The whole "green" factor

[Eclipse Now]

What was the problem being raised with silicone? Missed that bit...

[Cedars]

Originally Posted by Eclipse Now

What was the problem being raised with silicone? Missed that bit...

Solar Energy Firms Leave Waste Behind in China - washingtonpost.com

Its from post #3

[Zythryn]

Cedars, I actually read over that information. Thank you for posting it though.
Yes, what the Chinese plant is doing is deplorable and certainly doesn't affect all solar panel production.
However, the comparative amount of pollution from Chinese coal plants certainly does matter.
What I am trying to get at is:
How much pollution is created by other alternatives (to the solar panels at that specific builder). If the amount of pollution generated at the coal plant per unit of energy is STILL greater than the level of pollution generated by the plant mentioned in the article, it is STILL a 'greener' option to buy solar from that deplorable solar panel plant than other alternatives.

Please note, that would be an awful lot of pollution and I would be surprised it a coal plant kicked out more damage to the environment. But the point is, I don't know and there is no information in the article.
To come to a logical conclusion, it is necessary to know the pollution of all types of energy.

Also, please note I am NOT saying it is OK for this plant to damage the environment as it is. I am just saying that only one aspect of the comparison is given and people are left to assume it is worse than the alternatives.

[Cedars]

Originally Posted by Zythryn

What I am trying to get at is:
How much pollution is created by other alternatives (to the solar panels at that specific builder). If the amount of pollution generated at the coal plant per unit of energy is STILL greater than the level of pollution generated by the plant mentioned in the article, it is STILL a 'greener' option to buy solar from that deplorable solar panel plant than other alternatives.

Please note, that would be an awful lot of pollution and I would be surprised it a coal plant kicked out more damage to the environment. But the point is, I don't know and there is no information in the article.
To come to a logical conclusion, it is necessary to know the pollution of all types of energy.

I know your trying to explain your questions, and I may have misunderstood your point. That said:

The production process (when recycling during solar panel material processing) still involves using extra energy (coal for this example) to reprocess the waste while you still have to provide energy for existing needs.

While one can say that this plant in the article has avoided that extra energy use by not recycling, at some time the cost will be incurred to reprocess that material, whether its by the man-hours and materials used to spread it out (tillage); if thats even an acceptable method for this by-product or by burning more energy later to heat it back up.

According to the article, this plant produced 300 tons of product. This translates into 1200 tons of by-product needing to be recycled.

I dont know how many KWH are used in reprocessing this by-product back into whatever. I dont know how many finished solar panels are made from 300 tons of product. But this must be calculated into when solar panels achieve "green" status (rather than gray status as Alex pointed out).

But I did find a good guide to figure how coal converts into KWH here:
What is Energy? Conversion and Resource Tables

My quick (and need to be checked math calculations) 1 lb of coal (USA coal) = 3KWH. The above link also provides the types of coal and amounts found in the USA. I have no idea what kind of coal is used in chinese coal plants.

So then the consumer must try to balance all these things to decide whether using existing coal vs environmental recovery via solar panel methods (which there are multiple) or wait for the new technologies to assess whether the cost to the environment is less by waiting a few years for technology advances like this (found on a football forum of all places):

PopSci's Best of What's New 2007

Company site:
Nanosolar - Advantages

Is this closer to the kind of response you were trying to get?

[Eclipse Now]

I've been following nano-solar for years and am VERY excited by their new manufacturing plant finally being up and running. (Also the Ausra solar thermal factory is finally operational, and now they are manufacturing their unique cheaper flat panel solar thermal system that should be as cheap as coal when scaled up into the multi-gigawatt power station system).

The point is: one scary Chinese solar plant does not a debunking make. I'm sure that if Silicone Solar PV were the ONLY way to make renewable energy we'd eventually find a way to deal with the waste and process it properly. After all, some greenhouse greenies are even recommending NUKULAR and we all know how safe that is.

The other point is, the sooner we roll out exponentially more renewable energy of all forms, the sooner we get off the fossil fuels. The Pickens Plan (Youtube it) recommends replacing all the USA's gas fired electricity with baseload wind power (by spreading wind right up the centre of America) and then using all that natural gas as a less polluting cheaper transport fuel. I'd back this plan ONLY if it didn't send the message that Americans were all entitled to private transport as usual. If using the natural gas were seen as a stop-gap measure basically giving America a bit more time to build electric trains, trams, and trolley buses to permanently get off liquid fuels, then we might have a plan that deals with peak oil and global warming.

We have to get away from thinking a solar panel on it's own is going to save 'business as usual' and start seeing our industrialised world as a whole system. Forget energy efficient cars, we need energy efficient CITIES and there are ways we can retrofit, rezone, and rebuild sections of our cities to achieve amazing results. Energy efficient cars will have their place (in emergency services, postal delivery etc) but if we design cities in a way that allows Americans and Australians to live WITHOUT OIL we'll be in a more sustainable world, have solved peak oil and global warming, and stop funding people that don't like us very much. If the Pickens Plan keeps us addicted to business as usual, then I'm all against it.

Honestly, seeing our cities as 'industrial ecosystems' where each product —*whether solar panels or joggers — has it's 'next function' in mind (at the end of its lifespan) in "Cradle to Cradle" design terms is the only way to plan our world. Then "Greenwashing" will be a thing of the past, pollution will be a thing of the past, toxic waste dumps will be a thing of the past and everything will be made from renewable energy with recyclable and non-toxic materials.

That's the only way we are going to create a better world for our kids.

[alexander]

Ok, back from vaca and yeah, catching up to some discussions

Firstly, yes the solar panels we were discussing were made from crystalline silicone

Originally Posted by infy

Not all solar panels are from crystalline silicone

absolutely not, though i would say over 80% of the panels that are currently in wide-scale use are...

Any suggestions? I do this stuff for a living.

Yes, how about sharing newer ways of photo-voltaic material production, where the organic ones are going and how much more economical the never cells are?

besides, why only discussion about solar cells? there are plenty of other "green" things that we can discuss as well. Nickel-Hydride batteries for example, the ones that are used in so many electric vehicles.

Oh you say, well, they are green, right? Wrong! Nickel mining is a messy business with lots of chemicals, but aside from that, look at the production line... Nickel is mined primarily in Canada, it is sent to europe for refining, then on to china, where the material gets converted into sintered plates (bonded below melting temp, resulting in a very porous material), the plates are then shipped to Japan, where the batteries are assembled and then shipped to US to be used in that Prius you got. Am i the only person who sees a GIANT problem with this?

[InfiniteNow]

I was mostly thinking of thin films (with PVD & CVD processes, sometimes PeCVD, etc.).
There's also solar paints though, and that's exciting technology.
MIT had a study a week or two ago about painting a film/filter onto glass which directs the light to the edges and collects there.

Those were the primary. I can get more data later if needed.

[Zythryn]

Cedars, I am afraid I am not explaining myself well.
The issue centered on the amount of pollution created. So I was suggesting we look at the pollution and results of that pollution from Chinese coal plants. This way we can compare the two.
How many die each year due to the emmissions of a coal plant in China? How many days of missed work, incidents of asma, farmland that becomes unusable, death's, etc. Once we can compare the damage done by a coal plant compared to the damage done by this solar panel plant, THEN we have a logical basis.

Alexander, no you aren't, I see a problem with the nickle as well. But alone it is meaningless. How much material for a standard car is shipped over seas, multiple times? How much of the rest of the Prius is shipped overseas (more than the final delivery) as compared with other makes of cars.

Unless your whole point is 'its not perfect' then you need to compare the production process of both/all products you are comparing to see which is truely more 'green'. Right now, I will accept 'more green' than the alternatives. And yes, we all should strive to continue to improve on that. Which is one of the reasons I gave up bottled water

[alexander]

There is a company that is making the actual solar paints though, it has to be printed on a special way, and there are 3 coats of different colors that collect different wave lengths. I saw that on Beyond tomorrow, and they can paint on any surface... right now production is limited, but you could have this as paint on your windows at the office, and yeah the whole surface will effectively be a giant solar panel. They actually found the paint to be more efficient at solar energy generation then most other cells... which is cool, i think.

[alexander]

Originally Posted by Zythryn

Which is one of the reasons I gave up bottled water

and i thought i was bad when i sacrificed watching soft porn.... (energy efficiency and all, you know)

Alexander, no you aren't, I see a problem with the nickle as well. But alone it is meaningless. How much material for a standard car is shipped over seas

Plenty, i am not making a point that Prius is not efficiently build, and its not, but the point i am not making is that the other cars are, they are not either. I am simply giving you an example of how even green production processes are messed up from the get-go, economics is a big problem in the efficiency market.