Comments for 'Major discovery' from MIT primed to unleash solar power revolution »
Posted By capn_caveman 1 year, 3 months ago in Science & TechnologyIn a revolutionary leap that could transform solar power from a marginal, boutique alternative into a mainstream energy source, MIT researchers have overcome a major barrier to large-scale solar power: storing energy for use when the sun doesn't shine.
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mntnman444Comment removed: Spammer, Hard Banned8 Replies
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Gransater1 year, 3 months ago
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If true, something that can make us free from the yoke of hydrocarbons, and yet, this is the first I'd heard about it. Why is it that things that have the capacity to change life as we know it, hardly gets discussed, or, for that matter, hardly gets noticed by people and also the so called major media?
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BB641 year, 3 months ago
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Hydrocarbons? What are you using to make your solar cells? Glass? Plastic? Metals? All require energy far in excess that can be currently produced to make them in the first place. If you're one of the believers in global warming, then build nuke plants.
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As to solar energy crowds, they would disappear if there wasn't billions in tax credits available. They're inefficient and costly. No tax money, no plant.-
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Tangent0011 year, 3 months ago
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What are you using to build those nuke plants? Concrete? Glass? Plastic? Metals?
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As far as I know, a solar plant cannot melt down or leak vast plumes of toxic steam. Nor does solar have radioactive waste.
Yes, there are necessary tax breaks and subsidies (though I don't think they rank in the billions, like Big Oil). Technologies will improve and economies of scale will kick in to make it much more affordable. -
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BB641 year, 3 months ago
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I don't want to pee in anyone's cornflakes but I don't trust this revolutionary solution. We've had this concept for some time. It's the basis of one of the EU hydrogen fuel cells. Like Cold Fusion, I'll wait until they actually produce a repeatable solution. I see trillions being spent, like in the ethanol plants with very little return when you consider the investment of time, money and energy. Splitting water molecules isn't that simple nor energy efficient. If this is so revolutionary, I would recommend having private industry handling the funding. If private funding isn't available, let MIT spend some of their billions from the endowments.
Again, if it works, I'll be their loudest cheerleader. If this turns out to be one of those typical lefty solutions that never work, I'll make sure you all know it. I work with power gen and simply don't trust this.
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capn_caveman1 year, 3 months ago
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Your skepticism is duly noted, however I must remark on your point about splitting hydrogen from water being an inefficient process. As I see it, the efficiency of the hydrogen generation process really would only impact the initial investment because the energy input to the process is unlimited and free. The efficiency would impact the required size of the installed solar panels that were providing the input to the process. Larger solar panels would be needed for a hydrogen generating process that is highly inefficient and vice versa. One can imagine there would be a breaking point as to where it would be too cost prohibitive to purchase solar cells large enough to accommodate an inefficient process. Whether this process can produce the energy requirements of an average consumer at an initial investment cost that is affordable to the masses remains to be seen. But the research sounds promising overall and in the future the costs of manufacturing solar cells will inevitably decline. We may not see this in 10 years, but I think it's very possible I'll see this type of power generation become available to the masses within my lifetime.
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BB641 year, 3 months ago
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Caveman has a point. When you take into account the costs to build & maintain them, rarely have I seen one actually pay for themselves. Also, they're not reliable. Currently, the commercial technology required to produce the energy we need today does not exist. Another point, if you think it would take 7 years for us to drill for oil using existing technologies, do you really think inventing a new science would take any less. Pretending this is the answer, to bring this to fruition would require at least 25 years. We will need energy much sooner than that. Build your coal and nuke plants now.
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Tangent0011 year, 3 months ago
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I'm not sure where you get your data that solar systems do not pay for themselves. Simple, dirt-cheap solar water heaters have been distributed in rural areas of China, paying for themselves in the first few months of use. Residential photo voltaic panels usually have a ROI after between 5 and 7 years.
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Grid-level solar furnaces that use the sun's heat to drive steam turbines have a far lower initial costs than direct-to-electricity plants and thus, a shorter payback time.
Do conventional plants EVER pay for themselves? Do nuclear plants EVER pay for themselves? All power plants require operations staff and maintenance, but wind and solar (and geothermal and hydroelectric) require neither ongoing fuel costs nor do they incur waste disposal costs.
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Will13131 year, 3 months ago
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I see trillions being spent, like in the ethanol plants with very little return when you consider the investment of time, money and energy. Splitting water molecules isn't that simple nor energy efficient. If this is so revolutionary, I would recommend having private industry handling the funding. If private funding isn't available, let MIT spend some of their billions from the endowments.
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that's very selfish of you since you're a big proponent of coal to gas... which CARTER PUT BILLIONS OF TAX PAYER DOLLARS INTO RESEARCH.....
what's the matter don't want to get put out of business...
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BB641 year, 3 months ago
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Carter didn't spend a dime developing this. A company by the name of IG Farben developed this in 1929-30. This was developed in Germany because they have no oil of their own. Simply put, they crush and mix the coal into a slurry similar to sweet crude. They also developed a new method of refining that worked even better on crude, virtually killing their coal based business. In today's costs, we could produce fuel for around $ 35-50/barrel. Yes, I'm a fan of cheap energy. The American economy is built on low cost energy. Then again knowing your past comments, the Party is what matters, the American people are simply collateral damage. What's good for America isn't good for you guys right now.
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Will13131 year, 3 months ago
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CARTER: Good evening, tonight I want to have an unpleasant talk with you, about a problem that's unprecedented in our history. With the exception of preventing war, this is the greatest challenge that our country will face during our lifetime. The energy crisis is not yet on the front of the list, but it will be if we do not act quickly.
YOUNG: During the energy crisis of the 1970's President Jimmy Carter pumped billions into liquid coal.
----you're just too easy to prove wrong.. .. just as i did yesterday about wind power....
http://www.loe.org/shows/segments.htm?programID=07-P13-00017=1
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BB641 year, 3 months ago
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Don't have a clue what your living earth spam page is. Can't figure it out. Nothing came up other than ads. One other item, any sight like this isn't a credible resource.
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As to Carter, I'm not sure why he would. He didn't have much of an energy plan. I also don't understand why he would spend billions when the technology existed already. On Carter, he was and still is in the back pockets of the Saudis. How else does he manage to pay for his library and charities?-
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BB641 year, 3 months ago
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Actually, there hasn't been an effective energy policy in the USA since Richard Nixon's and his was only done because of OPEC's embargo. As to Carter's, the only one I remember was one he proposed as almost a poison pill on Reagan. Lots of restrictions, high cost solutions and the like.
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I support a balanced energy plan both for current technology available including coal conversion for gas and diesel along with new cleaner coal and nuclear plants. WInd and solar are simply no where near ready for meeting our energy needs. For the record, we deal with all forms mention. It's not that I wouldn't love to find a magic energy solution, we're simply not there yet with the available sciences.-
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Tangent0011 year, 3 months ago
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Actually, we've 'been there' with wind and solar for decades. The California Altamont Pass wind farm has been in continuous operation since the 70s. Large scale solar plants are being built around the world, and they don't take that long to build. Since they can be built in phases, getting solar on the grid can be only a matter of months. The Nellis plant began construction in April, 2007 and began operation by that October. The plant was fully operation by December.
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Are wind and solar the immediate 'magic pill'? Of course not, but the US is waaaaay behind a lot of other nations, including *gulp* China in percentage of our power needs supplied by renewables.-
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Nowalive1 year, 3 months ago
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Tangent,
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Currently China has surpassed the US in non renewable fossil fuels use. China now operates more coal powered generation stations than the US, and is gaining on oil consumption as well. Additionally, China has surpassed the US in "greenhouse gas" emissions. America is no longer the largest producer of "greenhouse gases".
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Will13131 year, 3 months ago
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The American economy is built on low cost energy. Then again knowing your past comments, the Party is what matters, the American people are simply collateral damage. What's good for America isn't good for you guys right now.
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i'm a libertarian.. registered republican.. and have never at a national level voted for a democrat...
so again you're WRONG....
post some facts.. as someone who claims to have testified before congress you should have some stats available to bolser your OPINIONS.. which by the way everyone has..
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Nowalive1 year, 3 months ago
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Hey Will good to see you.
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I hate to say this but Carter didn't spend a thing on alternative energy. When Pres. Carter announced his PLAN to pour billions into AE sources, OPEC dumped the price of oil and AE went out the window. How quickly America forgot about conserving, finding new energy sources, developing renewable resouces when they were able to get cheap gas, lots of it again. This is merely history repeating itself.
"It's like deja vu, all over again"
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quackpot1 year, 3 months ago
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I believe that you are wong on this issue, BB64. This article is about the development of a catalyst that lowers the activation energy of electrolysis. The concept of a catalyst may not be new (plants that do photosynthesis have had one since prehistory) but having one that actually seems to work is new.
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It should be clear to anyone that multiple forms of energy production coupled to GREATLY more efficient energy use are going to be critical to our economy in the next few decades. Anybody that proposes to remain in the horse and buggy era will not survive.
In the mean time, a focus on wise energy USE will do FAR more to reduce our dependence on foreign oil than any of the drilling schemes that have been proposed. Why waste our resources on inefficient transport (SUVs), poorly insulated buildings, irrational thermostat settings and all of the other purely wasteful uses of the resources.
Better hop on board the new energy train, BB64; it is coming.-
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BB641 year, 3 months ago
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First. I'm certainly not the foremost on the coal conversion process but I do believe it would be a better solution to our current energy problem. Lower costs, higher safety standards then platforms and drilling in the arctic. For an "evil" conservative, you'll find I generally take the best care of my team.
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As to hand outs, never said I was asking for money. My firm is owned by 4 Swiss banks. We only needed permission and support to build. We have plants through out the world. Some are turn key operations others are run by us. In this case, we needed only their support. It might not have bothered me as much if they turned us down or simply refused to meet with us but we were invited to present to them. Then they failed to show up to their own meeting.
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capecoralMComment removed: Retracted by user3 Replies
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miklkit1 year, 3 months ago
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From the article:
The success of the Nocera lab shows the impact of a mixture of funding sources - governments, philanthropy, and industry. This project was funded by the National Science Foundation and by the Chesonis Family Foundation, which gave MIT $10 million this spring to launch the Solar Revolution Project, with a goal to make the large scale deployment of solar energy within 10 years.
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BenO561 year, 3 months ago
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I have to say that this announcement doesn't convince me that widespread solar energy use is about to happen. The major roadblock for solar power use is not storing the energy collected, but the range of sunlight used to generate electricity. Currently, only a small fraction of the sunlight hitting a solar cell is converted - something like 15-20%. Also, if I understood the article, this method uses fresh water in the storage process - another commodity that seems to be headed for shortages.
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TonyByron1 year, 3 months ago
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This story is a steaming load of hyperbole.
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FTA: " Until now, solar power has been a daytime-only energy source, because storing extra solar energy for later use is prohibitively expensive and grossly inefficient. With today's announcement, MIT researchers have hit upon a simple, inexpensive, highly efficient process for storing solar energy."
Pure BS in several ways.
1-Batteries are not "prohibitively expensive" nor are they "grossly inefficient". The electrolysis tank, compressors and separate storage tanks for compressed hydrogen and oxygen and a hydrogen fuel cell are "prohibitively expensive".
2-Adding the additional amount of PV cells necessary to power the electrolysis, compressors and electronics is "prohibitively expensive".
3-Producing hydrogen and oxygen through solar-powered electrolysis is not "highly efficient".-
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Beau78901 year, 3 months ago
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If either of you is talking about the explosive properties of hydrogen gas (think the Hindenburg), we've been using dozens of hydrogen-fueled buses in Chicago for a few years now and there hasn't been one reported accident.
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As far as comparing these dangers to those of nuclear energy plants, think about it. Even if something goes wrong and hydrogen or oxygen explodes, it doesn't poison the environment around it for dozens, maybe hundreds of years, as happened at Three-Mile Island and Chernobyl. -
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bonaroo1 year, 3 months ago
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Its true that the space shuttle is launched into space using these fuels. Hydrogen peroxide can be very explosive. But to insinuate that this process is anywhere near as hazardous as nuclear energy is ridiculous.
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The cobalt/ phosphate catalyst used in this method is not very dangerous at all.
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ind061 year, 3 months ago
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"Sounds like there are too many moving parts for any type of mobile or cheap application."
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Hmmm....
Are you speaking of solar power, or are you talking about the auto-mobile? Because if you're taking about an auto-mobile, I absolutely agree, too many moving parts to make it mobile or cheap!
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Eagle_Eye1 year, 3 months ago
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I think it is the best thing for humans to invest in this type of energy for the future. At least we know the sun is a constant (until it explodes), being able to harness and store it's energy is a wonderful advancement.
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I like this: "Requiring nothing but abundant, non-toxic natural materials, this discovery could unlock the most potent, carbon-free energy source of all: the sun. "This is the nirvana of what we've been talking about for years," especially the non-toxic natural materials. -
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willottica1 year, 3 months ago
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The use of solar seems great, but one niggling question always comes into my mind. The Earth currently gets a fairly constant amount of sun. If we start to prevent the sun from hitting the earth (necessary in order to capture it), what effect will that have on global temperatures?
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I've never seen any scientific discussion on the heating effects of the sun on the Earth's crust, and while the effect may be small, all of nature is in a delicate equilibrium. If the heating of the Earth is reduced by even 1/100th of a percent, without somehow compensating for this lost heat, over time, it could translate into a significant cooling effect.
The same argument can be made for wind power. (And again, I've never seen it enter a scientific discussion of the subject). The majority of the Earth's winds are blowing in the same direction. By Newton's Third Law: Every action has an equal and opposite reaction, each of those windmills will be pushing against the rotation of the earth, and though the force may seem insignificant, it is not nothing. Over time, with nothing to compensate for this force, it will affect the equilibrium that keeps the Earth spinning.
Hell, maybe I should do a doctoral thesis on the adverse environmental effects of Solar and Wind power. You can never get "something for nothing".-
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willottica1 year, 3 months ago
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I didn't edit this at all, except to test the edit button. Yay edit!
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I would guess that wind power would be one of the most detrimental energy sources there is. It's a direct conversion of the kinetic energy of the earth's rotation into non-kinetic energy (assuming a balance of east-west human activity) this energy, however it is used, has the majority of its losses converted to heat. Solar would reduce the direct heat energy reaching the planet, but this would be replaced largely by energy use being converted (finally) into heat. The potential energy in fossil fuels is also eventually converted to heat, but potential energy doesn't really exist until it is used, so it's not really doing anything but decreasing future potential (and it's quite possible that heat energy somehow gets stored back into potential energy). Would anything restore the rotational kinetic energy of the planet, though? That is exactly what is being used to "create" wind power.-
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Tangent0011 year, 3 months ago
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Um, you are mistaken on where wind energy comes from. It is NOT from the rotational energy of the Earth, it is from the sun heating the air, oceans and land masses. Hot air rises and cooler air rushes in to take its place. Even the jet streams derive their swift motion from differences in the temperatures between macro-scale air masses.
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Wind turbines will not slow down the Earth's rotation, it's really simply another way to harness the energy of the sun.
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Tangent0011 year, 3 months ago
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"If we start to prevent the sun from hitting the earth (necessary in order to capture it), what effect will that have on global temperatures?"
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Actually, jet contrails do more to reflect the sun's rays than even multiple large solar farms could ever do. There is always an excess of solar energy, with a large portion of it simply reflected back out into space.
You argument about wind doesn't hold water. If blocking the wind would somehow slow down the Earth's rotation, it would have done so by now simply by the existence of big trees. The weather rotates with the Earth, so a hurricane doesn't move because the Earth is 'sliding under it'.-
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willottica1 year, 3 months ago
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I suppose if the interface between the atmosphere and space is frictionless (is it?) then Earth can be considered as a enclosed system, and you cannot change the momentum of a enclosed system without external forces. The Earth (inclusive of all of the air in the atmosphere) must then continue it's same rotational velocity regardless of what we do on the surface.
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I don't know if there is a prevailing wind direction (nor what, exactly, causes the wind)... I do know that both hemispheres have similar directional patterns. What causes this? It is cause by the Earth's rotation, isn't it?
And Newton's 3rd Law will apply. If wind-farms all face the same way, there WILL be extra force exerted on the Earth's surface... but perhaps the air mass spins entirely with the Earth, in which case net wind directonality would be zero. Or maybe the sun, by heating and cooling the wind, actually acts as a continual refresher of the Earth's rotation.
I don't understand this as yet... so I was looking at 'globalslowing.com' the other day (which seems pretty far-fetched, but maybe just because they're ideas I hadn't heard before). They talk about leap-seconds (which I wasn't really aware of) and how the Earth HAS slowed noticeably in the last several millenia (which is why leap-seconds are needed).
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Nowalive1 year, 3 months ago
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Check out my submission on cheap solar cells.
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http://www.homestead.org/ChrisDevaney/NanosolarCells/SolarCells.htm
This would go great with improved storage. Of course Seattle will still be without power for all but about 10 days a year. Oh, and England too. -
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Nowalive1 year, 3 months ago
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I would like to invite you all to visit my web site and read what I have been saying for well over a year now. I wish this were the old netscape/propeller so that you could read my past suggestions and comments regarding this issue.
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