SALEM, Utah--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 27, 2005--Will solar energy ever overtake the oil market? The solar revolution may be closer than you think. Breakthrough solar power technology developed by International Automated Systems Inc. (OTCBB: IAUS) may become the first solar to compete with gas. Low-cost energy produced by IAUS' new patented and patent-pending solar technology can be used to generate electricity or produce clean fuels such as hydrogen and green methanol (gasoline replacements) at a competitive price. >> Read more @ PubSub Business Wire
A solar area of only 100 square miles -- a size of land that equals only nine percent of the state of Nevada -- can generate enough electricity for the entire United States. WOW if true, this will be revolutionary... then again, its a gross mis-statement. oh well guess it could be a mis print, edited by a very non technical person. i would guess it should be 100 miles squared maybe. either that, or Nevada has done some major downsizing that i dont know of.
Quick search: Nevada - Silver State , Battle Born State, Sagebrush State. 286,367 sq km (110,567 sq mi) 1/10th of that is 11,0567 sq mi or a little more than 100 miles across by 100 miles high. If the solar collectors were distributed throughout the United States with size dependant upon each state's square-mileage, the entire country would have power - perhaps even interconnected in case one goes down - without the need for one huge collector and a whole bunch of high-powered transmission wires.
That 100 sq mile thing I have seen stated before. I have seen it in a paper from the US Department of Energy. And that's including typical current PV efficiencies. If this system listed in the article (involving lenses and a turbine) is more efficient than PV then the area would be even obviously less. I think the whole idea of that is not that someone would build such a huge array, but simply to state just how much energy comes from the sun that is freely available. One other interesting fact in the same paper I saw from the DoE is that 90% of the country's energy needs could be met by placing solar arrays on all the abandoned industrial sites.
well lets face it, solar is the way to go, its free and abundant but doesnt have the backing of the most powerful entity in the universe, and that is money.
There is a large, two orders of magnitude large, difference between 100 square miles and a 100 mile square.
