This seems like a damned good idea, afterall what else can we use a desert for....what do you think?

Question

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jul/23/solarpower.windpower

Answer 1

They better think of something up quick because time is running out.

Answer 2

Carpeting deserts with solar energy sounds like a good idea...at first.  Then you start running into some logistical problems.

If you have a solar plant producing electricity, you need workers, to maintain the plant and keep it running.  With the workers come their families who need housing.

With the families, come schools, churches, grocery stores, doctor/dental offices, strip malls, housing for the empoyees of all the businesses, ect so on and so forth.

OK....so what...if people want to live and work in the desert, so be it.

Where are these people going to get the water to keep their communities?  Water is the HUGE issue.  Most desert areas already support all the human population they can, with the water supplies the desert has.

Other desert communities, like Arizonia (prime example) have grown wildly beyond anything the desert can even remotely support.  People who live in those areas are completely dependent on food being grown elsewhere and trucked to them.  They are also usually dependent on water from another area being sent to them.

The way the human population has grown, it no longer works to take water from a water rich area, and send it to the desert.  Water rich areas which have signed up to send their water to deserts are now finding that they (the water rich area) are running out of water.

There's another problem.  If the power generating area is concintrated in one area, it makes it a PRIME target for terrorists, and during wars.

It's better to spread the power generation out.  Keep commercial plants at a reasonible size.  Don't make them as big as small states/countries.  Instead install homeowner solar or wind turbines on homes, and businesses.  

If every single home and business had the ability to generate just a portion of its power use, it would help TREMENDOUSLY.

~Garnet

Permaculture homesteading/farming over 20 years

Husband works on the commercial wind turbines

Answer 3

Excellent replies already to your question.

Please check out the research here, for FREE:

http://www.the-alternative.org.uk

See: Chapter 6: Energy / Solar

(sheds light on the subject!)

Also see: Project it.

And whilst you're at "it" using the full book,

do a key-word search for "desert" and sand.

You'll find other uses for both

EG. affordable ways to green deserts

and help the housing crisis.

Answer 4

Just one very huge problem here in that the environmentalist greens who are funded by big oil will never allow it to happen. Who is it in congress that have killed wind, solar and nuclear power plants so many times over the last 50 or so years, nobody but the political leaders that take the stage of the environmental bandwagon when they are running for office and then do everything in their power to keep it from happening during working hours. Who have done the most damage individually to getting clean power in the congress but Ted Kennedy, Al Gore, John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi and every other liberal in both houses.

Answer to getting clean power in this country is vote for any body but a democrat or green in every election and for every political office. Once the liberals are gone the rest can be sorted out and made to see reason by the voters, but as long as one single liberal or lawyer is in a legislative position in government we will continue to have major environmental problems.

Answer 5

It sounds like a good idea, especially if they use solar thermal plants instead of photovoltaic cells since they're cheaper to produce and maintain. The problem would be distributing the power once it's produced and like any solar plant, storing it for use during dark hours or cloudy days.

James W, it's certainly a novel idea to blame the environmental and green movements for our dependence on foreign oil and the oil companies. But just because it's one possible explanation for events I don't necessarily think it's true so I'd have to see some facts first.

I suppose they could use that electricity to produce hydrogen and then turn that into a liquid for transport to the EU or something similar since the power loss along lines that long would be tremendous. They could also grow the strain of algae that directly produces ethanol in the desert if they used a sealed tank so the water didn't evaporate. The more sunlight the algae receives the more ethanol it will produce so it would be a good way to utilize many undeveloped and mostly uninhabitable parts of the world.

Answer 6

Excellent idea if it's reliable. It would need good security though. I can see it being attacked left right and centre by people who stand to lose out e.g oil companies etc.

Answer 7

Bohemian_garnet_permaculturist completely stole my thunder with her excellent answer.  The only thing I would add is also the distance of the Sahara from Europe.  

There is always some loss of energy through the travel through transmission lines.  The amount of energy that you lose is dependent on distance (longer distance means more energy loss).  So the big question is what route would the EU take from the site, and how would they mitigate the energy loss.

Answer 8

its a great idea!

its not as if we can use the desert for anything else, since it's too hot and dry for people to live in!