When I do finally buy a house I do want to install solar and/or wind power. I do not plan to be off the grid, but sell back to the power company. That way I will not need batteries and can offset my costs substantially (and, if I'm lucky, actually make a small profit). I would be gone during the daytime and using very little power. This is the power companies peak time so I would be helping reduce the stations load. If a large number of people did this they could effectively reduce the mount of carbon based fuels needed to produce electricity, but still benefit from the "reliability" of being on the grid.

speaking to the questions of how badly does the production of the solar panels pollute. I can speak to only the plant I work in. We have a very rigorous waste treatment program and are limited in the amount of water we can put into the city sewer system. Most of the chemicals we use we recyle and reuse. I'm not sure of the actual amount of electricity we use, but it is fairly standard for a manufacturing plant of our size. We are also constantly searching more environmentaly friendly chemicals and process to use. And, the benefit of our products is they do not produce any kind of emissions when in use, they reduce the customers "carbon footprint".


Nick

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Previous Boats
'84 H16
'82 H18 Magnum
'74 Pearson 30
St. Louis, MO