Power Generation - Hydrogen and Fuel Cells: Advances in Transportation and Power - page 202

tied into a utility's electric power grid. If there is a surplus of solar power,
it goes back into the power grid. A 2-kilowatt solar system can supply an
average-sized home with 20 to 90% of its electrical needs, depending on
how many lights, appliances and air conditioners are running, and how
efficient they are. After the subsidy, and depending on how the system is
paid for (cash or borrowed money), a solar system may pay for itself in
as little as 6 years and as much as 36 years. The L.A. Department of Wa-
ter and Power was not deregulated along with the three major utilities
in California. It has some of the lowest power rates in the state making
the economical argument harder to make. To receive the full $5 per watt
subsidy, the L.A. Department of Water and Power requires a homeowner
to purchase solar panels from a manufacturer based in the city. This was
done to encourage the local growth of an emerging industry.
Siemens Solar reports the interest in solar from consumers has been
sometimes overwhelming and that supply has been a problem. Most U.S.
manufactured units are shipped to countries such as Germany, Japan and
Scandinavia, which have had generous subsidies for years.
WIND POWER
Wind power is used in over 65 countries and the basic principles of
wind energy have been used for centuries. Windmills existed in the 7th
century in Persia. An older image of wind power is Don Quixote and the
wooden towers with cloth-covered sails turning in the wind. But today's
wind turbines use a giant propeller on a tall metal pole. As it rotates, the
propeller drives a generator to supply nearby users or send power to the
grid. One commercial user, Corn Plus is adding two wind turbines for
power at its ethanol plant in Winnebago, Minnesota. They will produce
4.2-MW which is about 45% of the plant's needs.
During the development of electrical generating equipment in the
late 1800s, both Europe and America began to experiment with wind pow-
er for electrical generation. Among the first to develop wind-powered
electrical generators was the Danish professor, Poul La Cour, who worked
on wind systems from 1891 to 1908. He also saw the use of hydrogen as a
fuel and the use of wind-powered electrical generators to electrolyze hy-
drogen and oxygen from water. Another early investigator who promoted
wind-powered hydrogen production systems was J.B.S. Haldane a British
biochemist at Cambridge, England. In 1923, he predicted that England's