Solar Energy's Potential Is Hottest In The Planet's Coldest Regions
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By Michael J. Coren
Think the best place for solar panels is the desert? Think again. In Antarctica, the sun shines 24 hours a day.
The standard vision is a desert filled with solar panels. Solar power is at home in the desert, because the desert is hot. But the Arctic is calling.
Most of us have a hard time imagining solar panels among the frigid expanses and mountain ranges of South America or Nepal, but those sun-drenched regions can generate more energy per hectare than many of the world's deserts, according to an article in the Environmental Science & Technology.
The new study identified the Himalaya Mountains, the Andes, and even Antarctica as among the world's most promising solar power landscapes, at least in theory. The (flatter) regions around Mt Everest, say, could generate power for China's great industrial endeavors. At the polar regions, where temperatures might dip more than 50 degrees below freezing but sunlight shines 24 hours per day for half the year, solar technology could also be effective. Solar and wind power has already been a major power source for Antarctic research bases outfitted with many megawatts of renewable energy capacity (although what works for the U.S. McMurdo station in Antarctica may not much sense in other inhospitable conditions).
To pinpoint the best places for solar power, researchers used available weather data to account for the temperature effects on solar cell output, with variables such as transmission losses and snow fall to be considered in the future. Potential, however, is not reality. Why collect all this information if most of this potential energy will never be tapped? Because maps can catalyze large scale investment in renewable energy potential, as California's wind data maps helped enable that states' wind industry to invest in promising sites.
The next steps will be figuring out the infrastructure and economics of a new solar grid. Creating power in Antarctica is one thing. Getting it to civilization is another. That will prove considerably more challenging.
[Image: Flickr user Anne Froelich]
Reach Michael J. Coren via Twitter or email.
Copyright 2011 by Fast Company. Reprinted with permission.
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13 Comments
Add CommentOn the other hand, warming the Arctic might exacerbate certain potential effects of global warming, melting ice and rising sea levels, for example...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs a user of solar power it does work but it is ultimately impractical. The only reason I could do it at all was because the neighbor had removed his trees, I am not sure that is good.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAntarctica is pointless because there is no way to use the energy anywhere useful.
What needs to be done with solar is to mimic plants. We need to turn the photons into a fuel, not pure energy. Fuel can be transported making it possible to set up solar farms in the best locations to generate the most energy as stored in a fuel and then transport that fuel to where it needs to be.
The solar panels are not that effective though. In the end, my natural gas generator does a much better job. Only someone in a place like California with government controlled electric rates set so high does it make any sense. Possibly if the Fed and State governments were to get out of the solar subsidy nonsense and let the panels price out to what their real value is, then they might work out.
Until solar panels create fuels, solar is a non-starter. That is the issue with most alternative or "renewable" energy. They are not fuels, so their effectiveness is limited geographically. While most of the population lives in areas where these alternatives simply will not work well. A fuel is the key and the best fuel is one generated from sunlight. No Batteries won't work. Again, that is just energy on hold, not actual fuel. The end result of batteries will be landfill full of giant batteries with who knows what sort of chemicals leaking into the ground. I would rather have global warming than 1/3 of the water tables contaminated by batteries from all of these attempts to have all electric cars or somehow store solar energy for later use.
Don't forget the Arctic's Prudhoe Bay. I am sure my old employers there-- Arco and BP would be interested. All transportation, habitation and logistics are in place.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisStrange article. Yes, the sun shines 24 hours a day at the poles, but only for half the year, the other half is darkness. So the total sunlight over the course of a year is the same as anywhere else. The only reason I know of to put solar cells in cold places is because their efficiency drops as they get hotter, such as in the desert. If this is the reason, it should have been in the article somewhere.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOne of the most important factors impacting local solar insolation is the effective "thickness" which the energy must penetrate. The apparent thickness at the equater is about 100,000 ft. At the poles, it is the tangent length of the lattitude. Of course, local weather averages, ie., number of clear "sunshiny days" per year are also important. I find the premise of this article flawed into the "far Absurd" region. Of course, utilizing sterling drives, taking advantage of the extreme cold to help maximize the TD required is a plus. But then, of course, there is the question of power transmission from point of harvest to point of use. Back to that "Absurd Region"thing. Scientific American? I think I could come up with better headlines with with to place articles of this nature...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWired electrical grid stretching out from Antarctica to the US! Would be sooo beautiful! Not that much left on arrival but got to use all the nonsensical ideals imaginable to divert attention! People love pipe dream ideals like this one or the hydrogen energy based economy. Gives them hope somehow! And all this false hope based on futile technologies prevents people from taking the actual necessary step to insure the future of our species, cause lets be honest the planet is in no danger! So they will keep using their cars without true restraints all the while causing more cases of respiratory diseases and dysfunctions,cancers, heart diseases, eczema and other skin diseases, and ever increasing heat domes in the summer, because of their co2 emissions. Some times i wonder if it's ignorance that is bliss or if it's the makers of ignorance who are?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is a definite advantage in 24 hour sunshine even if it is only for half the year. It is a matter of time scales. You do away with the intermittent aspect of sunshine on a day by day basis everywhere else on the planet.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisStill, the whole thing sounds like a pipe dream to me.
Sites to generate unlimited amounts of solar power are available near all the human population centers where the energy can be put to good use. Sites that will generate energy and see it wasted because of transmission losses. What sites? In space, Of course... But many smart people are always looking down and not up, always forgeting the possibilities above our heads if only they would look up.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy trash the mountains or the artic when there is so much space waiting for humanity that is free of prior claims and free of ecological damage.
Solar power satelites can beam power down from space according to various proposals with far, far better efficientcy than the power could be moved through transmission lines from the Antartic and remote mountain ranges. Would a solar farm in Antartica or on top of Himalayan mountains be less expensive than solar power satelites? I would bet on the satelites, especially after I have seen the plans from space x for re-usable vertical landing rockets. Other, much more powerful and robust space access systems should be possible and practical if there was a committment to develop space solar power to deliver electricity to any site on earth that needed and wanted it with far less objectional infrastructure than any other competing source.
Space solar power would be the greenest possible power source and the easiest way to provide electricity to the half of the human population that lives without electrification now.
Save the planet from ugly scars on pristine mountains and one of the last great wilderness areas, Antartica, Leave i.e. begin the migration to space with the development of a space solar power utility and the infrastructure/popluation necessary to support it. Help create the space economy that can provide both prosperity for future generations and preserve this blue jewel of a planet and an ecology,
Space Solar Power Satellites not ugly, scars on
Anartica and pristine mountain tops.
Wouldn't the 24 hours of Arctic sunshine (for half the year) also be subject to obstruction by clouds?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs I understand, utilization or storage of off-peak period power generation capacity would require some significant (battery) storage capacity - making that 'excess' power available during periods of peak demand.
Also, aren't high latitude high tension power lines more susceptible to disruption from increased solar wind activity at the magnetic poles?
The single apparent advantage of gigantic solar farms situated in the Antarctic: sunshine for 24 hours a day for half the year; in the Himalayas and the Andes: a sizable daylight period for a considerable part of the year.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAgainst that, balance the several disadvantages:
-- darkness for nearly 24 hours a day for the other half of the year in the Antarctic;
-- warming up the Antarctic will have unknown effects on global warming, rates of melting of the arctic ice, rising sea levels - in general those effects are likely to be 'bad for the planet' over the long term;
-- in the Antarctic, the Andes and the Himalayas, huge environmental degradation; loss of habitat for many species in the Andes and the Himalayas (many of which are probably already under severe stress) and I believe for the penguins and seals in the Antarctic;
-- enormous transmission losses in carrying the electricity generated to where it is to be used.
All said and done, the proposal seems to be just utterly absurd, as many correspondents have observed. I do believe and hope that we will soon learn how to put the power of 'scientific thinking' to better use for the planet and its many species than we have done thus far.
If one were to look for a PRACTICAL incorporation of solar power, look no further than the millions of available commercial roof space. The utilities could install on leased roof space, the owning entities get a "free" as of yet underutilized cash stream for doing nothing. The utilities don't have to occupy valuable real estate, the environmentalists don't have to NIMBY an installation. It's a win-win-win. Seeing as I'm not the sharpest pencil in the box, I can only wonder why this isn't happening on a grand scale. One last thing, industrial/commercial installations are by default, already connected to the Grid in a BIG way, new transmission lines should be not generally required. PLUS, These installations would be close to point of use, too. Boring, not exotic, doesn't require ANOTHER layer of government. Hmmm, maybe THAT'S the problem...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf one were to look for a PRACTICAL incorporation of solar power, look no further than the millions of available commercial roof space. The utilities could install on leased roof space, the owning entities get a "free" as of yet underutilized cash stream for doing nothing. The utilities don't have to occupy valuable real estate, the environmentalists don't have to NIMBY an installation. It's a win-win-win. Seeing as I'm not the sharpest pencil in the box, I can only wonder why this isn't happening on a grand scale. One last thing, industrial/commercial installations are by default, already connected to the Grid in a BIG way, new transmission lines should be not generally required. PLUS, These installations would be close to point of use, too. Boring, not exotic, doesn't require ANOTHER layer of government. Hmmm, maybe THAT'S the problem...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat is more accurate and more useful, a clock with a 5% uncertainty in time, or an arrested clock, that gives the exact time two times a day ?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe proposal for polar solar energy capture, 6 months on 6 months off, seems very close to the arrested clock to me...