Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Non-Tech : Alternative energy -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Eric who wrote (4390)	3/3/2008 9:37:56 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 16955

Take the sun falling on one square acre of solar panels from Sunpower for example. It converts approximately 22% of the suns energy falling on them into pure electricity. And how much energy, as well as natural resources, are required to produce that square acre of solar panels? Thin film might be cost-efficient, but I'm not sure that this would be true with the more complex systems we've become familiar with. Plants of any kind (including algae) don't hold a candle to PV's and especially solar thermal in the end. Plants including algae are very inefficient. Actually.. given the infrastructure comparisons, I think that Algae would be quite comparable to PV (though I don't have any data to support this at the moment). Sunlight, water, nutrient cocktail (mainly natural) and you've converted CO2 to Hydro-carbons in a closed loop process. But don't get me wrong.. I think there's a lot of space available for PV, especially in the plug-in hybrid markets and I welcome the day when it becomes cost-comparable to fossil fuel, or nuclear, (or other means) derived electricity. But we're always going to require some kind of hydro-carbon fueled form of propulsion. I don't see the day coming soon when there's a PV power airliner, nor cargo ship. Nor do I see the day when freight trucks, or even cross-country passenger vehicles will be able to utilize it properly. However, I can see the day when such transportation platforms are powered by CO2 neutral bio-fuels. Hawk