Taking Your Home Off the Grid

i like the peddle power, i can open up a gym and power my house at the same time.

Simplifying the scale of the "Grid" is the smartest thing we could do. The advantages are great from reducing the number of nuke plants that will need to be built to diversifying types of power plants and the simplified security needs. We need a plan that will serve us and not be a new way for federal and state government to hit us with new taxes for them to waste.

I was a young chap when Carter was in office but I do remember folks saying that he was stupid for wanting to put a solar panel on every telephone pole in the future... may be true or not .. not sure.

This is funny because the oil companies that operate remotely need electricity to power their instruments so they turn to solar power... fact.

Damn did that sound like Jimmy Dean or what?

Oh, he was stupid. Well, he was blindly optimistic. Had we put up all those solar panels, they would have pretty much failed 10 years ago, and we'd have spent another small fortune replacing them with more panels that are hardly more efficient or long-lived than the originals. There's been precious little practical advancement in that technology in the last 30 years. The Democrats kept bloviating about how we couldn't let the tax incentives expire on that stuff. Fact is, we were incentivising an impractical technology. We subsidized an industry that was too useless to sustain itself. We should have been pushing money into pure and applied research, and we might have had something usable by now.
But no. We have to give ultimate credence to our "feelings" instead of our brains.

Those solar panels weighed too much, took a lot of space up and had performance issues.

But it was a nice pie in the sky jesture by peanuts.

My FB has a wind generator and solar panels. Rarely does she have to use grid power, even in the winter since she has a wood burning stove. You are seeing more and more of these popping up in rural Texas.

news.cnet.com

"We want to build a technical capability that will [help us] differentiate ourselves," said Danielle Merfeld, who leads GE's solar R&D, in a phone interview. Cadmium telluride holds the promise of being the least expensive type of solar panel, "and this is our way to get access to that that (kind of) module."

-----

CdTe panels are not projected to last more than 10 years, so the makers are supposedly going to have a recycling system, yeah right.

GE has quit making crystalline silicon photovoltaic systems because it is too expensive and energy intensive to make the silicon panels, though they last 25 years and have twice the efficiency of current thin film PV panels.

I ran across a blogger who said that PV panels should be developed using germanium which is available in massive quantity and would produce 40% efficiency, but little research is being done; another advocated using iron pyrite.

These idiots that try to solve the problem of nighttime inactivity by converting the solar power to steam generation are wasting too much energy.

We need PV technology made out of something cheap which is then bonded inside plastic and these small panels are interlocking. They need to be nearly indestructible.

PV is useless.
Solar is worthless.

In the exchange that happens in a few months, the first thing that is planned is several high altitude EMP releases.

This totally destroys all solar panels, they are real sensitive to this kind of abuse. all panels will be trash and there will be no factories to replace them with.
forget solar.
Learn how to make generators out of old car alternators with bailing wire, you may have a few days power to run your VCR for a week or so, until you expire from radiation sickness.

Richard-
re: In the exchange that happens in a few months, the first thing that is planned is several high altitude EMP releases.

Has it occurred to your family or what friends you probably don't have anymore that you are in trouble?

Hey Richard - buy gold.

Don't just buy gold, but buy it from Goldline, as hawked by Beck, Levin, and Limbaugh. You'll get screwed, but it will be for the worthy cause of Beck, Levin, and Limbaugh.

If Hannity would get in on the scam he'd have more money to charter bigger jets to fly to "Freedom Concerts".

We have to give ultimate credence to our "feelings" instead of our brains.

#4 | POSTED BY VALIS

Is this the same 'brain' that tells you that burning fossil fuels, polluting the planet, protecting corporate profits and the status quo is a GOOD idea? I wouldn't really listen to that brain if i were you.

I know what I know about solar because I desperately want it to work. It should work by now. If we had been pushing R&D instead of propping up the pathetic first generation technology, we'd have something usable by now. Instead we've pandered to a bunch of granola-eating, hemp-wearing retired hippies who think the government's role is to buy them solar panels.

Actually that's not fair. Some businessmen figured out they could make good money selling solar panels to the aforementioned hippies. They then figured out the hippies were annoying, so they worked out a solution.
"Hey hip- uh, customers," they said, "We're trying to help Mother Earth. You want to help her too."
The hip- uh, customers nodded ston-edly.
"These solar panels will let you live off the grid! You can say 'Fuck You' to The Man! But they're expensive to produce. You can't afford to stick it to the man and still buy a lid for the weekend."
"Whoa -no bud? That's not cool, man," said the protocustomers.
"How about this," suggested the solar salesman, "Go tell the government that we've got the product that will save us all from oil. Tell them that you want to be early adopters, but the cost is standing in the way. Tell them we'll learn a lot as people start to get off the grid and quit relying on polluting technologies. Tell them the government has a moral responsibility to help this happen."

So the annoying politi-customers aimed their annoyance at the government. The solar salesmen became white knights. The government gave in and began subsidizing the panels so a few thousand former hippies could feel good about themselves.

And the state of the technology stopped dead in its tracks. For 20 years, nothing notable happened in solar technology. Nothing. Name another scientific application that today can go 20 years without advancement and I'll show you a field that has a marginal commercial application receiving government subsidies.

#13 | Posted by SpeakSoftly

Considering he just continued his rants, guess Valis either didn't read or comprehend your post #13, I'm leaning on the latter.

I didn't continue a rant. I understood perfectly.
What has happened to people's ability to reason? It seems that increasingly we are only allowed to believe one of two sides to any issue. The current healthcare bill is either good or bad. There's no oxygen left in the room to discuss other ways of handling the situation. You're either for or against oil as the primary energy provider. You're either for or against solar power. There is no other way.

But don't you see? There is. There always is, and the more complicated an issue, the more "other" ways there are to view it. If you wholeheartedly accept one or the other major given arguments to an issue, you almost certainly haven't given it any thought at all.

I am very much in favor of solar power. That's why it pisses me off that solar power today is hardly changed from what it was 30 years ago. That is to say it is economically unfeasible because it's so inefficient. The reason it's so inefficient is because we have propped up the "almost good enough" technology instead of pushing it to get better.

Should we all buy Priuses? After all, they greatly reduce our dependence on oil. But they greatly increase our dependence on lead, and lead mining is more damaging to the environment than oil production. There are better solutions out there, but if the government gives people money to buy Priuses, that's money that isn't going toward developing those better solutions that will Really get us off oil.

Science is gone.
reason is gone
Anyone making ethanol "to help" and passing laws about it has no reason, no science, no good ideas.

Look we burn 81 MILLION barrels of oil a day in this world.

a day

A DAY!
An typical Olympic-sized swimming pool holds 660253.09 gallons of water. 50m = 164.042 ft

we burn and use 81 MILLION BARRELS of oil a day!

Care to convert?

take a guess! how many swimming pools is that a day?

And why wouldn't I have friends because I am telling you what is going to happen next year?

no logic here on this board.
anyway

get your calculator out and let me know what you come up with

Oh, a barrel holds 42 US gallons.

5152.5696002422343831817583769
279 not counting Mark Spitz's spit from 1962 which is still lfloating about in there

THIS IS HOW MUCH OIL WE BURN IN ONE DAY

You guyes are INSANE to think solar or ethanol or nuclear or ANYTHING can make a DENT IN IT!

ONE MILLION DOLLAR WINDMILL RUNNING ALL DAY MAKES THE ENERGY OF ONE BARREL OF OIL

A little drum roll here please....

a million dollar windmill running ALL DAY makes up enough jet fuel to Idle a modern 747 for one minute including startup

two more windmills a day for all day will let that jet taxi to the takeoff position of a runway.

How many windmills to ply ONE PLANE from New york to LA so some blond ditz can eat sushi at SHUSHI ASANEBO 11941 Ventura Blvd. Studio City, CA 91604818-760-3348 after dating a producer and toking two lines of cocaine?

I mean, c'mon. people talk green and act idiotioca.

MR. GREEn goes around the world on a plane talking about CO2 and the melting polar caps showing a film and living in a house with 12 cars....

crazy, man.

You all think you are going to keep living like this cause some alcohol induced politicians make ethanol and put up some windmillss...

crazy man

we will be ALL OFF THE GRId in 12 months, oil is at crises and when we go 10 percent under it snowballs like it did in 1974

I remember that.

pickup trucks with water bed mattresses driving in and filling up at 25 cents a gallon, only now it will be 5 dollars a gallon. plus

you guys are whussies.you can't handle THE TRUTH

The truth is ETHANOL is a JOKE, it costs more to make ethanol than what you get out of it and it takes rare resources to make the ethanol we can't afford.

PROOF:
take a fifty gallon barrel of apple juice or cane juice.
add yeast ferment ok, now distill it to ethanol
twice that means BOIL THE WATER and DISTILL the ethanol x 2

Now take that ethanol you got from one barrel and TRY to use it to boil the NEXT BARREL OF MASH! I found out that there is not enough ethanol to do it! That means to make ethanol, you are running around the energy circle like a dog chasing its tale. You MUST use electricity
(MADE BY BURNING COAL!) they are using ELECTRICITY to boil the mash but actually they use PROPANE!!!!

ok so they use a resource we are running out of to burn and make ethanol to replace what we are runningn out of

that is why ethanol is going to ALWAYS be more expensive than gas

when gas is 10 bucks a barrel ethanol will be 12

cause you use oil and gas and propane to make it

retarded.

and you all didnt know that, cause you belive the lies

and you hate the truth

so you hate me

well, go live the lie

YOU WILL BE OFF THE GRID NEXT YEAR and then there will be war
and more war
and bigger was
and finally someon is going to ignite the einstein equation.
and you will have no WII and no internet

Proimise.

five thousean
one hundred
and
fifty
two
and a half
olympic pools of oil a day.

A barrel is 5 foot tall. tie them end to end and float them around the world at the equator.

that is 76000 miles of barrel.

that goes around the earth 3.2 times.

If you take advantage of the continents you could make on the water portions double that.
SO EVERY DAY YOU COULD build a BRIDGE wide enough for a car to drive around the world every single day! and it would float!

a foating bridge wide enough for a dcar around the world every day.

that is how many barrels we use in A DAY
!

and you are going to make solar panels.

retarded.
you cant replace that.

we are running out
every field is now in decline and it is exponential.

how many windmills to equate 81 million barrels?

well, 81,000 000 windmills!

how many dollars?
81 trillion dollars.

we cant do it.

you are going off the grid in just days....

Your grandchildren will not go to college.
They will not drive cars.
you will not have internet
and there will be no food.

wait, some people grow food, still

I think.
they will be killed for the food.

This is the truth
and if you don't like it, it changes nothing that is about to happen.

There waws a prophet once that saw the world with NO COWS, no cattle, no grass, all famine(worldwide.

Ever think what will happen if suddenly YOU cannot drive your car ANYMORE>?

Wouldn that change your life any?

Can't take your 3 ton 15 MPG vehicle to pick up ONE gallon of milk at the store.

We live crazy, act crazy and vote crazy
ethanol!
joke.
Well, when you get all the panels on your house and you are off the grid for 20 grand, you will STILL have no car. your lifestyle will STILL change and you will STILL be hungry

#21 | Posted by richardrhine at 2010-03-21 02:20 PM | Reply | Flag: Flag: (Choose)
FunnyNewsworthyOffensiveAbusiv
e

thanks for the optimism Rich.

Yes I know that ethanol is a joke. I work in the oil business.

We are now having to chase after the "hard to get stuff" that wasn't profitable years ago. SO, with that said, expect your energy bills to go up from here and not comming back down.

We will depend on technology and nukes in the future for energy... no way around it. solar panels/windmills are not going to cut it.

BUT, unless there is a astroid that crashes into the earth and takes us out, humans are survivors and are not going to fold just because we can't drive our car.

Natural gas will take us through the next century, after that we'll depend on what we've learned over the next 100 years.

Richard,
Eloquence and calculator skills aside. And grok this.

Since Homo Erectus first harnessed fire for cooking, heat and protection against carnivores, we have had only ONE advancement beyond carbon based fuels as our base energy source-Nuclear. For such an advanced creature, we are pretty slow on the uptick.

"Since Homo Erectus first harnessed fire for cooking...."

Barney Frank did not invent fire.

Barney Frank did not invent fire.

Since he is a big flamer, the mistake is easy to make.

"Since Homo Erectus first harnessed fire for cooking...."

Barney Frank did not invent fire.

#24 | Posted by Diablo at 2010-03-21 03:56 PM | Reply | Flag:

FF!

For such an advanced creature, we are pretty slow on the uptick.

#23 | Posted by boojiboy at 2010-03-21 03:09 PM | Reply | Flag: Flag: (Choose)
FunnyNewsworthyOffensiveAbusiv
e

yes very slow but the mystery of why we've been so slow lies in politics.

We know better but we're not ready just yet.

Its not an accident we're still carbon based for energy.

It's because the carbon based energy profiteers have made it so. They've bought off our politicians and our information sources.

Get business out of government. Make lobbying illegal. Public funding for campaigns.
This is the first, last, and only thing needed to save humankind.
Anything else is a waste of time.

.. And the state of the technology stopped dead in its tracks. For 20 years, nothing notable happened in solar technology. Nothing. Name another scientific application that today can go 20 years without advancement and I'll show you a field that has a marginal commercial application receiving government subsidies.
#14 | Posted by valis at 2010-03-21 09:39 AM

NOVA | Saved By the Sun.. Then the film takes a tour of two solar-powered American houses: a modest family home near Boston and a "show home" in Maine that is so efficient, its owners pay nothing for electricity. The program reveals that, though still expensive for many, solar panels are now cheaper than ever. Some states offer cash rebates, and most now have "net metering," which allows solar users to sell their extra energy back to the grid for credit on their bill. (See This Solar House for one family's inspiring example.)

While a greater number of solar-powered houses can help reduce carbon-dioxide emissions in a modest way, some believe a bigger investment in a national solar infrastructure is needed. NOVA takes audiences on a rare journey inside the world's largest solar thermal plant: Kramer Junction in the Mojave Desert, which powers some 150,000 Los Angeles-area homes. Kramer generates electricity via vast rows of parabolic-shaped mirrors, which in turn heat vats of water to the boiling point, so the resulting steam can drive huge turbines (see New Ways to Catch Rays). Though effective, there is a reason no other plants like Kramer exist: huge amounts of valuable land are needed. But this too may be changing, at least in the Southwest, where NOVA takes a peek at a solar plant that will soon help fuel the power-hungry city of Las Vegas.

Other countries are pursuing solar power with far more gusto than the U.S. NOVA travels to Germany, which despite not being known for sunny weather, has become a solar mecca. By offering cash incentives, the government has encouraged many citizens, from city dwellers to a pig farmer, to put up solar panels. Astonishingly, Germany is now on track to produce 30 percent of its electricity from renewable sources by 2020. By contrast, the U.S. gets only 1 percent of its energy from solar and wind power. However, there are those, including Vijay Vaitheeswaran, energy correspondent for The Economist, who fear that Germany's expensive program could ultimately be hard to sustain.

While some remain skeptical, others see a blazing future through new solar technologies. The program introduces several passionate pioneers, including Sarah Kurtz, one of the forgers of the "multi-junction solar cell," which proved itself on Mars with the robotic rovers and now could portend an exciting leap in the efficiency of solar panels; Nathan Lewis at Cal Tech, who foresees nanotechnology -- technology on a submicron scale -- changing the solar landscape and has envisioned a "solar paint" that could one day turn the entire surface of your house into a solar cell; and one of America's most creative thinkers on energy issues, Amory Lovins, who has a goal of getting the U.S. off fossil fuels by 2040. Is such a goal really possible? The bottom line seems to be that nobody wants to wake up 30 years from now and wish we had tried to answer that question earlier.

Posted by richardrhine
How do I score some of the shit your smoking? I'm like damn man.lets not be bogarting that stuff.

Make lobbying illegal.

The First Amendment of the Bill of Rights

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Lobbying is how groups of people with common interests petition their government. Making lobbying illegal is essentially repealing the First Amendment.

I think you need to think of a better solution that doesn't involve encroaching on the rights of Americans.