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Clinton’s Solar Panel Plan Leaves America in the Dark
On Hillary Clinton’s campaign website, she calls for the creation of 500 million new solar panels to “power every home in America.” Voicing a strong preference for solar may win over the hearts of some environmentally conscious voters, but it should not win over their minds. A proposal to comprehensively retool the nation’s energy systems to solar power ignores a couple of very basic, yet critically important, complications.
First, every home in America is already powered. The country does not need to undergo a massive, redundant, and expensive overhaul to duplicate what has already been accomplished. Second and more importantly, this plan, if you can call it that, hinges on a physical impossibility. Solar panels cannot power homes. At least not in any way people in the industrialized world would consider acceptable. Solar power is unreliable, intermittent, and inflexible. This means solar panels are intrinsically incapable of handling the country’s home energy needs.
Energy is consumed on demand, without advance warning or notice. When anyone flicks on a light switch in their home, the unthinking expectation is that their lights will automatically turn on. That taken-for-granted miracle of convenience and standard of living is made possible through a steady and uninterrupted access to electrical energy. To ensure people always have electricity when they want to use it, power plants must use fuel sources that can continually power electrical generators. In practice, these fuel sources are limited to coal, natural gas, oil, nuclear, and hydro, and according to the Energy Information Agency those sources combine to generate 92 percent of America’s electricity in 2015.
On the other hand, renewable energy sources, like wind and solar, cannot produce power on demand. Windmills and solar panels produce energy literally as the wind blows and sun shines. Because of this intermittency, renewable energy, as it is widely known, is unreliable energy. Alex Epstein, author of The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels, coined the term “unreliables” to replace “renewables,” as it is a much more accurate description of what they offer to energy consumers. This is not to say that solar panels serve no purpose, but we all use electricity throughout each and every day, not just when the sun is being cooperative. Imagine depending solely on solar panels for your home electricity – your access to this critical resource could be cut off by something as simple and commonplace as cloudy skies. In your homes, you cannot afford to have all your lights and appliances shut off just because it’s overcast outside.
If you think this is an oversimplified review of solar energy, it actually gets worse as you consider more details.
Daily kilowatt consumption follows a predictable pattern of highs and lows over a full day, but the amount consumed at any given moment in any given region is in constant flux. Solar, unlike traditional fuel sources for electrical energy, cannot be adjusted to meet the moment-by-moment changes in energy consumption. Even when the sun does come out and solar panels start creating electricity, there is no assurance that whatever energy produced will match whatever energy is being consumed. Solar energy cannot be ramped up or dialed down to match demand. We are stuck with whatever the weather gives us.
Worse than this inflexibility, the very nature of the rotation of the Earth guarantees that solar panels will not generate electricity when it is needed most. People need energy 24 hours a day, but in their homes specifically, they need it most when the sun isn’t shining. Home electricity consumption peaks in the early morning before people leave for work and school and again in the evening when they return home. The bulk of home energy consumption happens when the sun is not shining and peak solar production occurs when it is needed least. The graph below, created by an Australian solar energy broker, illustrates this inversion between home energy demand and solar production.
Source: http://www.solarchoice.net.au/blog/home-energy-consumption-versus-solar-pv-generation/
If you consider your own daily routines, you will likely see why this is. The average working American wakes up and starts using electricity before the sun is up. In the dark or dimly lit morning hours, people turn on lights, pull food out of the refrigerator (which has been using energy throughout the darkness of the night), use their stoves or microwaves to make breakfast, and groom themselves with any number of bathroom appliances. During the daylight hours, when solar has the greatest potential to generate power, home electricity consumption drops off because most people have gone to work or school for the day. When they return home, as the sun is setting and solar production falls off, they turn on all the lights again, use their stoves or ovens to make dinner, turn on their TVs, and use their computers to read the latest on Ricochet.
Building 500 million new solar panels could, in theory, expand solar capacity enough to handle all the daytime home electrical demand, but the true capacity for unreliable energy sources is always zero. Clinton could subsidize the solar panel portfolio to be 100 times more than what is needed, but on a sufficiently overcast day, let alone at night, they would all be for naught. A solar panel sitting in the dark cannot turn your lights on. No matter how heavily the government invests in solar, reliable and controllable sources (fossil fuels, nuclear, hydro) will always be needed to maintain steady and affordable access to energy.
Published in Science & Technology, Technology
Solar power = Free lunch
The daily cycle could theoretically be addressed with batteries – the solar panel charges the batteries during the day, and then house draws from the batteries during the night. But, then one should also look at the environmental impact of battery manufacturing (a not pretty sight).
Then there’s the seasonal unreliability. Has Clinton never been to Oregon’s Willamette Valley (Portland, Salem, Eugene) between October and March? Maybe 10 days of sunshine over 6 months.
Finally, many people in the United States consider aesthetics part of their environment, and are likely to start objecting to covering large parts of their houses (and their neighbors’ houses) with solar panels.
Just out of curiosity, what is the increase in business electricity use during the day when people are out and about? These articles always bring up home use, which is a massive section, but I wonder how much day businesses balance out the energy use?
For candidate Clinton, whether or not this is workable is completely irrelevant. All she is required to do to get votes is promise free stuff and some facet of utopia (and call opponents names). Her intentions are good. It works every time.
I find it ironic that solar appeals to people concerned about global warming. The solar panel farms are cooking the birds that get too close. I envision the solar panels cooking people too if we put up too many solar panels. As a cool-weather, shade-seeking human, I do not like this solar idea.
Matthew,
Sometimes less is more. Sometimes a willingness to start on a less ambitious goal will bring success and this could still be a stepping stone to something larger.
The Environmental movement is predicated on a set of lies. First, and foremost, is the lie that some horrible disaster looms over us so we must rush headlong no matter what the cost into “green” (whatever that is) energy. Second, but equally foolish, is the lie that green energy is really easy with few problems and it is a conspiracy of the special interests that holds it back.
This second lie is what actually is holding green energy back. By simply accepting the inherent weaknesses of solar and going with a modest application solar might have already had a large impact. All one need do is allow the individual consumer to generate power and flow it back onto the grid. The power company would charge for additonal metering equipment & hardware to do this. Once done a price is set for the electricity so generated. If the consumer generates more than he uses he is paid for the difference. The consumer himself contracts for the most efficient panel system at lowest cost, with least maintenance cost, and least adverse aesthetic effect. The free market is the ideal place to work this out and competing companies to make the panels will do tremendously better at it than any government entity. The only reason that this has not happened already is the absurdity of the environmentalists themselves. Clinging on to their ideology of evil fossil fuel energy people conspiring to stop them, they never grasp the difficulties of what they are trying to do. They never accept the niche product that would succeed on its own merits and thus make a next stage product possible. They never understand that wildly exaggerating the wonderful nature of what they are proposing destroys everyone’s interest in going forward with it.
It was the environmentalists who killed green energy.
Regards,
Jim
All above being on the mark, I hope Republicans treat this subject with some delicacy. A joint policy of greater oil and gas production and exportation combined with less domestic reliance on fossil fuels is the single best weapon in our arsenal against the Putins, Iranian mullahs, Saudi Wahabis, Venezuellan socialists, you name it.
Also, if we can start being the principal energy supplier to China and Europe, this would provide a degree of integration of mutual interests that would promote world stability and, dare I say it, comity among nations that we had to enforce with our much overstretched military heretofore.
And the windmills kill millions of migrating birds. It makes me sick. I once had some solar-powered outdoor lights in the back garden. Even the Texas sun in summer didn’t give them the ability to give off more light than an old-fashioned cell phone.
One of the prettiest houses in my neighborhood was esthetically destroyed by solar panels. It’s a beautiful stucco hacienda with a red tiled roof. They now have five solar panels embedded in the formerly beautiful roof, and the first time I saw it I nearly died. What a shame.
I love solar – in principle – for the reasons I layout in #7. Panels don’t look that good, but the technology has been improving by leaps and bounds. It’s really amazing what our labs have accomplished in the span of a decade or two.
And think how it might transform the Saharan regions and other impoverished places of the world.
Especially think how much $$$ we can earn selling our petrol to the Europeans, Japan, Korea and China. Big $$$s. Fracking is a new lease on life for our country economically, if we but just grasp it…
RA,
There is so much more to the real market than the command economy fanatic ever dreams of. These problems are not insurmountable but each one must be addressed and properly handled.
The company that has the best looking solar panels and knows how to install them in the least intrusive way will have a big advantage. That’s part of the game in the real world. Each individual homeowner will decide what their priorities are as far of the aesthetics of their house. Too bad the environmentalists aren’t in the real world.
Regards,
Jim
But if past performance is any indicator, no individual home owner will be given a choice if Hillary’s plan has anything to say about it. She has no compunctions about strong-arming the public into submission. It’s the mandatory aspect of her mindset that I find oppressive.
Sure, right on, but can we not preempt her policy prescription as Republicans? Why not broach a “Grand Bargain” with the Dems: “You let us ‘drill-baby-drill” and export LNG and oil to Europe and other parts and in return we will let you take much of the tax receipts to promote non-fossil fuel energy”.
The ultimate dividends in advancing US welfare would be enormous. More tax receipts, more economic growth, fewer international troublemakers to deal with, lower military expenditures required, …
RA,
Absolutely true. If past is prologue it will be worse than that. There is only a little marginal utility in solar. However, the free market has the ability to glean it out. It will find ways to make the product more efficient, to make the product more attractive and to reduce maintenance costs. If the government does it by the time they’re through the energy saved won’t be worth the trouble and they’ll wreck everything to get it done.
Regards,
Jim
Except solar panels are mostly made of so-called “rare earth metals,” 90% of which are currently controlled by Communist China. So much for “independence.”
I expect the world to turn over several times on this technology based on what’s coming out of our labs (graphene, etc.). The Chinese might accelerate the conversion if they raise their prices.
This is an interesting point which raises interesting questions. I am not an engineer,so I am asking any engineers on Ricochet to answer these: 1. What is the efficiency of transfer of power from solar panels to batteries?
2. Assuming the transfer is NOT 100 percent(which it obviously is not) ,how many more solar panels would need to be manufactured and used so that enough power could be stored in batteries to meet demand when the sun isn’t shining?
Many of the green companies that were being funded and pushed by Democrats either have gone defunct, after taking the government money, or there was corruption – they don’t have a good track record. Not to say that good efforts are made everyday by smart entrepreneurs who are looking for innovative ways to use less energy. I love the hybrid vehicles, and many of the new products out (not the weird light bulbs).
You might be interested to know that there is a new incandescent light bulb technology that augurs to provide roughly twice the energy efficiency of any existing product with the best lighting of the incandescent variety. Pretty cool this.
Good article. Thanks for the link.
aardo vozz
You might be interested to know that there is a new incandescent light bulb technology that augurs to provide roughly twice the energy efficiency of any existing product with the best lighting of the incandescent variety. Pretty cool this.
YEAH!! I hope these can be marketed before I run out of my stash of incandescent bulbs. I loathe the curly light bulbs. Won’t buy them.
When I had my small cheese business our electric bill ran more than $ 12,000 dollars a month and that was when the rate was less than 5 cents a kilowatt. I had two grinders that had 100 hp electric motors each. The lights in the whole neighbor dimmed when they started up. If I had a power interruption it cost thousands of dollars in wages and wasted products an hour. No way I can see solar replacing the grid. My main production building was open 24 hours for producing or clean up. Hillary will make us into Venezuela of the North. They have run out of beer of all things. Riots are coming.
All good points. On batteries, as far as I’m aware, the technology just isn’t there yet to to hold and store charges of the magnitude we’re talking about with power generation. There are systems that sell off energy from places that over produce to places that have under produced. Germany does this with their neighbors. It’s not something you could implement nation wide in America though for the reason you mentioned.
Yeah, wind and solar farms take up massive chunks of land. Comparatively, drill sits and traditional power plants take up far less land and thus have a much smaller impact on their immediate environments.
You’re correct. It’s partly why I chose to write about it. “Power every home in America” is one of those obviously BS statements politicians make all the time, but words matter. Just because Clinton (and everyone else who isn’t drinking the Cool-Aid) knows the assertion is phony doesn’t mean she shouldn’t be held to those words.
Full disclosure: I work for BP (the oil company formerly known as British Petroleum). I went to work for BP well after I had formed the views I currently hold about what a scam global warming and alternative fuels are. The views expressed here are entirely my own.
The reality is that solar is NEVER going to come up to anything, at least in my lifetime, and probably the lifetimes of most people reading this.
BP divested its solar assets and maintains its other “alternative” projects as (IMO) the tribute it has to pay the environmentalists so it can concentrate on being an oil and gas company (and where it counts, the annual report, it makes no bones about being an oil and gas company).
BP also produces an annual energy outlook which is well regarded in the energy industry as being as authoritative as any prediction can be when made about the future. They say:
Oil and gas remain key
Fossil fuels remain the dominant source of energy powering the global economy, providing around 60% of the increase in energy and accounting for almost 80% of total energy supplies in 2035.
Here’s a chart of what 2035 will look like, based on BP’s numbers
Furthermore, no matter how punitive Clinton and the greens are with respect to coal, it will be with us a long, long, time.
Thanks for the share PHCheese. I didn’t get into this because I didn’t want to get too wordy in my post, but your marginal cost for electricity use would skyrocket with solar energy. That $12,000 bill would multiply several times.
Jim, thanks for your comment. That first point you make applies to so much of what the political left does. It’s their modus operandi — fear monger an issue (in this case, a climate Apocalypse) and insist that we must “do something!” It’s probably my most hated line in political discourse because it is never followed with the basic curiosity “will this something help at all?” It’s all about the intentions of doer and never about the consequences of what they do.
Matt, I was talking 1996 prices, the cost has gone up by a factor of 4 or 5 already. But it is not all about the money the dependability is probably more important. Imagine running a steel mill or foundry on solar or wind.
You can’t change physical reality with policy
What do you do for BP? I’m curious because I work for a smaller natural gas distributor and we do plenty of business BP.
Agreed. Energy should be a winning issue for conservatives. They need to reject the way liberals frame it around an always-around-the-corner climate catastrophe and talk about it in terms of providing an amazing, affordable, and globally unrivaled standard of living for all Americans.
Alex Epstein, who I mentioned in my post, does a phenomenal job of clearly explaining energy policy from a pro-human point of view (as opposed to environmentalists who hold preserving nature exactly as it is as a higher moral calling than improving human life).