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OKIsItJustMe

(19,933 posts)
Thu Apr 4, 2013, 05:57 PM Apr 2013

Global solar photovoltaic industry is likely now a net energy producer, Stanford researchers find

http://news.stanford.edu/news/2013/april/pv-net-energy-040213.html
[font face=Serif]Stanford Report, April 2, 2013

[font size=5]Global solar photovoltaic industry is likely now a net energy producer, Stanford researchers find[/font]

[font size=4]The construction of the photovoltaic power industry since 2000 has required an enormous amount of energy, mostly from fossil fuels. The good news is that the clean electricity from all the installed solar panels has likely just surpassed the energy going into the industry's continued growth, Stanford researchers find.[/font]

[font size=3]By Mark Golden

The rapid growth of the solar power industry over the past decade may have exacerbated the global warming situation it was meant to soothe, simply because most of the energy used to manufacture the millions of solar panels came from burning fossil fuels. That irony, according to Stanford University researchers, is coming to an end.

For the first time since the boom started, the electricity generated by all of the world's installed solar photovoltaic (PV) panels last year probably surpassed the amount of energy going into fabricating more modules, according to Michael Dale, a postdoctoral fellow at Stanford's Global Climate & Energy Project (GCEP). With continued technological advances, the global PV industry is poised to pay off its debt of energy as early as 2015, and no later than 2020.

"This analysis shows that the industry is making positive strides," said Dale, who developed a novel way of assessing the industry's progress globally in a study published in the current edition of Environmental Science & Technology. "Despite its fantastically fast growth rate, PV is producing – or just about to start producing – a net energy benefit to society."

The achievement is largely due to steadily declining energy inputs required to manufacture and install PV systems, according to co-author Sally Benson, GCEP's director. The new study, Benson said, indicates that the amount of energy going into the industry should continue to decline, while the issue remains an important focus of research.

…[/font][/font]
http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/es3038824
13 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
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Global solar photovoltaic industry is likely now a net energy producer, Stanford researchers find (Original Post) OKIsItJustMe Apr 2013 OP
That's deceptive. FBaggins Apr 2013 #1
I agree Yo_Mama Apr 2013 #3
Oponents have been spinning the report to make it seem negative. OKIsItJustMe Apr 2013 #4
I'm not saying that they intend to decieve... FBaggins Apr 2013 #5
I find spinning to be a fascinating thing OKIsItJustMe Apr 2013 #6
I don't know... FBaggins Apr 2013 #9
It's pathetic. wtmusic Apr 2013 #7
What was I saying about spin? OKIsItJustMe Apr 2013 #8
Blah blah blah. Here's mine: wtmusic Apr 2013 #10
Blah Blah Blah indeed… OKIsItJustMe Apr 2013 #11
More Van Leeuwen nonsense from Marc Jacobson's Church of Renewables. wtmusic Apr 2013 #12
Nice graph! Does it say anything about Greenhouse Gases? OKIsItJustMe Apr 2013 #13
WOW. That's all I can say. On several levels, wow. Gregorian Apr 2013 #2

FBaggins

(26,697 posts)
1. That's deceptive.
Thu Apr 4, 2013, 06:30 PM
Apr 2013

It's likely only true (if it's true at all) because such a high percentage of the installed PV base is only a couple years old (or less) and so many of the manufactured units are sitting unsold (and thus non-productive) in inventory somewhere in China. Incredibly rapid growth (particularly in countries with lower solar insolation) threw off the calculation.

It leaves readers with the false impression (spread by opponents of solar power) that solar PV takes many years to pay back the energy that goes into making/installing them (let alone pay back their expense).

They're still comparatively expensive... but not THAT expensive.

Yo_Mama

(8,303 posts)
3. I agree
Thu Apr 4, 2013, 08:00 PM
Apr 2013

Imagine the building of Boulder Dam. It consumed a lot of energy. In the first year, of course it wouldn't have generated enough energy to cover its own construction.

Any energy project would always be in energy deficit during the initial phase. Any project.

Because solar is a new tech on this scale, of course it has been energy negative. Scaling up made it so.

OKIsItJustMe

(19,933 posts)
4. Oponents have been spinning the report to make it seem negative.
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 10:53 AM
Apr 2013

The report is actually positive.

The payback time on a panel is now less than 2 years. Panels that were made 10 years ago, when the payback was more than 5 years, have already paid off their energy debt.

Meanwhile, even though the industry is growing at a phenomenal rate, the currently deployed cells are generating enough energy to manufacture all of the new ones.

FBaggins

(26,697 posts)
5. I'm not saying that they intend to decieve...
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 11:07 AM
Apr 2013

... just that the title and much of the article can leave people with the wrong impression.

And as you say... it obviously did.

OKIsItJustMe

(19,933 posts)
6. I find spinning to be a fascinating thing
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 11:51 AM
Apr 2013

If you’re told in advance that something is negative, when you read it, you tend to read it as negative.

I didn’t find the article or headline to be negative at all!

FBaggins

(26,697 posts)
9. I don't know...
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 12:01 PM
Apr 2013

I read it as a good thing but immediately assumed that others would misread it as negative - without the context of exactly how extreme the growth rate has been in the last 2-3 years (and what that means for the calculation).

wtmusic

(39,166 posts)
7. It's pathetic.
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 11:52 AM
Apr 2013

The very first nuclear power plant built probably paid its energy debt in the first year of operation.

wtmusic

(39,166 posts)
10. Blah blah blah. Here's mine:
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 12:04 PM
Apr 2013

Solar dead last (oops, my bad...wind is worse).

"The 2001 and 2002 Storm van Leeuwen & Smith papers and Background Information represent an interesting attempt to grapple with a complex subject but depend on many essentially speculative figures to put the case that nuclear energy incurs substantial energy debts and gives rise to minimal net energy outputs considered on a lifetime basis. Recent life cycle assessment (LCA) studies such as Vattenfall's show figures around ten times lower for key capital and waste-related energy demands. The Vattenfall life cycle study gives a bottom line of 1.35% of lifetime energy output being required for all inputs, and only a tiny fraction of this being in the nature of energy debts.

Finally, it should be pointed out that, even on the basis of their assumptions and using their inaccurate figures, Storm van Leeuwen & Smith still are forced to conclude that nuclear power plants produce less CO2 than fossil-fuelled plants, although in their view "the difference is not large". Others might see a 20 to 50-fold difference (between nuclear and gas or coal) as significant. The audited Vattenfall figure for CO2 emission on lifecycle basis is 3.10 g/kWh, less than one percent of the best fossil fuel figure. This could approximately double if nuclear power inputs to enrichment were replaced by fossil fuel ones, but it is still very low.

It is clear, then that the concerns related to energy costs at the heart of the Storm van Leeuwen & Smith paper can be dismissed. The authors' other point, that nuclear energy is not sustainable, is addressed in the Sustainable Energy and Supply of Uranium papers in this series."

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Energy-and-Environment/Energy-Analysis-of-Power-Systems/#.UWLqOxma3nA

OKIsItJustMe

(19,933 posts)
11. Blah Blah Blah indeed…
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 12:16 PM
Apr 2013
http://pbadupws.nrc.gov/docs/ML1006/ML100601133.pdf
[font face=Serif][font size=5]Valuing the greenhouse gas emissions from nuclear power: A critical survey[/font]
[font size=4]Benjamin K. Sovacool[/font]


Available online 2 June 2008


[font size=3]5. Conclusion

The first conclusion is that the mean value of emissions over the course of the lifetime of a nuclear reactor (reported from qualified studies) is 66 g CO2e/kWh, due to reliance on existing fossil-fuel infrastructure for plant construction, decommissioning, and fuel processing along with the energy intensity of uranium mining and enrichment. Thus, nuclear energy is in no way ‘‘carbon free’’ or ‘‘emissions free,’’ even though it is much better (from purely a carbon-equivalent emissions standpoint) than coal, oil, and natural gas electricity generators, but worse than renewable and small scale distributed generators (see Table 8). For example, Gagnon et al. (2002) found that coal, oil, diesel, and natural gas generators emitted between 443 and 1050 g CO2e/kWh, far more than the 66 g CO2e/kWh attributed to the nuclear lifecycle. However, Pehnt (2006) conducted lifecycle analyses for 15 separate distributed generation and renewable energy technologies and found that all but one, solar photovoltaics (PV), emitted much less gCO2e/kWh than the mean reported for nuclear plants. In an analysis using updated data on solar PV, Fthenakis et al. (2008) found that current estimates on the greenhouse gas emissions for typical solar PV systems range from 29 to 35 g CO2e/kWh (based on insolation of 1700 kWh/m2/yr and a performance ratio of 0.8).

The second (and perhaps more obvious) conclusion is that lifecycle studies of greenhouse gas emissions associated with the nuclear fuel cycle need to become more accurate, transparent, accountable, and comprehensive. Thirty-nine percent of lifecycle studies reviewed were more than 10 years old. Nine percent, while cited in the literature, were inaccessible. Thirty-four percent did not explain their research methodology, relied completely on secondary sources, or were not explicit about the distribution of carbon-equivalent emissions over the different stages of the nuclear fuel cycle. All in all, this meant that 81% of studies had methodological shortcomings that justified excluding them from the assessment conducted here. No identifiable industry standard provides guidance for utilities and companies operating nuclear facilities concerning how to report their carbon-equivalent emissions. Regulators, utilities, and operators should consider developing formal standardization and reporting criteria for the greenhouse gas emissions associated with nuclear lifecycles similar to those that provide general guidance for environmental management and lifecycle assessment, such as ISO 14040 and 14044, but adapted exclusively to the nuclear industry.

Of the remaining 19% of studies that were relatively up to date, accessible, and methodologically explicit, they varied greatly in their comprehensiveness, some counting just construction and decommissioning as part of the fuel cycle, and others including mining, milling, enrichment, conversion, construction, operation, processing, waste storage, and decommissioning. Adding even more variation, studies differed in whether they assessed future emissions for a few individual reactors or past emissions for the global nuclear fleet; assumed existing technologies or those under development; and presumed whether the electricity needed for mining and enrichment came from fossil fuels, other nuclear plants, renewable energy technologies, or a combination thereof.

Furthermore, the specific reactors studied differ greatly themselves. Some utilize relatively high-quality uranium ore located close to the reactor site; others require the importation of low-quality ore from thousands of kilometers away. A nuclear plant in Canada may receive its fuel from open-pit uranium mines enriched at a gaseous diffusion facility, whereas a reactor in Egypt may receive its fuel from an underground mine enriched through centrifuge. A nuclear facility in France may operate with a load factor of 83% for 40 years on a closed fuel cycle relying on reprocessed fuel, whereas a light water reactor in the United States may operate with a load factor of 81% for 25 years on a once-through fuel cycle that generates significant amounts of spent nuclear fuel.

…[/font][/font]

Gregorian

(23,867 posts)
2. WOW. That's all I can say. On several levels, wow.
Thu Apr 4, 2013, 06:57 PM
Apr 2013

And the reality is that energy has been going into it for a long long time.

But at least it's a good place to put the energy.

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