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124 comments on Outsourcing Solar Roofs

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jokuhl on October 28, 2006 - 1:19pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Robert;
  Actually, New England/Northeast has a pretty favorable insolation, compared with our neighbors around the great lakes and the Northwest.  

August  (NREL Map from 1961-1990 data)
http://rredc.nrel.gov/solar/old_data/nsrdb/redbook/atlas/serve.cgi

January
http://rredc.nrel.gov/solar/old_data/nsrdb/redbook/atlas/serve.cgi

We're about 1/3 below the Broiling Southwest, but don't show up much worse off than Atlanta or Houston.  Here on the Southern Maine coast, I think we're sunnier, but I don't have any maps that prove it.  Add to that, PV yields better current in colder air, and the North gets another little shot in the arm.

Bob Fiske

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Robert Rapier on October 28, 2006 - 1:41pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
As someone just reminded me by e-mail, Germany has even less solar insolation than the Northeast states, and they have made solar work in a big way. I should have remembered that since I lived in Germany for 2 years.

I was sent a map showing Germany and U.S. side by side, but it is too small to make out details. If I can get the original source, I will post it.

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jokuhl on October 28, 2006 - 2:17pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Yes, the Germans know a good deal when they see one.

Even in overcast conditions, those panels are 'makin money'.. (if your electronics are smart enought to use it).. and I fully suspect that the panels that live in cloudier towns will be up there that much longer, too.

I was in Westphalia as an exchange student, 1983, and I don't really even remember much direct sunlight.  But every sunset was lovely, with the Sun as a distinct, Orange ball that looked like it was painted onto the gray sky.

"All's for the best in this Best of all possible worlds, of which I might say Westphalia is the center"

 -Dr. Pangloss, Candide

..and while I have the libretto in hand..  (OT alert..!)
(Our men are brave. The war is over, but we still have six divisions of artillery ready to start another war. It's been a long and bloody war, but if men didn't fight they would never know the benefits of peace, and if they didn't know the benefits of peace they would never know the benefits of war. You see, it all works out for the best.)

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radlafari on October 29, 2006 - 6:46am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Only 4 weeks ago the largest installation of solar panels in Germany was opened near Munich, serving 700 households with 2.2 megawatts. (Link to german spoken page).
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