Best products from r/RenewableEnergy

Yes I think that book I found would be good for you. Wikipedia is also a great resource.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy

Wind electrical generation is essentially just a turbine, so maybe do some research on turbine theory - steam turbines and boilers. Windmills are some of the oldest energy technologies we have as they have been used for grain Mills and water pumps long before electricity was discovered. The same can be said about hydro power. Geothermal is another fun technology to read about, alot if interested history about it development in italy and the science involved around geology.

All three of these renewable resources have something in common when it comes to making electricity: a turbine and a generator - the same way a coal, gas, or nuclear power system operates. Try to watch some videos on turbines and generators.

The only different one is solar power, where the heat collected by solar PV panels produces a DC electrical current and is converted to AC power using an inverter. However there is also a solar-thermal power plant design that uses the standard turbine/generator theory.

There are also technologies for passive hot water heating involving solar and geothermal, this is an interesting thing to research.

If you are ever have any questions about anything feel free to PM me, I love to talk about this stuff. My career is more so focused on power plants and larger generation electrical grid systems, but much of my schooling had to do with residential homes and I find this is what most regular people are most interested in.

If you are interested in how renewable energy can be applied to your home check out this book:

https://www.amazon.com/Homeowners-Guide-Renewable-Energy-Independence/dp/0865716862

The Quest: Energy, Security, and the Remaking of the Modern World looks like a great read! Possibly a follow-up to his book The Prize.

Consuming Power: A Social History of American Energies looks good as well! David Nye has written quite a few books... He seems like an interesting guy.

I haven't seen evidence to say that GIS is necessary to get a job, but I still strongly recommend it. I know several people, myself included, who have been told that GIS experience has gotten their resumes taken out of the pile.

Even if your school doesn't offer a course on arcGIS, the company that puts out the software offers a pretty good workbook that comes with a trail of the software if you want to look at it yourself.

$3680 for 480Wp seems expensive, even if it would include the batteries, which is doesn't.

I would suggest a 24V battery system.
You'll need one (or more) solar battery charger, this example says 40A, 1000Wp and Vsolar is 100Vmax. $235.00

Solar panels, 1000Wp, Voc = 37.8V, for $1339.99
To connect these to this controller, you need 2 parallel strings of 2 panels in series.
These panels are 160x100cm, if you want to mount them on the roof, make sure they do not get any shadow, from A/C, ventilation pipes, sky-light, whatever.
If this size is too big, you can buy 9 of these, connect them with 3 parallel strings of 3 panels in series each, $1071.00
pvwatts v1 gives a rough indication of available solar energy in your area.

120Vac inverter, you need a "pure sine wave" inverter, some appliances don't work with 'modified sine wave', the 'Watt'-rating depends on how much energy you are using at the same time, a 3000W costs $1298.00.
$235 + $1340 + $1298 = $2873, add some for cables/connectors, and you have double the energy available (excl. batteries).

The battery capacity (Ah) needs to be 10x the charge current (40A) = 400Ah, like 4x 6V-428Ah, $1523.00

Is it worth it.
Make a note of every electrical appliance, how many Watts they are, and how many hours/day they are running, incl. day/night time use, and are they running at the same time.
From that you can make a list every 15min(1hr) of Watts needed (120Vac inverter), and kWh/day/night (batteries).
The A/C and water heater are probably big energy users, and then think of how many days the batteries have to last if there are clouds and the PV panels are working at 10%.

Once you have all the data and have further questions we can look into that.

If you're interested in learning a bit about the technical side of renewable energy and the electric power grid, Renewable and Efficient Electric Power Systems by Stanford professor Gil Masters and Electric Power Systems: A Conceptual Introduction by UC Berkeley professor Sascha von Meier are great resources.

On mobile right now can't do the math (edit, still did the math) but the solar bike pathway cost 3.7 million (granted it is a prototype) for 72 meters. That might have cost a couple thousand in bitumen and solar panels are around 1$/watt these days I believe. Assuming a width of 1.5m we end up with 105m^2. Now if we take these solar panels on Amazon we end up with 24m^2 for 600$. Now things should be looking pretty obvious. It doesn't matter how cheap they can make the solar roadway it's the same as about 5000~6000$ worth of solar panels and a few thousand dollars of road (didn't bother finding numbers, there's now way we would have roads if 72m cost more than a couple thousand dollars). So yeah, more expensive and less efficient. In conclusion, a terrible idea.

Power banks like that are usually capable of being charged through a wall outlet, or through larger solar arrays like this one: http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00E3OL5U8/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1420386439&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SY200_QL40&dpPl=1&dpID=51c7QRDDVnL&ref=plSrch

What is your phone's battery capacity and how often do you charge it?


Keep in mind, the energy required to charge your phone is minimal. Around 1 kWh a year. http://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2013/09/07/how-much-energy-does-your-iphone-and-other-devices-use-and-what-to-do-about-it/

I bought this book for a dollar at a library sale. Find it and you'll have every engineering idea you could want for solar-collectors and solar-passive heating setups. This is an excellent engineering/academic treatise on everything from efficiency to expected power output. I wouldn't pay $190 for it though, do some looking around and you can get it cheap.

Here's the ISBN: 0-07-035473-1

get some popcorn. save these links and watch them, it is highly probably your environmental advocacy will become much more productive.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2b3ttqYDwF0
source to back up the presentation rethinkx.com

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BWJcpesr6A
source to back up the presentation https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00WS1S4AM/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8mrL8bvTWI source to back up podcast
http://www.innovationconcepts.eu/res/literatuurSchuiling/olivineagainstclimatechange23.pdf
projectvesta.org

this one is about animal advocacy, but its lessons apply to all forms of advocacy. (marketing, public public relations are really the same thing as advocacy. fossil fuels are ten times better at this than environmentalists)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUEGBDpmX0A

Environmentalist have one go to tactic, which is scare people really bad and hope the alter their behavoir.

https://cleantechnica.com/2018/11/18/buying-a-tesla-is-the-best-thing-you-can-do-for-the-environment/

my hope and belief in science is what motivates me every day. its not the fear.

Great news. For those sceptical of this report, I recommend checking out an an interesting assertion from Tony Seba regarding fossil fuels and nuclear going obsolete. He's saying that solar & battery are technologies and will continue to drop in price, like they have done for the last 30 years, and that the cost of fossil fuels will continue to be static or rise.
His book [Clean Disruption of Energy and Transportation: How Silicon Valley Will Make Oil, Nuclear, Natural Gas, Coal, Electric Utilities and Conventional Cars Obsolete by 2030] (http://www.amazon.com/Clean-Disruption-Energy-Transportation-Conventional/dp/0692210539?ie=UTF8&keywords=clean%20disruption&qid=1462589361&ref_=sr_1_1&sr=8-1 ) discusses this in detail.

Here is a [Short presentation] (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0L0JAnACdyc) and
a [long presentation] (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kxryv2XrnqM) .

For a great history on wind power technology, markets and policies see the recent book The Wind Power Story

> The US is still a democratic republic, and not a fascist state.

This is a perspective of wealth and race. In places such as Pine Ridge, South Dakota, Ferguson, Missouri or the Mexican border the perspective differs. The US is a proto-fascist state in an academic sense and has been documented as such.

https://www.amazon.com/How-Fascism-Works-Politics-Them/dp/0525511830

> The government is still functioning as intended.

The government of the United States was designed by slave-holders to protect their wealth, so this statement is historically questionable. But it is also a bold claim considering current events.

The system "may" be working in some ways. It is definitely not working in others. (But either way this is a topic obviously outside the scope of the current forum.)

> You, for example, believe the US has weak air pollution standards.

And you only provided whataboutism in response. I never mentioned anything about Europe or Asia. They also have very poor environmental laws in many cases. "Everybody does it" isn't even accepted as a child's excuse.

But instead of an actual conversation, you can't help but make weird false equivalencies. Why is that? Why the pose?

Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk

NB: I had to remove the affiliate links because the automod removes Amazon links with affiliate codes.