Impact of solar panels on global climate

[Jovus]

Back to the topic at hand...

Oh look, Jovus is volunteering to do it better.

I can't, of course, because we don't know what the paper says or its methodology. But from what little we know about it from the abstract: I'd start by not writing it at all. It's like writing a paper on what the effects would be if all the water on the planet suddenly disappeared, or if all the cows died off, or if the dinosaurs came back to life. It has no grounding in reality.

I will, of course, retract if we get access to the paper and that turns out not to be the case. As I said, we're dealing with the abstract only here, which in my experience is a very poor measure of the actual work of the authors.

[magnemoe]

Reading the entire article (at least the conclusion) actually helps understanding there should not even be a debate as originally stated by OP:

You can't just create a debate whilst having only read the introduction of an article.

PS: If there's any issue with quoting a limited access article, please tell me.

I agree, however other large scale effects like cities, road networks and farming has more impact.

Even if you create giant solar farms up to 100 km^2 the the installation itself and running it would have more impact, you would remove larger vegetation scare off animals and so on, the access roads would likely offset the increased reflection anyway.

[Requia]

Reading the entire article (at least the conclusion) actually helps understanding there should not even be a debate as originally stated by OP:

You can't just create a debate whilst having only read the introduction of an article.

PS: If there's any issue with quoting a limited access article, please tell me.

You mean the 32$ article? Either actually post it if you're in Uni and have access or don't ..... at people who don't have access.

[Gaarst]

You mean the 32$ article? Either actually post it if you're in Uni and have access or don't ..... at people who don't have access.

I am indeed using my university access to read the article. Also, I'm pretty sure that posting the entire article here is illegal.

I am not criticising the fact that you're not willing to spend $32 on an article. And neither am I .....-ing (whatever this means) at people who don't have access to it.

I am criticising the fact that OP started a debate and drew conclusions based on an article that he obviously didn't read. While the introduction/abstract of a scientific article is meant to contain an outline of the article itself, it is far from containing the entire article: for example, the conclusion of the article, which I quoted, explicitely states that OP's concerns about solar electricity being worse for the environment than "fossil" electricity shouldn't exist.

[Darnok]

explicitely states that OP's concerns about solar electricity being worse for the environment than "fossil" electricity shouldn't exist.

What? Where did I said it is worse than coal? I said that solar panels are not clean, because they also have negative impact on environment and that is very different thing. Later I was asking about how much negative impact would solar panels had if we would convert all coal power plants into solar. Assuming things I never said is not nice.

[Gaarst]

What? Where did I said it is worse than coal? I said that solar panels are not clean, because they also have negative impact on environment and that is very different thing. Later I was asking about how much negative impact would solar panels had if we would convert all coal power plants into solar. Assuming things I never said is not nice.

You said this earlier on:

Scale difference is also obstacle to see problem... if we would replace every coal power plant with solar panels then it would be very harmful to environment.

I understood this quote, in its context, as you saying that replacing coal plants by solar panels would actually be worse than keeping the coal plants.

I apologise if I didn't understand your point correctly, but even then, my argument about qutoing the article is still valid.

Not saying there shouldn't be a debate though: now that it is launched and has evolved, whatever was said initially doesn't really matter anymore.

[fredinno]

Seriously, who cares? It's a lot easier to generate heat than to get rid of it. With a little ingenuity, we'd have no trouble growing food during an ice age. Making life bearable in a perpetual global warming heat-wave though? Ugh...

I put it in quotes for a reason.

[WinkAllKerb'']

what about geothermal and thermodynamics long run ; ) not really a question more a reminder ; ) heard of 6% it'sound fine for now ... i mean for now ...

[Darnok]

I understood this quote, in its context, as you saying that replacing coal plants by solar panels would actually be worse than keeping the coal plants.

I know my English sucks... but I thought "very harmful" isn't same as "y is worse than x".

Please guys try to read my post not only using 0 and 1. I am against TV kind of discussion where you are limited only to two choices and you have to argue which one is better

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what about geothermal and thermodynamics long run ; ) not really a question more a reminder ; ) heard of 6% it'sound fine for now ... i mean for now ...

When I think about this I look at Mars... and see dead planet without liquid core and magnetic field

[WinkAllKerb'']

hum speaking of earth i remain a "flow"(gaz/liquids) and magnetic and/or gravity periodic stuff related to moon supporter or support air

speaking of others planets that's an other matter ... : )

speaking of solar panel they remain pretty weak against elements and recycling remain pretty bad overall from what i know but far from the worst also actually depending the amount ... but my infos could be outdated ...

[Darnok]

Yea we have Moon, something that Mars doesn't have and that is only reason we are still here

But still if you take energy from environment you affect that environment, so taking energy from Earth core is one of the worst ideas I can think of.

Solar panels on high orbits in ring formation around Earth would be pretty good IMO... problem transfering energy to Earth :/

[Jim DiGriz]

Fun fact: we are in an ice age right now. It's called the Quarternary Glacation. Specifically, we're in an interglacial, which is a relatively short (10,000-20,000 years) intermission between the glacials (the really big cold surges). And from historical evidence, this interglacial (called the Holocene) has already been going on for a while and ought to be ending "sometime soon" (which can be understood as sometime in the next couple millenia). Though scientists are still arguing whether that will actually happen, or whether human influence has already artifically delayed or outright cancelled the next glacial.

Outside of ice ages, Earth has almost no permanent ice at all. Perhaps some temporary freezing during winters, but none of that permaforst stuff we see today in many northern and southern latitudes. Even the poles are just about completely free of ice. And yes, this would make our world dramatically different for us to live in... so be glad we're in an ice age

During ice ages we should also see advancing continental shield glaciers. While this the current glaciation would have been expected to be mild based on orbital parameters, the fact at we don't see those kinds of continental glaciers is likely due to moderate global warming caused by the past 8,000 or so years of agriculture. And the fact that we're now seeing a dramatically warming climate while we are smack in the middle of what should be a mild ice age is alarming.

[WinkAllKerb'']

During ice ages ...

as i m interested in languages stuff i was thinking about this elders perticular sentence since a few day "y a plus de saison" ("there is no more season") dunno when we can find first records of this sentence but kinda remind me kepler ring with smaller variation somehow ...

Edited November 6, 2015 by WinkAllKerb''

[Bill Phil]

Wait, how would the panels be harmful to the environment? They need large surface areas, and cause heat fluctuations, but that's it.

[Jim DiGriz]

Please tell me how to falsify Big Bang or Global warming model This is issue I am talking about in many threads, science is creating artificial models that can't be falsified without going outside of that model.

If the 2.7K cosmic microwave background radiation was not there it would have falsified the Big Bang. The fact that its at 2.7K and has the shape of a thermal blackbody that has been redshifted due to the expansion of the Universe is completely necessary to the model of the Big Bang. If we didn't see that, then there would have been no point in the distant past where matter and energy were decoupled and the universe was a hot ball of plasma. That would have instantly falsified the Big Bang theory. Similarly, if we didn't observe hubble's law in the redshift of galaxies that would have falsified the Big Bang. You can also see the effects of the redshift in the Lyman-Alpha forest from hydrogen absorption lines of neutral matter in front of distant objects like Quasars. And its not just qualitative, but quantitative. If the CMBR had the wrong shape or wasn't at 2.7K that would have invalidated the Big Bang theory (and opened up 'tired light' theories and other alternatives that *have* been eliminated through observation).

So that's how you invalidate the Big Bang model.

For Global Warming we put up satellites that measure the outgoing thermal radiation spectra of the Earth starting with the NASA IRIS satellite in 1970, the Japanese IMG satellite in 1996, the NASA AIRS satellite launched in 2003, and the AURA satellite launched in 2004. What those all found was increasing and broadening absorption bands due to CO2 and methane. If for, example, the CO2 IR spectrum was saturated with H2O absorption bands through the air column (and not just at sea level) then Global Warming would be wrong, and we would have expected to see no change the IR spectroscopy of the Earth as measured from space. Instead of falsifying Global Warming, however, those experiments all found confirming evidence that the Earths CO2 and CH4 spectra was changing consistent with Global Warming.

See the references linked off of https://agwobserver.wordpress.com/2009/08/02/papers-on-changes-in-olr-due-to-ghgs/

(And those are just some ways that experiments could have invalidated either theory, those are not the only ways by far)

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Big Bang: Develop an alternative explanation, consistent with current information, develop analytical and experimental means of testing it, perform the tests. Open it up to scrutiny from peers, if they find no significant flaws after their own analysis and tests, then maybe you're onto something.

Global Warming: Same thing. Link the observed rise in temperatures to something other than increased levels of the known greenhouse gas carbon dioxide, or disprove that there is a rise in temperatures at all. If you can find something hitherto unknown that has been causing the rise, you will probably win a Nobel Prize.

Actually it wouldn't even take that.

Just travel back in time before Penzias and Wilson and (in a sci-fi style parallel universe) completely fail to find any CMBR remnant. It doesn't take an alternative theory or any deep and analytical means of testing it. The Big Bang Theory itself /requires/ the presence of the CMBR, and if it didn't exist, that would blow a massive hole through it. It'd just be Dead on Arrival and while we'd need to look for other theories, it wouldn't be necessary to come up with any other theory to have falsified the Big Bang Theory.

Similarly, if Satellite spectrometry of Earth's OLR had found no increase in CO2 or CH4 absorption lines, then Global Warming would have a huge problem. Wouldn't be necessary to have any alternative theory to blow a hole through Global Warming.

[lajoswinkler]

This is nothing new, but it's not popular to say because of the greenwashing.

Greenwashing (a compound word modelled on "whitewash"), or "green sheen," is a form of spin in which green PR or green marketing is deceptively used to promote the perception that an organization's products, aims or policies are environmentally friendly.

Photovoltaics are anything but beneficial. They are expensive, but actually cheap compared to the price we'd pay for them if China was manufacturing them while thinking about the environment.

While stupid Western people think they're so green and good and fancy with their silly panels, it's all being paid by this.

Heavy metal pollution of the watertable and streams and lakes, soot and carcinogenic compound pollution of the air, acid rains, enormous carbon footprint, CFC release, etc.

That's what drives our "green technology" called photovoltaics.

They suck ass when used as anything than remote, offgrid, small application, peak load energy source. They were never meant to be used as base load power. It's just stupid and silly, completely disregarding the professional opinions.

[Albert VDS]

If producing something creates pollution then that doesn't mean the product isn't environmentally friendly.

It's like saying vitamin C isn't good for you because it's made in a factory that pollutes the environment.

Also this is not something which is limited to solar panels, other non-green product produce equal or worse environmental pollution.

[Jim DiGriz]

In my mind, the effect of solar panels on global climate is a minuscule concern compared to :

1. Solar panels do not produce electricity at all at night and efficiency is greatly impacted by clouds.

That is an already solve problem with thermal storage in molten salt in several power plants around the world already:

http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/solar/a-tower-of-molten-salt-will-deliver-solar-power-after-sunset

[lajoswinkler]

If producing something creates pollution then that doesn't mean the product isn't environmentally friendly.

It's like saying vitamin C isn't good for you because it's made in a factory that pollutes the environment.

Also this is not something which is limited to solar panels, other non-green product produce equal or worse environmental pollution.

Of course everything has an impact and everything creates pollution. The problem with PV is that its benefit is awfully pathetic compared to its downsides. It's a known fact, but it's not popular to say.

The most environmentally friendly energy source is the most energy dense and plentiful one - uranium fission. And comparing PV with it is done by people whose knowledge on the topic of energy production is worse or equal to SimCity.

That is an already solve problem with thermal storage in molten salt in several power plants around the world already:

http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/solar/a-tower-of-molten-salt-will-deliver-solar-power-after-sunset

Such power plants have proven to be unfeasible. I had hope for solar thermal, but it simply isn't worth it.

http://news.heartland.org/newspaper-article/2015/07/20/solar-power-still-disappointing

Mind that this is still more feasible than photovoltaics.

Edited November 7, 2015 by lajoswinkler
typo

[WinkAllKerb'']

communication around:

https://www.google.fr/search?q=recycling+solar+panel has changed so much & so fast thoose last year that i do must must believe it...

no magic only enough advanced recycling tech in no time, oh nvmd then. i m always wrong anyways.

*out of this trhead for me, i'm tired and need a good movies kinda something like "The Pelican Brief" or "The Fugitive" ... no nightmare 150% guaranted*

[YNM]

I don't want to say "green" or "not green", I just want to say "let's exploit the Sun".

[Drunken Hobo]

I've often wondered how expensive other forms of energy would be if they were as safe as nuclear. We're ridiculously paranoid about any sort of nuclear accident (and that's a good thing as it increases safety), yet take such a blasé attitude towards fossil fuels. "Oh a giant tanker filled to the brim with a highly toxic, combustible material circling the globe in treacherous seas? No big deal." "Air pollution in cities is responsible for millions of deaths worldwide? Meh, it's inevitable."

A few years ago 47 people were killed in Canada when an oil train exploded. I wonder what the media and public reaction would have been if that had been a train carrying nuclear waste that had exposed 47 people to a fatal dose of radiation. Of course that couldn't happen, as nuclear waste carriages are unbelievably strong. Shame the same can't be said for oil tankers...

[Bill Phil]

Definitely orbital space power stations.

Let's exploit the CRAP out of the SUN!

It's mostly* safe.

*it actually could cause harm, but only if people happen to do something extremely idiotic. Which can happen.

[Albert VDS]

The problem with PV is that its benefit is awfully pathetic compared to its benefits.

What did you mean?

[peadar1987]

I know my English sucks... but I thought "very harmful" isn't same as "y is worse than x".

Please guys try to read my post not only using 0 and 1. I am against TV kind of discussion where you are limited only to two choices and you have to argue which one is better

Your English is pretty good actually. Just that one particular sentence read like you were saying it was the replacement of coal that would be the problem, not the fact that power was being generated at all. Easy mistake to make, and the sort of thing you could also see from a native speaker.

When I think about this I look at Mars... and see dead planet without liquid core and magnetic field

Yea we have Moon, something that Mars doesn't have and that is only reason we are still here

But still if you take energy from environment you affect that environment, so taking energy from Earth core is one of the worst ideas I can think of.

Solar panels on high orbits in ring formation around Earth would be pretty good IMO... problem transfering energy to Earth :/

The world's daily energy usage is 5*10^20J. The energy released in the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake was 4*10^22J, or enough to power the entire planet for about 80 days. And that's just one earthquake, produced by heat causing convection in the mantle, which transferred its energy to the plates by friction, slowly building up stresses, so not a particularly efficient process. Any geothermal energy we take out is a drop in the ocean compared to the amount of energy contained in the earth.

The kinetic energy of the moon relative to the earth is 4*10^28J. That's ten billion times our daily energy consumption. At current rates, it would take 27 million years to deplete this source of energy. Even more when you consider if you start to slow down the moon, it will begin to rob the earth of rotational kinetic energy, which is a further order of magnitude higher.

Edit:

Leaving the above info up, but I found some more relevant stuff.

The heat flow from the earth's interior to exterior is estimated to be 43-47 TW, through entirely natural processes (vulcanism, geysers, hot springs, etc.). Humanity's energy consumption is about 18 TW. Worst case scenario is that this is added onto the top of the natural heat flow (which won't happen. Using hot spring water to heat homes won't make the earth reject heat any faster, for example). It's taken the earth 5 billion years to get this far. Even increasing the rate at which it loses heat by 50% isn't going to have a significant effect on the core over the next ten thousand years. By which point we will have cracked fusion, or gone extinct.

Mars is 0.1x the mass of earth, with 0.28x the surface area, as well as being much further out from the sun, so it will have rejected heat almost 3x faster, while having less of it per kg to begin with, due to the lower energy of formation.

Of course everything has an impact and everything creates pollution. The problem with PV is that its benefit is awfully pathetic compared to its benefits. It's a known fact, but it's not popular to say.

The most environmentally friendly energy source is the most energy dense and plentiful one - uranium fission. And comparing PV with it is done by people whose knowledge on the topic of energy production is worse or equal to SimCity.

Uranium is not unlimited, however, it is not found everywhere, it is not dispatchable over short timescales, and it needs significant capital investment, which is not available to all countries.

The best energy solution is almost always going to be a mix of generating technologies. Solar and wind are often complementary, tidal is completely predictable, geothermal is dispatchable and widespread, hydro is dispatchable and powerful, but is reliant on geography, and has a nasty tendency to flood things, biomass, well let's avoid that for now, because people need to eat, wave, well, some day, maybe! Pelamis is now dead, which is sad.

Such power plants have proven to be unfeasible. I had hope for solar thermal, but it simply isn't worth it.

http://news.heartland.org/newspaper-article/2015/07/20/solar-power-still-disappointing

I don't trust that source. The Heartland Institute are a libertarian, climate-change denying think-tank (“the world’s most prominent think tank promoting skepticism about man-made climate change", as they proudly state on their website), and therefore have a biased viewpoint. As an engineer, the substandard performance of one prototype plant doesn't worry me unduly.

Definitely orbital space power stations.

Let's exploit the CRAP out of the SUN!

It's mostly* safe.

*it actually could cause harm, but only if people happen to do something extremely idiotic. Which can happen.

I don't agree. Rockets are hard. Rockets produce pollution. Rockets take energy, and money, and labour to manufacture. They use toxic fuels, if not for the main engines, then almost always for the RCS system. They can release massive amounts of greenhouse gases. I'm willing to bet significant amounts of money that launching 100kg of solar panels into orbit and beaming the power back will cause far more environmental damage than installing those same 100kg of solar panels on the earth's surface, even if the latter does cause some degree of cooling due to increased albedo. At least, unless there is a MAJOR technological shift in the future, and we're suddenly able to build a space elevator.

Edited November 7, 2015 by peadar1987