So I work in the field of renewable energy specifically solar cells

>>7804589

It's kinda funny how you're lying about working in the field.

>>7804593
I'm guessing "working in the field" means that Anon is the grunt who reads the number off the scale when they test the integrity of the piles/footings that solar panels are mounted on.

>>7804589
I have high hopes for solar energy, but a big issue is raw materials. We already use so much silicon for computers, and we would need so much more to provide solar power for the whole country. We need to figure out how to harness solar energy using a more abundant material.

>>7804589
>Not to mention most of these solar cell materials are all patented, which is the very reason why they are so ridiculously expensive

Fucking criminal.

>>7805787
This nigga here...

>>7805787
Silicon is literally as abundant as dirt.

It's the bullshit rare-earth elements involved that make them expensive.

If solar panels were sustainable, we'd have solar-panel powered solar-panel factories already. The whole vertically integrated supply system of solar panel production would be powered with solar panels. This is not the case, it will never be the case. Solar panels are niche products that will never substitute hydrocarbon energy sources.

So we have a shitton of toxic waste from solar panel production using up rare-earth elements, it's obviously a dead-end technology, I don't know why people think it's viable. Even with the costs subsidized, their break-even point from a cost-benefit analysis spans over 15 years.

Wind is okay, where it works, solar is strictly for niche applications, off-the-grid, or for space craft, ect. Spain is going bankrupt with it's shitty solar power plants.

>>7805787
lel

>>7805804
>Fucking criminal.

Why?
A company spends a lot of money to develop a product and you expect them to just give it away?
Then the Chinese would have nobody to steal stuff from if we were just giving it away. Takes the fun out of it.

>>7805787
>We already use so much silicon for computers, and we would need so much more to provide solar power for the whole country.


I'll take "What is the second most abundant element in Earth's crust" for $500 Alex.

>>7804589
A crazy guy I follow on youtube powers his entire family's personal electricity needs, manufacturing, and transportation with just a few solar cells and boat batteries and he's been unemployed for the majority of a decade.

>>7805861
What rare-earth metals, pray tell?

>>7805897
Off the top of my head, Tellurium.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadmium_telluride_photovoltaics

>>7805881
>A company spends a lot of money to develop a product and you expect them to just give it away?

Look up the patent paradox. The vast majorty of patents are completely useless and companies only hang on to them because they might hit big on one of them someday. Patents are basically lottery tickets.

Also patents make scalability much harder. Say If you have a company x and wants to use company y patented tech. Now company x has to pay cash flow draining royalties to company y.

>>7805943
Tellurium is not a rare-earth metal. Also, most photovoltaics are based off silicon, and use nothing more than silicon and trace levels of dopants. The difficulty is in producing the ultrapure silicon needed for efficient operation.

>>7804593
My thoughts exactly, and I barely know anything about solar energy and don't work in the field either.

>>7805988
No, tellurium is not at all common, it's about as common in the earths crust as palladium or platinum. Maybe it's really abundant in distant galaxies or something, but lettuce be cereal here.

>>7806011
>I don't know what a rare earth metal is

File: 213221321.png (705KB, 1500x739px) Image search: [Google]

705KB, 1500x739px

I don't get why they bother building solar panels in wintery northern climates. The solar irradiance/insolation is shitty. The whole thing is horribly inefficient by location alone.

>>7806011
Your central point here is correct, but the term you are using refers to a certain group of elements, not 'metals that are rare and come from the Earth'.

I'm not the guy you were talking to. I'm just pointing out the misunderstanding here so that you can tell this guy to eat shit when he ignores the crux of what you're saying.

>>7805787
literally sand, fucking sand is is silicon

>>7806011
Please look up the definition of "rare-earth metal". It still doesn't address my point that most solar panels are made of 99.999% silicon doped with ppm quantities of elements like phosphorus and boron.

>>7806036
>>7806091
Okay sorry for misusing the scientific definition, but what the fuck is something like tellurium besides a fucking metal that is rare on earth?

File: solar panel.png (92KB, 757x216px) Image search: [Google]

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From alibaba. Thats 12 panels for max $2000.

>>7806491
Umm, that'd be $3000 (well, 2999).

Good luck getting those here unbroken and then there's everything you need aside from the panels themselves.

>>7804593
>It's kinda funny how you're lying about working in the field.

Thank you. I have worked in the field and the way OP talks makes me think he hasn't.

>>7804589
10% efficient? Even crappy modules are 15% efficient. Last time I checked, SunPower has a 20% efficient model or around there.

I think it's cute how people use efficiency to attempt to knock on solar. First, it's not really about efficiency, it's about dollars and space. If the price is competitive with other technologies (grid parity, which is being reached more and more everyday throughout the world) and you have the space, then solar is competitive. And when I see 20% efficient, I think to myself, wow, we have so much room for improvement from this point.

>>7804589
>Not to mention most of these solar cell materials are all patented.

I guess we'll just have to wait for those to patents to possibly expire just like Disney cartoons.