UN Says World Could be 80% Renewable by 2050

Recently, the UN stated that we could be 80% renewable by 2050.  In order to make that a reality, however, the broad scope of human beings in the world need to be ready to accept and understand the new technology brought upon us.  Being responsible for your own power generation is a concept foreign to many of us, because most of us have our electrical energy produced somewhere else, on some remote site.  Are you ready to produce your own electricity?

I hope that through this website, and others like it, together we can prepare for that kind of a future.

This page indicates ways of generating power.  Some are clean, others less so.  No matter what, a human being is going to have a carbon footprint because none of us are so light that our breath does not enter the air, any less than our feet touch the ground.

That said, consider all of the types of utilities available.  Did you know that in 2010, the United States uses less hydroelectric power than it did in 1997?  In effect, we are less renewable than we were back then.

If the US Federal government were to manufacture its own solar panels, there would be no cause for excessive price due to corporate profits.  People could buy them directly with "tax" money.  Currently, that's not how the system works, and it may never work that way.  If we've learned anything by watching the way that this century has unfolded, the separation between "have's" and "have-not's" is becoming more clear and distinct by the very concept of ownership that exists between those two states. 

Military Bases Get 160,000 Residential Systems Guaranteed

"The Energy Department said Wednesday it provided a partial guarantee for a $344 million loan to San Mateo, Calif.-based SolarCity for the SolarStrong Project, which seeks to place solar panels on 160,000 homes across 124 military bases in 33 states." (main article)

Recently, it has been reported that the government plans on funding "the largest residential solar project in history."

That's great, but at the same time, doesn't the military get enough funding?  I think it's telling, of the times, to say that the greatest investment in residential solar in the United States goes towards the military, as does most of the federal budget.

As convenient as that may be, this doesn't solve anything.  Even a certified atheist would have a difficult time not coming across as a religious nut, trying to explain the problems we face, because the situation is immensely complicated, and to many people, the end of the Mall sounds like the end of the world.

If you're in the military and you live on a base, I hope you read this website because you're going to have one of these things on your home probably pretty soon, so you might as well learn what the parts are, and how they work.

Reasons Not To Max Out Roofspace.

Ok, let's say you got yourself a weird roof.  There's nothing normal about it.  It's not a square.  It's some kind of peculiar shape.  There is a way to figure out how many panels are going to fit up there, but it's not going to be as simple as getting the square area and fitting in a number of panels that match that area.
Here is the way that I've come up with that may help.

First of all, panels all have dimensions.  Also, panels require mounting systems.  Ultimately, the space on your roof has to facilitate the rails.

Start with the longest vertical measurement.  That's a good place to start, right?

Get yourself nice and comfortable along the ridge of the roof and run your tape measure down to the gutter.  Don't measure exactly from the very top to the very bottom!  In fact, if your roof overhangs beyond the structure of the house at the bottom, don't consider mounting onto that part.

Next, draw a series of horizontal lines, perhaps with a crayon onto the shingles. (the lines will wash away in the rain if you make them lightly).  Use the dimensions of the panels you intend to use.  Here we see that from the top to the bottom, there's enough room for 3 rows of portrait-oriented panels, without enough room for 2 rows to fit at the narrower part on the left.  However, if the panels are oriented landscape, three rows will fit.

Don't let someone sell you this.  It's too big for the roof.  Note the "precise" distance from gutter to the peak.  This generally means one of two things.  You're either going to see the backs of the top panels from the other side of your house, or the panels at the bottom are going to send rainfall right over your gutter.  Possibly both.  I know it looks 'great' (yeah right).  But in reality, it's impractical to fit that many panels on a roof.

Here is a way more practical approach.  There are only 6 fewer panels in this example (the one above is the 'maxed out' version).  But in this version, first of all the array will definitely fit on your roof.  And secondly, 32 panels will fit onto a single inverter as 4 strings of 8, which is great!


What would the purpose of those additional 6 panels actually equate to?  In all honesty, nothing but a bunch of issues.  First of all, 38 panels would require you to break your array into 2 separate inverters, because 38 is not divisible by a number of panels that will series into a string that is compatible with an inverter.  You'd end up with 2 strings of 10 and 2 strings of 9, probably, each on 4000w inverters.  Now you have twice as many inverters, and only 6 more panels.

I guess that's ok, there's nothing exactly wrong with 2 inverters.  But additional costs are not just that you're buying twice as many inverters (rather than a single 7kw inverter).  You also need an additional subpanel.  It might require a service upgrade.  Those 6 panels, at STC 1.2kw, are really going to only generate 900w at max power, 1.4 mW a year in an area like Connecticut.

Hmm, that's starting to sound good again.  I guess these are the questions we're forced to ask ourselves before we enter a situation like getting a PV installation though... right?

Private Testing Programs

Let's face the facts, here.  Nabcep is nothing more than a private enterprise, centered around collecting money from people.  I would believe otherwise, if they were differently structured.  But all indications point to lead towards Nabcep standing not for education, not for workforce preparedness nor usefulness to the industry as a whole.  I think it's just a way for a few people to make a bunch of money. 

If the Department of Energy (Energy.Gov) were to step in, the test would work drastically differently from NABCEP's.  First of all, it would only contain questions relevant to the average workers' experience.  Many of the key questions in the Nabcep exam are based on the hardest questions ever faced by anyone in the industry.  And their answers are pretty much the opinions of the people who were asked the questions by real life experience in the first place.  Nobody truly understands the way that electricity works.  We're still learning about it everyday, and yet the Nabcep exam claims, in its questions, to know the best solutions to the most unanswerable problems that PV could ever deliver. 

I say leave those questions to the few and far between us who might be faced with them on occasion.  The average solar workers' experience contains boundless amounts of information to be memorized, none of it as specialized as Nabcep.  Some of which is asked on their test, often where the phrases are oddly structured and the true nature of the question is difficult to determine.  

To me, that's by design.  I know that tests aren't supposed to be easy, but the Nabcep test is designed to fail, solely for the reason that they can charge you to take it over again.  In fact, you have a much better chance of passing it if you invest in one of their official preparation classes, where the instructor is given precursory language to explain the meaning behind the next batch of tests to the students. 

To me, that's not capitalism, and I believe that's where we draw the line.  The point at which capitalism ends is not socialism.  It's exploitation.  And this is an exploitative technique, as many techniques currently exist within the industry, to keep knowledge of the field to a minimum.  There's no shortage of interest in the study of solar electricity, but society almost intentionally keeps itself apart from the information necessary for we, as a nation, to move forward with alternative energy. 

Solutions

I believe that the first, and probably the best, solution is this.  The US Government needs to step up and create a federal certification (not a license but a certification) to prove to others that "this individual is capable of estimating the production of a PV array annually." 

And I'm not talking about just one time showing what the scores are.  I'm saying that individuals could take this test multiple times, getting higher scores in different areas each and every time they take it.  I'm also suggesting that the DOE publish the results of the test, for those who wish their test scores to be seen.  This would give people an indication of the level of understanding an individual has, in that particular field.  Much of this, though, is hypothetical. 

Because in reality, the rules of on the job preparedness for PV solar are still, despite the booming success of the late 2000's for solar, extremely primative.  Nabcep certainly isn't doing the trick, and I would be skeptical for any institution, even my own, for providing students with credentials that evoke confidence in people who are looking for others to hire in order to install photovoltaic grid-tied backfeeding systems.  

Solar Credentials in CT: A Summary

As of September 20 2011, in Connecticut there are only:

10 people in with PV-2 licenses, 

15 people in with PV-1 licenses 

[search here]

and 

17 people in with Nabcep Certification. 

[search here]

What does this mean?
These kind of certifications qualify individuals to design and lead solar PV installations.  In order to implement solar electrical energy on a mass scale, more people need to qualify with licenses to ensure that homeowners are getting proper estimates, and systems are installed correctly.

What if you're a regular electrician?
Ordinary electricians with normal training are well-versed in AC wiring, and can learn the DC wiring of systems with relative ease.  The construction aspects of PV systems are slightly out of the normal range of an electrician's experience, and the design and estimation techniques are never touched upon in normal electrical training.


Why Certify?
I have proposed to the state board of licenses to offer an additional PV endorsement test for licensed electricians, such that they will become certified PV electricians through the process of reviewing material and passing a test that proves:

• That these electricians understand NEC 690 and can answer questions like which is the ungrounded conductor, wire sizing for PV systems (voltage drop at <1%)
• That these electricians understand waterproofing methods, aspects of roofing, can calculate hold-down strength and uplift potential, as well as dead load, and weight distribution.
• That these same individuals can estimate the annual production of a PV system based on the methods described here in this website.  

This website contains the relevant information that will help an electrician perform these calculations.  Electricians should be tested on this material because it ensures:

• The longevity of the system
• The safety of the installation
• The accuracy of the estimate

Something to consider.
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