Crazy Generator & Solar Questions

You know with the current trend in alternative fuels on the
rise - Are you completely off grid guys considering running a
Diesel Backup Generator off of cooking oil? If they can do it with cars
Surely a backup Generator hooked into this stuff or Bio-Diesel should
provide an attractive and cheap fuel source.
Also, with all the innovations happening with these concentrated solar panels
is there any benefit to waiting on some of these products to come to market.
They promise more effective and less expensive but when? In 5-10 years or 6mos -2 years?
I am just curious as I would like to integrate solar into a new house project but I don;t want to spend thousands of dollars to have more effective products come to market at half the cost.
Thanks in advance.

I wonder if biodiesel/cooking oil fuel can sit a long time in a very seldom used generator and still work.

I have read about this looming breakthrough in photovoltaic technology that will be much cheaper to produce and more efficient than the systems currently available on the market. Call me a cynic, but if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. For one thing, if the technology is patented (as it inevitably will be), it means that there will be just one source for this technology, which inevitably means that pricing will not be as low as it could be in a marketplace with competition. And even if the MANUFACTURING costs are much lower, the savings may or may not be passed along to the consumer. And considering that the costs of other energy sources such as fossil fuel, natural gas and even bio-fuel are sky high, solar energy producers have every incentive to charge top dollar. Energy is energy. Another thing to keep in mind is that IF solar voltaic technology does go way down in price, the existing incentives/subsidies paid to homeowners by many utility companies may be drastically reduced or eliminated, which means that, either way, you end up paying the same amount of money for the same amount of electricity produced.

If I were you, I would look into the availability of incentives currently offered by your electric company and then assess whether the net cost justifies your desire to generate green, sustainable power. Rather than wait for ____ months/years for this new technology to hit prime time, I would take advantage of any incentives while I had the chance. If there are no incentives offered, only then would it make sense to sit on the sidelines. Sure, this means having to be connected to the grid, but I think it is a cleaner alternative to running generators or losing electricity in batteries.

Here is a link to a great home generator story:

http://www.f1-rocketboy.com/lister.html

This fellow bought an old-tech lister diesel engine generator which could be run on bio-diesel. He has the step by step process of how he set it up. Not for the feint at heart, but doable.

Guardian makes a line of Home Standby Generators (available at Home Depot and elsewhere) that are powered by LP or Natural Gas
http://www.guardiangenerators.com/products/guardian.asp?NavID=1