Researchers Use AI To Map Every Solar Panel In the US (cnet.com) 75
An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNET: There are about 1.47 million individual solar panel installations in the US. That number comes courtesy of an artificial intelligence system developed by researchers at Stanford University. The system is outlined in a study released Wednesday that describes how the AI setup analyzed satellite photos to figure out how widespread solar panel usage is. The report, called "DeepSolar: A Machine Learning Framework to Efficiently Construct a Solar Deployment Database in the United States" and published in the journal Joule, showed there are more solar panels out there than previously thought. The group plans to update the database annually and add other countries and regions in the future, the study says.
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A day is 23 hours, 56 minutes and 4.0916 seconds. The days do not get long or short.
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Your characterization of me as a fuckwit is offensive.
I'm an insensitive clod.
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I was being sour caustic because of how this played into Trump's recent call to pull out of Syria, a move he criticized Obama for doing.
I'm surprised it wasn't down modded to -1 right away with no responses.
We sour, we caust, we move on.
Let me guess... (Score:2)
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Yeah, how dare they be concerned for their workers safety when they have to go out and fix something and your house is still feeding power back into what they are working on.
That's not an issue if your inverter isn't grid-tied.
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We might need someone to start making solar panels that donâ(TM)t t look solar panels so they won't come around and tax you for having power. Also would probably look nicer.
You could search for solar roof shingles, some of which probably wouldn't match the AI search criteria.
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Actually we have that already.
Panels that are like paint and can be put on the wall or panels integrated into the windows which provide shade and energy.
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That's all?? (Score:3)
Australia surpassed 1.5 million cumulative installs in 2016, Germany was at 1.7 million in 2017
Th-th-th-that's all folks! (Score:3)
You don't need solar panels when you have subsidized oil, coal, and nuclear power. Tax the middle class to support a welfare state for industrialists and energy moguls.
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US is 2.0% of total consumption and Germany is 7.%.
What are you talking about?
The US is a much bigger manufacturer than Germany, that is why CO2 "per person" is higher. It has nothing to do with solar.
Germany manufactures 73 cars per 1000 people; USA manages only 38.
America's production of 818000 metric tons is 1.5x that of Germany but Canada's production is 3.5x that of America's and their per-capita CO2 is about the same despite also producing oil from tar sands.
It's not greater manufacturing that's the culprit, it's the vehicles driven, the relatively inefficient homes and being the 3rd largest producer of GHG from agriculture.
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Germany has been increasing their CO2 output year over year and is spinning up coal plants. Nice "targets" but the US has more installed solar and wind and renewables than almost any country in the world.
Per capita, per tonne of CO2 emitted and considering the impressive resources of both solar and wind, what the USA has done so far is not that impressive.
China leads the world in solar heating for hot water with 70% of installed systems of the global total.
America is now in 2nd place but with only 4.5% but Germany & Turkey were at that level nearly 10 years ago.
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This is the US of A we are talking about. You know, a place so special that things which worked around the rest of the world would become impossible here.
For example, public transportation, nationalised health care, fast broadband internet with competition among ISPs, mobile phones that didn’t lock you to a provider, etc.
Just having as many solar panels as another country with 1/10 of the population is already a huge achievement! Just like pollution, Americans think it is stupid to count per capita!
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Quite sure that it's nothing to do with larger houses (more floorspace to heat and cool and light per person) and larger less efficient personal vehicles with longer distances to travel due to less clustered population?
Rgds
Damon
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it is stupid to count per capita. The US is the #2 manufacturing nation in the world. That is why the per capita numbers are so high.
Hogwash.
Japan is no slouch when it comes to manufacturing and their CO2 emissions spiked after they shut down their nukes.
Yet it's per capita numbers, while high, are still well below America's.
Find other excuses.
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A broken grid and long-term power outages, because they also took their backup coal and gas plants offline, thinking their "renewables" could handle it.
Not even close.
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Nothing like that happened in the western third of the country, where electricity supply is still govt owned.
Maybe you easterners shouldn't have privatised an essential service?
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But I do work there at times.
If you can count it ... (Score:2)
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Was the permit for a size of solar generation but a lot more was added later? Its full gov inspection time.
An energy company might like to shape state and city "energy" production laws?
To find out how much solar exists on and off the grid and how much energy could be pushed back into "their" grid should laws get changed? Different federal US law enfacement experts might like to know who is buying and placing so much "hidden
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Eat the Rich ! (Score:3)
According to the upcoming 2019 USA edition of Homeless Workers' CoOp Manifesto, 'Eat the Rich' chapter; this is how you find them. Maps of residential solar panels, swimming pools, private tennis courts and inaccessible ocean beaches. Members are encouraged to map their own locale via drones for inclusion in future editions. Don't forget that they are nicely fattened during the holiday season!
If you repeat a lie enough times (Score:2)
Folks eventually start to believe it.
The media throws around the term " AI " like its commonplace in society.
If and when a true AI is ever created, it will be truly terrifying in comparison to what passes as AI today.
I say terrifying because we, as a species, are used to being top of the food chain here.
Once we lose that distinction, quite a few folks aren't going to deal with that realization well.
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How sure are you, and what do they mean (Score:2)
I was wondering how many false positives they might get from this - a local restaurant has decorative steel panels outside that look kind of like solar panels (including the angle) but are not...
Also, what do they really mean by "Solar Panel". My mom technically has a solar panel on her roof - but it's only for heating water, it does not provide power. I know at least a few other people with solar water heating panels as well, are they included in the tally yet being thought of as providing power?
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Distinctive type of materials should be detectable and not get counted.
Repeating grids and rows can be telling too. When not just one or two big panels.