PV Gap

Jerry Said:

Why is Dep of Interior blocking 800 Alternative Energy plants?

We Answered:

Please cite your source

Your numbers do not appear to be correct.

The cost of construction of a 90 mile by 90 mile solar photovoltaic cell solar farm in the Arizona desert is approximately 2 Trillion dollars.

That does not include the annual maintenance costs which are very high. The annual maintenance cost of a facility of that size is approximately 200 billion dollars per year.

The annual electricity production of such a solar photovoltaic cell farm is approximately 1 Trillion Kilowatt hours of Electricity per year.

Annual electricity usage in The United States of America is over 2 Trillion kilowatt hours of electricity per year.

Your facility would produce less than half the electricity used in The United States of America.

When you consider the line losses of transmitting that electricity the amount of electricity deliverd to the final end user would be less than on fourth the amount of electricity used in The United States of America.

You would need a facility approximately 4 times the size that you describe to provide all of the electrical needs of The United States of America.

Also your facility does not produce electricty at night. What is your source of electricty for use at night?

Also electrical production from your facility varies with the time of year.

Although electrical production in the summer is very high, your electrical production is only a fraction of that during winter when the sun is low in the sky and the days of sunlight sre shorter.

Also you have not considered the losses of transmitting electricity over several thousand miles of electrical lines. Transmitting electricity over those distances results in losses of over 50%.

The cost of production of electricity from such a facility just for the maintenance costs is over 20 cents per kilowatt hour of electricity.

When you factor in losses of over 50% to transmit that electricity to the final end user that doubles the cost of production to over 40 cents per kilowatt hour of electricity that is actually delivered to the final end user.

That is a very expensive way to produce electricity.

These costs do not include the cost of the capital to build the facility or the cost of building the necessary transmission lines which is also significant.

Current costs of production on electricity by conventional means are on the order of 3 to 5 cents per kilowatt hour of electricity.

The cost of production of electricity from a facility such as the one that you describe is over 10 times the cost of production of electricity from conventional plants.

If we cannot afford $4.00 gas how can we afford electricity from a plant of the kind that you describe.

Also what do you do for electricity when they have sandstorms which knock the facility off line.

Sandstorms are very common in the Arizona desert.

It is well known that if cost is no object there are many ways to produce electricity.

the facility that you describe produces electricty at a cost that is much higher than the average American Citizen can afford.

Only the very wealthy can afford electricty from a facility such as the one that you describe.

Russell Said:

Why solar power is not used by all in Phoenix, Arizona? It leaves no mess behind. Think People!!?

We Answered:

Because there is no good way to store the energy.
Batteries are expensive and they do leave lots of "mess" behind.