On Mar 16, 2006, at 2:45 PM, Jed Rothwell wrote:
It is a shame you cannot transmit electricity 2000 miles because if you could, we could establish a massive solar thermal plant in a 100 square mile area of the Southwest desert, and generate all the electricity we now consume. Or we could do the same trick with wind farms in North Dakota. Alas, it is impossible. Someday high temperature superconducting wires or hydrogen pipelines may allow electricity to be transmitted across the continent.
The Georgia coast seems like it should be a good place for solar chimmneys - assuming they can be built economically to handle category 5 hurricanes. The wind typically blows along the coast, which should give a solar chimney a significant boost.
Power transmission from the windy state of Texas should not be infeasible if done using HVDC lines. For example, see:
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm? PgNm=TCE&Params=M1ARTA0002566
Horace Heffner
