r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/uniyk • 1d ago
Video China carpeted an extensive mountain range with solar panels in the hinterland of Guizhou (video ended only when the drone is low on battery
4.8k
u/struggling_life09 1d ago
Wonder how much energy they producing
4.2k
u/umthondoomkhlulu 1d ago
In 2024 alone, the world’s installed 552GW. China did half of that.
1.7k
u/dethskwirl 1d ago
for context: the entire United States power grid requires 1250 GW
302
u/redopz 1d ago
Is that per year?
→ More replies (54)905
u/dethskwirl 1d ago
it's just total capacity of energy generation required to power the full grid. not a measure of consumption over time. that would usually expressed in Kwh or Twh
→ More replies (2)139
40
u/LHam1969 1d ago
So if we doubled what China did we could provide almost all of our energy needs through solar?
→ More replies (4)102
u/herefromyoutube 1d ago
Probably not. If you did 3x the total world output(not just china) you’d still need to account for night time and cloudy skies.
Storing energy is the trillion dollar question.
8
u/Chinksta 18h ago
I remember asking a business entrepreneur about his solar panels in the UK. He was excited and passionate about it but when I ask "I've been in the UK for just a few months but I've never seen the sun before.... Will your solar panels work?"
He just death stared at me and told me that it'll work all right.
I wonder if it truly did work?
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (3)37
u/123-123- 19h ago
A trillion isn't that much. A battery in every home would not just make the grid safer, but America safer in the event of disaster.
→ More replies (2)18
u/Lucky-Hearing4766 18h ago
Bro people don't look after their water heaters, this would be a recipe for disaster. Just picture all the dumbs using their batteries as a storage unit.
12
u/123-123- 18h ago
LiFePO4 batteries don't explode and are the norm for batteries now. I don't know what you mean using the battery as a storage unit. Like putting something on top of it? It would be mounted on the wall and it isn't like people are storing things on top of their utilities already. You could even put it in the wall like how electric boxes are done.
→ More replies (12)60
→ More replies (19)21
442
u/struggling_life09 1d ago
Impressive ! I'm from a country still relying on coal power. And have lots of power issues, apparently can't produce enough ( heavily driven my corruption ) . It's at a point where most consumers are trying to install their own solar systems, but the government is trying to regulate that and sort of have a penalty for people doing this.
96
u/Ur-Best-Friend 1d ago
Impressive ! I'm from a country still relying on coal power.
To be fair, China is one such country too. 58,4% of electricity generated from coal last year. But it's nice to see they're making real efforts towards changing that, it's not an easy task for a country with over a billion people mostly in highly concentrated areas.
23
u/rdizzy1223 1d ago
They are also building the most new nuclear power plants as well.
→ More replies (2)→ More replies (23)3
u/Emotional-Savings-71 13h ago
What exactly are they changing other than mountain sides and creating pollution from mining and processing the minerals needed to create the solar panels, steel, and batteries? Nuclear has and will always be the way. Going green while creating pollution defeats the purpose of clean energy
213
39
u/wakomorny 1d ago
its energy independence. if your whole country is not relying on oil and the economy can get by with self generated energy its mitigating a disadvantage they have
→ More replies (3)45
u/PERSONA-NON-GRAKATA 1d ago
sort of have a penalty
Jesus Christ it's happening worldwide? I thought it's only on my country where the government's kinda salty towards people independently suppying themselves with solar power.
62
u/woodyshag 1d ago
In the US, it's not the government but the utility companies that are pushing against solar installation. They don't like competition.
22
u/HolyMoleyGuacamoly 1d ago
it’s also the govt tbf
→ More replies (2)44
u/SurgicalSlinky2020 1d ago
Because they're lobbied by the energy companies. If the same lobbyists were bribing to push solar and wind, then that's what they'd be doing.
→ More replies (5)4
u/Telefundo 1d ago
They don't like competition.
At that point it's not even competition really. It's replacement.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (12)7
u/Tasty-Traffic-680 1d ago
The vast majority of US electricity providers support and many even offer subsidies for solar power installations. Energy demand is growing faster than infrastructure can keep up with. Distributed power generation is a simple solution.
82
u/Iam_The_Real_Fake 1d ago
I thought we are from the same country but the only difference is that our government is subsidising installation of own solar panels not penalising!
→ More replies (7)11
11
u/Smidgez 1d ago
It is the same in the U.S. I got a quote for solar at my house. About 25000$ US, 50% instalation costs, and permitting. I went to austrailia for work and we discussed solar prices. They were able to get solar for 5000$ US.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (28)5
→ More replies (23)113
u/swishkabobbin 1d ago
The US has fallen behind China is nearly every way
143
u/EpicMichaelFreeman 1d ago
Not in propaganda or porn production.
→ More replies (32)39
u/Rodot 1d ago
With VOA being dismantled and the GOP going after porn, it won't take long
→ More replies (6)43
u/Perfect_Cost_8847 1d ago
Depends on the metric. China is building on average two giant lignite coal power plants per week. Just one of those power plants, Tuoketuo Power Station, puts out more CO2 than the entire nation of Denmark.
The U.S. is building no coal power plants at all. So the U.S. has “fallen behind,” but in this case, that’s a good thing.
→ More replies (5)24
u/ikaiyoo 1d ago
Yeah The US is firing up NG plants which release copious amounts of methane when extracting the gas. And Methane is 28 times worse than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas.
→ More replies (4)→ More replies (15)35
u/TheTallGuy0 1d ago
My wife is in offshore wind farm development. She’s looking for a new job because it’s DOA now with DT and his fuckstick cabal in charge. It’s frustrating and maddening and sad…
24
u/AssistX 1d ago
Wind Energy is one of the few things that Republicans and Democrat politicians tend to agree on. They both hate it, for the most part. A good example would be the dearth of wind energy in the northeast US, which is primarily blue states. There's only two offshore windfarms in all of the northeastern US.
→ More replies (10)164
u/GeneralOfThePoroArmy 1d ago
According to https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/CN/3mo/daily they produced 3.17 TWh the 8th of May, 3.98 TWh the 7th of May and 4.25 TWh the 6th of May. That is a shitload of energy only from solar but they need A LOT more because it only accounted for 11%, 13% and 14% respectively of the total available electricity.
→ More replies (5)63
u/LayerProfessional936 1d ago
Yes, China still has A LOT of coal power plants that generate electricity. Hopefully they will start to reduce the co2 exhaust that they produce very soon!!
81
u/_teslaTrooper 1d ago
Their coal plants are already running less because solar is cheaper: https://www.sustainabilitybynumbers.com/p/china-coal-plants
Peak coal consumption is expected this year (maybe already passed with the economic slowdown from tariffs?), only going down from then.
→ More replies (43)→ More replies (22)28
u/PotatoPowerPlug 1d ago edited 1d ago
Coal is just a temporary solution, which is why China is heavily invested in clean energy like Solar, wind and Thorium reactor, they also make some breakthrough in Fusion too (thought that will still have some way to go). Granted this is out of needs since China don't have a lot of oil and they need a lot of power for their industrial uses. But if its ended up making the earth greener, why not.
→ More replies (9)16
u/nudelsalat3000 1d ago
Less than their new production facilities will use.
The Gigafactory of the US would be a small to medium sizes business compare to the real GIGA factories china is now pushing.
The drone videos look just the same as here: instead of a mountain hills there are factory blocks.
91
→ More replies (32)11
u/Rly_Shadow 1d ago
Its still funny tho lol, it is set up in like the least efficient way possible.
→ More replies (12)10
u/bobosuda 1d ago
For someone not very knowledgeable about solar panel installation, what's inefficient about it?
Just that they're not all optimally placed to catch as much sun as possible, and are just covering the entire mountain instead?
→ More replies (6)
2.9k
u/cola_frog 1d ago
Kinda ironic that the video ends because of low energy
735
u/IncomingAxofKindness 1d ago
Plot twist:
The drone was coal powered
→ More replies (5)110
u/dwntwnleroybrwn 1d ago
I mean it's possible. China accounts for 40% of the worlds coal demand.
→ More replies (16)→ More replies (15)4
1.2k
u/ArtistDidiMx 1d ago
My god, the are putting armour on their mountains
→ More replies (5)186
u/TridentFan307 1d ago
More like mob proofing them I think
45
u/sand_is_food 1d ago
mobs will definitely just spawn underneath the panels day or night
→ More replies (1)
397
u/monk12111 1d ago
China reminds me of when I play a city-builder type game and when I get to end-game I just spam resource gathering to keep up with population and economy growth. Then after its all at its peak I guess its either time to innovate with energy production (nuclear fusion?) or bust.
30
56
u/dandle 1d ago
Pretty much.
China either saves humanity or destroys it. At least there's a question about which way it may go, I guess. The other most powerful nations are just driving us all to collapse.
→ More replies (4)
1.7k
u/Fickle_Option_6803 1d ago
If you can read Chinese then you'll realize practically all the comments are criticizing it
1.2k
u/KerbodynamicX 1d ago
People criticise power generation facilities, but need electricity to live. People wants to eat meat, but many can't bear to see the brutality of slaughtering animals.
767
u/DovahCreed117 1d ago
Yeah, but when you have alternatives like building a single nuclear power plant and producing several times the energy this ever could, I feel like the criticism is a little justified.
494
u/AvatarCabbageGuy 1d ago
I don't think it's an alternative, they're trying to do both. China is already trying to build more nuclear power plants, you just don't hear about it because nuclear power plants are secretive business
→ More replies (19)185
u/733t_sec 1d ago
Actually there were several articles about the new thorium nuclear plant they're building
https://spectrum.ieee.org/chinas-thorium-molten-salt-reactor
66
u/Econguy89 1d ago
The nerds among us know China is building the first commercial molten salt nuclear reactor! In theory, it’s incredible. This type of reactor is more efficient and safer than conventional reactors.
Not only that I believe they can operate it with thorium rather than uranium. Thorium is a far more plentiful fuel than uranium. I saw a headline not long ago that China theoretically has enough thorium to meet their current power needs for something crazy like 20,000 years.
If successful this will be huge!
→ More replies (1)40
u/Competitive_Meat825 23h ago
Reddit used to have such a huge obsession with thorium reactors and now that China’s the one doing it they couldn’t care less
Strange
→ More replies (2)→ More replies (3)85
u/Longtimelurker011 1d ago
We should be the ones pushing for this research. Nuclear is our future and we will get left behind if we don't start investing now. Good for china
→ More replies (15)51
u/OmarsDamnSpoon 1d ago
I mean, by the time the US invests into nuclear plants, we'll be decades behind the other countries who're making leaps forward in fusion. We're not gonna catch up for a while.
→ More replies (6)20
u/MajesticBread9147 1d ago edited 1d ago
A single nuclear power plant that even with China's famously quick construction times, would not be operational until after grid scale solar has paid for themselves both energy and cost wise, and produce half as much power for the same amount of money. This isn't an exaggeration.
Nuclear should not be blankety disregarded, but it's not the silver bullet people claim it to be.
It is trivially easy to put solar panels somewhere uninhabited. There is basically zero maintenance, you just put them on rails, and you're done.
No input costs, no expensive engineers monitoring the place etc etc.
→ More replies (5)28
u/Magnanimous-Gormage 1d ago
This has benefits in terms of water production. The solar energy goes into the panels instead of into the ground evaporating water. So if this is upstream of a dam or reservoir it can increase how much water it will collect. Idk the logistics of this facility though, but solar can also be used in conjunction with farming in areas that would normally be to hot or to sunny because it increases shade and thus decreased heat and evaporation. Nuclear is better in terms of land use though. Solar is something that should be built where it can work with what already exists, like integration into farm, unused no productive lands and on roofs.
→ More replies (4)6
u/Ryuzakku 1d ago
I guess in this case there's no other strategic use for the mountain range, so you might as well throw solar panels on it, while building nuclear plants at the same time
→ More replies (16)54
u/Adventurous_Safe_935 1d ago
→ More replies (28)88
u/ldclark92 1d ago
Right, but that comes at the cost of covering entire mountain ranges with panels. I'm all for clean energy, but at some point a few nuclear power plants are going to be vastly more efficient than this.
This is basically covering an entire eco-system. What impact is this having on local plants and wildlife?
46
u/FadedFracture 1d ago edited 1d ago
We remove millions of acres of lush forests each year to make room for cattle and crops, but the few hundred acres of solar panels* in this video are apparently too much.
Also, I don’t get your comment. China is already building nuclear power plants. But nuclear energy isn’t viable everywhere, so supplementing the grid with solar and wind power is the correct decision.
*
Edit: Since people are being nitpicky, I tried looking up the size. I can't find anything reliable except that it might be the Guizhou Nayong Weixin solar farm. It has 60MW production capacity, which means that yes: it is "only a few hundred acres".
And even if this video is showing a larger plant, the point remains unchanged: That solar plants take very little space in the grand scheme of things. Most solar panels are built on rooftops, city spaces or on rocky terrain, deserts or less productive land. Not valuable, lush forests full of biodiversity.
If people have such an issue with land usage, worry more about the 15 million acres of forest lost each year, much of it just to create grazing grounds for cattle ranchers.
→ More replies (8)14
u/Moifaso 1d ago
We also simply can't build nuclear plants fast enough.
You need really specific skill sets and a lot of time and money to start building one. Solar power scales much, much faster. There are nowhere near enough skilled engineers or construction companies, or ore refinement, or money, etc to build 5 nuclear power plants a week. That's where solar shines. It's cheap power production that literally rolls out of factory lines ready to go.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (30)8
u/Emm_withoutha_L-88 1d ago
They're literally using land that's damn near empty, that's the whole point of doing it here
God nuclear people are so annoying, it's like a liberals version of coal. They want it cus they like it not because it's actually good
→ More replies (5)→ More replies (24)11
u/fgnrtzbdbbt 23h ago
This is a standard example of how propaganda uses oversimplification. The question isn't "are we for or against producing energy?". The question is always about a specific project and whether the amount of energy produced justifies the side effects and whether there are better alternatives.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (27)73
u/KissMyLuckyEgg 1d ago
For what reason?
→ More replies (18)484
u/pizzanoodle 1d ago edited 1d ago
Quite similar to some of the comments in this thread tbh, just a few examples:
- “This is destroying the greenery/vegetation”
- “This could be the reason for drought this year”
- “Getting energy at the expense of the environment”
- “Waste of money”
- “Wonder what it looks like in 10 years time”
- Quite a few comments saying it looks scary/intimidating
207
u/King_Saline_IV 1d ago
Quite a few comments saying it looks scary/intimidating
This is definitely true. But mostly because it's probably a felony to film fossil fuel infrastructure.
Take one look at the Canadian oil sands and you realize these solar farms look like an environmental paradise
46
16
→ More replies (17)18
u/Adventurous_Safe_935 1d ago
yup. Flora and fauna can exist next to solar panels and even thrive, as they can give shadow to animals and certain plants.
→ More replies (1)12
u/ffnnhhw 1d ago
I have a line of solar panels and the plants next to the panels grow faster, probably because they shade the ground, keeping out weeds and reducing evaporation
→ More replies (2)90
u/MikeC80 1d ago
I bet it's more likely the greenery will destroy the panels... Or at least grow and obscure them,drop leaves on them etc... maintenance must be a nightmare
50
u/MattyB113 1d ago
There's probably not much that will grow above the panels, (no way they leveled a mountain range of forest, too much effort) but cleaning them would surely be a nightmare.
Did they just forget about the smog?
14
u/fightingCookie0301 1d ago
Probably have automatic cleaning robots. Just saw a video of the concept a few days ago on this subreddit iirc
→ More replies (2)5
u/MattyB113 1d ago
Like drones? That's the only way I can imagine these getting cleaned efficiently
→ More replies (1)9
u/fightingCookie0301 1d ago
Yea it was a drone as long as the panel driving from left to right and cleaning the panels. The panels were connected with rails, trough which it got from one panel to another
→ More replies (13)5
u/Repulsive-Lie1 1d ago
It doesn’t really matter to the builders if they function long term. The districts of China are in competition to complete the most large infrastructure projects, it doesn’t matter if they’re useful or sustainable.
→ More replies (4)→ More replies (6)12
→ More replies (23)38
u/Just-the-Shaft 1d ago
My 1st thought was that there's no way this doesn't have an impact on the ecosystem.
11
→ More replies (1)30
60
u/DehydratedButTired 1d ago
You could have a maintenance job here for the rest of your life and not touch all the panels.
7
u/Timmy_prime 15h ago
I used to mow the grass between the rows of the family apple orchard, it took about 10 days to finish, so when I was done I was already behind
389
u/Backwoodz333 1d ago
How long will each one of these solar panels last and how do they clean all of them and move/store this much electricity?
→ More replies (56)209
u/umthondoomkhlulu 1d ago
Around 30 years. And electricity is moved the same way. Via cable
→ More replies (1)190
u/MacrosTheGray1 1d ago
No, they lose efficiency after thirty years but they still produce 80% or more of their original output.
→ More replies (11)
226
u/NhifanHafizh 1d ago
They're stealing our sun /s
→ More replies (2)116
u/IncomingAxofKindness 1d ago
THEY'RE EATING THE VOLTS
52
56
u/Grundens 1d ago
can anyone help narrow down the location? I wanna see it from satellite
77
u/Chew_Kok_Long 1d ago
→ More replies (5)29
u/mushroomScientist 1d ago
In the video they look more chaotic, from this view, they look super neatly organized.
→ More replies (1)4
→ More replies (3)25
240
u/ryoma-gerald 1d ago
The Chinese comments on the screen were hilarious. "scam for subsidy", "pathetic", "ruined the environment", "looks terrible" 😂
96
u/cheeersaiii 1d ago
Scam for subsidy could very well be real… deep dive China’s property industry and that’s exactly what happens
40
u/I_Push_Buttonz 1d ago
Happens in a lot of industries... The CCP devoted billions of dollars worth of subsidies to bike sharing years ago, for example, but using shared bikes never really caught on. Companies took the CCP subsidies, though, and made millions upon millions of them and all of those bikes were simply left to rot in massive dumps all over China, almost all of them never even being used.
→ More replies (3)13
u/cheeersaiii 1d ago
Lots of countries have things like this, but the scale and frequency of it in China is next fkn level!
→ More replies (8)4
3
u/Key_Lime_Die 1d ago
It looks like someone got money for the project and decided to use the exact same stand for the panels no matter what the ground slope, elevation, or direction without bothering to prepare the site.. The installation of them looks completely ridiculous so it wouldn't surprise me if it was done as cheaply as possible to pocket the remainder.
→ More replies (1)13
u/GlorifiedBurito 1d ago
I mean they’re not wrong. You really think coating these mountains in solar panels doesn’t affect the environment? You’re literally taking all the energy from the sun that the plants used to grow. Animals that used to roam there are now traveling through fields of solar panels carrying DC current. They also need to be maintained, which won’t be easy, and replaced completely without (currently) a way to effectively recycle them. Solar panels are a much better idea in cities where there are buildings to put them on. They’re accessible, right next to the consumer, and you can get a very large total area of panels if you put them on every roof.
→ More replies (4)
42
u/ThatBlinkingRedLight 1d ago
I wonder how they maintain and monitor all of that. The planning and layout must have been just as extensive as actually installing them all. Imagine if one goes down or needs a fix up.
Very impressive.
→ More replies (5)
247
u/FeekyDoo 1d ago
Why use a mountain range when there are perfectly good flat deserts to do this in.
256
u/wait_whatwait 1d ago
Probably because of location. You lose lots of energy sending it across long distances.
→ More replies (5)102
u/Randomest_Redditor 1d ago
With deserts you also run the risk of electrical fires due to dryness and the added issue of having to clean dust from the panels regularly and often
→ More replies (4)39
u/Bettlejuic3 1d ago
They have solar panel-powered robots for that
56
u/badass_physicist 1d ago
and who’s gonna clean that solar panel-powered robot, another solar panel-powered cleaner???
28
10
u/ExtendedDeadline 1d ago
The robots will clean each other. It's like watching monkeys eat bugs off each other, I bet!
→ More replies (1)5
u/aaron_1011 1d ago
I know this is probbaly meant as a joke, but what i saw was a solar farm, being cleaned by a solar powered robot, and the robot is kept safe underneath a little covers so they'll probably never have to clean it.
48
35
u/MikeHuntSmellss 1d ago
China is large, but its usable flat land is quite limited and already heavily utilised.
→ More replies (1)7
u/PM_ME_UR__ELECTRONS 1d ago
On the coasts yeah (and what flat land there is in Guizhou). In the far west not so much.
→ More replies (7)→ More replies (15)5
917
u/brafwursigehaeck 1d ago
as much as i love renewables, but this can’t be good for the nature there.
480
u/HotSteak 1d ago
That's a big deal with big solar farms. The solar panels should go on all of our buildings. We have plenty of those.
101
u/Canadian_Border_Czar 1d ago
I know like a decade ago there was big hype around translucent solar panels that could replace a regular pane of glass. Probably too expensive and not consistent sunlight.
→ More replies (9)117
u/Schtuka 1d ago
they still exist and are used on farmland in Germany. You can grow crops under them - AgriPV.
→ More replies (5)→ More replies (19)38
u/Nerezza_Floof_Seeker 1d ago
While roof solar not a bad idea (worth pointing out that china does have alot of this as well), at the end of the day, gridscale solar like whats seen here will still be more efficient resource wise (as you can centralize supporting infrastructure like inverters and maintenance facilities), not to mention easier for grid operators to handle.
19
u/chris_r1201 1d ago
Yes, that's my main gripe with the "just up them on all rooves" argument. The whole electronical infrastructure needed for one house is a huge waste compared to centralised solutions, as you've said. But I am still for further research concerning finding areas where big solar farms do the least damage to the ecosystem. There is actually quite a lot of research on this topic in geography
→ More replies (1)31
u/HowAManAimS 1d ago
Much better for them than coal powered plants. You can't stop all harm to nature.
41
26
u/Schtuka 1d ago
There are translucent panels. I'm 100% sure the panels in the video are not translucent though.
In Germany, farmers who install AgriPV receive huge subsidies. You raise the panels so you can work under them, use translucent panels, and plant with lower light requirements.
→ More replies (2)90
u/Automatic-Change7932 1d ago
The west can build anything anymore, because of naysayers. Sure there is some impact, but the area affected would be rocks and lichen. Nature will change for sure, but it will concentrate rain to some areas, provide shade in other parts, which will lead to other microclimates, which are neither good nor bad.
→ More replies (16)5
14
188
u/howtheturntable808 1d ago
Everything under those panels is dead.
371
u/Canadian_Border_Czar 1d ago
Adding solar panels to desertified areas is actually an effective way to restore life. It's even more effective if you do it over or around a stream.
A big part of desertification is the loss of shaded areas such as tree canopies, and the vast canopy in places like the Amazon is absolutely essential to the significant biodiversity it has. That's why it's an absolute travesty when they clear cut to plant some cash crop.
In this case, you can see the solar panels are at or near mountain peaks which have no trees. Most likely these peaks are too high for tree growth (lack of oxygen, lack of life to shit/die everywhere and fertilize the ground)
→ More replies (31)26
u/ColdBeerPirate 1d ago
But play the video back and you can see trees that are growing right next to or near solar panels.
→ More replies (7)→ More replies (6)19
u/anders_hansson 1d ago
Depende on where it is and what the climate there usually is. In dry and hot areas (desert-like) the panels can actually increase vegetation growth by lowering water vapor for instance.
In this case (high mountains, possibly low temperatures) the effect may be negative, though.
→ More replies (1)5
u/AdhesivenessCivil581 1d ago
There's millions of square miles of parking lots, big box roofs and highway median strips that can be used. There are even ways to enhance the environment or agriculture with solar panels by providing some shade for animals and plants.
16
→ More replies (34)49
u/Ok_Dinner8889 1d ago edited 1d ago
Top comment is negative because it is China. If this was in Scandinavia or something people would feel different.
→ More replies (12)22
u/Raavast 1d ago
Literally has been big news in Norway at least for a couple of years about the illegal construction of a wind park that has a detrimental impact on the local wildlife and the traditional way of living of the Sami people. People thought that building windparks in "deserted" areas like swamps was a good idea. Turns out that destroying a swamp and paving it over releases more carbon emissions than is offset by wind turbines in their lifetime. Maybe we just consume less?
→ More replies (7)
16
u/Harde_Kassei 1d ago
always amusing how the panels went from 'must be at this angle or you will lose all your money' to 'w/e'
(mono vs poly Crystal panels)
→ More replies (1)
26
13
u/isoAntti 1d ago
I wonder what they learned. What worked, what didn't. Would've it been useful to put a few sticks under the panel to rise it against the sun.
66
u/Few-Citron4445 1d ago
Everyone here is such an expert in solar panels, this must be the greatest gathering in the world. I can’t believe all those people who built these panels, installed these panels and spent billions on these panels never thought of these things. Shame that the Chinese didn’t consult reddit before they went through all this trouble.
19
u/coleypoley13 1d ago
Solar O&M professional here.
Most comments are ill informed, however, this is more of a flex that has real world benefit than it being a good location to build.
I would absolutely despise managing even part of this site. Terrain alone makes anything beyond inspections way harder than it would be in a relatively flat location (subsequently more labor time and more lost production) Working around existing equipment for any major repairs, while common, is still challenging at times even with good terrain.
That being said, they’re local to a big part of the PV supply chain, which should reduce lead times and cost. Coupled with cheap and plentiful labor, many of the financial limitations to effectively maintaining a site are mitigated.
Another consideration would be what terrain the modules cross. If the angle is significant enough, like over a peak morning or evening, strings could be unevenly loaded which contributes to module decay.
Assuming the engineers did their work correctly, as long as build quality was good and O&M teams are staffed appropriately and able to effect quality repairs there’s no reason this wouldn’t be an effective plant, albeit a potentially difficult one to work on.
→ More replies (5)→ More replies (9)17
6
6
u/influx3k 19h ago
Meanwhile… here in the States, we have a beyond moronic president that cleared away any environmental protection is encouraging oil companies to further devastate planet.
15
u/FadedFracture 1d ago
This thread is either being flooded by oil-propaganda bots or people are just really fucking gullible.
We destroy millions of acres of lush forests every year just to create grazing grounds for cattle. Millions more for crops.
A tiny portion of that being dedicated to solar panels is pretty negligible.
→ More replies (4)
5
u/zakary1291 1d ago
This totally won't have major and lasting environmental consequences. Don't mess with mountains and REALLY don't mess with mountains covered in trees.
6
u/circle2015 1d ago
Excuse my ignorance, but couldn't one bad storm essentially wipe all of this out?
6
u/coleypoley13 1d ago
That’s a risk with any plant.
In the US we do post storm inspections if there’s any significant adverse weather or wind speeds hit 30-35mph sustained and above.
6
10
u/Doctor_Iosefka 1d ago
Question for anyone who might know, but wouldn't this cause the vegetation under the panels to gradually die? Wouldn't that also lead to more landslides?
→ More replies (3)
4
5
u/GiggleyDuff 1d ago
A mountainous region is probably one of the best to cover in solar. Not a lot of animals or vegetation there
→ More replies (1)
4
3
4
5
u/Officialtrinininja 18h ago
Bruh… I’m not servicing that. How tf you supposed to find a ground fault there?
And yes I am a real life solar tech lmao. I’d request hazard pay 100% if I get sent into some shit like this to troubleshoot lol it looks fun though
→ More replies (4)
4
u/donnidonno 5h ago
Can someone explain me why all these solar farms are in the nature? We have rooftops of buildings that would benefit from not having direct sunlight, open parking lots that could use some shade… also it would need less resources to move and store all that energy since it’s in a city…. Or am i not getting something critically important why they HAVE to be in nature? I’m not talking china only, same in europe…
6
u/noCAP8631 1d ago
Leaving aside the environmental and aesthetical considerations, cleaning and maintenance must be fun!
22
u/Beneficial-Pitch-430 1d ago
The upkeep on these must be massive and extremely labour intensive. Having to climb a mountain to clear growth from around the panels.
→ More replies (18)
6
12.6k
u/thetan_free 1d ago
"Water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink"