GM laying off 15% of workers and shutting down 5 plants due to trump tariffs

Lucky Luke said:
People save a heap here. Solar is huge. In some states its on 1 in 3 houses and growing. But you guys get lots of that white wet cold stuff. Winter here is clear skies.
How much do you save you think @ruby fruit

My state govt offers a interest free 10K loan for solar instalation. Takes pressure off the hydro power we run and in effect gives people more money in their pocket- which then gets spent hopefully in the local economy. Win/win.
Australia is I think the biggest by head of population solar users. Hence why the interest in the Tesla power banks.
Click to expand...
A fellow I know from tractorbynet lives on an island in Hawaii and has no grid access. He has lots of solar, but has a huge propane powered generator too. He's always updating his batteries. Quite costly being off grid.
 
too larry said:
A fellow I know from tractorbynet lives on an island in Hawaii and has no grid access. He has lots of solar, but has a huge propane powered generator too. He's always updating his batteries. Quite costly being off grid.
Click to expand...
yea, guy near me runs an old stationary engine every few days and runs 12volt everything. Batteries are the problem. Not very environmentally friendly and just don't last very long. That's the problem with the "green" tag on electric vehicles.
 
Lucky Luke said:
1/3rd..lol. Most my country is desert.
"70% percent of Australia is desert/semi-arid. About 45% of the Australian continent is sand dunes. 3. Around 40-45 percent of Australia is covered by deserts."
Glycol now has a life span of 10 years depending on brand and is failry cheap.
Click to expand...
Lol I’m sorry I foolishly assumed fogdog was in the states and as far as the glycol, seems my supplier is wrong then. Given the temps that are circulating through the system at 35% he said 5 years, I just priced one. And I’m thinking Australia would not even require glycol, sounds like the perfect place for solar hot water ;). We pay $110 for 5 gallons so not super cheap.
 
Budley Doright said:
Lol I’m sorry I foolishly assumed dog dog was in the states and as far as the glycol, seems my supplier is wrong then. Given the temps that are circulating through the system at 35% he said 5 years, I just priced one. And I’m thinking Australia would not even require glycol, sounds like the perfect place for solar hot water ;). We pay $110 for 5 gallons so not super cheap.
Click to expand...
I used to sell it when I was a Rep for Wynn's and Fuchs. We would be about $110 for 1 gallon. But when it lasts for 10 years it works out as not much at all. (our wages are higher to I spose)
 
Lucky Luke said:
I used to sell it when I was a Rep for Wynn's and Fuchs. We would be about $110 for 1 gallon. But when it lasts for 10 years it works out as not much at all. (our wages are higher to I spose)
Click to expand...
Ya I’ll look into the lifespan because from 5 to 10 is a huge difference depending on the size. Fuck my condo in Mexico has a tank painted black on the roof for hot water and works quite well lol.
I use glycol in all the geo’s we install and it lasts forever given the low temps. What temperature are you referencing at a 10 year lifespan?
 
Budley Doright said:
Here if your on the grid you feed back into it and basically sell the power back to the utility at a huge premium.
Click to expand...
They do that here but is slowly being fazed out with feedback $ being cut. (maybe @ruby fruit can explain that better than me). The trend is toward feeding and fully charging a battery pack during the day and then feeding the grid once at full capacity and then drawing down on the battery at peak after work times.
 
Last edited:
Lucky Luke said:
Be hard for solar to be cost effective in your winters Dudley- no argument. Even the cots of systems here take awhile to see the benefits.
Click to expand...
I saw in a local paper that a 400 acre solar farm is coming soon to a county near me here in NW Florida. I looked up the plots of land on Goggle Earth, and there is over a 1000 acres of cropland there, so I guess they will still farm around them.
 
too larry said:
I saw in a local paper that a 400 acre solar farm is coming soon to a county near me here in NW Florida. I looked up the plots of land on Goggle Earth, and there is over a 1000 acres of cropland there, so I guess they will still farm around them.
Click to expand...
LOL yup that’s what they do here, there have been 6-7 within 10k of me. Not real sure I’m liking what they’ve done but the farmers are making a killing, they lease the land to the solar farms. My land is certified organic and took 5 years to get it. Not selling now, kids probably will lol.
 
Budley Doright said:
There are many alternatives that are great. The only way to promote them is to offer financial insentives or they won’t happen. I work in the industry and as soon as the green on rebates were ended so did the Geothermal sales. Our industry is driven by rebates be that good or bad. All I was pointing out is solar hot water is not viable re saving money in probably a 1/3rd of your country and 2/3rds of mine. Solar water, if using it in below freezing climates requires glycol, that glycol has a life span of 5 years and has to be replaced. The pumps require replacement as well. By the time these costs are figured in, it’s a 0 savings system. And yes they can be quite costly but I gues that depends on your ability to pay.

I did say solar power generation is viable and yes you can save loads. Hot water not so much lol. We have huge solar farms going up all around here, as well as windmills. Resi windmills, so far I haven’t seen a huge benefit from.
Click to expand...
meh

Rebates are an inefficient way to let middle men skim tax revenue but OK, I'm not going to argue that rebates work for those who can benefit from them. Energy tax rebates as implemented in the US only go to people with enough income to benefit from them. What about people who don't have the income but would like to have solar power too? What answer do we have for them?

Also, so what if solar water heating isn't practical everywhere? Geothermal isn't even close to a total solution either. Neither is wind or tidal power. Hydropower has such strong negative influence on the environment we are actually taking some dams down. The answer lies in intelligent systematic planning which the US government is clearly not doing. Because --- wait for it --- "Save the planet" followed by much snickering from ignoramuses. Right wing assholes (and I don't mean you) mock and cloud the effort to reduce carbon emissions with trite phrases such as that while trotting out fake science as if it should be taken seriously. Also, as I said earlier, purchasing-cost-payback analysis is short sighted and misses the real reason we need to get away from carbon fuels.

So, yeah, I find foot dragging irritating because the Great Barrier Reef is dying and there are signs of our oceans dying too. There is a die off of vertebrates going on all over the world. Islands are disappearing, flooding, heavy storms are all taking cost and human tolls and we are just beginning to experience rapid global warming, with the worst to come. Meanwhile pencil pushers bloviate on about fine details such as rebates and Tesla loans when we haven't come close to serious debates about what to do and how to pay for it.
 
Budley Doright said:
Lol I’m sorry I foolishly assumed fogdog was in the states and as far as the glycol, seems my supplier is wrong then. Given the temps that are circulating through the system at 35% he said 5 years, I just priced one. And I’m thinking Australia would not even require glycol, sounds like the perfect place for solar hot water ;). We pay $110 for 5 gallons so not super cheap.
Click to expand...
I think you mistook somebody else's post for me. Doesn't matter though. You are jumping to solutions when we haven't even finished analyzing the problem. Bassackwards engineering gives tech a bad name.
 
“meh

Rebates are an inefficient way to let middle men skim tax revenue but OK, I'm not going to argue that rebates work for those who can benefit from them. Energy tax rebates as implemented in the US only go to people with enough income to benefit from them. What about people who don't have the income but would like to have solar power too? What answer do we have for them?”

Our rebates were and are cash rebates, not tax rebates but your right, it only helps those that can afford to do it in the first place. What solution would work better? I’m open to anything that helps.

“Also, so what if solar water heating isn't practical everywhere? Geothermal isn't even close to a total solution either. Neither is wind or tidal power. Hydropower has such strong negative influence on the environment we are actually taking some dams down. The answer lies in intelligent systematic planning which the US government is clearly not doing. Because --- wait for it --- "Save the planet" followed by much snickering from ignoramuses. Right wing assholes (and I don't mean you) mock and cloud the effort to reduce carbon emissions with trite phrases such as that while trotting out fake science as if it should be taken seriously. Also, as I said earlier, purchasing-cost-paybackanalysis is short sighted and misses the realreason we need to get away from carbon fuels.”

Your right there is not just one thing that works and unless there are financial incentives to offer the public then its a hard sell. The carbon tax, while not perfect was and is a good start as well, it did provide money that was made available here to offer those incentives. Payback is always a talking point when thinking about purchasing more efficient equipment. I gotta ask, what are you doing or have done personally to use less energy in your home? If you were offered .5 the cost of a new more efficient furnace would that not be something to consider? It’s a complexed problem that I doubt will be solved and frankly I hold little hope that the damage done can be reversed.
 
Fogdog said:
I think you mistook somebody else's post for me. Doesn't matter though. You are jumping to solutions when we haven't even finished analyzing the problem. Bassackwards engineering gives tech a bad name.
Click to expand...
What? I’m pretty sure we can agree that reducing emissions is a start right? What problem have we not finished analyzing that must be done before we start to work on fixing it?
 
Carbon trading doesn't really work as its open to so much abuse.
No such thing as clean coal. We all know coal is the past.
Hydro whilst impacting the landscape and environment is arguably the cleanest, most reliable and easiest. Wave and tidal is problematic and I don't think anyone has had much success. Nuclear is the past and to bloody dangerous. Wind is OK but is a blight on the eyes for 100's of klms, expensive to maintain and its not always windy. Solar can be integrated onto and even into roofs (I believe there is a solar roof tile that you can tile a roof with) Works even on dull days (it works on heat so will even work under a tarp). Every new house in the right area "could" be made to be energy self suffient within 10 years using solar or a mix.
 
[QUOTE="Budley Doright, post: 14641978, member: 907263" What temperature are you referencing at a 10 year lifespan?[/QUOTE]
Sorry mate I missed this Q. Im not sure I was just going off this product. What temp does an engine get up to with heat sink?
https://www.autoserv.co.nz/wynns/wynns-hd-green-coolnat

"
Wynn's Pro Heavy Duty Engine Coolant is formulated to provide the following benefits:

  • 10 years or 1,000,000 km service life (whichever comes first) when used as recommended
  • Anti-boil protection
  • Corrosion protection
  • Anti-freeze protection
  • Does not contain: Phosphates, Borates, Silicates, Amines, Nitrates or Tannins.".
Id imagine you can use it in solar as well. But check of cause before taking a stoners advice..lol
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top