Day 47: Solar Grid

2026-03-25

Hello!

I like lines. I like leading lines, whether they're leading you to a lamp or down a railroad. I like perpendicular lines, like that dine in restaurant that I obsessed about for a little too long (did that article make sense? I fear I might have lost everyone with that ramble).

I also like solar power. So this photo rocks.

This wall of solar panels was placed on a field in a university campus. It accompanies a bunch of solar panels on the roof of a building, and I wanted to know how much of their electricity could be supplied from solar panels. Pennsylvania is far from the sunniest state in the nation, but I've seen people with solar panels for their personal home, so it can't be that unreasonable to try calculating.

Now, I was going to pull out the calculator and get some tools to estimate how big the solar panels would be, how much energy you could collect for that size per hour of sun, how many hours of sun that area would get, and do a bunch of number crunching.

Or I could look it up (lol). The solar panels in the picture generate "11,000 kWh of electricity annually". A residential house uses more than that amount, but they also might have more ideal solar panel arrangements, so as long as you keep some batteries, I'd imagine you could live on solar entirely so long as you're careful about your energy usage.

Of course, the university campus isn't a residential house, so they have a bunch of solar panels on the roof and elsewhere, too. But this was an interesting thought experiment on solar panels and energy usage. When I took this photo, I was thinking of the YouTube arguments for and against rooftop solar. Regardless, the upfront costs are way too high for me, even if they would save in the long run.

But, as a technology, solar power is really interesting. My mate has these small solar-powered lights to illuminate sidewalks, which makes it way easier to plant in the ground. No wires to hook up to an outlet! Just stick 'em in the ground and they charge during the day, light during the night. As spring weather approaches, I'm remembering the solar-powered water fountains that I wanted to buy last year for my backyard garden, before I was reminded how little sunshine actually hits my garden during the day.

Finally, the sport of basketball has turned up something interesting. Bam Adebayo scored a historic 83 points in an NBA game this March, and while it's not part of the March Madness games, it's still basketball and it was still amazing to watch.

Cheers,
David