ALTERNATE ENERGY: Solar power outshines them all

Here comes the sun (doo doo doo doo)
Here comes the sun and I say
It’s all right
— George Harrison, “Here Comes the Sun”

​Solar power has the best advantages of all our energy technology today. It is cheap; it’s durable; it can make you money; it has a net capital advantage, is virtually terrorist proof, is kind to the environment and needs virtually no maintenance. It does not rely nor does it deplete limited resources. Solar is not dependent upon unfriendly nations for these resources. In fact the materials associated with most solar panels are silicon and aluminum, the two most abundant resources on earth.
Allow me to contain my exuberance while promoting yours, and explain.
Solar cells are an amazing technology. The semiconductor technology of the solar cell is over 60 years old and it is improving all the time. The price of solar cells is steadily dropping. The installation of solar cells is improving all the time. If you own a home that is properly oriented, you’d be foolish not to take advantage of installing solar cells. A properly oriented house with a properly installed system will pay for itself in four years and you keep the solar cells. After that you make money. Couple that with the advent of long-range electric cars, just around the corner, and you could avoid the gas pump for all your local driving.

Not a terrorist target nor accidental catastrophe
There is no reason an intelligent terrorist would want to target a solar plant. There is no collateral damage like that which would happen at a nuclear plant. Even if some knuckle-headed terrorist did attack a solar power plant, the nearby waters would not be contaminated nor would the land be put off limits. If damaged, the replacement is simple and quick. Solar panels could be replaced in a day.
Let’s compare the aforementioned to what has already happened with totally human caused accidents limited just to nuclear power production. The accident at Three Mile Island alone precipitated additional costs at every nuclear plant under construction by at least $6 billion apiece. This does not include lost revenue of about $1 billion each year of delay. This also does not count the costs of modification of the existing plants to meet the new safety specifications. A figure I would suspect to be nearly $1 billion per plant. After 9/11 new security measures had to be implemented. These measures would easily cost over $100 million per plant. Not to mention additional yearly maintenance costs for decades to come.
Now let’s go global on this issue. Chernobyl is being fitted with a concrete sarcophagus that will cost the Ukraine over $100 billion. According to the article “Chernobyl Consequences of the Catastrophe 25 years later,” San Francisco Bay View, April 27, 2011, the overall economic impact to Russia, Belarus and the Ukraine is already over $500 billion. This one incident has severely affected the whole national economy of the Ukraine. One only has to visit the Ukraine to see the long-term economic impact of this one incident — an incident, by the way, that was entirely avoidable. The damages will have lingering effects for at least the next 50,000 years.
Next is Fukushima, whose recovery costs already have exceeded $180 billion. This one catastrophe also has severely affected the Japanese national economy. These two cases do not even take into account the long-term environmental impact.
Three Mile Island had only marginal effect on the environment. These nearly $1 trillion disasters did not produce one single watt of electricity.
Do you see a pattern here?

Questions and answers
Q: What would $1 trillion of solar cell power plants do?
A: Provide 1 trillion watts of power every hour the sun’s rays hits their panels
Q: What is the carbon footprint of installed solar panels?
A: Zero
Q: How much water is being used to maintain this amount of energy?
A: Excluding the occasional cleaning of the panels, zero.
Q: How many unfriendly nations are involved in the process of maintaining these panels?
A: Zero (and yes, I am considering China an ally for this issue).
Q: What are the security costs for maintaining solar panels?
A: Zero
Q: What is the risk to the environment once installed?
A: None
Q: If for any reason a solar field was damaged either by man or nature what would be the long-term fall out?
A: None.
​
No sun?
The down side is, what happens when the sun doesn’t shine?
The solar energy chain is broken at night and on cloudy days. You can’t rely on it. The missing link is the backup system. The most used backup system is neighboring power plants. These strictly regulated power providers are obligated to buy back power from those so positioned to provide it. This is, you, the average consumer. These power providers have to maintain not only their power plants but the infrastructure too. There is much reasonable debate on the equity of such an arrangement. The next question is what if everyone got on board, factories, whole apartment complexes, all homes, etc, to where it was no longer profitable for these power companies to stay in business? The near future response here is fuel cells and a grid system. Wet and dry storage batteries also are a consideration. Who will maintain the grid system though?
Wind power tied to power grid could conceivably handle the off-hour needs fairly reliably. Strangely enough wind is fairly predicable. Properly placed wind turbines on our abundant national coastlines could easily handle the off hours of solar production.
We need support to get solar on board. Maybe if Beyoncé or Adele came out in support of solar power, it might get some attention. This is, as long as they got approval from Lady Gaga.