PV Gap

Marcus Said:

Monitor Solar Power production on a server?

We Answered:

If the metered data can be written to an excel spreadsheet the bar graph could be generated from that.

Dwight Said:

Can you relate hydro power to production and possibility curve?

We Answered:

Hydro power is the cheapest way to gain electricity. The dam can be used for agriculture. But it causes big damages to the environment, rain forest, fish stock,and cultivated lands.To build such hydro power today is almost impossible because local people will protest to death. Only in some countries such as Myanmar and China, it is still possible anyway.Solar and wind turbine are expensive, and have mostly to be imported.It's still not economically feasible in developing countries. In terms of PPC, the opportunity cost however might be decreasing. Because solar and wind are renewable energy resources. It is environmental friendly. The PC might be convex in this case.

Ronald Said:

what types of hazardous substances are used or created in the production of solar power and nuclear power?

We Answered:

At their most basic:

(1) A nuclear reactor uses the enriched uranium isotope U-235, along with deuterium oxide ("heavy water"). The heavy water itself isn't dangerous, but it can become heavily radioactively contaminated if the containment chamber is compromised, and also causes thermal pollution in cases where it is recycled from a large body of water, such as with the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) in Southern California (about 20 miles way from me...) The uranium needs to be mined, and transported, and separated into the necessary isotope (power and chemical intensive), and the "waste" uranium (which is 90%+ of what you brought to the refinery) needs to be disposed of. The U-235 needs to be assembled into fuel rods, which is a very highly polluting process. But for all of its science-fiction sounding technology, a nuclear reactor is nothing more than a steam turbine along the style of 100 years ago. It just has a more efficient turbine, and instead of using coal to heat the water, it uses heat generated by radioactive decay. Obviously, it produces copious amounts of radioactive waste that we have no current way to do anything about except pretend that it's not there. Then, of course, it goes without saying that there was all sorts of mining and manufacturing of the metals, plastics, and concrete that go into actually building an entire electricity nuclear generating plant.

(2) Solar power is much better. But - this is specifically referring to the direct photovoltaic-cell capture mechanism, not the reflection mechanism - solar power does have to be built. You need to mine quartz sand for silicon cells, metal ore for thin film cells. Next, these materials have to be treated, following different steps (in the case of silicon cells these are purification, crystallization and wafering). Finally, these upgraded materials have to be manufactured into solar cells, and assembled into modules. All these processes produce air pollution and heavy metal emissions, and they consume energy - which brings about more air pollution, heavy metal emissions and also greenhouse gases. Of course, if you're using solar energy to generate the power needed to produce more solar cells... it's not such a problem. In solar generators (reflection type), you need to deal primarily with the chemicals involved in forming metal mirrors and shaping it so that it focuses on the sodium generation plant itself (it gets extremely hot, melts sodium, and the sodium carries that energy to create electricity).

I realize that you're not asking for this, but solar power is, in the end, far cleaner than nuclear power. The pollution comes from the fact that, "You can't get something from nothing." Or perhaps put better in the physics term, "Matter/energy can neither be created, nor destroyed." If you want something, then you're going to have to take something else and turn it into your new thing. We do our best at being clean, but there is no such thing as perfect cleanliness in manufacturing, and there probably never will be (unless maybe those Star Trek replicators are invented... which would be cool...).