They should have followed the lead of Solyndra. Grease a few palms, pledge a few billion in campaign cash and wait for the gooberment to pay for your stuff while you burn money like crazy.

woo hoo --- green energy!

I can not for the life of me understand why right wing douchebags such as yourself, EnviroDude, are so against figuring out a way to harness an energy source that would create who-knows-how-many jobs right here in America and be a stick in the eye of those darn Middle Easterners you claim to want independence from.

Instead of being gleeful when solar hits a stumbling block, you should be pounding you fists on the table and demanding that Congress step up to the plate to fund research for this potentially massive source of electricity for the very American people you guys claim to care so much about.

What gives?

Seriously, instead of pumping so much cash into solar panel efficiency, how about we pump money into thorium reactor research?

Or better yet, screw the panels, go straight to the molten salt solar plants instead. Why piss around with something that's expensive, will go outdated very soon, and doesn't yield a lot of energy when you can go for something that generates high energy yields?

MrSteve007: RexTalionis: Or better yet, screw the panels, go straight to the molten salt solar plants instead. Why piss around with something that's expensive, will go outdated very soon, and doesn't yield a lot of energy when you can go for something that generates high energy yields?

Spain just opened up the first 24-hour molten salt solar plant last month - with 20MW of output. Apparently it's working great. Link (new window)

Also in October, the 110MW molten salt Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Project in Nevada began construction.
[media.npr.org image 640x426]
It's to be operational by Dec 2013.

I know about these. They just seem to be anomalies because much of the renewable energy push seems to be myopically focused (that's an oxymoron, right?) on solar panel research, when there are innovative solutions that's just begging to be funded.

excedrin: max_pooper: ole prophet: max_pooper: WrestlerManager: The sad fact is, solar just doesn't work on any kind of economically viable level.

You may need to look up the definition of the word "fact."

Go look at your mom and dad's electricity bill and see what they pay per kilowatt hour, then come back here when you can get solar remotely close to that cost...

I don't how much about my parents utility rates but I just received my weekly energy summary from my provider and I used 86.1kwh at a cost of $9.62.
I also know that solar costs $0.00 per kwh. The start up costs are not insignificant but your pronouncement of absolute fact that "solar just doesn't work on any kind of economically viable level" is even remotely true.

What?! So it's free to create and manufacture solar panels? Free to convert solar energy to electricity? Free to send that electricity to your house? Free to keep it running 24/7? Free to maintain that network? Free to repair after natural disasters? Really? Solar costs $0.00 per kwh? Sunlight might be free, but converting that light into a usable energy source will (always) be anything but free.

Isn't it pretty to think so?

/Maybe obscure.

Calmamity: I can not for the life of me understand why right wing douchebags such as yourself, EnviroDude, are so against figuring out a way to harness an energy source that would create who-knows-how-many jobs right here in America and be a stick in the eye of those darn Middle Easterners you claim to want independence from.

Instead of being gleeful when solar hits a stumbling block, you should be pounding you fists on the table and demanding that Congress step up to the plate to fund research for this potentially massive source of electricity for the very American people you guys claim to care so much about. I am not gleeful that

What gives?

You mean like exploring the oil shales? developing the natural gas reserves we have in the US? Adopting a sound energy policy?

In the 1970's, after the Arab Oil Embargo that sent oil prices soaring over $40/bbl and gas prices at the pump to $1.50, the government created the Department of Energy to formulate ways to become energy independent.

Since then, they have spent billions of dollars. What do we have to show for it? The US Congress banned the manufacturing of incandescent bulbs. That's it.

I can remember when you could get a government grant and install solar panels on your homes paid for by the government - in the 1980's. They didn't work then.

I can remember watching the wind turbines spin in Fairfield California. They didn't produce enough then.

You see, we were well on our way to being energy independent by proposing several nuclear power plants near major bodies of water. But the democrats, environmental wackos, Jane Fonda, and the anti-nukes killed them. There is a shell of a plant that was under construction in north Mississippi when the funding was pulled. 1/3rd of the cooling towers were built. The plant was abandoned in place.

So before you go off calling people names because they poke fun at the modern state of energy politics, know your history. Know that it is the democrat party that has been running interference with wind farms (off the coast of MA) and solar panel plants for years.

Is it any wonder then, that the democrats (and Obama) funded this fiasco at the expense of our tax base? I only wonder if Pelosi/Reid were told to sell short as a payoff for their support.