ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO HELP PROMOTE THOSE SOLAR PANELS?

     Some time ago, I posted a report that the manufacturing process to build the supposedly environmentally-friendly Toyota Prius produced a lot of pollution.  In response to that Post, greenies were most angered, pointing out the supposed fallacy in the study that highlighted the pollution.

     Well, here goes another pin to burst the bubble:  China has become a major player in the production of solar panels; however, the production process reportedly produces lethal hazardous waste.  No less than that liberal icon, The Washington Post, reports this in a Sunday, march 9, 2008 story entitled "Solar Energy Firms Leave Waste Behind in China" (the firms are Chinese).  Excerpts:

GAOLONG, China -- The first time Li Gengxuan saw the dump trucks from the nearby factory pull into his village, he couldn't believe what happened. Stopping between the cornfields and the primary school playground, the workers dumped buckets of bubbling white liquid onto the ground. Then they turned around and drove right back through the gates of their compound without a word.

This ritual has been going on almost every day for nine months, Li and other villagers said.

In China, a country buckling with the breakneck pace of its industrial growth, such stories of environmental pollution are not uncommon. But the Luoyang Zhonggui High-Technology Co., here in the central plains of Henan Province near the Yellow River, stands out for one reason: It's a green energy company, producing polysilicon destined for solar energy panels sold around the world. But the byproduct of polysilicon production -- silicon tetrachloride -- is a highly toxic substance that poses environmental hazards.

"The land where you dump or bury it will be infertile. No grass or trees will grow in the place. . . . It is like dynamite -- it is poisonous, it is polluting. Human beings can never touch it," said Ren Bingyan, a professor at the School of Material Sciences at Hebei Industrial University.

     Other examples of trade-offs abound-for example, when under government mandate oil companies laced their gasoline with the additive MTBE to clean the air in California, an unintended consequence was to enhance difficult water pollution problems (because MTBE is very difficult to remediate).  In short, like everything else in life, "going green" produces its own unintended consequences.  "Going green" is an attractive platitude; but platitudes are not very helpful in evaluating real-world consequences of any given "green" technology.

Comments

[Online CLE]

This is not something you like to be hearing about a technology that was very promising. It seems like we are always switching one form of environmental harm for another. We can never get everything right, if that is even possible.

[Solar Future]

At least 89% of air pollution associated with electricity generation could be prevented if power from solar photovoltaics (PV) displaces convention sources of energy on the the grid. In addition, the PV industry follows a pro-active, long-term environmental strategy involving sa recycling and waste management to prevent environmental damage. For more information on the environmental sustainability of solar energy, please see the following link to a study by Brookhaven National Lab and the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL):

http://www.pv.bnl.gov/keystone.htm

and a recent Science News article about it:

http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20080301/fob5.asp

http://pubs.acs.org/cgi-bin/abstract.cgi/esthag/2008/42/i06/abs/es071763q.html

[Solar Future]

At least 89% of air pollution associated with electricity generation could be prevented if power from solar photovoltaics (PV) displaces convention sources of energy on the the grid. In addition, the PV industry follows a pro-active, long-term environmental strategy involving sa recycling and waste management to prevent environmental damage. For more information on the environmental sustainability of solar energy, please see the following link to a study by Brookhaven National Lab and the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL):

http://www.pv.bnl.gov/keystone.htm

and a recent Science News article about it:

http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20080301/fob5.asp

http://pubs.acs.org/cgi-bin/abstract.cgi/esthag/2008/42/i06/abs/es071763q.html

[Solar Future]

The 550 member companies of SEIA were outraged and disappointed by the reports of toxic chemical dumping by a factory in China ... this practice violates both our association's professional code of conduct and the very spirit of what we're trying to do as an industry. We are out to solve environmental problems, not create them... Solar energy is the most environmentally friendly energy technology that exists today… But manufacturing solar feedstocks, like any heavy industry, requires strong environmental safeguards. Polysilicon, the primary feedstock in most solar cells, has been produced in the U.S. and Europe for fifty years using the Siemens process in a clean, safe manner, in strict compliance with environmental law… Rhone Resch, president, Solar Energy Industries Association, Washington, D.C. See Rhone’s full statement: http://www.seia.org/solarnews.php?id=168.



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[Rich]

Here's something that is so easy and makes so much sense. Everyone will pretty much need to purchase cartridges so...I came across information through a business customer and looked further into it. Here is what I found, "
Over 700 million cartridges were thrown away world-wide in 2003 - and since more and more people use inkjet cartridges this amount will continue to grow year after year.
Empty cartridges contain residual toner powder, ink, a plastic casing, aluminum and other parts. These parts are all non-biodegradable and they will take more than 1000 years to decompose in landfill sites.
The remanufacturing of cartridges as an alternative to producing new ones currently reduces world demand of oil by 300,000 barrels and saves 17,000 tons of aluminum as well as 10,000,000 tons of timber. Besides helping to reduce carbon emissions, a major cause of global warming, it conserves resources and reduces waste.
1.5 pints of crude oil are needed to produce one cartridge. In the last 6 months alone inkjet cartridge recycling has saved more than 50 million liters of oil, more than the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989."
Wow, so my whole point is this client twotonellc.com remanufacturers ink and toner cartridges and considering the above information it only makes common sense to buy remanufactured ink and toner cartridges. You save money, get a higher yield (more prints) and save the environment.