Will Solar Photovoltaics Become Grid Competitive?

Efficiency is the main culprit. Would you spend money on a solar system for your house that has a 20 year (or more) payback. Until the solar cell efficiency is increased, these will continue to be a money hole for tax dollars in the name of "green".

What advances in solar cell technology could make solar photovoltaics grid competitive?

When they can make power in the dark.

The hazard of a rush to mandated PV resulting in having to shut down power generation during the day and start them back up at night is going to result in serious problems.

The issue with solar is, and will continue to be, storage capability. Efficiency issues pale in contrast. Recent solar installation (remote radio relay site)- $200 for the panel, $650 for the battery, $350 for the electronics. Talking about the efficiency of the panels is a smoke screen to keep people from recognizing the real problem here.

Using solar cells to charge batteries is in my opinion on par with using electricity to make hydrogen to run a car.

The ONLY way solar currently makes sense is to install local (rooftop) systems in a grid tie design. No batteries are needed. While this means the grid is still required, we don't end up with an infinite number of batteries in our landfills. With prices falling below $1.00 per watt, a DIY system is close to doable.

Solyndra is irrelevant in a sense, that stupidity, graft, and enabling of the same explains most. On the other hand, it does great damage, by showing how not to reach for success.

Efficiency of the equipment? Did not change materially in generations, except switching power supplies.

Just because Solyndra went down the toilet doesn't mean all is lost (well, I guess $500,000,000 of our money has been pi$$ed down the drain by Obama and inept cronies). Our little buddy in the White House just decided a couple of days ago to "invest" another $500+ million dollars in, I think it was 2, other solar companies. So, all is not lost. We have the best people money can buy working on it. They may not know anything about solar technology, but they sure know how to spend someone else's money.

The research for new fields of energy should come from the private sector, not the government. It isn't the governments job to be involved in those things (check the Constitution).

When there are viable products the free enterprise system works great and the people who have invested their time, money and effort will make money. There aren't any guarantees that any venture will bring about the desired result of profit but that is part of the challenge of business. The government should just help set the environment where everyone can compete on the same level without a lot of interference from the government.

I live in the Phoenix area, and solar power is available nearly every day of the year (infrared always gets through the clouds). I think that a "local" grid approach could work, even with today's collector efficiencies. If every home in a given neighborhood had solar panels that could furnish more than they need for daily use, then the excess could be sent to a large capacitor (building sized) to be used at night (a city in Texas already uses such a capacitor to avoid frequent power loss from the grid).

These small grids could even be connected to each other to provide city-wide grids. This could minimize the need for the very lossy power lines that are strung all over the world today in order to bring power from huge generators that are up to 200 miles away.

While I am not convinced that solar will live up to your expectations, I do tend to favor localized grids for power distribution- smaller generating facilities, adaptable to local conditions/environment, more responsive to local needs, etc., less susceptible to large-area blackouts. There are, of course, down sides to smaller grids (i.e., probably higher costs), but I think there are significant advantages, as well (based on working with a number of isolated local power generating systems). Toshiba is even working on the licensing stage for a small nuclear plant for a remote village in Alaska that shows promise (if only the government would get out of the way...)

While large capacitors are interesting, the one to balance a large city or county is the water storage at a mountain top. I visited one in New Mexico, and its overall efficiency was impressive. Having a steady baseload + pumping water up / letting down to generate variable power, a load balancing can largely be achieved.

There is a prime example, to discuss the propping up problem on a different example:

GM Volt moves to china

The competition buys a 1% nominal share in the ioint venture, and gets - as it is customary there - a full technology transfer. Good move from them. Now, how does that looks from here?!? Taxpayers paid $o,5billion to prop it up (with dismal sales). Now, instead declaring default, after spending taxpayer's money, they rather take it to the competition.

What would you call that, in plain language?

Solar panels might be most useful for supplying power to cool buildings.