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RE: Promises promises
By SPOOFE on 3/22/2010 6:30:35 PM , Rating: 2
By your own words, you suggested the amount of land was enough to provide "a fat percentage" of the nation's power. If something between 1 and 2% is "fat" in your book, then I concur.

But we've already seen that your numbers are hasty, inaccurate, and low-balled.

I identified several, the two largest being a) the amount of land is only enough to provide a tiny fraction of our power needs, and b) Highway siting would be far more expensive than using undeveloped land somewhere, despite the space above the highway being "free", due to the need for elevated supports.

You had two insignificant quibbles, the first of which was sloppy math on your part, and the second of which simply observed that we can't build these things out of stacks of newspaper and Q-tips. That's hardly "countless".

If you think that's still a viable alternative just from those two factors alone, I don't know that continuing the discussion will be fruitful.

You tell me if I think it's a viable alternative. Hint: I say as much in my very first post. I'm sorry your heightened emotional state has hampered your literacy.

This is a little silly. A tunnel 100' long is quite dark in the middle.

The word "tunnel" does not at all describe the described structure. I don't even know how you got that. The fact that you would even suggest that as a real counter only throws doubt on everything else you're saying.

Anyway, a "tunnel" has stupidly narrow apertures at either end, relative to the volume contained therein. A road covering would have exposed sides and let in orders of magnitude more light relative to volume.

Take a look at any large wall-less structure, for instance a large horse arena. There's one near my house, that is roughly 100' x 300'...and lit from above, even during daylight shows

For comfort, not by necessity. Attendees to a large event do not come with a pair of powerful lights attached to their faces, in addition. Again, it does not seem like you have any coherent argument; it's like you're just shouting the first thing that pops up in your ADD mind.

And, again, since you don't seem to know what you're arguing: The point was raised only to demonstrate the availability of land. I never presented it as a viable option; only your hasty fevered mind interpreted that. The land is available, public, very undeveloped for the most part, stupidly accessible (as opposed to the "middle of nowhere" option you presented), and most importantly, would cost nothing to acquire.

RE: Promises promises
By porkpie on 3/22/2010 7:03:09 PM , Rating: 2
"But we've already seen that your numbers are hasty, inaccurate, and low-balled."

Come now, don't descend to hyperbole. Even taking into account your objections on road width, it only boosts my figure from 1.0 to 1.25%...and we still haven't subtracted what's necessary for transmission and storage losses. I am generously positing a value as high as 2%.

Is 2% a "fat percentage" of our nations electric needs? Yes or no.

"The word "tunnel" does not at all describe the described structure"

It most certainly does. A strip several miles long is effectively enclosed front and back -- zero sunlight will penetrate that far. It's also enclosed top and bottom.

That leaves two sides for light to penetrate. If the strip is 100' wide, that's equivalent to a tunnel 100' long. Mathematically, they are equivalent. Would you prefer it if I formulated it as a formal boundary value problem?


That certainly sounds like you're calling it a viable option. Which one is it? If you don't consider it viable, why are you fighting so hard to portray it as such?

And while this "land" would cost nothing to acquire, it would cost at least 10X as much to cover with solar cells as would an equivalent sized piece of undeveloped land, far outweighing any savings in acquisition costs. We have even more "free land" in the open ocean. Does that mean floating solar cells in the middle of Pacific is a better alternative than putting them in the NM desert?

RE: Promises promises
Here... let me add some numbers.

The US currently produces/uses ~
4 x 10 ^15 Wh a year.

Solar Insolation
I assumed Horizontal Flat Plate.


A really good solar panel is 20% efficient.

So that leaves use with






RE: Promises promises
By porkpie on 3/23/2010 4:04:26 PM , Rating: 2
Spoofe, I'm going to cede the land use point to you. I made a rather shocking math error. I correctly calculated ~500 sq m for road usage, and 5000 sq. miles required for power-- but then somehow read (a) as being 1/100 of (b), rather than 1/10.

So yes...if you could solve the other myriad problems, this would give you enough land to power a 'fat percentage' of our electric needs.

