Only 100 square miles of solar panels are required to power the entire United States

If you wanted to power the entire United States with solar panels, it would take a fairly small corner of Nevada or Texas or Utah; you only need about 100 miles by 100 miles of solar panels to power the entire United States,

The batteries you need to store the energy, so you have 24/7 power, is 1 mile by 1 mile. One square-mile.

It’s a little square on the U.S. map, and then there’s a little pixel inside there, and that’s the size of the battery park that you need to support that. Real tiny.

How many solar panels to power the usa


If this were spread over the United States connected by a power grid, sounds doable and not very intrusive, the panels also being on top of building roofs.. What we waiting for?

a reply to: nOraKat

The liminting factor you are missing here is that the USA is powered by the petrodollar. Hence the wars on oil nations or those that want to scrub carbon from the air.

originally posted by: nOraKat
If this were spread over the United States connected by a power grid, sounds doable and not very intrusive, the panels also being on top of building roofs.. What we waiting for?

Sounds simple, but 100 square miles is an awful lot of land. Plus it'll be very intrusive for those places which get carpeted.

I am a fan of renewable energy, but there has to be balance, including a mixed approach and sensitivity when it comes to environmental destruction, as in vast solar farms. Well placed off-shore wind and wave is also a good bet.

To add that off-shore wind in the UK already accounts for 10% of electricity generation. That may be due to the amount of wiind being produced by politicians at the moment in the UK (if you know what I mean), but that's another story, eh?

Say a 3ft by 4ft panel is $1000, the panels alone would be near $25 Trillion. Land, labor and infrastructure probably close to that, so $50 Trillion... When you think of the Trillions lost in government creative bookkeeping .... It is probably affordable.

During the day maybe.

I don’t think it is economically feasible, or right out impossible, to create a battery that could power all manufacturing during the night.

Batteries can’t solve the world’s biggest energy-storage problem. One startup has a solution.

qz.com...

It Is Surprisingly Hard to Store EnergY

www.gatesnotes.com...

When you hear about this problem with wind and solar, it is tempting to ask: Can’t we generate extra energy on days when the sun and wind are strong, and store it for those days when they’re not?
Here’s the problem: Storing energy turns out to be surprisingly hard and expensive.

Case using two facilities I have worked at. One facility used 15kv motor that drew 900 amps. The second facility used a 460v motor that drew 800 amps. I would like to see the battery that could power those motors through a long winter’s night. Much less the solar power array that could charge such a battery on a short overcast winter’s day.

a reply to: nOraKat

So...say we did this. I can imagine clouds on top of clouds on top of clouds mysteriously appearing and the US Government having "no explanation" for these weather patterns.

Solar panels, wind farms, hydro-electric, nuclear electric and all other non carbon based plants should be overlapped and create a unified power system. To count 100% on any single source is madness. I personally believe that micro nuclear plants can be combined with solar and wind farms to generate power in pretty much all weather and do it safely.

Are there any "numbers", to back up Musk's claim?

You know, like total US electric usage vs real output per sq ft?

You know, like amp hour storage capacity of the battery bank required?

You know, like energy loss, through dc/ac conversion, and transmission over such distances as Nevada to NY?

Actual costs of infrastructure requirements, and upgrades?

I have done extensive work with small solar systems (up to, and above 20 Kw), and I dont buy his assertions, as anything even approaching reality.

I love clean solar, and think it will provide great benifit at some point in the future, but the tech is nowhere near that point now, or in the near future.

Musk has a history of making bold statements to get investors, then falling way short on producing.

That's fine, as he does do bleeding edge research, but make no mistake, dispite popular myth, he doesn't use his own money, and it sounds like he's lobbying for even more tax payer $, while promoting his new solar panel division.

In other words, get back to me when you can show me how it works, both mathematically, and financially.

originally posted by: nOraKat

If you wanted to power the entire United States with solar panels, it would take a fairly small corner of Nevada or Texas or Utah; you only need about 100 miles by 100 miles of solar panels to power the entire United States,

The batteries you need to store the energy, so you have 24/7 power, is 1 mile by 1 mile. One square-mile.

It’s a little square on the U.S. map, and then there’s a little pixel inside there, and that’s the size of the battery park that you need to support that. Real tiny.

How many solar panels to power the usa


If this were spread over the United States connected by a power grid, sounds doable and not very intrusive, the panels also being on top of building roofs.. What we waiting for?

100 miles x 100 miles is 10,000 square miles........so a bit bigger slice of Nebraska than mentioned.

originally posted by: charlyv
Say a 3ft by 4ft panel is $1000, the panels alone would be near $25 Trillion. Land, labor and infrastructure probably close to that, so $50 Trillion... When you think of the Trillions lost in government creative bookkeeping .... It is probably affordable.

Yea.. fix corruption and take away the pointless oil wars, and we have our funding...

a reply to: nOraKat

I don't even need to read the article to know that everything stated in it is wrong.

No, 100 sq/m of solar panels CANNOT power the US.

a reply to: nOraKat

Nikolai Tesla wanted to give virtually limitless free energy to the entire world and in all likelihood he would have succeeded with the claim some so called modern expert's make that he did not know what he was doing being the real myth were that is concerned but JP Morgan withdrew funding once they realized what he was up to, he also invented the flying saucer that would have required his wardenclyffe tower to power it since it was designed to use external power.

Guess whom has that technology - that's right the Elite and were did they steal it from a man whom wanted to gift it to the entire world.

There is more than sufficient geothermal energy the entire world over to power a civilization far larger than our's indefinitely but they once again make claim's that it is too difficult to drill that deep when in fact they really do not have to go all that deep at all, tell them there is oil and they have no problem because they can sell that carcinogenic crap to you.

Wave energy, Salters duck and other suppressed invention's.
hubpages.com...


Free Energy mean's energy to grow food in vast hydroponic facility's, energy to power all manner of gadgets and inventions that would make life easier and liberate people and allow the population to grow exponentially.

Humanity would not become extinct and we would not over exploit our planet with free energy.

But the elite could not then control you.

So they use SCARE tactic's, children bad, limit your population, not enough energy, no room, not enough food etc and of course Global Warming - which is mostly down to them selling you oil and which free energy does not cause.

Humanity should now be among the stars, should have colonized the moon and mars and even perhaps Titan and gone beyond our own solar system, have mining colonies in the asteroid belt.

But then they could not control you, they could not play king's when in fact they are paupers moral and factual greedy little paupers whom have impoverished you and everyone else so that they can still hold onto all the cake for themselves with hatred of you that you have never earned - because they fear not being in control.

Are these elite us or could they actually be servant of or in actuality an alien species keeping us down, keeping us in chain's, keeping us in serfdom.

If they are human's then the human race is a very diseased and insane sentient species set on a self destructive path toward it's own annihilation at the hands of those it has let seize control of it's destiny.

There would certainly need to be a TAX for that...... you know to compensate lizards or weed fauna or interruption of evaporation. I'm sure you could get Al Gore to run it, and AOC treasurer ......

Let the nuclear power stations energize the U.S instead of making bombs, it is almost free, low cost maintenance and pollutions free (compare to other available sources).

originally posted by: paraphi

originally posted by: nOraKat
If this were spread over the United States connected by a power grid, sounds doable and not very intrusive, the panels also being on top of building roofs.. What we waiting for?

Sounds simple, but 100 square miles is an awful lot of land. Plus it'll be very intrusive for those places which get carpeted.

No, I disagree vehemently. The USA is 3,119,884.69 square miles -

As of the 2010 census, the United States consists of 11,078,300 Census Blocks. Of them, 4,871,270 blocks totaling 4.61 million square kilometers were reported to have no population living inside them. Despite having a population of more than 310 million people, 47 percent of the USA remains unoccupied.

I agree that multiple sources are a good idea with the exception any more messing with the water. We need to leave all water sources alone. The vacant dessert areas have ample space to use without compromising the environment.

Think of all the minig we would have to do to build enough batteries...and all that silicone that needs to be used in 10000 miles of solar panels.

Way to protect the environment.

a reply to: LABTECH767

here is more than sufficient geothermal energy the entire world

Once you get your facility running, let me know. I would like to have that “free” power. You’ll run the extension cord to my house for free too?

Nikolai Tesla wanted to give virtually limitless free energy to the entire world

Ok? So what process and fuel had the power density?

Are you one of those people that think an armored Brinks truck can go 1000 miles off one gallon of gasoline if it just had the right carburetor/ injection system? When there is not enough energy in one gallon of gas to power the truck’s engine for a 1000 miles at highway speed.

The energy that goes in hast to match the energy out. Or the energy out and energy waste can only match the energy stored. Unless you are suggesting Nikolai Tesla was using nuclear reactions.

originally posted by: theatreboy
Think of all the minig we would have to do to build enough batteries...and all that silicone that needs to be used in 10000 miles of solar panels.

Way to protect the environment.

Environmentalists don’t do details. It’s about feel good policies, not reality....

There are areas of the country that aren’t going to be able to use solar because of weather and other factors. It’s a nice theoretical idea, but ultimately a no go.

a reply to: neutronflux

I would seriously suggest you do some research into geothermal temperature gradient's.
Also and I am being serious here remember Free Energy is not Energy from nothing there is no violation of the law's of conservation of energy so if you thought that was what I was suggesting then I would kindly ask you to get that idea gone.
Remember how intelligent and how much his detractors set about to destroy him including some of the supposed greatest mind's of the period.
In MY humble opinion Tesla was far more intelligent than Einstein.

(of note to this next video Tesla automobiles and Elon Musk have absolutely NOTHING to do with Nikolai Tesla but this is still very intriguing, could this be a transmitter to power Black Budget Tesla based technology's for flight while other's would have been hidden inside radar dome's to hide there existence)

And so much more.

They stole his idea's and did not even give him credit.


Let's not get into other potential energy sources such as subatomic quantum oscillation energy which we would need something like a quantum diode to harvest - you know zero point energy it is not fake we just can't access it yet - at least as far as we know.

a reply to: nOraKat

If it is feasible then go for it!

Sounds great!

Just don't raise my taxes, 'kay?