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Japan Is Building Solar Farms On Abandoned Golf Courses
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bloodhawke83
I Strike Fear into the Hearts of the Masses
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nice, everyone should be doing that. too bad our grids never got upgraded to handle the extra loads.
In WA, only because of subsidies. And even with the rather generus subsidies on made in WA, you'd be lucky to beat the s&p500 with your investment after 20 years
Ashbringer
Supreme [H]ardness
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Good cause Golf sucks.
Trepidati0n
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Troll 0/10
Japan has more than 40 reactors, but all of them are still offline after Fukushima. Only now are some of the reactors getting prepared to restart; in the mean time, Japan has been burning a lot more fossil fuels. Also as a result of the nuclear shutdown, Japan gave out very generous renewable feed-in tariffs that have led to these kind of projects.
Mr Milquetoast
Weaksauce
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I don't see why it's a troll. It seems like a legitimate question.
Nuclear has the lowest deaths per TWh of any energy production method. Nuclear is is amongst the cheapest energy production methods. Nuclear is carbon neutral. Nuclear delivers consistent levels of power without the need for backups and can be rapidly throttled to meet demand. Nuclear uses very little land.
Meanwhile solar is expensive, inconsistent and wastes a lot of land. Using the statistics from France nuclear cost 50 per MWh while solar cost 293 per MWh.
The only reason nuclear accidents occur is because irrational lunatics refuse to let new nuclear power plants be built, and existing plants are being run long past their intended lifespan.
Given that nuclear beats solar in every metric, I'd ask the same question as Wildace - Why don't they build a Nuclear plant instead?
There's certainly no shortage of that but there's also private industry deciding it's cheaper to keep pushing the old plants and regulatory agencies that won't step up and get them shut down.
Regardless, I still agree. Right now, nuclear power is tops where hydro won't do the job.
Youn
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Japan could provide free energy for the entire world if only they'd use pillow power generators.
Negative Ghost Rider....
If everyone was doing this then the grid would actually have less load to support through any given section as the distributed production sources would mean that the energy was traveling through less wire before it made it to its final destination...
Um, uh....Fukishima? Japan wants to phase out Nuclear.
Personally, I think this would make more sense if they built the panels on top of houses or other things. Maybe I"m wrong, but I always Thought Japan was pressed for housing.
Hopefully panel efficiency will improve dramatically over the next 20 years.
oROEchimaru
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bastage I may of misread the op... however most companies with huge solar hookups are hooked up to the grid so the excess ends up feeding the grid which is great and in return shortages are fed from the grid.
Until batteries are great and solar is better, it is still a growing technology. If they found a way to harvest solar or a different type of energy (original tesla) that works regardless of shade or even night time that would be an overall win or at least triple efficiency rates.
Until batteries are great and solar is better, it is still a growing technology. If they found a way to harvest solar or a different type of energy (original tesla) that works regardless of shade or even night time that would be an overall win or at least triple efficiency rates.
Trepidati0n
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For the poster to be posting, he/she would have been more that alive when Fukushima occurred and should know that a) that japan does have a lot of nukes plants and they are shut down b) know that the Japanese currently have no love for Nuclear after Fukushima.
So either
1) the poster is trolling
2) the poster is all that is wrong with society in terms of having any clue of what is going on other than what is inside their twitter bubble
While #2 is a possibility, i'm inclined to give him/her the benefit of the doubt and go with #1.
DeathFromBelow
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This isnt really a valid argument against solar (or wind) in general. Sure, there are certain places where you dont want to build a solar collector or wind farm due to weather concerns, but energy from those plants can be stored in various ways, like molten salt for relatively short term use or pumping water uphill behind a dam for extended use. Even without perfect sources of sunlight or wind its possible to substantially reduce their need for non-renewable energy sources if they're willing to invest in the necessary infrastructure. It also makes sense for them given the dangers of operating nuclear plants in tsunami/earthquake prone areas regardless of how advanced the reactor design happens to be.
The infrastructure cost and land required certainly are valid concerns.
Actually at my home (in Japan) we had solar panels installed when we had it built.
The investment should pay off (ie... break even) in about 10 years according to my current solar production/usage.
Many houses (new and old) are having solar panels installed when built or "renewed" as the subsidiaries are still good. I also see them in my area where there is open land a company owns. This has been over the last 10 years or so (but increased over the last 5 after the Daiichi meltdown).
I agree that per wattage nuclear ----*new nuclear* as in a modern nuclear plant--- would be the way to go but everyone is paranoid about nuclear here now since the incident.
And just a side note.... the incident would not have occurred if:
1)The inspection body was not corrupt and lazy while accepting bribes to look the other way on major infractions.
2)NEW nuclear power plants were built instead of keeping the old ones running LONG past expiration (way longer than they were meant to run)
3)There were other choices on which power company to buy your energy from (there really is only one who can do as they please with no real gvt. oversight)
Anyways... time to /endrant
Ashbringer
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Nuclear isn't horrible so long as a tsunami doesn't come along. But for everyday home use, solar is good enough. Eventually you'll have Fusion energy which should replace any need for nuclear or coal burning power plants.
The worst that can happen with nuclear.
The worst that can happen with solar.
The worst that can happen with nuclear.
The worst that can happen with solar.
BUT, you don't have to bury solar panels for 10,000 years when your done with them....ZING!
sfsuphysics
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Eventually fusion? Got a lot of faith in making that work do you?
I mean we can make fusion, that's not hard, it's getting net energy gain from it that can be sustained that's the hard part This is really what it comes down to, when you hear about "deaths per TWh" type statistics. While I'm not sure how many deaths have come from solar... maybe installers falling off roofs? When something bad nuclear happens, it's really bad, then there's any sort of waste material from nuclear. Of course you'll inevitably get someone countering with breeder reactors and the what not, but no waste nuclear is a lot like clean coal.
That's an oil refinery fire at Chiba caused by the same earth quake.
The worst that can happen with solar is that you end up generating most of your electricity from coal and natural gas.
japan began starting up their reactors last year....most are online now.
i don't think they'll phase out nuclear anytime soon no matter what their government says to pacify the population. powering a country on renewables is simply not currently feasible, forget a densely populated country like japan with very little land to spare. everyone wants to get away from fossil fuels (and rightfully so!) so that leaves us with two options: hydroelectric and nuclear. japan doesn't do so well on the hydroelectric front...
although these solar farms are nice, they are not cost effective nor do they have the capacity needed. with current technology, its just more greenwashing. i'll change my tune once they develop a reasonable way to store the power.
case in point: here in ontario, canada we have a lot of wind turbines now. its cost us an arm and a leg. its one of the main reasons our energy bills are going up. but what happens when the wind suddenly dies off while the turbines are carrying a large load? ontario doesn't have prevailing winds. without warning, there becomes a load defect on the grid. this goes to the next nearest generator which gets overloaded and trips off, and so on it goes. its called a 'cascading effect' in the industry. the end result we've already experienced in 2003 with the big blackout. the solution? idle a natural gas plant at all times to pick up the load in an instant....so much for being green!
Nuclear isn't horrible so long as a tsunami doesn't come along. But for everyday home use, solar is good enough. Eventually you'll have Fusion energy which should replace any need for nuclear or coal burning power plants.
The worst that can happen with nuclear.
The worst that can happen with solar.
kind of a half truth...fukishima survived an earthquake significantly beyond its design without a problem. the tsunami did them in, but it wasn't so much the tsunami that did them it - it was two major design flaws. these flaws were noted by their nuclear regulatory commission, but were never fixed nor was there any demand to do so. their vital backup generators where installed into the BASEMENT of the plant and the tsunami wall was not built high enough. tepco knew this and did nothing. their government did nothing about it either. both are equally to blame here.
to label all nuclear as bad or inherently dangerous is like saying cars are all deathtraps based on the ford pinto. it was a bad and very flawed design just like chernobyl was - which is why nobody builds anything like the old soviet RBMK reactors anymore!
fusion may be the ultimate solution, but until then make fission safer and better to get us through to when fusion is viable. these designs already exist, everybody is just too scared without knowing the facts.
i stand corrected. they had begun a restart only to bring them offline again shortly after. they're saying august now, excuse my out of date info.
Personally I'd rather pay more for power than put up with a 3-mile island scenario in my backyard. When nuclear goes wrong it really goes wrong with far reaching consequences.
I trust the military to run reactors on CV/SSN/SSBNs but that's because they have their shit together, and because the cost of running those reactors properly is not a factor in the reactor operation (we are all paying that cost).
I don't trust commercial operators to provide the same level of safety because in the commercial world cost/profit matters.
I trust the military to run reactors on CV/SSN/SSBNs but that's because they have their shit together, and because the cost of running those reactors properly is not a factor in the reactor operation (we are all paying that cost).
I don't trust commercial operators to provide the same level of safety because in the commercial world cost/profit matters.
Good to see people finally coming around to the economy realities of power generation.
HeavensCloud
Oswego, not shitty as Buffalo
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Are you kidding? The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is the biggest bunch of hard asses ever. My stepfather has been a contractor and operator at Nine Mile Point and on/off at a couple other plants for over 20 years. Their nuclear regulations are insane, and have tripled since the Japan incident. They are making rounds at all of the reactors constantly and if one speck of metal is 0.001mm out of place they shut down immediately. I trust nuclear power entirely, but earthquakes and other shit do happen.
SL-1. Watch the old propaganda video on that shitshow and then make this statement.
CreepyUncleGoogle
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What's wrong with baking birds? Birds are really stupid animals anyhow (even the supposedly smarter prey birds) and precooking them just means that you have like a steady supply of chicken sammiche components plus some electricity.
sfsuphysics
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And then the poor people of Nevada have been given stewardship of holding all the nuclear waste for all of eternity. Well if they ever stop complaining about it one way or another, and about 90 miles from the most populated city in Nevada too! And lets not forget all those communities along the rail ways as it's being shipped hoping that no train accidents occur while they're going by.
NickJames
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Nuclear isn't horrible so long as a tsunami doesn't come along. But for everyday home use, solar is good enough. Eventually you'll have Fusion energy which should replace any need for nuclear or coal burning power plants.
The worst that can happen with nuclear.
The worst that can happen with solar.
Fixed that for you.
I've got an issue with the third image. While the lingering radioactivity is keeping that damage from being fixed (and obviously people moving back in), the damage itself was caused by an earthquake and tsunami, for neither of which was nuclear power responsible.
NickJames
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There are many towns and villages that were largely untouched by the tsunami but sit within the Fukushima exclusion zone. Yes the earthquake definitely caused damaged but nothing that couldn't have been fixed within a year if not for the radioactive fallout.
But they can and are being fixed as radiation levels subside back to Denver levels.
A catastrophic failure of an aging civilian reactor will result in a large areas of land to be uninhabitable for some time; but for Japan put enough solar panels to match the electricity output of Fukushima 1 would make 100s to >1000 km^2 of land to be uninhabitable as well.
Justintoxicated
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Not all forms of solar use solar panels.....
