While the cost of PV has been driven down by worldwide demand for mW scale installations, that lower cost benefit flows down to small installation too. And the same is true with trackers. Huge increases in demand have driven competition which has brought manufacturing costs down, which in return, has forced more efficent design and manufacturing process in order to remain competitive. Especially true in the Euro market is the fact that many mWs of PV installs are on trackers. One primary reason is the increased power gained by moving further north away from the equator, a subtle but very real available gain in daily insolation we in southern climates don't share the benefit from. It's to a point that, in utility scale tracker installs at least, the too-high price of the land for the array is more likely to be a deal-breaker than the cost of the PV. While the $/W still follows the economy-of-scale curve the PV prices are less a factor than previously observed. Jim Duncan North Texas Renewable Energy NABCEP Certified Solar PV Installer No.031310-57 TECL 27398 nt...@1scom.net 817.917.0527 www.ntrei.com
-----Original Message----- From: re-wrenches-boun...@lists.re-wrenches.org [mailto:re-wrenches-boun...@lists.re-wrenches.org]On Behalf Of Jeff Oldham Sent: Wednesday, August 10, 2011 3:39 PM To: re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] Tracstar Linear Tracker Tracstar is as good as any of them, however I would not track this array unless it is dedicated to a pumping load or MAYBE grid tie on a PBI. My issue is that PV is too cheap now to do much in the way of justification for the added expense and reliability issues. We are so lucky to have energy systems that can produce power with no moving parts and have an extremely long life that I just cannot see intentionally adding complex and expensive moving parts to undo this elegance. Closely look at your math and see just how close the economics are considering PV can be retailed for likely under $2.20/W. Lastly and perhaps most importantly, you should consider tracker service life. With modules lasting 50+ years you surely will have to replace the tracker well before the array, if not twice or more. Personally, I think trackers lasting more than 15-20 years w/o significant servicing is not realistic. Not much in the solar world more aggravating then seeing the sun shining on the BACK of your array at almost noon! It seems that we spend a lot of time trying to talk customers out of sexy notions like trackers, battery back-up grid tied systems and wind where there is little. I think trackers can have their place, but not many! And this is coming from a guy w/a tracker for 20 years and I refuse to remove it,I just keep rebuilding it (they are indeed very cool when working). All expansions have been fixed mounted. From the Solar, Wind and Hydro powered office of Jeff Oldham/Regenerative SOLutions ____________________________________________________________ Penny Stock Jumping 3000% Sign up to the #1 voted penny stock newsletter for free today! AwesomePennyStocks.com
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