Does anybody can point me toward good sources about costs of maintaining those solar / wind / hydro installations ? I'm thinking about the solar panels, which I always thought have a limited lifetime (apparently it's getting much better). Is this viable in the long term ?
For solar panels in particular, the answer is more or less shrug; for current common types estimates range from 25 to 50 years before efficiency drops off significantly, but obviously the technology was rather different 25 years ago so there’s no example of a modern-type solar panel that has worked for 25 years. Domestic panels often have a 25 year warranty.
Of course, _useful_ lifetime may be a different thing. If you have limited space for panels, and in ten years efficiencies have doubled (current panels that you can actually buy are in the 20% range; current lab record is 47% for exotic types, so this at least seems _plausible_), then it may be more economical to just replace them early.
Also most solar pv manufacturers warrant their panels at 90% for 25 years. I don't know if you consider that limited but to me that sounds pretty good.
Solar has a limited economic lifetime but it is in terms of centuries, not years. Panels just don't degrade that quickly in practice, and even when they do degrade at higher rates than expected, it's irrelevant to the economics of the projects. You'll be hard-pressed to find a large-scale solar power station that has been retired, even among the oldest of them.
So, this is what I don't get. If this stuff is install once, profit for 25-50 years, how is it possible that electricity in Portugal is so expensive ?
Something doesn't add up here.
I don’t know but I do know the answer for California. The answer is: as distributed solar and battery power proliferate, normalizing the price of electricity per kWh makes less and less sense because increasingly what you are paying for is not energy but intangible grid stability. Until finally you’re not drawing any current from the grid and your utility charge is infinity per kWh.
Does anybody can point me toward good sources about costs of maintaining those solar / wind / hydro installations ? I'm thinking about the solar panels, which I always thought have a limited lifetime (apparently it's getting much better). Is this viable in the long term ?