I'm normally against virtually all government subsidies, to private individuals or to companies, but if after this money is spent it allows for consumers to be able to buy PV cells at a low enough cost to be competitive with other electricity sources, I'm for this. If this jumpstarts the decrease in price point so that economies of scale can be found through big increases in consumption, then this is a worthwhile investment. I wish I could say the same for 99% of the rest of the money the govt wastes.

They do seem to have done their homework on this one. There isn't too much emphasis on thin cell (cool, but restricted by rare elements) and there is a variety of projects for materially unlimited technologies as well as non-sexy items (manufacturing technology)

I don't see any thermal converters here. I am sure a small free piston stirling at the focal point of one of those concentrators would beat ANY pv in cost effectiveness right now, not in some pieinsky future, and not a penny of subsidy.

If you don't believe me, take a look at the papers on NASA isotope space power stirlings.

Form what I understand, sterling motors are a big pipe dream. There's no way to perpetually maintain motion without consuming some form of energy.

You need to work on that understanding, then; Stirling engines promise no such thing.

Wimbi, I'm still hoping you'll post a pointer to a way to have a multi-piston Stirling using heat at a range of temperatures.

Useful info on stirling solar:

http://www.power-technology.com/projects/victorville/

http://www.sce.com/PowerandEnvironment/BetteringEnergyEfficiencyPowerSources/SolarProject/

Stirling Energy Systems has already been contracted by Southern California Edison and SDPG%E to build 1000MW of solar units starting this year and next. It'll be one of the largest solar farms in the world.

Hey Engineer-Poet, I guess Richard should "work on that understanding" concerning Stirlings as you should "work on that understanding" concerning WVO/SVO in diesel engines, HUH? Your reaction to Richard was well justified, and now you can understand how absurd you sounded as well, right?
:)

Remmember, PV gives you some 10-20% of nominal power when there is no sun shine.

What you get from Stirling system in this case in nothing (0,00 watts) or am I wrong?

You mean during the day, but cloudy/overcast? Most PV will give you zero at this point.

Stirling systems, just like any solar thermal hot water system, still get heat as there is still a lot of UV on a cloudy day. Not sure about the cut-in heat requirements, so I can't answer for sure. But there is still a good amount of heat the collectors can get on a cloudy day.

This initiative was announced by Bush in Jan 2006 and they do not even have congressional appropriations yet. Normally, you get the appropriations before, not after you negotiate contracts. The way things are going, they will be lucky to have funding by next fiscal year beginning in October of 2007. Obviously, there is no sense of urgency about funding these solar initiatives. Maybe they just need to give them a blank check like the war in Iraq.

Above, it was mentioned they are not funding thin cell, they are funding thin film. What is thin cell? Is that different?

Glad to see they are tying to lower the cost of inverters and balance of system components. This is becoming increasingly important as Applied Materials, for example, speculates that they can get the cost of thin film down to a dollar a watt in a few years with the monster machines they are manufacturing. Accordingly, the thing holding solar back will not be the cost of the PV material, but the cost of the ancillary components.

If indeed, we believe that we can enable solar to be competitive with fossil fuels, we need to immediately position ourselves to transition away from fossil fuels. We should start by prohibiting any additional coal fired plants with a plant to phase them out unless they can sequester co2. Even if we maximize wind, solar, wave, geotthermal, and hydro, we will need to maintain dispatchable fuels sources, which should be nuclear and natural gas with natural gas to be phased out later.

While the above projects will, hopefully, be useful, and results in some breakthroughs, the U.S. should prioritize carbon taxes and other direct incentives to get consumers and utilities to move to renewable energy. The big breakthrougs will come with a hundred plus billion dollar market that all these solar and other renewable players have to compete for.

Wow, 120,000 of these sterling puppies to keep from building a new nuke or coal plant. I am glad I am not required to buy power from this mandated source. My electricity is 99.2 coal and nuke. While I might be willing to pay more for electricity if it the environmental impact was reduced, the environmental impact of 120,000 of these sterling puppies is huge.

I challenge anyone to tell me that this monster is somehow better than Mohave Coal station. I bet every elected official has room for at least one sterling puppy in their backyard. How about 100 between the White and the Lincoln memorial? They would be called art if Golden Gate park was bulldozed.

Wait for it.... Offshore sterling puppies!!!

Sorry, I got carried away. I am not really against sterling puppies or other solar technologies because someday we may run out of coal.

Well, let's see...

With a big stirling station, you have an initial impact to the area being used. After that, well, basically free, unpolluting, zero C02 energy for the remainder of its life expectancy. Upgrades are easy to make, increasing efficiency over time, resulting in a very long life span.

Coal. Coal. Did I say coal? Let's start with the horrific damage mining the stuff causes. Next is the infrastructure needed to haul the stuff to the power station. Next is the C02. Next is the Mercury. Next is the myriad of other toxic emissions. Next is the huge costs associated with any possible upgrades. Next is... the list is endless and never changes over the plant's life span.

Am I missing something or is this so blatantly obvious that even a chimp can grasp the difference? ;)

Kit P.

I'm sure you're right about the environmental impact of stirling puppies. No doubt those dishes sit out there in the Mojave desert just pouring out tons of mercury, nitrous oxides, sulfur, particulates and other pollution like mad, not to mention CO2. Never mind the strip mining and the necessary *blowing the tops off of mountains* that are required in order to fuel those things, causing yet *more* environmental degradation.

I mean, really, what in the world is So. Cal Edison thinking?

Sterling Energy Systems Dishes are designed to maintain a constant hotside temperature by throttling the mass flow of Hydrogen through the engine. So during an overcast day less working fluid is circulating through the system, but it's still generating electricity.

Kit P.
As far as whether or not you'd choose a solar array vs a coal station. The environmental impact of coal stations is well demonstrated including Mercury emissions, obvious carbon and heat release (heck that coal at one time was made by the sun), death of workers in coal mines etc. Coal is a quick and dirty method to generate lots of power, it's time one of the richest countries in the world started to rise above that.

Thank you Tom for making my point. Any story about solar leads to the suggestion of banning coal. Solar will never be compete with coal because of the massive amounts of material and maintainability of that material.

My calculation was wrong however, Southern California does not have enough backyards to supply electricity with sterling puppies.

There should be no sense of urgency about solar. Most Americans are more worried about heating when it is 30 below. Renewable energy gets more than its fair share of research dollars and presidential attention.

Am I missing something else? I reviewed the posts and see no mention of "banning coal". Kit, you seem to be scripting a play in your head in which we are all actors, yet are not told our lines.

Let's not forget that there are types of solar power other than pv and stirling based solar thermal. Solar chemical shows some promise for the future, and other viable types of solar thermal already exist, most of which heat fluid to power a steam engine or turbine. The largest solar plant on earth (located in the Mojave) uses SEGS parabolic trough system which heats fluid which powers a turbine: http://www.fplenergy.com/portfolio/contents/segs_viii.shtml

Can't we make such kind of Solar Energy System where Sunlight is concentrated and fed into a collector which then separates the light beam into those frequencies which are suitable for Solar Cells and which are not.

The suitable light is then fed to the Solar array and other part of light is used to do something else, like heating.

A wild thought, I guess...

Kit.

Never say never. The times they are a changin'. If, indeed, we get into a dollar or less a watt, things start to get competitive.

Splar isnt as impprtant as wind on the elenergy producer side of things but its very useful on the home side if they can get the cost down.

Also there are tons of places where a windmill would not be ok but where thereis plnety of space for solar and a need for cheap energy during the day.

Parking lots malls large area buldings so on and so forth.

you guys over there in the states are missing more than a few hills and creeks due to the disgusting way that coal is being mined in some parts of the united states, its about time that some new methods were explored,

Andichrose:

We're not missing the hills; it's just that there are a lot of hills in West Virginia, for example, that are now very flat on top. This is part of the U.S. tennis court initiative. As for the creeks, their just fine except for the fact that the water is black and extremely difficult to drink.

Kit P.
False dichotomies are the seed of ignorance, fear, and hate.

The large stirling program may have had more to do with them wanting to get a power transmission line through public lands than it had to do with any renewable energy. If they could claim that it would be carrying renewable energy, then they might get approval. After the line was approved and built, you could imagine that the program just might get scaled back a bit and carry more of the Palo Verde nuclear power to the San Diego area.