Try a 267% electricity increase on for size

Theres multiple problems in your proposal. First, there is no infrastructure for alternative energy but let assume we start today, it takes years if not decades to roll out.

Supply and demand and customer satisfaction is not revavent in this senario. Hell, even the most advanced countries USA, Japan, Germany are battling to find alternative affordable sources.
 
Eh! said:
Theres multiple problems in your proposal. First, there is no infrastructure for alternative energy but let assume we start today, it takes years if not decades to roll out.

Supply and demand and customer satisfaction is not revavent in this senario. Hell, even the most advanced countries USA, Japan, Germany are battling to find alternative affordable sources.
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There are very cheap ways of heating water using vacuum sealed glass painted black combined with fresnel lenses or some form of optical concentrator. But virtually everything has been patented, thus it can't be commercialized at a reasonable price. Take commercial roof based water heating systems and what they weigh, a few kg. Now how can few tubes of glass and metal run in the thousands of rands? The present designs on the SA market don't have any optical concentrators around the vacuum sealed glass tubes reducing their efficiency by orders of magnitude.

This patent http://www.patentstorm.us/applications/20080307804/fulltext.html describes a heat actuated cooling system. The design can easily be copied and made yourself but can't be commercialized. Noboby seems to understand that the technology exists but patents is preventing its large scale deployment. http://www.gridlockeconomy.com addresses the issue. Anything can be made with 3D - laser scanning devices and CNC machines. We can crank out thousands of customized parts for final assembly using semi-skilled workers.
 
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hmmm maybe we should start by not giving any electricity away for free. Hey every little bit helps. Also stop people making illegal connections to the power grid. Why should we pay more if the resource is not managed properly.

Same as with Metrorail. If everyone that actually rides these trains pay for their tickets these things would make money. They are normally overcrowded so there is surely no lack of business now is there?
 
Eh! and Praeses, please tell me what municipalities are raping you like that.
Actual figures would be awesome.
e.g. Ekuruleni : R9.20 per unit : 470 units : August 2009.
 
davemc said:
Eh! and Praeses, please tell me what municipalities are raping you like that.
Actual figures would be awesome.
e.g. Ekuruleni : R9.20 per unit : 470 units : August 2009.
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I'll have to check, but supposedly it was mostly the water usage which raped the account for some reason. Will get the R/unit price and units for you.
 
MyWorld said:
I heard from an electrician friend of mine there was a man who wanted to convert his entire business to solar/wind power (the people where he works, huge dairy farm), and here's the kicker...

They (whoever does the installations) refused to do it if he was not connected to the Eskom grid so they can tap HIS unused power.
So people, this is what communism does, you can go alternative energy, but they still want a piece of that pie!
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That's completely not true.
 
Drake2007 said:
By 2012, electricity will make up 10% of household expenses.


ANC = FAIL
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Well, its will put us nearer a world average for electricity. However, the way it has been done is complete BS. Had the ANC increased year-on-year from 1994 the electricity price it would have been much less of a shock.

1994-2012 at a modest 5% each year (less than inflation, for the most part) we would be looking at the 252% increase.

I also trust they are selling the electricity to the rest of Africa at that price. If not then the entire country needs to be informed that the SA government is screwing its own citizens over in favour of foreigners!
 
captainwifi said:
Presently a Stirling engine using air. http://www.stirlingengine.com/ecommerce/product.tcl?product_id=84 achieves 15% efficiency. The hydrogen based one achieves 30%. Parabolic trough systems combined with a turbine achieves 15%. With a 60% efficiency the unit area is reduced by 4 to achieve the same output power. See:

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/earth/4243793.html That will change if Lonnie Johnson’s invention works. The Atlanta-based independent inventor of the Super Soaker squirt gun (a true technological milestone) says he can achieve a conversion efficiency rate that tops 60 percent with a new solid-state heat engine. It represents a breakthrough new way to turn heat into power.

* http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/4724683/fulltext.html ''Johnson tube, a thermodynamic heat pump.''
* http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/6489049/fulltext.html ''Electrochemical conversion system''

Focus a the suns rays using a http://www.solarfire.org/tech/helios/helios.html mirror design on to his heat pump and you should be able to remove yourself of the grid. For night time use Molten salts are melted during the day and using a heat exchanger powers his heat pump design. 60% is an astounding efficiency gain.
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See this article from November 2008: http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/research/4288743.html?page=3

First Solar, the company that made the (cadmium-telluride Thin-Film Photovoltaic) panels, estimates its manufacturing cost to be $1.14 per watt and falling, about half the cost of comparable silicon panels. As a result, Kazmerski says, “There’s a big turn happening.” First Solar quadrupled its manufacturing capacity from 2006 to 2007, to 396 Mw, and it expects to exceed 1000 Mw next year (in 2009).

Two years after its initial public offering, the company’s market value is over $20 billion — double that of General Motors. :eek:

Cad-tel (cadmium-telluride) isn’t the only promising thin-film technology on the market. Newer panels developed using a copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS) semiconductor have efficiency ratings almost 30 percent higher than First Solar’s cad-tel PVs. :)

The advances have sparked a flurry of startup companies. Venture capitalists are pouring in 20 to 100 times more money than government research funds are, Kazmerski says, creating what some are calling a dot.sun phenomenon.
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Amazing stuff!

By the way, that is R8/watt. How would you rate that against fossil fuels?

Hey captainwifi, this product will suit you perfectly. ;) :cool:
 
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