Comments on: Gilligan’s Island Goes Solar

By: Mixed Greens: Carbon Conscious profit soars, outlook positive : Renew Economy

Mixed Greens: Carbon Conscious profit soars, outlook positive : Renew Economy — Mon, 03 Sep 2012 03:39:47 +0000

[…] and the isle shown in the opening and closing credits of 1960s TV show Gilligan’s Island, has entered a 20-year agreement with SolarCity to install 260kW of solar panels to supply 25 per cent of the university’s […]

By: Bob_Wallace

Bob_Wallace — Mon, 03 Sep 2012 03:06:00 +0000

The Western grid can accept as much as 35% of its total input from wind (30%) and solar (5%) with no changes. No additional storage. Nada.

As I recall the Hawaiian limit is 5% or so higher.

Adding EVs to the grid increases those levels. Closing down coal plants and switching to natural gas (which we are doing on the Mainland) increases those levels.

We’re also developing way to make some of the demand/load dispatchable. That will further increase the acceptable percentages of renewables.

http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/can-autodr-meet-the-needs-of-renewables/

Finally, there are at least a couple of very promising new utility scale battery technologies under development. One of them should be in production in a few months, just as soon as the factory is finished.

20%/25% is a very low number.

By: T Adkins

T Adkins — Mon, 03 Sep 2012 02:16:00 +0000

sorry it corrected above to about- should read -dont feel the power grid can handle intermittent electrical power sources above that %

By: T Adkins

T Adkins — Mon, 03 Sep 2012 02:13:00 +0000

Probably due to many states including Hawaii having utility companies that dont feel the power grid can handle intermittent electrical power sources about that %

By: Ross

Ross — Thu, 30 Aug 2012 18:55:00 +0000

Why only 20%?