The three things that irritated me:
Pete
Jessie
Pete-n-Jessie

Can we just kill both of them already?
the fight scene at the end was well played, but I'm over the love triangle drama.

 

For a storyline that was important enough to bring this far towards the finally, the characters weren't developed well enough for me to care about either of them

 

Ok, I did this really quick, so I'll come back and check for math errors, but I think it gives us a rough idea of what their life should be:

Solar panels have varying efficiencies, and even a panel advertized as 100W may have an output less than that, but we'll say these panels are putting out 100W of power per panel, and there are 20 of them per solar array, 6 solar arrays.

So, 120 panels X 100W is 12,000W of power per hour. These are not rotating panels. Even better angled panels can't usually hope for more than 4 to 5 hours of solar input per day, on average. So we'll say these panels get about 4 hours per day of usuable sunlight.

So, that's 12,000W X 4 hours per day, so 48,000Wh per day.

Or 48kWh per day we have to work with total.

With our group, plus named characters, plus total unnamed redshirts, we have about 50 people living here that we've seen for far. So, lets say, 12 houses, plus 8 apartments in the brownstone...that's 20 'homes'.

Now, of course, we haven't seen every home, so we kind of just have to a reasonable estimate of what they are portraying this people as doing. And these are rough estimates, just to give us an idea. From what I've seen, they are giving us the picture that each person is living a relatively normal energy life: taking daily showers, lighting their homes, cooking meals [using ovens, stove tops, refrigerators], staying warm at night [this is late fall/winter in Virginia], the teenagers play video games, even using garage door openers, etc..

So if we start with the showers, lets say that each person agreed to limit their showers to luke warm showers of just THREE minutes per day. It takes about 1 kCal to raise one liter of water by 1 degree celcius. An average shower uses about 15 liters per minute, so 45 liters of water in a three minute shower. We'll assume the shower is 37 degrees celcius [which is actually a pretty cool shower, not comfortably warm like we usually take]. That means 45 liters of water raised 15 degrees from room temperture, so about 650kCal. Its about 1.2kWh per 1000kCal so about 0.75kWH would be used for a 3 minute luke warm shower.

If you have 50 people doing this daily, that's about 37kWh daily. So we've used 37 of our 48 kWh just in 3 minute luke warm showers.

Now light bulbs. If each home has just two 60W bulbs on for 4 hours total each day, that's about 0.5kWh per day, per home, so another 10kWh daily.

So, just with showers and very mild lighting we've used basically everything. That extra one Kwh we haven't used yet, just might power one refrigerator total in the safe zone, if they have an ultra efficient new refrigerator.

So we have nothing left over for stoves, and ovens, or heating any buildings at night, or video games, and only one person could have a refrigerator. And this is even assuming that everyone would follow the rules and only take three minute showers and use 2 light bulbs for a total of 4 hours.

And my shower math is actually under-estimated, because heating water heaters actually takes more than just the exact amount that comes out of the shower head.

 

Ok, but first what do you think they are protraying their energy use as? I have also attached pictures of a 100 watt panel and a300 watt panel.

 

I just posted it above. And most panels the size of the panels we are seeing are in the 100 to 120W range. You can also use the rule of thumb that you get about 8 to 10 watts per square foot of panel. If you measure these arrays on google earth, and use that rule, you get a number consistant with these being about 100W panels.

 

Nothing like a Trent Reznor ballad to soothe the senses in the evening.:Grin:

 

Lol, my wife wasn't familiar with the song, or NIN in general. She thought it was a song that Aiden made himself, because it sounded "homemade and rough." Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of this song, but I thought her reaction was funny. "Really, someone actually TRIED to make it sound like that?"

 

One thot I had about Noah being such a big deal and I cld be totally off- cause I agree, lots of talk about him but they've lost much more important people..
I think Sasha's losses are just starting to pile up, cause in the previous episodes we have seen flashbacks of tyreese as well as bob but she seems to be the only who is grieving. Maggie seems all better now, daryl- you never know.
Possi the reason Noah was mentioned so much this episode is cause of the way he died. I mean it wasn't lime he was just being careless, or didn't see the zombie that bit him in the arm while he reflected on some photographs. I would even dare to say that Nicholas pretty much murdered him, so maybe that's why the group is in such shock about it or thinking about him so much. They have to live w/these "weak" people that are now at least responsible for one death. I think maybe that's why they are questioning it maybe or even still talking about it... Also they have one injured cause of stupidity, Tara. So I think the whole experience in general has the group ruffled. Not so much because Noah was this great long lasting best friend character- but cause of the manner behind his death.

 

And also about the alarm clock- maybe I am weird or something but I have had the same alarm clock now for 15 years. My dad has one he still uses or at least in his bedroom that I can remember from my childhood so it had to from the early 80's. Guess my point is- when your alarm works and you trust it why go out and buy a new fancy one? I mean yeah a new fancy alarm wld be awesome that played my iPod or something- but I don't think its unusual to hold onto an alarm for years! But maybe I am weird.

 

Ok I'll argree with your acessment of power comsumption. But when you look at the panel it is a 60 cell panel and if you google 60 cell solar panel all the panels are rated on average around 250 watts.

 

The 60 sell solar panels that are in the 250W range are typically about 3.5 x 6.5 or 7 feet in size. These are smaller panels. Panels are average of 8 to 10 watts per square foot. I measure the square footage of each array on google earth. They are about 20 x 13 feet, something like that, so that's 260 square feet, divided in 20 panes. so 13 square feet per panel. 13 x 9W is 121. That's a rough calculation, so these are almost certainly 100W panels.

 

@Neuropyramidal is like a living Library, you won't always know what you're looking for but you'll definitely learn something even if it looks like gibberish at first. Honestly, who he f*ck can have a fully blown conversation about solar panels like that?

 

Ha! I bought one of these in the mid 70's with my paper route money. It was new technology because it was "digital", and allowed you to wake to music. It was a chore to spin through all the numbers to adjust for daylight savings time.

 

How do we know that the water heaters are electric?

 

Holy f***.

 

We don't for sure, but I think the idea of the community is that it could run on solar power if it had to, so it would stand to reason.

 

haha, don't be too impressed yet. I had to double check one or two of my facts with google before I made the post.

 

Why is everyone walking around with little snubnose 38s? Ever shoot one of those things? The safest place to be when someone shoots one is where ever the shooter was aiming. If you were playing Russian Roulette and it fired you'd probably miss your head.

 

Propane would be more likely. A quick google shows propane is also used in Virginia. Propane heaters last longer than electric and, on most of the propane sites, it says they are more efficient than electric ones. Which, since it's a "green" community I am guessing they would have went that route.

I am wondering if the houses have their own individual wells (like my unincorporated township does) or if they have a water tower? Because that can change just how cold the water is. Well water can chill beer to a decent drinking temp. Tower water barely gets cold. If you are running propane that won't mater much but with electric it would mean expending more wattage to go from delightfully thirst quenching to a tolerable shower.



(My boys never really got to play in sprinklers and the Slip-N_Slide was abandoned after one try... even in 90+F weather the water from the well was too cold. Kiddie pools would be filled either for a few days in advance just so they could warm up or we would run a hot water hose from the washer to the pool for a chance at maybe playing in the water that day.)