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48 comments on The word is slowly spreading that we have have a problem

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Engineer-Poet on November 29, 2005 - 9:20pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Warranties on panels are running 25 years, and that's just a guarantee that they'll retain a certain percentage (80%?) of rated power after that time.  They'll probably produce useful output for much, much longer.
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GreyZone on December 1, 2005 - 2:52pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
I wish I still had the link but I believe that the very first solar cells are still producing power at about 50% of original capacity more than 50 years later. It would be interesting to plot loss of rated power over time and see if it's linear or a curve. If on a curve, those things might produce 30%-50% of original rated power for a century or more, but I don't know anywhere to find such data.
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LevinK on December 1, 2005 - 4:06pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Would it be possible to recycle PV? It could be a much better deal in terms of energy payback.
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