Solar Plane Lands in Ariz., 1st Leg Of Major Trip

Your ROI info is either outdated or inaccurate. See this report on the ROI for solar panels


http://www.solarenergy.net/News/800626394-solar-power-has-high-return-on-investment-report-says.aspx

 

You are a typical lib who wants pointy-headed autocrats in Washington to tell the rest of us what to do instead of letting the free market decide.

Let Obama worshipers fund these crazy experiments out their own wealth instead of asking taxpayers to take all the risk.

Warren Buffett or George Soros have more than enough money to search for the lost secrets of Atlantis without asking me to pay for it.

 

Everyone in the world of business is not an Evil Madman, as you apparently delude. What is BEST for the MOST PEOPLE is how ALL BUSINESSES PROFIT and THRIVE.

Solar energy is just TOO WEAK...try to get that concept. The problem with it is ELECTRICAL, not "cultural".

 

"If an airplane can fly day or night with no fuel, just on the sun's power, of course it means that everybody in daily life can use this technology for his house, for heating and cooling systems, for lighting, for cars, for trucks. There's so much we can do now to have a cleaner future," Piccard said.

Sure, 20 hours from CA to AZ is slower than a human powered vehicle but hay, the thing only cost the tax payers a few million dollars and carries one person.

From Phoenix, the aircraft will travel to Dallas-Fort Worth airport in Texas, Lambert-St. Louis airport, Dulles airport in the Washington area and New York's John F. Kennedy airport. Each flight leg will take about 19 to 25 hours, with 10-day stops in each city.

I called my cousin who live up there around Dallas so he is going to knock this thing down with a rock.

So, you think that the price of natural gas is going up??? We have so much natural gas that we can afford to export it.

The idea that solar power is great as long as the tax payers are subsidizing it is crazy. These people are taking welfare and you think that , that is good??

 

Nope the problem is it doesn't generate enough profits for it to be financially feasible enough. That's not an evil thing it's just common sense when it comes to business, and big business especially. If it or anything for that matter had the potential to make high profits it would be at the top of the wall streets/corporate America's priority list, and without a doubt they would be figuring out the best way to use the best government corporate money can buy and how they could use the tax payers money/credit to finance their interests.

 

Wel, if you want to look at future energy prices, you just need to read here. Basically, we have an increasing energy demand both in the US and worldwide. As China, Brazil and India become more modernized, energy prices will increase because world wide demand increases. Our energy output is thus affected by worldwide demand, not local demand. As for subsidizing, that happens whether you have coal, natural gas, solar, or any other power source. It is really a moot item for if you take away the subsidizing from oil and gas (usually in a form of natural monopolies, land credits, depressed vaulations for property taxes, etc), your formula is hogwash using a very simplified payback period.

Second, prices for solar panels should drop because there should be an increase in supply with a relative growth in solar panels for residential units. Take for instance televisions. Prices for 32 in flat screen, no frills, televisions have dropped. You can now buy a 32 in flat screen for the price today as you would be able to buy a 26 in traditional television set some 10 years ago. And the same can happen with solar panel technology as well.

 

As this chart will show, yes when you do a regression analysis on the prices.

 

No, but the science does consistently get better. And this is what people keep missing. Everyone saying, "We need to abandon solar panels" now are missing why solar is subsidized, why it makes sense to promote it: the technology is consistently improving. Graphene, solar windows (already in use), and all manner of other interesting developments have been going on to gradually make solar power more and more viable. We subsidize it now so that later we can all profit when the technology truly comes into its own. And I'm not convinced your figures are still up to date.

 

How fast did the Wright Brothers go in their first flight? And should their low speed have ended airflight for ever?

 

He's the Wright Brothers and t heir "One trick pony":



110 years later, here the Eurofighter:



You're right, if technology isn't, in its first incarnation, perfect, we should drop the idea and consider it nonsense.

 

Mac-7

Your post here has the most important point. IF--------------all of the green energy crap is so wonderful, let the green weenies develop it with their own money. Dont throw taxpayer money down the hole like Solyndra.

 

Yeah. And then sometimes you have ideas like the theory of evolution, where the most crucial applications weren't discovered until over a century later. Alchemy never did work out not because it wasn't profitable, but because there was never any scientific basis for it to begin with. Same with everything else on your list. Far better examples would be technologies which have proven themselves to be functional, but not profitable or marketable, where something required is missing. Because that is the category that solar panels almost belong to, and won't very much longer if improvements continue at this rate. And it just keeps on getting better.

Graphene panels is a major breakthrough. We're talking about a much higher energy yield thanks to new technology. The new semitransparent polymer is a major breakthrough, allowing for solar power to be implemented virtually everywhere. These aren't gimmicks, they're big moves forward in the research and development of what is close to being a major viable power source. Remember when all those solar panel companies that you right-wingers like to (*)(*)(*)(*)(*) about went belly-up? It wasn't because they were non-viable businesses, or that they had some major failing, it was because China butted in in the market and found a way to produce the panels considerably cheaper than Solyndra could. That's a bit of a breakthrough, wouldn't you think?

Solar panels are constantly getting better. This idea that it somehow is "failed" because we haven't made it perfectly profitable is insane. It isn't even stagnant yet!

 

Swiss shootin' fer round-the-world solar flight...

Swiss-made solar plane makes maiden flight
Jun 2,`14 -- A Swiss-made solar-powered aircraft has made a successful inaugural flight as its makers prepare for what they hope will be the first round-the-world solar flight.