Rainbow Power Company Enewsletter #115 - 11th March 2008
Index:
1) News from Around the World
2) Kyocera Production Targets
3) Queensland - A Solar Future
4) High Wattage CFLs
5) Air Conditioners
6) Solar Cookers - have arrived!!
1) News from Around the World
According to a report in Scientific American (21 Feb 2008):
"PV power would cut air pollution, including the greenhouse gases that
cause climate change, by nearly 90 percent if it replaced fossil fuels.
Environmental engineer Vasilis Fthenakis, a senior scientist at Brookhaven
National Laboratory in Upton, N.Y., and his colleagues examined the four most common types
of
PV cells. Even taking into account the low efficiency of thin-film solar cells or the
energy needed to
purify silicon for the other types of PV, all proved to entail significantly fewer
emissions in their
entire life cycle than the fossil fuels needed to produce an equivalent amount of
electricity.
In fact, most of their dirty side derived from the indirect emissions of the coal-burning
power plants
or other fossil fuels used to generate the electricity for PV manufacturing facilities.
These four types of solar cells pay back the energy involved in their manufacture in one
to three
years, according to an earlier analysis by the same team. And even the most
energy-intensive to
produce, mono-crystalline silicate cells with the highest energy conversion efficiency of
14
percent, emit just 55 grams of globe warming pollution per kilowatt hour - a fraction of
the near
one kilogram of greenhouse gases emitted by a coal-fired power plant per kilowatt-hour"
For more information about energy payback, see:
http://www.rpc.com.au/products/services/Environmental_Engineer_Summer_06_paper_2.pdf
2) Kyocera Production Targets
Kyocera Solar announced late last year that it plans to increase annual
production of PV from the current 180 megawatts to 500 megawatts by 2011. That's enough
to
put a 1kW solar system on some 500,000 homes each year!!!
3) Queensland - A Solar Future The Queensland government has announced it will bulk-buy 1,000 solar power systems to
drive
down the price for homeowners and tackle climate change.
The idea came out of the 16-member Premier's Council on Climate Change,
that met on Wednesday for the first time since it was formed in December 07.
Only 446 Queensland homes use grid-connected solar power systems, compared
to 2,045 in South Australia, 1,166 in Victoria and 1,007 in New South Wales.
One wonders how/where they are going to find installers to connect all these
systems???
On another front, Premier Anna Bligh has just announced that the solar feed-in tariff for
solar
power sent to the grid would rise to $0.44/kWh from July 1 08. This is a great boost to
the
industry.
4) High Wattage CFLs We are now stocking some high wattage 240V CFL-type fluoros for use in large rooms. They
have a standard Edison Screw base. The available wattage are:
55W equivalent to 250W of incandescents
65W equivalent to 300W of incandescents
85W equivalent to 400W of incandescents
The colour temperature is 4000K (which is mid range between warm and cool).
5) Air Conditioners
It has been suggested, just as all swimming pool installations have compulsory safety
fencing,
that all air conditioning installations should have compulsory solar panels!! Both are
saving our
children´s `futures´, and the panels are assisting with peak load requirements, caused by
all those
air conditioners in the first place. Not sure how `compulsory´ it will become - but it´s a
good
thought to put out there.
6) Solar Cookers
Our new shipment of Solar Cookers has just arrived!
They are improved models from the same manufacturer. The box cooker comes in an
attractive
red moulded fibreglass `suitcase´. The fragile mirror in the old models has been replaced
with an
unbreakable polished stainless steel reflector. They come with 4 stainless steel pots
cooking pots
- all ready for your first meal!
We also have a new model of 1 metre dish for those of you wanting to make large meals - eg
stew for a dozen or more people. We will put more pictures of the dish cooker on our
website this
week.
In the meantime, see:
http://www.rpc.com.au/catalog/solar-cookers-c-1_155.html
Kind regards to you allDave Lambert
Sales Manager
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