Solar panels would suck up all the energy from the Sun

Discussion in 'World Events' started by Plazma Inferno!, Dec 14, 2015.

  1. billvon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    21,634
    Oh, so you just plain think the reporter's lying, because you want him to be. In that case, you can believe whatever you like.
     
  2. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  3. billvon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    21,634
    No one is talking about storing old fire trucks (or old solar panels.) We are talking about banning working solar panels or working fire departments from a town because someone thinks they might cause cancer. In both cases, that is a poor decision based on ignorance.
    Doesn't matter. Some people believe they do - and to them, that's all they care about. Should we congratulate them on making their own decisions, or tell them that they should learn more about vaccines?
     
  4. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  5. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    54,036
    You are correct that most of the hazardous materials are only involved in the manufacture of solar panels, however, they do contain lead solder, and there is a valid concern about end of life cycle disposal, the same as with other electronics like computers.
     
  6. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  7. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,935
    You attack the arguer, not the argument. A strong indicator that you have no valid response to it.

    The reporter is demonstrably biased.
     
  8. Jeeves Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,089
    And are all electronics, therefore, banned from this town? Probably not' probably, some arrangement has been made for their safe disposal. Same or similar arrangements can be extended to the solar panels.
    Now, is everybody happy?
     
  9. Edont Knoff Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    547
    Somewhere else I read a discussion that low-efficiency solar panels heat up more than the average ground because they are darker, so they are effectively warming the area. If the efficiency of the cells raises above 30% (I don't think there are cells like that existing yet?), the amount os sunlight converted to elecric power is great enough, that the cells beomce cooler than the average ground, even that they are very dark.

    But the claim that cells suck up more solar power than radiation hitting the area of the cell just shows complete ignorance of how solar cells work.
     
  10. Yazata Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,902
    A large industrial scale solar-power project is just like any other large industrial project when it comes to it's impact on a local area. There are going to be environmental impacts, land use impacts, economic impacts and all kinds of concerns. I mean there's a reason why these things aren't being placed in urban open-space reserves and green-belts near the urban populations that they will serve. Any attempt to do that would doubtless cause politically-connected environmental activists to have consternation fits.

    But rural populations aren't typically politically-connected, so there's a sense in which their opinions don't count as much. Urban elites already perceive rural people as ignorant yokels who marry their sisters, as 'little-people' whose concerns needn't be taken seriously. The kind of "news reporting" that we see here, and the negative stereotypes that the "journalist" is seemingly trying to promote, only increase those inaccurate perceptions.

    Rural people are well aware of how the urban elites perceive them. I expect that many of them resent the elites trying to place something that the elites wouldn't want near their own homes in communities considered less important and more expendable.

    If the project needs local government approval in order to proceed, it is entirely reasonable for local citizens to publicly raise the question of what the impacts are likely to be on their community.

    If the project promises all kinds of benefits, who will enjoy those benefits? The owners of the plant? The urban residents who will use the power it generates? The environmental activists who get to screech, "It's Green! It's Saving the Planet!"

    Will any of the more tangible benefits ever trickle down to the community that has to actually put up with the thing?

    I'm inclined to think that the locals should try to drive a hard bargain, refusing to allow the thing in their jurisdiction unless they think that it's in their interest to welcome it. My sympathies are with them.
     
    Last edited: Dec 17, 2015
  11. Bells Staff Member

    Messages:
    24,270
    Well, your argument about this issue stems from the same umbrella of fear, distrust that drives these sort of conspiracies.

    The fact is, the car you drive, the mobile phone you use, the landline you use, the computer you use, the house you live in, the items you use, wear or even consume or consume from, can and do contain carcinogens. For a fact, coal powered stations that generate electricity release toxic materials into the air that does cause cancer. Not only that, what is pumped into the air from those coal power stations do cause air pollution, ground pollution and they also pollute waterways with yes, cancer causing chemicals.

    Frankly, your excuse that they could end up broken and apparently leach carcinogens into the soil is a weak argument. On the one hand, those things do not break easily. Mine have come through severe hail storms and my roof suffered damage. Those panels came through without even a scratch. So you are simply feeding the hysteria that drives these sorts of conspiracies. On the other hand, these are working and functioning solar panels, that are there to use solar energy to make electricity without causing the horrendous pollution that coal power stations cause and without the fear of nuclear contamination from nuclear power plants.
     
  12. Edont Knoff Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    547
    I was under the impression that lead conatining solder was banned some time ago, and that nowadays there is lead free solder?

    I am somewhat certain that lead containing solder was banned from the european union in 2006, no idea about the rest of the world, though, but the ban also affects all imports, so there is some pressure on the manufacturers outside the EU as well.
     
  13. Jeeves Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,089
    Absolutely! But for logically solid reasons, and with a realistic agenda in mind. Making themselves look ridiculous is not helpful - to them, to their town, or to the next dozen rural communities that will be approached with similar proposals.
    Realistically, they would be far and away better served by a solar generating plant in their environs than by a fracking contract --- if those were the choices. But people allowed oil, coal, gas and metal mining operations everywhere, for decades, without raising any objection (jobs!jaawbs!) so why stick at this least invasive project? I'm thinking they were riled up by some flat-earth pol or rev.
     
  14. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    54,036
    I'm not saying the town's objections are perfect and that no one should ever use solar panels, I'm saying solar power, like many other energy solutions, are not without consequence. Even if the panels are relatively safe as we use them, they are not safe to manufacture. How easily we dismiss subjecting other countries to our problems. And how easily we dismiss people from the American south as stupid.
     
    Yazata likes this.
  15. Yazata Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,902
    Wasn't this a proposal for a massive industrial scale solar power project, intended to produce megawatts for the power grid?

    It didn't have anything to do with individuals choosing to put solar panels on their roofs.
     
    Last edited: Dec 19, 2015
  16. billvon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    21,634
    They are safer than most things we manufacture here in the US (like cars.) Indeed, they are safer than IC manufacture, since they use simpler dopants and do not require X-ray lithography.
    How easily we dismiss subjecting other countries to our problems.[/quote]
    Up until recently most US solar panels were built in the US.
    ?? Southerners aren't stupid. People who think that solar panels "suck up" all the nearby sunlight, and emit dangerous radiation, are stupid.
     
  17. Bells Staff Member

    Messages:
    24,270
    Few things are safe to manufacture. Just about everything in your home is not safe for manufacturing.

    And no one is saying people from the South are stupid. However the reasons cited against this proposal are inherently stupid. I mean come on, sucking up all the energy from the sun?

    Yes. It was a proposal for a large solar farm to generate electricity.

    ?? I never said it did..?

    My point was that they are safe to use and frankly, safer than a coal power station to generate electricity. My other point, which was really sarcasm which you obviously missed, is that we, and by "we", I mean people in my home State, utilise solar energy on a fairly large scale on our homes and hence, the sarcasm..
     

Share This Page