solar energy good and bad

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Why’s coal nuclear wind and solar energy used for electricity and oil for transportation? Is this good or bad?

I pretty much agree with Jeffry.

Except with the comments about solar manufacturing producing pollution. While that is undoubtedly true, why single out solar? Pretty much everything we make has some environmental impact.
Wind turbines too. Carbon fiber blades must have some impact in their manufacturing for instance.

Solar thermal power plants may have less impact in their manufacture than PV. It’s basically glass and steel, with a generator of some type.
(turbine, stirling engine for example)

At any rate, both wind and solar have small impacts over the life of them, providing completely clean energy once they are installed.

They both have advantage of being able to be built in relatively short times, compared with coal or nuclear plants.

Mass production of plug in hybrid cars in the U.S. would save lots of oil. They are more marketable than pure electrics, because they have no range limitation. The average American driver would get overall mileage of 100 mpg. Recharging at night for $1 of electricity.

Plug in Partners – advocacy group for PHEVs
http://www.pluginpartners.org/

“Charging the battery each night would cost less than $1.00 at current rates. PHEVs outfitted with a battery pack providing a 40-mile electric range could power, using the all-electric mode, more than 60% of the total annual miles traveled by the average American driver. That means tens of millions of motorists could make their daily commute using little, if any, gasoline. ”

“PHEVs would result in significant fuel savings for most motorists. The initial cost of the plug-in vehicle, however, would be more than a conventional car or one of the existing mass-produced hybrids. However, a 2004 study by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) found that plug-in hybrids can achieve life cycle costs parity with conventional gasoline vehicles – meaning that over the life of the car the cost will be equal or less despite the initial higher cost. The study calculated gasoline price as $1.75/gallon.”

So at $4 a gallon which we will see soon, how much would you save?

Using the grid to charge cars at night is already cleaner than burning gasoline. As we make the grid cleaner, PHEVs and EVs will make more and more sense.

Good ideas here:
http://www.setamericafree.org/blueprint.pdf
A Blueprint For U.S. Energy Security

and here:
Scientific American A Solar Grand Plan
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=a-solar-grand-plan

and here:Green Wombat several stories about solar thermal power plants in California etc.
http://blogs.business2.com/greenwombat/

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