One gigawatt can power about 1 million U.S. homes. But since solar power is on only about a third of the time, a gigawatt of solar can only power about 330,000 homes.
And by that logic 3 women can have one baby in 3 months.
One gigawatt can power about 1 million U.S. homes. But since solar power is on only about a third of the time, a gigawatt of solar can only power about 330,000 homes.
And by that logic 3 women can have one baby in 3 months.
The difference is around half of Texas's summer electricity usage is on AC. AC use tends to be the best use-case for solar power, as both AC use and solar power are primarily driven by the sun.
Basically, in some cases, the mythical man-month holds.
Which in many ways shows that the state should be encouraging passive houses. A passive house would put less pressure on the power grid when the heat kicks in. On the other hand humidity appears to be the current Achilles heal of these houses.
Great so all we have to do is tear down the roughly 8 million houses and rebuild them...
I agree that *new* buildings need to be built more efficiently, and a lot of existing buildings can be upgraded in various ways to save energy, but shit like "encouraging passive houses" is about as useful a suggestion as "just move where the food is" is for hunger, which is to say not useful at all. =Smidge=
Actually, it's very useful, because we are building new homes somewhat rapidly (albeit mostly for investment purposes, so there's still a housing shortage — many if not most of these new homes are not affordable to those people who need housing) and because most homes in America are built like shit.
I can't compare to other "fully developed" nations because I haven't been to any, but I can compare to what we used to build homes like here in the USA and modern homes are trash. They are built out of a mi
Again, I agree that new buildings need to be constructed to a higher efficiency standard.
However, doing that will merely make the problem worse at a slower rate - it will not solve the already big problem of existing, inefficient buildings. That's why saying "Just build more efficient housing" is not useful. It doesn't actually address the problem. To do that, we need to either upgrade or straight up demolish and rebuild what we already have. =Smidge=
Typically you'd approach such a problem from multiple angles, since there isn't a one size fits all. Examples:
- Existing buildings would need to retrofitted, though would probably only be done if the home owner can recupe the cost within a reasonable time or had a grant to make it more likely they can
- The building code would be updated with certain energy requirements, while it is up to the contractor to work out how to achieve them. The exact technology should not be prescrib
You see but you do not observe.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, in "The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes"
Math (Score:3, Insightful)
One gigawatt can power about 1 million U.S. homes. But since solar power is on only about a third of the time, a gigawatt of solar can only power about 330,000 homes.
And by that logic 3 women can have one baby in 3 months.
Re: (Score:5, Insightful)
The difference is around half of Texas's summer electricity usage is on AC. AC use tends to be the best use-case for solar power, as both AC use and solar power are primarily driven by the sun.
Basically, in some cases, the mythical man-month holds.
Re: Math (Score:2)
Which in many ways shows that the state should be encouraging passive houses. A passive house would put less pressure on the power grid when the heat kicks in. On the other hand humidity appears to be the current Achilles heal of these houses.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Great so all we have to do is tear down the roughly 8 million houses and rebuild them...
I agree that *new* buildings need to be built more efficiently, and a lot of existing buildings can be upgraded in various ways to save energy, but shit like "encouraging passive houses" is about as useful a suggestion as "just move where the food is" is for hunger, which is to say not useful at all.
=Smidge=
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Actually, it's very useful, because we are building new homes somewhat rapidly (albeit mostly for investment purposes, so there's still a housing shortage — many if not most of these new homes are not affordable to those people who need housing) and because most homes in America are built like shit.
I can't compare to other "fully developed" nations because I haven't been to any, but I can compare to what we used to build homes like here in the USA and modern homes are trash. They are built out of a mi
Re: Math (Score:2)
Again, I agree that new buildings need to be constructed to a higher efficiency standard.
However, doing that will merely make the problem worse at a slower rate - it will not solve the already big problem of existing, inefficient buildings. That's why saying "Just build more efficient housing" is not useful. It doesn't actually address the problem. To do that, we need to either upgrade or straight up demolish and rebuild what we already have.
=Smidge=
Re: (Score:2)
Right, we need to do both things.
There are no simple solutions to problems of this complexity, only complex ones.
If the problem is distributed, the solution needs to be distributed.
Re: (Score:2)
Typically you'd approach such a problem from multiple angles, since there isn't a one size fits all. Examples:
- Existing buildings would need to retrofitted, though would probably only be done if the home owner can recupe the cost within a reasonable time or had a grant to make it more likely they can
- The building code would be updated with certain energy requirements, while it is up to the contractor to work out how to achieve them. The exact technology should not be prescrib