"EPRI found that most panel recycling in Europe through the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment(WEEE) Directive—which established rules for solar panel recycling in 2012—happens at glass recyclers. Panels are crushed or shredded and then glass and metals are separated. Other chemical and thermal processes may be used to recover high-value material like silver or copper."
Nuclear technologies, both from military and commercial applications, pose a complex of environmental justice issues in terms of current and future risks they pose to people and environments. These risks, as both nuclear testing and nuclear reactor accidents have shown, transcend national boundaries, can span millennia, and can have multigenerational health risks. To explore nuclear risks and environmental justice, we focus on issues only in the continental U.S. However, we recognize that the risks are expanding at a global level with accumulations of high-level nuclear waste, mining and milling waste, and unresolved serious nuclear contamination problems at military sites in North America, Europe, Africa, and Asia (see [1]).
Hey, you know youve got the good stuff when it has the "auto work" feature!
You guys are probably fine. Its a different beast.
The OP is having trouble with settings or had cell voltage dis-association that was short cycling the charge modes.
It will be interesting to find out. Those 20$ "tracers" are definitely not great and the one in the photo is already bypassed onto the harborfreight controller in the image, taken a year or more ago.
It depends, "tracer" is on so many. I see Sun Yoba and a dozen other names on these. The smaller 20a-50a versions range from $15-80 us for the same unit.
Good thing Dave! I did not want to keep hammering for a control upfit. People are not a good substitute for a controller..... short attention spans and that whole other things to do thing....
But you quite layed it out "like it is". Tracers are hard to pass up for the 15-20$ they cost, bit this is the 10th or so tracer botchery ive seen or heard of.
The only one ive installed or handled directly has the same issue and is about to kybosh a set of 4 perfectly good golf car batteries for a friend who couldnt justify budget on a reliable control. The same guy also didnt see the need to attatch modules.... to anything, too expensive.
He picks them up and patches the wires every now and then though..... two storeys! Hasnt broke one yet, so maybe im a flashing and rail snob ;)
In this case however she says it is not affordable to do, a totally different situation. Not the same as trading a 500 dollar investment in battery to get that sweet deal on a 20 dollar controller.
I have learned a similar lesson the hard way also. Harbor freight panels..... they work ok, but cost a pile for nota lota watts, $250 for 45 whole watts of solar madness! nuff said.
To recycle, of course. Glass, tedlar film, eva film, polyethylene, hyper pure copper and silver and aluminum. Not sure what to do with the silicon wafers, luckily there is about 2oz (need to check this to avoid inflated or deflated figures) of this material and as long as the panel was in the sun for a year and a half, no major loss of embodied energy even after recycling. I allow 6 months in the sun for that as 1 year will recover the energy embodied in the module.
Here is an interesting article i found a while back while posting in permies about the world saving joys of the greatest form of electric power ever devised by people way more enlightened amd intelligent than myself!
This an issue, and its worth an ulcer or two to talk about and trade articles on. I have no idea who thinks all this is great, but you can tell us all about it and reform my anti-nuclear ways.
If youncan convince me this is just fine and i am wrong to be totally appalled by the antics of new clear......
Ill post a video of me smashing a solarworld 250 mono to bits and the hazmat cleanup that follows !!! ;)
That is kinda funny. Thanks you guys, and now we know. Sorry it caused a ruckus and stuff though. Well pv systems are sometimes operated like ww2 you-boats then! Im sure that statement will cause another international grammar incident.
Thanks Pearl. No, no cntrl key and i was posting back and forth between forums and returning to try the nife again to no avail. Will not allow the same in a PM to Nicole. I had to email it to her for examination. There are two paragraphs it simply will not allow.
It will not allow me to post it in parts or whole, even in the pm i sent you. There is nothing shady in it and i dont understand the metric apparently being used.
It is still the same bit. Just tried to post it here. Not over the character limit a.d no message just a return to the comment entry page without saving as if i did not submit.
It would allow "test" then not allow the paste, it would allow parts of the same comment not the whole and not world war two as i had it. Nor the section on hydrogen safety as a cooking gas reclaimed from battery charging.... dangerous.
Nicole Alderman wrote:Were you, by chance, leaving the tab open for a while and it gave you a CRSF error message page? I got one of those last night and hadn't gotten around to reporting it. Sometimes when we take too long composing something, or someone posts while I'm composing, I get that error. It's supposed to be fixed, but sometimes the CSRF messages rear their ugly heads.
Usually you can just go "back" and copy your message and put it in a NEW reply and it'll work just fine.
Oh yes, i did all that several times. Even closed, came back in and pasted a reply with amd without quote.
Only when i removed w-w-2 and percentages of hydrogen which are dangerous would it allow a post. I hammered it about 15 times.
Imagine not having to even come up with ever more elaborate and material resource consuming efforts at technology because it didnt happen in the firs place because we never really needed the first iteration of nuke plant? Of course fantastical as we have already allowed mad scientists to kill this place.
Chris Kott wrote:While I don't want to be located downstream or downwind of any nuclear project, from the past or in the future, the anti-nuclear lobby often misses the mark.
If one must resort to whataboutist retorts and exaggerated figures, one's position has already been dismissed.
Yes, the potential for disaster from not only operational PWRs (Pressurised Water Reactors) but components and waste products is unacceptibly high. What we need, in my opinion, is the next iteration of nuclear reactor, and that doesn't get discussed by the anti-nuclear lobby, because that is confusing. Nuclear = bad is much simpler to get across to people not steeped in the technicalities.
So, as mentioned in other energy threads on this site, I can't wait for MSRs (Molten Salt Reactors) to be fully explored. How better to deal with tonnes of "spent" reactor fuel than by running it through a more efficient reactor as fuel, generating energy and decreasing the volume of the waste by a huge margin? By some estimates, we have over a thousand years of current power needs in stores of radioactive waste, and all we need to access it is a type of nuclear reactor that eats it like candy. Enter the MSR.
What is often overlooked on the personal scale is the end-life of those solar panels. If you break one, are you going to have to hazmat yourself and evacuate your house? Because that, for instance, is what some CFL bulb directions essentially indicated, along with directions to not vacuum, as the particles would go airborne, and you'd contaminate the vac. I am not saying that photovoltaic panels are the same in any way as CFLs, but they were also a household product that was supposed to have been safe for household use, and obviously wasn't.
And how many solar panels are required per person to satisfy their lives' energy needs? What are their lifespans? Can they even be recycled? Can the component layers be separated one from the other, or are they inextricably linked? In the event of battery storage, all the same questions need to be asked of each component.
Renewable power is a little different when what's needed to capture it is an electric motor you can rewind by hand, some gearing and bearings, and shaped wooden, or even fibreglass, components. You're not worried, in that event, of a tiny module being crushed underfoot whose mercury would be sufficient to poison that part of the watershed. Even a millpond, whose creation can no doubt be disruptive, causes less potential harm.
What's needed in this space, I think, is rational discussion, not inflammatory, accusatory, imprecise language and dubious fact.
-CK
No different than insinuating that silver and silicon in pv modules is equatable to mercury contamination. Not acceptable means more than any as opposed to a decimal or comma off in an absolutely ginormous figure nor in counting my panels but not the nuclear wase issue.
It is called marginalizing. And is dishonest and quite apart from excited commentary in good will.
A fun exercise for sure......... but, we have a perfectly perfected reactor design already, with the very best sheilding and safety record in existance.
Economical to operate, as in absolutely free for billions of years past and into the future, safe as it gets for such titanic energy flow and guilt free...... we didnt put it on line or cause its failure in any way and so are quite removed from the responsibility for it, just as it should be. (Read as ' squirrels plant trees so what the heck are we doing exactly?')
The only tech required to hook into it it to bask in it and plant seeds in its rays, and scoop up the water distributed by it and cool ourselves in the winds provided by it and sometimes put rocks (photovoltaics) or refined metal ore out exposed to it if air conditioning, communications, transport and lights or most any other work are desired.... although that may not give you every bit and more on demand "dammit here and i said right now!", as you "deserve". Ok nothings perfect.
The sun is a perfect nuclear reactor, is 90 some million miles away and costs us absolutely nothing to make use of.
Problems start from a point of " sure theres running water in that river over there, but i really just have this unstoppable ambition to get it to run right here instead"
Devolvements cascade into cascades of failure and it is what we see before us currently and at an exponetial rate.
Stop hitting your selves in the head with hammers or paying others to, and your head will surely stop hurting.
If we could only do a "where are they now" tv special on the 50 mile in evey direction rivers of tritium documented by DOE to be leaching out from oak ridge tennessee, or the friendly rinse down at a facility in a famous california wildlife sanctuary that reportedly is killing seals and other precious ocean and shore life or the daily leaks, and contaminated pressure venting direct to the open air and waterways at the plants, or say the fact that transporting waste in imperviously "safe" containers and with procedures we paid billions or trillions to develop.... can be traced everywhere it drives........ by measuring the contamination trail?
What a country! What an industry! What a wonderful world.
Then tell me my pv system is actually the devil in disguise and too expensive to own and operate and will cause my neighbors and future generations misery, almost as much misery as organic food consumption, or taking the teflon/c8 (look it up pfas chems) out of my dress slacks or work jacket would cause them, so we need nuclear and roundup to combat hunger.
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
"It makes me want to run, screaming....... from my BMW."
Un-frozen Caveman Lawyer. Peace.
If thats not enough, it would literally bankrupt the population of our planet for a generation to remediate fukishima in a total fasion, a real cleanup and not the twisted musical chairs game of hot potato being done with superfund cleanup soils and such.
This does not even touch on straight out illegal dumping, onlt the A-OK "regulated" "appropriate" forms of dumping.
I also call bulshit on the most damaging, expensive and reckless form of energy conversion.
I had a copy of a document called Complex Cleanup by OTA, or Office of Technological Assesment a us government research facility.
It said in no uncertain terms that the contamination from simple proscessing fuels and explosives has consigned us to a horrible future and that grants of 500 million dollars a year to DOE were inadequate to even begin to track how far and wide nuclear contamination has spread and the rate it is continuing to do so.
Guess what department was shut down shortly after?
Ding ding ding, first prize of a barf bucket that doubles as a container for falling out hair and teeth to whomever answered...... OTA!
Energy required to produce machinery, components and materials to service the nuke industry are off the chart...... before fuel arrives at any generator. This is also resulting in widespread "recycling" of things like totally hot copper, aluminum, stainless and other precious material into household goods all over the globe, india, china, and yes even here in the us as greedy operators are getting the go ahead to "treat" contaminated materials precious to industry.
Like screwdrivers, hammers, furniature parts , decorative items, fasteners and parts in our solar electric, your eating utensiles, baby crib, kids lunchbox, your wedding rings? That ok? It is happening as a constant and only a 1,000,000/th of it gets detected and stopped at customs or recycle facilities.
Water? Really? Yes, lets just rinse our troubles away! The operators, government and regulators say its fine as apple pie. Hook me up!
Its a weapon. Simply a means to the end of all ends. And the amount of actual power produced that is not used to manufacture more "fuel" is used in keeping spent "fuel" stable and used to keep the dang things online proscessing "fuel".
Ota claimed 8% total consumer purchased power from the energy pie attributed to nuclear after embodied energy in the industry.
Is that really worth anything? No. Its the liability of all liabilities.
The whole industry is the doomsday machine from dr strangelove...... a weapon in every major region and large city will keep everyone on task..... making piles of fortunes for people preparing to off world or bunker up anyhow.
Energy in atoms, cool. Absolutely screwed environment and the loss of our genetic stability is totally worth the amusement park like atmosphere we are building to elevate ourselves above the other creatures. Problem is squirrels and soil micro-organisms are a higher form and are in no way responsible for our demise, so lets juts ruin their day too, what happens in vegas stays in vegas right?
No, absolutely not cool. Not even interesting except as a horror story of what not to let goons soothe say if just A-OK to accept.
As he said it will not be damaging at all unless you expose plates. Allow proper ventilation amd keep an eye on voltage. When you hit absorb voltage re-connect your controller.
This is exactly what a pv charge control does. In bulk mode your panels are directly connected to the battery. As long as array voltage is not over equalize voltage or more correct, when connected voltage is not higher than absorb it should never be an issue. With a low battery your array will drag down plenty from 36v better to bee in the 20v range if you cannot keep a close eye.
Tracers are suspect of not being an actual mppt control, so step down is likely provided by the battery being connected in bulk mode anyway, like a pwm control.
Nicole Alderman found the issue. Here is the original with a hyphen to make it post.
Thing is, i would not quite trust the tracer read out......
someting is goofy with only 20a from 900w at 12v nominal, its 280ish watts depending on actual voltage at the time. In bulk mode you should have 60 or more amps available until after the early portion of absorbtion charge.
Steve has you on track for ww2 U-boat style re-route of power to bypass the control (in question of proper operation wiring or electronics...) in order to connect to ample charging current.
As he said it will not be damaging at all unless you expose plates. Allow proper ventilation amd keep an eye on voltage. When you hit absorb voltage re-connect your controller.
This is exactly what a pv charge control does. In bulk mode your panels are directly connected to the battery. As long as array voltage is not over equalize voltage or more correct, when connected voltage is not higher than absorb it should never be an issue. With a low battery your array will drag down plenty from 36v better to bee in the 20v range if you cannot keep a close eye.
Tracers are suspect of not being an actual mppt control, so step down is likely provided by the battery being connected in bulk mode anyway, like a pwm control.
Hydrogen from your bank is mixed with air containing oxygen and so it is explosive (bang not flare!) In mixtures from 1%H to 90 plus percent H........ it means it is volatile and dangerously explosive unless its quite pure. By contrast gasoline and most fuels have a very narrow range where fuel air mixture could produce an explosion.
Thing is, i would not quite trust the tracer read out......
someting is goofy with only 20a from 900w at 12v nominal, its 280ish watts depending on actual voltage at the time. In bulk mode you should have 60 or more amps available until after the early portion of absorbtion charge.
One thing i failed to notice earlier, your array at 900w should be close to 50a charging near absorb voltage if all is well.
Another, that your battery is only 12v thought it was higher. In a guide for ukranian made edison batteries, they mention using one less cell if your gear cannot be set the the higher voltage. That cell could be cycled in periodicaly or left out until you get another controller.
In full sun.ypur array has higher power available than the control can pass. Its another great excuse for an upgrade controller!
