/1 area, Jerome A Paris has written about this in EU, hes a financial consultant for wind projects in the EU.

Storage. Maybe you miss the point, If we continue to use coal and nukes, we have traditional base load. Dont need storage to get you thru the night in this situation. If all you want to do is expand Amercias energy portfolio with solar and wind, storage is an option..

If you wish to replace traditional base load (nukes and coal) with non traditional base load (solar and wind) storage makes it possible, and is vital. If you want to get a high percent from solar and wind, 90%? then storage is vital.

Of course none of these goals are possible without the use of HVDC trunklines to move electricity long distances.

I believe the most important step is to end the use of all fossil fuels. Then, as the amount of renewable energy increases, end the use of nuclear power until the world is powered 100% by renewable energy.

From Wikipedia's article "Worldwide Energy Consumption"
Note that the above includes *all* energy sources currently used, fossil or otherwise. Note that solar alone can provide 4 times the current total worldwide energy consumption, wind can provide 100% of worldwide energy with a little room to grow, geothermal power can provide 100% of 2008 energy usage but with not much room to grow. And I think the author is seriously underestimating ocean energy but nobody has the illusion that it can provide all our energy.

And from the same page:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Available_Energy-4.png

This graphic shows that solar energy dwarfs all human energy consumption. The quoted paragraph above is representative of the amount we are likely to be able to extract.

And, yes, the only way we are going to get anywhere above 20% renewables is with energy storage (whether it be on site, local, regional, national or a combination of all of them).

PS, I just ran across this today: http://greentransportandenergy.blogspot.com/2009/04/underground-pumped-hydro-storage-to.html
... It's an interesting idea: making your own pumped hydro energy storage by tunnelling down 1.8 miles and excavating from the rock. I call that having a pair of brass ones...

If anything, I think we can look forward to a future with far more sunshine - hot and dry with periods of "WTF was THAT?"

Dry period followed by heavy rains are what dams are FOR. in most cases, power generation is a secondary benefit.

Is there even a commercial concentrator system out there?

The two schools of solar commercialization thought can be broadly classified as:

1. Take a cheap, manufacturable technology and try improve the efficiency, and

2. Take an efficient technology and try to make it cheap.

It's been fun watching those two camps do battle for the last forty or so years, but it kind of gets to be like the headline "World's Oldest Person Dies". It's a neat story, until you notice that it pops up every couple of months.

That and "Bus Plunge Kills X In (Insert Country)". Although with the "bus plunge" stories, I've always thought it would be possible to develop a universal bus plunge model where you take:

1. Depth of the ravine;

2. Number of passengers aboard / number of depths

3. Degrees of latitude from the equator

...and plot those in three dimensional space. My hunch is that these parameters will allow one to develop an empirical curve to model bus plunges to a fairly high degree of accuracy.

In many parts of the country heating needs are almost equal to their electrical needs and concentrating sunlight can provide a big chunk of their heating needs. Very big in Sweden.

I know there must be an annual convention somewhere.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_plunge

Unfortunately, the Plunge Of The Month site is no longer updated: http://users.lmi.net/tcs55/

The other is mechanical failure.

That's why the tropics is the "bus plunge zone".

Again.

Until next week's solar breakthrough to save the world.

And we won't know which one is going to be deemed the "best" -- and maybe none will stand out but the competition between the different companies will force many different style solar panels to be better in the end. Either way... it's a win, win for us (the occupants of planet Earth).

Unfortunately.

I've seen that up close.

Tech sounds promising, hype doesn't.

The concept is sound, the technology should be scalable, and if they don't completely botch it they have a great shot at being a big player in the market.

They're going about it the proper way, starting with a 20MW/year pilot plant before jumping into their 800MW full scale production plant. I wish them luck. And because the actual solar collector occupies only .1% of the cell (the rest being concentrator) it has an edge already: reducing the expensive part and relying on cheap materials to bring the sun to it, in highly concentrated form.

on a cloudless day, at high noon when the Earth is at perihelion. About 2 square miles.

Multiply by 4-6x to make something that's feasible year-round.

CPV systems high efficiency minimizes the number of trackers and amount of land required for a project. CPV's ground-mounted deployments reduce installation and operations & maintenance costs. Lastly, CPV systems are very modular and can address multiple markets; they can be readily installed close to the load, avoiding congested transmission lines or in central solar farms.
... http://www.semprius.com/cpv_products.htm

CPV offers the lowest solar Levelized Cost of Energy (cents per kWh) in sunny, dry climates. High energy (kWh) production is achieved through use of two-axis trackers and gallium arsenide-based, multi-junction solar cells, which provide the highest conversion efficiency and lowest temperature degradation. Energy production is well-matched to high demand periods, such as summer afternoons, which have the highest time-of-delivery multipliers.
... http://www.semprius.com/cpv_products.htm



Given 1366 watts per sq meter, 32% efficiency, 100% separation between panels = 218.56 watts per sq meter, aka .21856
800 megawatts x .21856 = 174,848,000 sq meters

Answer: 174848000 m² = 67.5091 mi²
OR 67 mi² and 14195408.5 ft²

Aka a patch of land 8.2 miles wide and 8.2 miles long.