[aerohead]

Oilpan brought up the issue of the amount of energy required to produce a PV panel vs how long,if at all,it would take for the panel to produce that amount of energy.
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*On 'Really Big Things',the program went inside Cardinal Glass Manufacturing,Winlock,Washington,USA.
*It's a 600,000 sq-ft facility which runs 24/7/365.
*They produce 600-tons of residential glass a day.
*Their glass furnace consumes $6-million worth of natural gas/year (in 2006 dollars).
*It's float-glass,which leaves the furnace and onto a pool of molten tin,where as it cools,is forced into the dimensions/thickness spec'd by the customer.
*Later,cold processed into the net dimensions.
*600-tons/day equates to on the order of 47,520 linear feet.
*If you break down the fuel cost,it works out at around 1.37-cents/pound of glass.
*And it looks like the natural gas is the major energy component for the glass.
*If we knew what the commercial-rate gas sold for in 2006 was,we could arrive at the amount,and energy content per pound.
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We'd also have to factor in some element of the energy to create the facility ,all its equipment,commuting energy of the employees,and energy to prospect for, mine,and transport the lime,soda ash, and sand which is batched together for the furnace,the electrical power in the factory,and then the truck/rail transportation from the Winlock warehouse to the receiving dock of the PV manufacturer.