Thread: Oil Dependency

Originally Posted by gwahir

sorry, pardon? i'm not calling you a liar, but you'll need to expand on this.

My belief is that the rests mostly in solar and not wind technology. Further, the argument rests over the creation of the technology, not its generation. I find it would be difficult to argue against the negative impact of PV arrays in terms of the electricity produced unless you wanted to complain about the pain a photon may undergo bashing into and energizing an electron with enough energy to pass that fermi level. (or the pitiful efficiencies that are not up to par with what we need... )

In sense, there's some truth when looking at the chemical composition of solar panels, their creation, and the excess waste. The composition of new and upcoming thin-films contains elements like Cadmium and Arsenide which are heavily toxic. My girlfriend monitors a PV company's production as an EH&S consultant, but it only shows that these residual chemicals and their disposal are heavily regulated. Probably the same as, if not more than, an oil company.

As for turbines, I don't see the argument but it probably will take some level of abstraction/extraction. Some say eyesore, but there's something called the Tehachapi pass in California that I've driven through multiple times. that has a windfarm nestled in its hills. Quite beautiful if you ask me. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tehachapi_Pass_Wind_Farm

Originally Posted by Atmoscheer

For the record, wind and solar are going to do far more damage to the environment than gasoline engine exhaust... though obviously coal power is guaranteed self-destruction and should be discontinued 20 years ago with a lifting of the ban on new nuclear power construction.

This is the dumbest thing that atmosfear has ever posted on CD ever and is just him giving into some stupid ass conservative BS propaganda.

Adding solar panels in a location would be a one-time change in albedo, and if one considers current amorphous Si technology panels' efficiency, it would be quite act as a increase in globall warming. However, changing the albedo of a portion of land is like a one time addition of carbon into the atmosphere. You don't have to continuously warm the atmosphere per amount of electricity generated. Furthermore, as solar panel efficiencies increase, the amount of global warming from the panels' prescence would decrease. Also, of course to make solar panels now requires electricity, and that comes from burning fossil fuels, but it's just the necessary start to a bootstrapping process.

As for wind power, yeah if affects the climate if turbines cover massive areas of the globe, on the order of ~10%. But even then studies suggest that its impact on the global climate would be far less than that of other human activities such as deforestation or burning fossil fuels, yes not just coal but also petroleum...


The concern would be over local climate and ecological effects more than global ones. Better turbine design can prevent things like bird death due to turbines or turbulence in the turbines' wakes.

Originally Posted by TheOriginalGrumpySpy

In sense, there's some truth when looking at the chemical composition of solar panels, their creation, and the excess waste. The composition of new and upcoming thin-films contains elements like Cadmium and Arsenide which are heavily toxic. My girlfriend monitors a PV company's production as an EH&S consultant, but it only shows that these residual chemicals and their disposal are heavily regulated. Probably the same as, if not more than, an oil company.

What sorts of PV's are these? The only materials I can think of that could be used in PV's with Cd or As are things like CdZe and III-V semiconductors like GaAs or InAs, and I wasn't aware there was any real potential for making marketable solar cells out of these.

Also by girlfriend, I take it you mean a rough job named Mark?


EDIT: Okay I take that back, I HAVE heard of GaAs and other III-V semiconductors used in solar cells, in fact with the highest reported efficiencies ever, but last I heard they were so prohibitively that they couldn't be used practically.