That strikes me as just fine.

Maybe it would be reasonable to ask them to add a small section as a memorial to those who fought and died to free France and perhaps those people could be honored by future research done in their name, since such a research station only exists built by the French because of it.

So sure, go ahead... dedicate the building to the allied soldiers, it would be a nice tribute.

What a great way to slap the face of the Nazi's by building our future on top of their evil. You could use it as a learning opportunity for all future students. You could put a memorial to the whole thing right in the center of the common grounds of the university. Millions of students over the years would have direct contact with it and be forced to see it on a regular basis, rather than once in a lifetime on a field trip during high school.

That's fine, all of Earth is one big nature preserve... Perhaps 25% of all the profit from the mining could be used to double the size of the preserve and establish a fund to return the land to better condition when they are done.

You could, but it would be pointless, there is perfectly good land half a mile over that works as well, and no one is asking to do that.

Yep, and it stores a WHOLE 39 MW... that is nice, but it is noise in the grand scheme of things.

That hill is also taller than anything within 500 miles of where I live.

A "few meters"? Really? It is 128 meters higher... That isn't a "few meters", that is a lot!

That is 300 meters difference in height. As I said, there is a LOT of elevation changes in Germany. I'd have to travel a thousand miles to find a hill that high here.

So for 155 million euros, power is provided for 1600 homes...

That is a TERRIBLE investment...

There are about 5 MILLION homes in the Dallas, TX area...

This is all a nice idea, but you really are off by 3 orders of magnitude in what would be required to provide such power storage for a large number of people.

In Texas, we're slowly shutting down coal and it is largely being replaced by natural gas. That being said, we're the largest state for wind power in the US, so we're doing a decent amount of that too.

Wind is much cheaper than solar, but of course it kills a lot of birds, so go figure. No free lunch. :(

Not quite that simple. I have 5 people who live in my home, that uses far more energy than a single person in a small flat would. Also, my ceilings are more than 20 feet tall in the main rooms, that makes my heating/cooling bills much higher than yours (unless you also have two story rooms). My family room, living room, dining room, front entrance, and hallway are all two stories. In addition, it is open concept, so the upstairs kids playroom is open to the house below as is the upstairs hallway, so keeping warm air down low and cold air up high is nearly impossible, forcing additional heating a cooling that a more closed house would not require.

Now you could argue that is bad design, but my point is simply that sqm alone or how many kitchens a home has doesn't indicate the power bill.

Or you could be wrong and it is much higher. :)

Far more American's likely have fully AC homes than Europeans, for example. We have more food at lower prices, we have more cars, we have more gadgets...

I suppose it depends on what you consider to be a higher standard of living. If it is "who has the most stuff", then Americans win by a landslide.

Yes, you do... your reading comprehension is terrible.

Go back and reread what I wrote, you really, really misunderstood like all of it...

Isn't that what the game streaming services for the PS4 and XB1 are supposed to be doing?

Actually, it is rather smart... You could provide far more GPU power for less money, if everyone had enough bandwith... Same with CPU power...

Frankly, my internet connection is faster than my USB 2.0 memory sticks, which tend to read and write at about 10mb/s, while my internet is 18mb/s. When it comes to moving files around the house, my wired gigabit ethernet connection is FAR faster than copying stuff to USB and moving it by hand.

If I went with AT&T's new GigaFiber service, the same would be true there as well, assuming the speed is as stable as FIOS has been.

^ That too...

My Mom's upload speed is terrible, but she is on Carbonite and while it took a long time to upload the first time, it finally got uploaded (she had no backups before then).

She takes a lot of digital pictures, now they are also backed up to the cloud.

She also has a link to a folder on my wife's OneDrive that has our family pictures, she (and my wife's Mom) can go online and view them any time they want.

Backup has become cheap, $60 a year or so, $5 a month. A lot of people currently don't backup, but that will change as people lose their files and pictures and learn their lesson. I know it happened to me. :(

It probably works if 10% of the customers install it. It probably doesn't if 100% install it.

That being said, with such a system, why do you need a grid tie?

The interesting part of this becomes... put enough solar on your roof and put a half dozen of these in your garage... and be free of the power company...

A year ago I would have thought such an idea was further off, 10-20 years... now it appears it could be done this year.

I'll admit, I'm impressed...

All true, but if no one is an early adopter, then it will never happen. :)

I'm probably one of the people who SHOULD be doing it, being in the upper brackets of income...

Actually, from a "technical" point of view, I agree with you. Most of the driving cases are already covered by EVs. Even those like the Leaf.

My point is that people by and large don't make car purchasing decisions based on the technical data, they buy emotionally.

You need EVs that are WAY beyond what most people "need" before they'll "want" them.

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That being said, I just noticed that Tesla a few weeks ago upgraded their base car from a 60kwh to a 70kwh and made some other changes, it is now four wheel drive for example.

Looking at the base model, which is no longer quite so bare... the purchase price and lease cost is no longer as crazy as it once was.

I don't want a "car", so it really isn't of interest to me... but if it were in the shape of a SUV, I might be more interested. Yes, I saw the Model X, it is probably too small for me.

As I sit here at my computer looking at my Yukon XL parked out front, it seems to me that if you remove the big 6.2L V8 engine, the transmission, the differental, and all the other parts needed to make a gas car work, you could put the motors from the P85 version of the Tesla on there and get about the same, if not better performance. The battery wouldn't be good for as much range, maybe down to 150-170 miles, but that would be enough most of the time.

How much would it cost? How much of the price of my truck is the engine and gas parts and how much is the sheet metal, interior, etc? I honestly don't know.

I paid $73,000 for my truck last year, it is fully loaded with everything you could want. Would I pay "more" to get an EV version? Meh, I don't want to, but if we had supercharger stations and places to plug in everywhere, I might consider it.

If you look at Dallas:

http://www.teslamotors.com/fin...

The only real place to charge would be at home. However 150 miles of range would be plenty for driving around town. I-20 and I-30 don't have superchargers, so frankly it doesn't work here yet, but I imagine they'll get them at some point.

Frankly, I don't understand why gas stations don't install them, I would pay for power, I don't expect it for free. And a 15-20 min recharge time gives me a reason to go inside and eat something.

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So to sum it up, if the cost was similar, if the range was 150+ miles, and if you could put the Tesla EV tech into my Yukon, I might become interested...

That is a lot of "ifs", to be sure. But it is quite possible that in 20 years, it will be a no-brainer.

Well that is California, what do you expect? :)

http://www.dovetailsolar.com/S...

Average of $3.77 per watt for residential systems, as low as $2.50 for large commercial installations.

California is paying stupid prices.

http://www.dovetailsolar.com/g...

Today, for right now, at the 720p or crappy 1080p they are streaming...

What about 4k? Give it 5 years, that'll be more common..

We have 3 large TVs in the house, it is not uncommon that the adults are watching something on one and the kids on another. Sometimes two of the kids are on one TV and the third kid is on the iPad watching something.

So 3 HD streams.

Then we have about.... 20 some odd devices that like to auto-update... Say the PC or PS4 or whatever wants to download something while we're watching TV?

25 meg would do it, barely, with no headroom, but 10? Not even close.

I think there are a lot of homes today that would go to streaming, if they had 25 meg, but at 3, 6, or 10 meg? It isn't enough for multiple streams.

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Don't get me wrong, I understand what you're saying, and yes universal 10/10 next year is probably better than universal 25/25 in 5 years. But I'd suggest both are crap.

We rolled out national telephone lines a very long time ago and provided for universal service.

We now have good quality fiber, there is no reason to do any of this slow stuff, be prepared for the entire next century and roll out gigabit to everyone in the country.

Lack of access to technology and the Internet will only hurt America going forward.

Except, of course, my local co-op provides both my power and my natural gas, so I can't ditch them even if I wanted to.

Actually, I don't know if they would sell me JUST natural gas, I've never looked into it. Since they are a co-op, they might, I really don't know.

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As a side note, I've always viewed natural gas as superior to electricity due to the lower cost. My natural gas dryer, cooktop, HVAC, etc. use less... well, money, than electric versions would.

But they burn fossil fuel, which won't last forever.

So the question becomes, at what point do we switch from gas to electric? I'll miss my "instant on" cooktop. :(

Sadly I'd have to agree with you...

For some reason, many large businesses would rather hold on to dear life to their old business models rather than embrace a new idea.

Yes, that thought occurred to me as well.

Question, are those HVAC units updated to efficient models? I was rather impressed at how much power my new HVAC saved over my old one.

My compressor went out and I considered having it repaired, but it was about 1/3 the cost of replacing it and it was a 10 year old 13 SEER unit. My new unit is a 16 SEER two stage, two speed unit and my power bill went down an average of $100 a month. It will pay for itself in about 7 years, making it largely free in my mind. (the finance cost is a bit more than the monthly savings, but it has a 10 year parts and labor warranty and should last longer since it isn't a builder's grade unit).

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I just wish I could install solar that would pay for itself in 7 years. If I could, I'd do it tomorrow. :(

HECO is nothing like a "free market", since I can't go install a competing power company, now can I?

I am one of those "gas guzzler drivers". I love my big truck...

Last night I watched a Head 2 Head video from MotorTrend

https://youtu.be/RWQ-dnpplaA

Pitting a Tesla P85D against a Dodge Charge Hellcat...

I have to admit, the Tesla looked like fun. It isn't a sports car, but it wasn't meant to be one, but it sure seemed to have some fun driving experiences...

I think one of my objections to EVs is that they are all cars or little mini CUVs.

If Tesla could make a Suburban an EV that was fun to drive and cost about what current Suburban's cost, I might consider one.

I wouldn't have said that a year ago. So EVs are warming up to me... except for their cost...

The P85D in that video is $132K! That is nuts. As he says in the video, if you own both cars for 20 YEARS, you're still $1,000 ahead in total cost driving to the Dodge and buying gas as compared to the Tesla. (Maintenance might be closer than you think, the Dodge's engine should still be good in 20 years, the Tesla will need a new battery pack for $35k in that time)

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So Elon, get on it, make me a full size EV SUV for $75K with a 250 mile range! :)