Talk:Photovoltaics

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[edit] Serpa power station finished

The Serpa power station is inaugurated today, 28/3/2007, so I edited the table. The source is in [1], but in Portuguese only. Dreixel 11:49, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] current developments

Given the recent breakthroughs in transitor development cited by IBM and Intel using hafnium, I would like to see some discussion of how the use of hafnium in photovoltaics is currently researched, existing hafnium supplies, etc.

[edit] technology

There is no information about how photovoltaics work, different photovoltaic technologies, and the article lacks any mention of the photoelectric effect. This article feels like an economic and environmental argument for photovoltaics, rather than a balanced article of all aspects of photovoltaics.

[edit] historical price information?

Do folks think it would be helpful to show how the cost of PV hs been coming down as production has increased? Also, there is currently very little info on the technology itself. I.e., might a discussion of crystal silicon, amorphous silicon, CdTe, CIGS, etc be helpful? --Bikechess 21:17, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

I think they decided to have the technical section under Solar Cell. The price-per-watt in dollars is on the Solar Energy page with a source. It could be copied here. 82.93.133.130 10:18, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
Here is one: Photovoltaic Electricity in Hawaii (page 3) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 212.202.73.243 (talk) 21:45, 12 December 2006 (UTC).

[edit] rewrite

I have rewritten the introduction and am planning to move text in here from the solar power article in order to address the confusion in that article between PV and solar thermal. Please comment either here or on the solar power talk page.Itsmejudith 16:10, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. Am I right to assume that a large chunk of solar panel needs to be moved here as well?
Also, I envision a more complete ROI calculation somehwere on WP, will that be in this article? I made some corrections to the computations done in the article solar panels, but did not apply and dollar values to the figures. linas 20:17, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
OK, I've made major reshufflings. Solar panel is a disambiguation page, pointing to either solar hot water panel or to solar electric panel, which is a redirect to photovoltaic array, which is defined to be just a panel assembly of solar cells. I'm thinking the politics, and the major applictions, and etc. will be in this article. linas 22:05, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
Agree with your last comment. As for "array", my understanding is that an assembly of solar cells makes up a panel, or module. An assembly of modules is an array. I'm not sure that one module on its own would be called an array. Solar electric panel would perhaps be the place to discuss the different types of panels that are available - laminated, framed, unframed etc. I'll have another look through the whole series and comment again here. Itsmejudith 09:37, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
It would help undertanding to describe a PV system in its entirety here: Modules, inverters (for grid connected), cables, fixing systems etc.Oldboltonian 22:28, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] average cost per installed watt

As of early 2006 average cost per installed watt has decreased to about $4.50.

Should it say in which currency the 4.50 is in? Presumably the author lives in the USA?

A cited source for the figure would be good, too. --Nigelj 11:05, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
HowStuffWorks mentions a much higher cost: http://home.howstuffworks.com/question418.htm
Have a look at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/5234402.stm for something a bit more realistic and probably much more recent, I think. --Nigelj 19:09, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Source data for PV Power Costs?

Anyone know what the source for this infor is/was? The fact that the decimal places are commas is a bit confusing. Also the statement "Normally photovoltaic equipment is fully functional after 30 years also." is a bit weird. Does the author mean "fully profitable"? Or paid for? -KevMoo 18:55, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I changed the sentence to what I think it means - PV equipment should last 30 years or more, not just 20. I also changed the decimal separator to point. But this table can't stay unless there is a source cited, in case of copyvio. And the introductory paragraph still makes no sense. And I am still not sure how the table is meant to be read. Other than that, fine! ;-) Itsmejudith 20:12, 6 August 2006 (UTC)
This is my table. I created it. You read it the following way: The costs depend on the sun power you have in your country. For example in south Germany it is 1,000 kWh/year or in Spain and Sicily it is 1,800 kWh/year. California should be about 2,000 kWh/year in some regions. After that you must know how much you paid for your photovoltaic equipment and then you can see how much a kWh costs for you in cent/kWh. Here in germany we will soon produce solar modules for about 1,000 €/kWp. The costs for customers are much higher cause the firms must grow very fast. Take a look at the german article too de:Fotovoltaik there's much more information about photovoltaic. The calculation is the following for 3,000$/kWp, 2000 kWh/year, 4% interest and 1% cost of operation: Money costs: 3000$ * 0.04 = 120$/year, depreciation: 3,000$/20 years = 150$/year, cost of operation: 3,000$ * 0.01 = 30$/year, sum: 120$/year + 150$/year + 30$/year = 300$/year. Now devide 300$/year through the kWh/year ==> 300$/year / 2,000kWh/year = 15 cent/kWh. That's it. At the moment more as 500 million persons boost PV (most of them in europe), so 100 billion dollar isn't really much money per person. Take a look at the mobile phones, digital cameras or TFT displays. Economy grows very fast if there are several billion dollars to earn. At the moment we spent 2326 billion dollars a year for oil (75$/barrel). --212.202.193.176 10:08, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
Solar panels cost a lot more than 1,000 Euro per Kw. Here in the Middle East they are around 15,000 Euro per Kw excluding installation. Also the calculation doesn't square with the UK estimates earlier which suggest it takes 130 years to just recover the capital costs. Curry's also mentioned above quote starting prices at 12,000 Euro!--Rjstott 10:39, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
The production costs in germany are 2,000€/kWp and on the market you can buy 93.1 kWp for 337,953€ (532 modules, 175 Wp, single crystal, 40" container, CIF Hamburg). This is 3,630€/kWp. But 1,200€/kWp are silicon costs cause we use chip silicon at the moment. Now the production uses solar silicon which is about 70€/kWp. So in the near future production prices could be lowerd to 1,000€/kWp and more due bulk production. Bulk production reduces production prices by 20% if you double the production. And we must double the production at least 10 times. Thin film moduels (amorphous silicon) are at 2,800€/kWp at ebay: [2](scroll down to the middle of the page). If you pay 15,000 € per kWp better ship your modules from germany.--212.202.193.176 11:37, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
Here is an auction for 7.26 kWp [3].--212.202.193.176 14:26, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm sure you will be right about panel prices some time in the future. What matters here surely is a like for like comparison of the situation now. To do that you would have to include the costs of the necessary regulators and power inverter, delivery, plus installation using actual prices including profits now. This is very topical and interesting and an article detailing practical installations with some good facts would be very useful. We're buying Kyocera panels and the prices I quoted included regulator, battery, enclosure and wiring. Delivery is a significant cost as is profits to various middlemen who add little value. Neither BP nor Shell can match the prices and all companies report significant back-order situations. For the time being price is determined by market forces similar to those driving oil prices where currently a factor of five or more can be found between extraction costs and market price.--Rjstott 03:43, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

We're still missing a source for the table, correct? Please include one. KevMoo 04:36, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
There is no source for this table. You can calculate every value as I described it above. So the source is Microsoft Excel or your pocket calculator. And yes, you have to calculate all your costs of course, not only the module price. If you are grid connected, you don't need batteries. You supply surplus power to the net and get money for it. In Germany, France, Spain and Italy this is about 50 eurocent/kWh. If you need batteries you must calculate them to the costs/kWp of course. If you are grid connected you have additional costs for the inverter. For example: Module costs: 40.000$ (10kWp), inverter: 2.000$, installation: 8.000$. So your costs are 5.000$/kWp. Now the auction ([4]) ends at 4422 Euro/kWp. It includes all, modules, inverter, cables and mountings for self-construction. So in Sicily (1800kWh/year) you can produce power for 24 eurocent/kWh. Net power costs are 21.08 eurocent/kWh. Here you can buy modules for 3,49$/Wp [5] and thin film ones for 3$/Wp.
Excel
$D$1=0.04
$E$1=20
$F$1=0.01

B5: 2400
C5: 2200
D5: 2000
E5: 1800
F5: 1600
G5: 1400
H5: 1200
I5: 1000
J5: 800

A6 : 200
A7 : 600
A8 : 1000
A9 : 1400
A10: 1800
A11: 2200
A12: 2600
A13: 3000
A14: 3400
A15: 3800
A16: 4200
A17: 4600
A18: 5000

Fist cell: =$A6*(($D$1+$F$1)+1/$E$1)/B$5*100

--212.202.193.176 18:00, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Here is another calculation from diablosolar: [6]--212.202.193.176 20:49, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I had to study the chart and read this commentary and re-study the chart before I comfortably understood what it represented. I suggest adding the following wording as introduction to it. "The label at the left end of each row shows an example price ($US) per peak Kilowatt hour (kWp) of a PV panel. The column headings indicate the actual kilowatts of production to expect from the panel. This varies by geographic region. The calculated values reflect the cost in $US cents per KwH produced, considering a 4% cost of capital, a 1% operating cost, and a 20-year lifespan of the equipment. "


comments? Leotohill 04:14, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

I think that's good and just suggest a few small changes to clarify it a little more:

The labels on the left show various total costs, per peak kilowatt (kWp), of a PV installation. The headings across the top refer to the annual energy output expected from each installed kWp. This varies by geographic region and according to efficiency etc. The calculated values reflect the total cost in cents per kWh produced, including a 4% cost of capital, 1% operating and maintenance cost, and depreciating the capital cost over 20 years. Normally, photovoltaic modules have 25 years warranty, but they should be fully functional even after 30-40 years.

BTW, did you also see my, and the original author's, re-calculated examples near the bottom of this page? --Nigelj 19:23, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
I've added the paragraph, more or less as above, to the article. --Nigelj 20:12, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Deployment of Solar Power

This section contains all kinds of solar power not just Photovoltaics and should be in an article on its own. Lumos3 09:07, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 100 billion Dollars left

My information was reverted. What are the reasons? The rest of the costs to get this technik cheeper as Fossil fuel are about 100 billion Dollars or 10$ a year 10 years long for 1 billion persons in these countries. This is the same amout of money we worldwide spent for oil in only 16 days.

The claim is valid enough to include and is seen in several major publications. I can offer sources if needed. Jens Nielsen 06:01, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
I have no idea what's being discussed here. Would someone explain? Leotohill 22:11, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] PV profitable without subsidy in Italy since 2006

Can anyone put this section to good english. It is from the german article de:Fotovoltaik

How about:

In Italy PV power is cheaper than retail grid electricity since 2006. One kWh costs 21.08 -€cent/kWh. Italy has an average of 1,600 kWh/m2 (Sicily even 1,800 kWh/m2) sun power/year. At 4 % costs of capital, 25 years of depreciation and costs (including installation) of 4,600 €/kWp PV current costs are 20.91 €-cent/kWh. At large scale plants with 3,900 €/kWp the costs reduces to 17.75 €-cent/kWh and is 15 % cheaper. To reach a 19% PV power coverage in Italy, 34,000 MWp power must be installed. This means 0.09 % of the size of Italy. 9 % of the size of Sicily could produce 25 % of the power of the complete European Union (ca. 2,100 TWh/year).

- - - - - - - -

I also calculate Italy to be the first country in EU to reach grid parity, with second highest retail However I heard grid electricity prices vary considerably from one region to another. Anyone got any data on that?

Eurostat carries EU - 25 retail electricity prices


consumer electricity prices (EURc/kWh)


Denmark 23.62

Italy 21.08

Netherlands 20.87

Germany 18.32

Luxembourg 16.03

Ireland 14.9

Slovakia 14.48

Belgium 14.42

Sweden 14.35

Cyprus 14.31

Portugal 14.1

Austria 13.4

France 12.05

Poland 11.9

Spain 11.47

Finland 10.78

Hungary 10.75

Slovenia 10.49

United Kingdom 10.2

Czech Republic 9.85

Malta 9.49

Latvia 8.29

Estonia 7.31

Lithuania 7.18

Greece 7.01

Oldboltonian 20:43, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Power costs

I'm interested how much electric power costs in other countries. In Germany we pay about 18 €-cent/kWh and Italy is 21,08 €-cent/kWh. How much do you pay in your country?

Here's a link to power costs in Texas today. http://www.electricitytexas.com Costs have recently skyrocketed - 2 years ago we were paying under $0.08/kWh. Now it's about $0.144/kWh. So if I go here: http://www.oasismanagement.com/eurodesk/eurocalc.html ... Looks like you are paying almost double what we pay in Texas, and 3x what we were paying 3 years ago. Wonder why the difference? Taxes maybe.
Yes, there are a lot of taxes on our energy prices. Today (2006-10-26) gasoline prices are at $5.76/gallon and as I can see on gaspricewatch you pay $2.20/gallon. This is 2.6x higher. So why do you worry? :)
I think it would be good to add just a few words (maybe one sentence) of general intepretation to the data provided in the "PV power costs" table. As it is, it takes a while to begin to comprehend what it's telling us — and I believe it would be better if some explanation or interpretation were added. That way someone (say, an interested but uninitiated high-school student) coming to this topic for the first time could more immediately understand the data provided. Sentence could be added in either before or after the table. Joel Russ 15:03, 14 August 2006 (UTC)
OK. Add something like this (example calculation):

Parameters
Equipment + installation: 5,000$/kWp
Yearly sun power per kWp: 2000 kWh/year
Interest: 4%
Depreciation: 20 years
Operation: 1%

Calculation (for the first 20 years)
Money costs (interest): 5,000$ * 0.04 = 200$/year
Depreciation costs: 5,000$/20 years = 250$/year
Costs of operation: 5,000$ * 0.01 = 50$/year
Sum: 200$/year + 250$/year + 50$/year = 500$/year
==> 500$/year / 2,000kWh/year = 25 cent/kWh

Calculation (from 21 till the end)
Costs of operation: 5,000$ * 0.01 = 50$/year
==> 50$/year / 2,000kWh/year = 2.5 cent/kWh

Or you can calculate with 10 years also:

Calculation (for the first 10 years)
==> 750$/year / 2,000kWh/year = 37.5 cent/kWh

Calculation (from 11 till the end)
==> 50$/year / 2,000kWh/year = 2.5 cent/kWh
--212.202.193.176 23:24, 21 August 2006 (UTC)


Right, I'm trying to understand this, but I'm not sure the units of the results are at all clear:
Parameters
Total cost of equipment plus installation: $5,000 for each installed kW
Energy yield: 2000 kWh per year for each installed kW
Interest: 4% per year
Depreciation: 20 years
Operation and maintenance costs: 1% of total cost per year

Calculation (for the first 20 years)
Interest on total cost: $5,000 * 0.04 = $200 per year for each installed kW
Depreciation costs: $5,000/20 years = $250 per year for each installed kW
Cost of operation and maintenance: $5,000 * 0.01 = $50 per year for each installed kW
Sum: $200 per year + $250 per year + $50 per year = $500 per year for each installed kW
Therefore, $500 per year for each installed kW / 2,000kWh per year for each installed kW = 25 cents per kWh

Calculation (from year 21 till the end of the life of the system)
Cost of operation and maintenance: $5,000 * 0.01 = $50 per year for each installed kW
Therefore $50 per year for each installed kW / 2,000kWh per year for each installed kW = 2.5 cent per kWh
Is that right? There is too much abbreviation in the original example above (and also in the table that is currently in the article).
One more question, what exactly is the 'p' in kWp meant to stand for?
One final question, even if this actually makes sense, is this too close to original research, or is it an encyclopedic elucidation of some self-evident facts, and so valid? --Nigelj 18:04, 22 August 2006 (UTC) -- Modified Nigelj 20:43, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
Yes, everything correct. The 'p' stands for 'peak'. It's needed to normalize test conditions. You're measuring at 25 °C and 1000 W/m² irradiance (STC-conditions, STC is short for standard-test-conditions). Sorry, but I don't know the answer of your last question. :(--212.202.193.176 23:33, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Something wrong with the units of all these figures

There's still something wrong with this table and the section that has grown around it. Today, Eric Kvaalen has changed all the column headers from kWh/year to h/year on the basis that, I think he says, there was an implied "per installed kWp" in there that cancelled so that "kWh/year per installed kWp" becomes, dimensionally, just h/year. He may be right dimensionally, but what about the scaling multiplier that relates kW(actually generated) to kWp(installed capacity, under reference conditions)?

I'd let him off except he's gone ahead and changed the units of all the country-related data below too, to h/year. Where did this country data come from? What units were they in when gathered? You can't just change the units of someone else's measurements because it looks neater to you! If we have no source for this country data, shouldn't we just delete it all?

A factoid like "South Germany: ~900-1,130 h/year" sounds like it's a measure of the hours of sunshine per year there, but at what power? What angle of incidence through the atmosphere? What about hazy sun? Is this a way of measuring insolation? The insolation article has examples in W/m2, which makes good sense. Unfortunately they're in the same numerical range as the figures on this page (e.g. 1350 W/m2). If we have figures here that were measured in W/m2 and we're now quoting them in h/year, we have gone seriously wrong and this all needs deleting until some people who have access to citable sources get together on this talk page and put it all square. --Nigelj 18:57, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Most people in the PV world talk kWh/kWp per year, since earnings from feed-in tariffs are calculated in money/y, and PV modules are sold by kWp
It's therefore not helpful to simplify kW.h/kW.y. For a mathematical purist, the yield should be dimensionless number, thus
1000 kWh/kWp.y = 0.1142 yield
Oldboltonian 21:15, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for that. I agree with you (and the person who made this change hasn't been back to put any case) so I've changed the article back to these more meaningful units. Do they look right to you, now? More importantly, do you have any access to any viable source(s) that we can cite for these figures, or for this kind of calculation, in the 'PV world'? --Nigelj 21:48, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
The units are OK. The content of the table is simply a calculation, based on some assumptions (which are reasonable). No citable source needed, not original research.
The country numbers kWh/kWp given below the table however need to be justified and explained. kWh/kWp.y is mainly a function of kWh/m2.y (or W/m2) of insolation and the efficiency of the module. There are other factors as listed in a BP Solar paper[7] which claims "kWh/kWp differences between correctly measured different technologies is small"
so what is needed is a list of insolation ranges of different countries and US states ( I think the country numbers in the list actually are insolation numbers not kWh/kWp.y. The NASA map at the head of the article can be cited for these.
To get to kWh/kWp.y, one must now calculate annual insolation * system efficiency, which is primarily module efficiency and a bit of inverter efficiency. There may be formulae for this in the public domain
An example from Sonnen in Bavaria [8] quotes for a park built with Sharp ND-Q0E6T (can't find specs for these but must be 12-13% module efficiency) and 94% efficient inverter.
1268 kWh/m2.y . . . 1746 kWp . . . 1775000kWh/y . . . yield = 1015 kWh/kWp
A second column in the country table could be populated either with actual data of kWh/kWp.y (as the example above) or calculated assuming typical efficiencies, eg module 13%, inverter 95%.
The cost data at the bottom is reasonable but there will be no citable source, as it is is not publicly quoted
Oldboltonian 22:23, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Hello, this is Eric Kvaalen. I didn’t have a "watch" on this so I didn’t see the discussion.

The reason I changed the units in the chart (from kWh to h/y) was that when you take kWh/y and divide by kW(peak) you get h/y. This simply means that you get the equivalent of, say, 1000 hours of direct sun per year. Obviously this doesn’t mean 1000 hours of sun (anyplace on earth gets about 4383 hours of day per year and 4383 hours of night), but rather it takes into consideration the angle of the sun compared to the (optimally oriented) panel and the amount of cloudiness.

In the table giving data for different places, again, the units are kWh/(kWp year) which simplifies to h/y. I don’t know where the data are from, but a book I have (Other Homes and Garbage, 1981) gives a "capacity factor" of 0.209 for Santa Maria, California, which can be converted to h/y by multiplying by the number of hours in a year, 8766. This gives 1832 h/y. Together with the data referred to by Oldboltonian this seems to confirm that the numbers in the article are all right. (They are not average watts per square metre. To convert from average W/m2 to kWh/kWpy you have to multiply by 8.766, using 1000 W/m2 as normal direct sun. 1350 W/m2 is the value above the atmosphere. After this is diminished by the atmosphere and clouds and the fact that the sun is usually not shining directly onto the panel, and then you multiply by 8.766, you get back to a similar numerical value—that’s all.)

I don't know if the kWp already takes into account the inverter losses or not.

By the way, I think the map at the beginning refers to solar energy falling onto horizontal surfaces, and is therefore not really relevant.

I will wait a few days for comments and then I will change the units again, because what's there now is just plain wrong. We could put kWh/(kWp y), but personally I prefer h/y because it's less clumsy.

EricK 20:28, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi Eric. But what you're saying is pure original research WP:OR. What you "personally ... prefer ... because it's less clumsy" is completely irrelevant. What an encyclopedia gives is a report of what is currently known, used and done in the actual, real world. If, as Oldboltonian says, "Most people in the PV world talk kWh/kWp per year" and he has "An example from Sonnen in Bavaria" of them doing just that, then we must go with that for now. I say 'for now' because this part of the article is, in my opinion, hanging on by its fingernails until we can find citable sources for every base figure in the country table, and some justification that the calculated figures in the other table are realistic too. --Nigelj 20:51, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
I didn't do any original research! I agree with Oldboltonian that kWh/kWp per year is correct. If you insist, we will put that. I'm just saying that that is the same as equivalent hours of direct sun per year, so it would be simpler to use the label h/y.
As for the reference for the table, why don't you look back in the history and find who put it in and then ask him? It's important information and it would be a shame to delete it.
EricK 09:36, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
Eric and Nigel, the table is a simple mathematical calculation - would you require a citable source for a multiplication table or a mathematical function? Surely not.--Oldboltonian 07:56, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
Personally, I am still confused by the table, although I transferred it to this page from Solar power and made some style edits. My level of knowledge is as a user of PV. What I think would really help is an explanation of what the table is for, i.e. who would use it and when. Itsmejudith 09:54, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
I agree that the colourful table is a pure calculation, but its usefulness and meaning must be based on raw data in the list below, that I've been calling the 'country table'. A person living in, say, England, should be able to look up 'England' in the country table, find some figure (insolation level? Whatever, but verifiable and true with cited sources) and take it into the colourful table and say, "If I could get my solar system installed for, say, $3,800 per kWp, then I'd effectively be 'paying' x cents per Unit (kW-h) for my solar power. Now, is that worth it, to me?" From memory the concept and the basic idea was added a long while back by a German contributor (just an IP address, I think). It's had a lot of clean-up and debate since then, but it's still not finished or at its best, I think.
What I'd like to see, one day, is some verification that the derived figures in the calculation table actually bear out when compared to a few actual cases-studies reported somewhere. Case studies that say that someone, in some part of the world, has calculated their actual, installed PV energy costs and that our table would have predicted something similar. That would be really neat.
I once asked the person who created the colour-keyed insolation map of the world at the top of the article for some help tracking down raw and citable insolation figures for possible use in the country table, but never really followed up on his response. Maybe someone with time and energy could pick up on that? --Nigelj 13:33, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
See also http://www.ez2c.de/ml/solar_land_area/ --Nigelj 15:08, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] References

The links to the references don't seem to be working and/or are not all the correct sort. I can't find where it first went wrong. Rmhermen 16:43, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Largest PV plant planned

I'm not sure whether I should add this to the article. It is a project that is planned, but perhaps it would be prudent to wait until it is underway before adding it to the article proper.

ABC (Australia) News Item

Solar Systems Pty Ltd

Solar Systems Pty Ltd (Australia) and Boeing have applied for a Low Emission Technology Demonstration Fund for a 154 MW concentrated photovoltaics plant. If approved, it will be built in Victoria, Australia.

Ordinary Person 09:12, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] History

Perhaps someone could add something about the invention of PVs. Ordinary Person 05:13, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Hi Ordinary. There is some history in solar cell. Do you think it should be brought over into this article? Itsmejudith 20:26, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] DIY Solar panels

As solar power still tends to be quite costly, aldough grid power aint cheap too and prices of PV modules are dropping, there are do-it-yourselvers who construct the panels themselves. In "Benin, Gambia, Ghana, Haiti, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Malta, Mongolia, Nepal, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo" projects are underway to construct PV's yourself. More info on following page: biodesign.co.uk

Please insert this info on the photovoltaics page or somewhere else on wikipedia,

thanks

[edit] Financial Incentives

The main driving forces for installing photovoltaic modules (or panels) are subsidies.

Germany pioneered this mechanism, Spain, Italy, Greece and France are other EU nations that have followed. The merit of feed in tariffs is the rewarding of overall annual power generation over the years; capital subsidies tend to encourage less reliable, cheaper equipement.

A comparison table of the incentive schemes in force in different countries, with the range of insolation to be found in that country would be helpful. Oldboltonian 21:48, 26 October 2006 (UTC)


Added intro as suggested by itsmejudith--Oldboltonian 10:47, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] PV Power costs (again)

The table doesn't specify what technology is being examined. I'm assuming since the concern is a terrestrial power grid it would be silicon, but this should be made explicit. Perhaps tables of similar pricing for gallium-arsenide cells would be appropriate, though judginbg by this talk page the table itself appears to be something of a contentious issue. - IstvanWolf 14:50, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

The table is technology independent. Only price per watt is needed to calculate it. --212.202.73.243 21:35, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Japan

Somewhere, prolly in HomePower, I read that world prices were going up because of incentive systems in Germany and Japan. I see the Germany here. If I find a bunch of Japanese stuff, should I put it under the other countries? Japan is not only a large producer of panels (Kyocera for the win), but also they are users (dunno how they compare to Germany for amounts). Sadly, I'm in Europe and my beloved HPs are in the US... and I won't get them shipped here until June-ish 2007. 82.93.133.130 10:26, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

It's hard to say if you should put it straight in or not without knowing what you are likely to find. You might want to bear in mind that while sources not in English are acceptable in English Wikipedia, English-language sources are to be preferred if possible. There seems to be a lot to say about the economics of PV and perhaps we should think about a spin-off article at some point. Itsmejudith 14:04, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
PV module prices are tracked by solarbuzz [9], and you can see they have risen. As demand exceeds supply, prices are controlled by the feed-in tariffs. Modules are sold for the highest price that still offers the investor about a 7 year return on investment. Since Spain and Italy Greece and France in Europe, and California and Korea have added FITs. Japan has no more incentive system, but it has very high grid prices.--Oldboltonian 07:13, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Spain

Since the financial incentives section for germany, greece, california... does a distinction between intallations above and below 100 kWp, and since the spanish legal framework does the same, i think it should be included in the article. According to Royal Decree RD436/2004, the feed-in tariffs are as follows:

first 25 years:

  • Installations <= 100 kWp: 575% of the TMR = 0.4404 EUR/kWh
  • Installations > 100 kWp: 300% of the TMR = 0.2289 EUR/kWh

Installations >25 years:

  • Installations <= 100 kWp: 460% of the TMR = 0.3523 EUR/kWh
  • Installations > 100 kWp: 240% of the TMR = 0.1838 EUR/kWh

TMR: Reference Mean Tariff (Tarifa Media de Referencia) TMR as at 2006 = 0.076588 EUR/kWh. A new TMR is fixed by the government each year. Source here (in spanish, sorry)

Also, the article says that the contract duration is 25 years. That's incorrect, contracts have a different selling price for the first 25 years, but they don't have a fixed duration.

Problem is, nobody is installing more than 100 kWp in spain: As legal framework is much better for small instalations this means that if, for example, you are building a 1000 Kwp installation, you set up 10 independent 100kWp installations, each one owned by different individuals. The installations can share panels and land, but they can't share lines and transformers: large istallations have a building with rows of 100KVA tranformers, instead of a single transformer, what would be much more efficient. I don't know how the situation is at other countries, but this makes the price for >100kWp irrelevant, since nobody is using it.

I don't have much experience with wikipedia so i prefer to add the info here and have one of you to move to the article page is you find it suitable. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.44.77.96 (talk) 15:13, 6 December 2006 (UTC).

[edit] Efficiency

This article could do with some analysis of the improvements in efficiency (and the related issue of decreased lifespan). For example, the article [10] mentions 40% efficiency, but I've heard from the South African research that this comes at a cost of decreased robustness. Greenman 09:50, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] PV power stations

The following sentence is pretty speculative:

But as all industrialised nations share a need for electricity, it is clear that solar power will increasingly be used to supply a cheap, reliable electricity supply.

This is not at all clear. There are good reasons for being skeptical about how widely the current technology will be deployed (cost), and what benefits it would have (relatively low EROI). However, I think something like this sentence, qualified as a projection rather than fact, would be good for the introduction to this section. Can someone find a study that gives some projections of future PV energy production? CyborgTosser (Only half the battle) 10:03, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Solar tracking

I feel that the following part is too ambiguous, especially about declination versus east-west tracking. I also think that semiyearly adjustment is fairly common, especially in non-equatorial regions. So, I replaced:

This implies that the orientation of the panel should be optimized for the latitude at which it is used. (In theory the orientation can be changed from hour to hour or, more practically, from month to month, but this is rarely done.)

with:

Panels are usually mounted at an angle based on latitude, and often they are adjusted seasonally to meet the changing solar declination. Solar tracking can also be utilized to access even more perpendicular sunlight, thereby raising the total energy output.

Thank you, --LRG 23:13, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] EROEI

The section on energy returned for energy invested has some silly text in it. There's a reference to some random article by some random person named Jeff Vail. Vail's argument is poorly argued. Using his methodology, you come to the conclusion that Oil has an EROEI of 1:1. I think the whole concept of EROEI is silly since you can't actually rigorously define how much energy is invested. In any event, EROEI doesn't matter. What matters is whether or not you can make a profit installing photovoltaics and selling the generated electricity, or installing photovoltaics and not paying for grid electricity. Cesium62 00:36, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

I've taken the liberty of removing the argument in question. It assumes the price of an installed PV system is representative of the energy used, which by no means is true, and there is no sense in comparing EROI using this abnormal methodology with the standard methodologies.Jens Nielsen 07:28, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Worldwide installed photovoltaic totals

Can anyone provide a source for the claims inthe section on Worldwide installed photovoltaic totals, specifically the one claiming total worldwide capacity at more than 5 GW and the 90% share of the three leading countries? The best sources I can find [11], [12] show lower figures (though lagging two years behind). Also, the IEA figures seem to include only figures for selected countries, so I wonder what it says for the global total. Jens Nielsen 13:10, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

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