Huge Solar Farms Coming. To Canada?
I was in Vegas last month, and the region has three interesting things as it pertains to this story:
- Lots of wide open spaces
- A distinct lack of inclimate weather
- Lots of SUN
Same is true of, shall we call it, the entire desert southwest. Almost no snow, a little rain here and there, but sunlight. Also, it being a little closer to the equator, there’s more hours in the day when the sun is out. Sounds like the perfect spot to put some solar cells to my ignorant ears.
I must be wrong in my assumptions, as I read today about Silicon Valley-based (well, Hayward, but it’s close enough) Optisolar, a new startup that will “build the largest solar power “farm” in North America, using solar cells manufactured in Silicon Valley. The site, near Sarnia in Ontario, Canada, will be enough to power between 10,000 and 15,000 homes on sunny days, drawing on a monstrous 40-megawatt capacity.”
Sounds great, but what’s going to power the homes on the 300 days of the year that aren’t sunny, eh? I wonder if the energy costs to have people come clean the snow off the cells will exceed the energy gained? By the way, did I mention I’m from Canada, whose weather is best described as “nine months of hockey followed by three months of crappy ice”.
It turns out the Ontario government offers financial incentives for alternative energy producers, just like unlike the USA, which considers oil from countries with stable governments “alternative”.
At least the solar guys are making some progress, unlike wind/turbine generators, a.k.a. “the Aquaman of alternative energy”.
posted in Energy | 0 Comments