When is cashes ledge going to o be a national monument

Cars going off the road and crashing into the panels.

Maintenance would be pretty difficult. Solar panels are not something you just plop down and leave.

Yeah that guy used the word Evah with a hard H. He doesn't just throw those around willy nilly.

> solar panels still work under snow

Not really. Power is generated in the area where the snow slid, not through thick snow.

https://www.energy.gov/eere/articles/let-it-snow-how-solar-panels-can-thrive-winter-weather

> Light is able to forward scatter through a sparse coating, reaching the panel to produce electricity. It's a different story when heavy snow accumulates, which prevents PV panels from generating power. Once the snow starts to slide, though, even if it only slightly exposes the panel, power generation is able to occur again.

Yeah idk why everyone hears solar and instantly jumps to "but RELY on it?? HOW?"

Isn't it possible that... we just collect some cheap, easy power that isn't being used, and lighten the load on other power-generating methods?

People are so tribal when it comes to power generation for no good reason.

Booooo! I hate that this is the top comment. Placing solar panels in the median is a brilliant idea and has worked in some of the dirtiest cities in India and Southeast Asia. The best part? Solar power is virtually free and they can't find a way to make it scarce in order to jack up our energy bills. Anyone leading us away from solar power is not our friend and these energy bills are fucking killing us common folk. Solar power in the medians all day, every day. Great idea.

They actually still generate power with snow on them, clearing them off wouldn't really be needed.

If they're set up with a steep enough angle, it would be hard for snow to accumulate on them anyways.

Safety reasons?

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I don’t think you know what detriment means.

>all across the highway in the middle of nowhere

Well.... you can move the electricity to other places... with those wire-things we have.

It being the middle of nowhere is more of a reason to have them there. Why would we take up space in populated areas for solar when we can easily and instantaneously move power anywhere we put a wire.. ?

...Not really sure what the issue is?

China went through their industrial revolution 110-or-so years after us. We've had almost a century to expand our infrastructure into our rural communities.

The things you're complaining about - it being a mess (underdevelopment, lack of robust infrastructure) and them using coal - both of those things are solved by the work their doing with solar panels, like in the picture above.

Hope that clarifies. Let me know if you'd like any other information.

>in Maine: You know solar panels still work under snow, right?

I did not know this, and I'm still not sure I do. Are you saying that they work even with a foot of snow on top of them blocking out the sunlight? Or just that snow tends to melt and slide off of them so it doesn't end up being a big deal?

What in the world are you talking about, that’s a ridiculous proposal

Boothbay Harbor - so peaceful, near the botanical gardens, I love browsing the touristy shops

That’s a chart of total installations; that doesn’t disprove the comment about how crappy Chinese rural power is. Just shows they install a lot, which is to be expected given the large urban populace and heavy urban shift since the 1980s.

Yeah this wont be popular north of bangor, it makes going off the left lane way more dangerous that it needs to be

"Maine should take on the long term detriments because we're too cheap to put any up-front costs into infrastructure."

Agreed. But taking a single picture of some solar panels stuck on the middle of a random road with no context doesn’t really prove anything.

China’s power grid is a mess, and still relies a lot of coal. Yeah, they are doing solar, but let’s not hold them up as some kind of leader in it. Their rural infrastructure is incredibly archaic.

I actually like this idea. Wish it would happen

Solar panels lose efficiency at high temperatures, the dry environment creates a lot of dust which requires near constant cleaning of panels, and the spread-out nature of infrastructure in the southwest would drive up transmission and maintenance costs as well.

Solar is still highly effective in Maine, but you're right pointing out the issue that we'll need a specialized trucks (or attachment to plow trucks) to clear snow off various lengths of the solar panel chain after snowstorms. Which is another benefit of adding them to highways where it is much easier to do that.

But the ad on YouTube told me that it would be a bad deal for Maine; surely the energy companies have our best interest at heart. /s

https://chinadialogue.net/en/energy/chinas-power-system-needs-to-modernise/