Comment on How solar panels generate electricity

Gladaed@feddit.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

• SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

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  Solar thermal concentrators, they get so hot they have to use liquid metal.

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  • Gladaed@feddit.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Parabolic plants also exist w/o a tower of sauron.

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    • ICastFist@programming.dev ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      But half the fun is having a gleaming tower of doom!

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    • bizzle@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Why would anyone want that when the alternative is a tower of sauron

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      • psoul@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        All I want for Christmas is new petty gods with towers to worship.

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  • nevemsenki@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Didn’t this exact plant go bankrupt due to solar panels being so much more efficient?

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    • tryitout@infosec.pub ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      If you mean the Vegas one, then yes it’s closing, don’t know if it’s gone bankrupt exactly.

      en.wikipedia.org/…/Ivanpah_Solar_Power_Facility

      The facility, though cost effective at the time it was planned (2009), is now twice as expensive to run as solar photovoltaic technology, which has decreased in price much more rapidly than was expected in the 15 years since Ivanpah’s construction began.

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      • Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        I think that’s what they called a First Generation generator.

        The ones in use now will actually use sunlight to melt salt (than then is used to generate steam) rather than directly generating the steam which has way more capacity to store heat, so they have a solar conversion efficiency of between 38% and 44%, plus the molten salt can keep on being used to generate steam during the night until it cools down enough.

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      • EmpathicVagrant@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Well that makes no sense, I need it shut down to get Euclid’s C-Finder to work.

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    • brucethemoose@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      It would make sense.

      Thermal concentrator cost is basically fixed: mirrors of a specific quality, tracking mounts, an eye of sauron cooling loop. That tech doesn’t change.

      But the bulk of photovoltaic installation cost is the panels. And those get exponentially cheaper.

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      • BartyDeCanter@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        They’ve gotten cheap, in fact, that the panels are sometimes less expensive than the labor and mounting hardware.

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      • Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Actually it does change, from what I read mainly in terms of what substance is used to capture the heat of the sunlight, which in turn has other implications downstream (for example, if you melt salt and the molten salt is used to generate steam, rather than directly generating the steam, not only does the efficieny go up but you can keep on generating power during the night as long as there’s enough heat left in the salt).

        Here is paper I found about it.

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    • Gladaed@feddit.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      No. The issue is solar panels getting much cheaper. The advantage of solar thermic plants are low cost of panels in exchange for more difficulty to maintain. This stops making sense when solar panels become dirt cheap and they cannot shift their power generation outside of peak solar(easily possible with molten salt tanks for the night, but not free)

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    • SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      There are hundreds of these.

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  • a_non_monotonic_function@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    They also function as adequate bird-zappers from what I’ve heard.

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