Massive Spotsylvania solar plant is online

[garybeck]

13. Yes I know what data is and it clearly proves that you are wrong.

your breakdown of minutes and percent utilization shows a complete misunderstanding of the data.

first of all, when you talk about 100% utilization or 80% utilization, you have to understand that 100% utilization is almost never seen with solar panels, because they are rated in a laboratory under standard test conditions (STC). in real life, most solar panels produce about 75-80% of the full-rated power under full sun, which is 1,000 watts per square meter.

so your rant about how horrible it is that solar panels never had a 5 minute period when they were producing at full utilization only shows that you don't understand the data you are looking at.

utilization percentage is meaningless. who cares? it really doesn't matter if they are 100% utilization or 90% utilization. it just matters how much power they actually produce.

if you are actually interested in facts, perhaps you will be interested in knowing that standard test conditions for photovoltaic panels is 25 degrees Celsius and 1000 watts per square meter of light. the reason real life never emulates STC is because solar panels always are hotter than 25 Celsius when they are exposed to full sun and their production decreases with temperature.

focusing on utilization percentage is a complete waste of time. who cares? what we care about is how much power they are actually producing, which is clearly evident in the data that you yourself provided. you yourself indicated that the array is producing 11,000 MW when the sun is shining.

with all due respect, i think you are just confused by what you are looking at, and you would benefit from looking at the MWH (quantity) produced per day, instead of the instantaneous MW (rate) produced at one particular time. when you look at the MHW, this is an actual quantity of power that was delivered to the grid that day. Yes DATA. That is what people get billed for every month. and that is why thousands of people are saving money with solar, because it's cheaper than utility power.

But even if you look at the MW, it is really difficult for me to understand how you can make the argument that solar panels don't produce power:



this is data. it shows production. you can see that on 7/20, the in the middle of the day, the solar array was producing almost 12,000 MW of power, as you yourself indicated. that is data. the site produced significant power on that day. as it does most days. as do many solar panels all over the world. do you deny that solar panels actually produce power? because that seems to be what you are arguing. when you say, and i quote:

"This 3,500 acres, by contrast, will never, except for maybe 25 minutes on a clear sunny day, produce 500 watts of electricity, "

do you seriously stand behind that statement?

with all due respect, if you are standing by that statement, you clearly do no understand the data you are looking at.