A More Efficient Bridge Rectifier?

Reminds me of when the telephone tax for funding the Spanish-American war rescinded because the war was, ahem, sort of over for a while. Missy Bell jacked up some fee which ate it right up. But they have a monopoly so you must buy at the company store.

Be glad you don't live in some parts of Europe where they give solar panel owners huges sums per kWh. Guess who ends up paying that hidden tax?

Same thing goes on here in the US.

"Joerg" a écrit :

owners huges sums per kWh. Guess who ends

In France at least it is not hidden. The added cost of the solar / wind energy appears separately on the electricity bill.

owners huges sums per kWh. Guess who ends

The thing that kills me is that solar and wind aren't really environmentally friendly! The amount of land required to generate even modest amounts of energy is vast. The land has to be cleared roads have to be built, equipment run in and out.

Nobody really knows what effect the large magnet field that those huge wind turbines generate have on wildlife and people. The other thing is it's unreliable.

The only reason it's gaining popularity is because governments are handing out lucrative contracts and incentives to 21'st century snake oil salesman to appease a bunch of uninformed people. Tell me what you want to hear and pay me enough and I'll tell you.

The most environmentally friendly method is nuclear. It's also the most reliable and generates the most output for its footprint.

There are also several places here in which you could build Hydro generating plants with minimal impact on the existing surrounding environment once it's built and running.

anel owners huges sums per kWh. Guess who ends

energy

Actually we do know what strong magnetic fields do to animals but the wind generators don't make a strong magnetic field so we don't even have to go look it up.

The fields in the generators are fairly well contained because of the need to make the generators efficient. The power feeding out runs through wires that are close together so that the fields cancel.

The effects of a strong magnetic field has been studied on rats and monkeys, as has the effects of having no magnetic field. Early in the space race, there was a worry that without a magnetic field, astronauts would suffer from bad effects in space. It was good to check but no problems were found. Strong magnetic fields have an interesting effect. Animals subject to strong fields live longer. We also know from various medical studies that being near 50 or 60Hz magnetic fields, if anything, also makes you live longer. The studies were driven by rumors that being near power lines caused cancer etc. It was proven that the AC magnetic fields people experience can't be the cause.

We have yet to take a single power plant all the way through its life cycle. Until we do it for real , we can't say exactly how bad the problem of getting rid of the old plant will be. There is a lot of material that is just radio active enough to be trouble to make the question a hard one. If it was just the reactor core, the question would be a lot easier.

Imagine the no input ripple version of the transformer coupled SEPIC circuit. ie: there are 3 windings the third being the isolated output. Now take the power MOSFET and replace it with a pair in series source to source.

This circuit can be connected directly to the unrectified maines. It makes an isolated squarewavish wave form. This can then be run into a sychronous rectifier to make a DC output.

All this involves no diode drops from the mains to the DC output.

Oh, there have been. Then next one south of here:

owners huges sums per kWh. Guess who ends

Both wind and solar can be very useful and put up in places where nobody really cares. However, they must be paired with sunstantial buffer capacity for when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine, and that's one of the largely unsolved issues. We don't have enough high-mountain valleys even if we had them all dammed up for hydro storage.

On Sat, 13 Feb 2010 07:46:11 -0800 (PST), MooseFET

What a lie.

Decommissioned US commercial nuclear reactors (excluding experimental reactors): Connecticut Yankee Maine Yankee Shippingport Shoreham Yankee Rowe Elk River Zion Fort Saint Vrain Pathfinder Rancho Seco Trojan, Rainier

owners huges sums per kWh. Guess who ends

energy

Oh, that issue has been solved. Unfortunately, it means that the cost of the solar/wind generation is *IN ADDITION* to the cost of the more reliable means. It does save some fuel cost but add tremendous capital costs.

The greenie's answer is "live in a cave".

None have really been finished from the comments on Yankee Rowe Nuclear Power Station "However, over 100,000 pounds of spent fuel rods are still on-site, contained in dry casks, built of concrete and steel. These will be located at the site until the completion of the Yucca Mountain disposal facility, around 2020."

It assumes that Yucca is built and really works as intended.

A purely political problem. IOW, you continue the lie.

And His Royal Highness, the Ultimate Dipshit, Obama, has pulled Yucca Mountain funding from the budget. ...Jim Thompson

Of course. He wants no solution that doesn't double down on taxes. In fact, he want's no solution but does want to double down. That's the way of the tyrant.

Neato :)

How have they resolved this if there is no wind or sun you cannot generate power from it therefore it isn't solar or wind generated power.

That is my point it's not reliable.

You will always need 24/7 and neither can provide that.

The time and resources spent on this pipe dream could be better spent on resolving issues with proven reliable technologies mainly I'm talking nuclear; such as disposal of radioactive waste.

My point being short of an accident and waste disposal; nuclear generation has a small negative environmental impact. Compare this to using up a massive chunk of land to plant wind turbines or solar cells with supporting infrastructure. Then to compound it say for two years your ideal sun or wind location isn't so ideal. Then you have a field with some really expensive lawn ornaments.

How much land would a wind or solar farm require to generate even 1/10 what one modern nuclear generation plant can generate?

I guess it keeps the environmentalist happy.

By burning coal in the other power plant that also had to be built.

The ultimate solution is to reduce our unreasonable per-capita consumption of energy, as well as reducing how many "capita" we must feed. This *will* happen eventually, and possibly in our lifetimes. If we invest in renewable energy, even if present yields are minimal and "unreliable", we will also be promoting research into improvements, and we will be creating jobs that can be performed by those with less education and training, with less disastrous consequences if someone goofs up, or worse, goes berzerk and actively initiates a calamity. So far, nuclear power plants have suffered "accidents" which were mostly human error and not deliberate malice. As people generally are "dumbing down" and/or becoming mentally unstable and morally bankrupt, there is increasing risk of major problems in nuclear facilities. They are designed with multiple safeguards and have been made idiot-proof, but the world continues to evolve to produce better idiots.

We should invest more in "human engineering" to create (or recreate) truly liveable cities and a social ethic that promotes cooperation rather than the sort of competition that relies on unfair advantages and ruthless and irresponsible business practices. The majority of the world's population lives in extremely substandard conditions, while many of us in the US and other more "developed" nations enjoy artificially inflated lifestyles based on wasteful energy consumption and an economy that is unsustainable in the long run.

Paul