FAQs
- Q: You've got to be kidding me. Are you serious?
- A: Absolutely. Look at any pie-chart of generation methods of electricity and you won't even find Solar PV listed - it's some sub-slice of a small slice called "Other". But solar PV has a lot of virtues which will be getting tapped over the next few years. I think the most value is not going to lie in any one technology, but rather the usage patterns of a large group of individuals.
- Q: Hold on: how do you transport power over the internet?
- A: You don't. You consume all the electricity generated by the solarNode - it's just the cost that gets shared over the internet.
- Q: Why don't you just feed back into the grid?
- A: For the same reason you don't sign a bad deal. Why would anybody sell cleanly generated, carefully monitored, data-rich Kilowatt hours for the same price someone is selling polluting kilowatt hours? It makes no business sense, unless you can't see the difference between the two products.
- Q: Why do you need to locate the solarNodes globally?
- A: Well, the theory is that you first want to pick the best locations with the best combinations of sunny weather, large electricity usage, and sustainably-minded customers. Distributing the panels globally hopes to achieve this, while streamlining cashflow. But optimizing placement non-globally is certainly possible, within that requirement.
- Q: What happens if it's rainy and cloudy?
- A: solarNodes in cloudy locations won't generate much electricity that day. But the average of the network will hopefully still carry them through. Plus, as far as they're concerned, their grid power will most likely be operational.
- Q: What do you do when the batteries are empty?
- A: You let them charge up again. Meanwhile there's still grid power available.
- Q: What about wind power?
- A: I don't know. I think while very powerful and more affordable, wind-based micro-generation still takes a bit more maintenance than most people would be ready for. Solar PV has fewer moving parts and increases in its efficiency are imminent. However, the software could easily expand to accomodate the kinds of charge controllers that wind-turrbines use, and would be a perfect balance for nodes that are placed in windier rather than sunnier locations.
- Q: When will the software be ready for testing?
- A: TBD - stay tuned.
- Q: What's the software written in?
- A: All solutions employed will be constructed from open-source platforms. For this project, that currently means Linux, Java, PHP, MySQL, and db4o but of course it could change - will be announced shortly.
- Q: What about solar hot water or space heating? Aren't those the bigger issue in terms of environmental impact?
- A: A similar scheme for hot water heating (also mentioned in the patent) might actually be the most cost-effective way to create such a distributed business, since the payback time would be much faster. Quantifying the power generation, plus the fact that significant system integration needs to be done per household, makes this scheme a bit more ambitious. But it could be that the biggest dollars and most significant energy/CO2 savings lie in space and hot water heating. I consider this project is more of a layup, rather than the half-court 3, but you have to statr somewhere.
- Q: Why did you open source this idea?
- A: I think it's the best way forward for the idea. The building blocks of technology to deploy this system already exist - but it needs a group of dedicated technologists to assemble and push forward, so everyone can participate.
- Q: What if other people do it first?
- A: Good luck to them! If this service was already available now, I might sign up as a customer too! But I think it'll be fun to build anyway, and we can design it as we like.
- Q: I really like your logo - who designed it?
- A: Damian McCleod, a brilliant young professional with a lot of talent and charm. You can see more of his work here: www.dynamic75.com .
