24 minutes ago, martin-w said:

Agrivoltaics is not new

Oh, I'm sure it exists.  It's a good idea to utilize the land to the fullest.

I just don't see it being utilized on a large enough scale to provide power to billions of people.

These are cute little projects and ideas, but they're just not practical.  The geothermal idea is much more viable IMO.

If every town on the planet builds one of these small-scale agrivoltaic plants then maybe it would work, but that just ain't gonna happen.

Dave

It seems to me the best solution is to require individual geothermal for all new builds and then retrofit all existing builds to the extent that that is possible.  Most electricity usage is for heating and cooling and geothermal can greatly regulate the temperature extremes in a home.  From there we rely on more efficient products of all kinds.

P.S.:  the government and private entities have been paying landowners for decades to put wind turbines on their property.  I don't see why it would have to be any different with agrivoltaics.

Edited July 6, 20223 yr by sightseer

2 hours ago, dave2013 said:

 

Show me some pictures of large solar plants with food crops growing under them

Or how about solar panels mounted on 12 foot poles over grazing land with cattle grazing under them?

Noel

1 hour ago, birdguy said:

Or how about solar panels mounted on 12 foot poles over grazing land with cattle grazing under them?

Noel

Sure, why not?  A lot of things are possible.  The question is: how much will it cost in terms not only of money but materials as well?  It is astounding how much mining would have to be done for all the materials needed to build enough solar panels, wind turbines, batteries, and all the supporting infrastructure.

It can and is being done, but it will take a long time and will cost a lot.  Even with all the renewable power we have today, it isn't nearly enough for current, let alone future, needs.

Despite all the big talk by various govts. around the world for over 20 years and many billions in subsidies and research, energy needs are so bad right now that those same govts. are scrambling to reopen dirty coal power plants and desperately seeking to import more coal.

Dave

"We have met the enemy and it is us."  Pogo.

A scientist named Ambloyzx on the Planet Xermtyr.  "Well, the experiment our forefathers started on that planet they call Earth appears to be failing.  We need more data.  Send in some more of what they call UFOs.  And we had better slow down our own technological progress before we repeat their mistake of reaping the benefits before analyzing the cost." 

Noel

Edited July 6, 20223 yr by birdguy
Corrected the spelling of the planet Xermtyr.

3 hours ago, dave2013 said:

Despite all the big talk by various govts. around the world for over 20 years and many billions in subsidies and research, energy needs are so bad right now that those same govts. are scrambling to reopen dirty coal power plants and desperately seeking to import more coal.

I just read where the EU is proposing to label gas and nuclear 'transitional' green.  Maybe coal can be labeled 'almost' green.

Noel

13 hours ago, martin-w said:

Billions have been spent on nuclear fusion. In fact its impossible to count how many billions. Deep geothermal drilling technology, utilising this new gyrotron method, seems to offer a quicker cheaper route to abundant power. So should we now divert a fair chunk of those billion in this direction? The amount of energy available from deep geothermal drilling is staggering. Is it a better direction?

By all means research into fusion must continue to be funded. It would be difficult to count on geothermal to power our spaceships! 🤓

23 hours ago, dave2013 said:

Oh, I'm sure it exists.  It's a good idea to utilize the land to the fullest.

I just don't see it being utilized on a large enough scale to provide power to billions of people.

These are cute little projects and ideas, but they're just not practical.  The geothermal idea is much more viable IMO.

If every town on the planet builds one of these small-scale agrivoltaic plants then maybe it would work, but that just ain't gonna happen.

Dave

 

Huh... nobody said anything at all about it being able to provide power for billions of people. That's not its function. There aren't going to be acres of crop growing fields combined with solar serving the world's billions... obviously!

And you asked for a photograph of plants growing under a sizable installation. You got one, a one gigawatt version. Bigger are planned.

I think what happened here is that you'd never heard of the technology and jumped to conclusions, criticized without knowing anything about it.

It's a useful way of providing power and food from the same plot of land that's all.

And nobody has ever said there's  going to be one in every town. 🙄

Edited July 7, 20223 yr by martin-w

21 hours ago, birdguy said:

Or how about solar panels mounted on 12 foot poles over grazing land with cattle grazing under them?

Noel

 

Already in existance and with sheep underneath. It's another form of agrivoltaics. We also have floatavoltaics too which is useful. 

23 hours ago, dave2013 said:

And you cannot prove otherwise.

There are a lot of mysteries, Martin, and you cannot know the truth about everything.

Dave

 

 

I can't prove fairies aren't at the bottom of my garden either or that my kitchen chair isn't really an omnipotent deity in disguise or that a miniature teapot isn't orbiting Venus. But what I can do is use common sense and consider plausibility and liklihood.  The sensible thing is to consider the evidence and extrordinary claims require very good evidence.

If claims of genetic tinkering by aliens is claimed then evidence is required. There is none. Unless you have some? Does it have a non-zero possibity of being true? Of course it does. Can we prove its not true? No, but we don't believe something just because we can't prove it's not true.

And I don't claim to know the truth about everything, neither does science. But what I do ask for is very good evidence for such extrordinary claims.

Edited July 7, 20223 yr by martin-w

16 hours ago, n4gix said:

By all means research into fusion must continue to be funded. It would be difficult to count on geothermal to power our spaceships! 🤓

Unless we used geothermal power to energise collasal lasers to propel a solar sail. 😁

42 minutes ago, martin-w said:

use common sense and consider plausibility and liklihood

Not all theories require evidence.  Just common sense supposition.  It's plausible that aliens tinkered with primitive apes that developed into humanoids.  It's plausible that alien helped the Egyptians build the pyramids at Giza and aligned them perfectly with the earth's poles.  It's plausible that aliens helped the Incas line up those huge figures on the ground.

Nobody has to prove otherwise.  They are just theories.  You can ridicule and dismiss them out of hand, but that is not the scientific method is it?  Before Marconi nobody ever dreamed that signals could be broadcast across an ocean.  In fact there were probably Martins back then who said this:

42 minutes ago, martin-w said:

And I don't claim to know the truth about everything, neither does science. But what I do ask for is very good evidence for such extrordinary claims.

Such evidence might surface sometime in the future just as the naysayers had to wait for man to walk on the moon before considering that possibility.  And there are still those who say it was faked on a Hollywood stage.

Dave and I might be right or wrong.  But to dismiss our suppositions and theories borders on scientific bigotry because you refuse to consider the possibility.

Noel

Edited July 7, 20223 yr by birdguy

1 hour ago, martin-w said:

I think what happened here is that you'd never heard of the technology and jumped to conclusions, criticized without knowing anything about it.

What technology?  Solar panels mounted on a raised platform so you can grow some crops under them?  That's not exactly an advanced concept.  I'd never heard the catchy term "agrivoltaics", which is a misnomer because the panels are still "photovoltaic", so the term is just something that marketing folks came up with.  Again, you love to promote these neat ideas but they just aren't practical in the near-term.  You don't have a background or education in science and technology, so it's easy for you to be dazzled by these youtube videos promoting this or that niche technology.

Solar and wind power plants are being built and their contribution to the total energy supply is increasing, which is a good thing.  However, currently only about 12% of electricity in the USA comes from wind and solar, and we have a *lot* of wind turbines and solar panels.  I guess if you have your way then we will just have to build almost 10 times more of those turbines, panels, and batteries.  I wonder how much that will cost?  I wonder where all the materials for those things will come from, perhaps more intensive strip mining?  No problem, we'll just outsource all that to another country and say how green *we* are.

In the meantime, France is restarting coal power plants.  So much for their nuclear capacity and all their vaunted renewable energy.  That's where you get your power from, right? 

Dave

1 hour ago, birdguy said:

Not all theories require evidence.  Just common sense supposition.

That's usually just hand-waving away a lack of evidence.

Common sense once suggested that the earth was flat and that the Sun revolved around the Earth.

Cheers

1 hour ago, birdguy said:

And there are still those who say it was faked on a Hollywood stage.

Do you consider that plausible?