Chinese "Sun Dial" is the World's Largest Solar-Powered Office Building

Masdar city--22 billion square feet!? and energy positive? Crazy.

The solar powered building in Masdar City at 1.4 million square feet and $22 billion seems extremely pricey. That's over $15,000 a square foot just for construction. I think $22 billion is the cost of the entire Masdar City project and the solar powered building itself is $300 million of it.

China should start spending there own money on projects for the rich instead of having other countries pay for it.

USA should play catchup and build The World's Largest Solar Powered prison facility =)).

What do you mean catch-up? Where are all the highways/paved roads in China? Did I miss something? When did the US fall behind China?

And China is still considered a developing nation?? What the Hell is America considered with its low grade fossil technology? America should get its head out of the WAR bank vault and spend that war money on catching up to the rest of the world's advanced technologies. Oslo already has 4G communications and we are barely into 1G. The Bush war administration really got this country dumbed down to a third-world status. Great going, you stupid war mongering bastard.

I still cannot figure out why desert areas are used and developed into Solar farms

www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFvWgAAgOO0

@laurenra7. a fine editorial eye you have. indeed, the development is $22 billion overall, not the building alone.

@JamesDavis

My apologies but you are aware that 1G means first generation as in first generation analog cellular technology from the seventies, and eighties.... I believe you mean we are just barely obtaining 4G as in fourth generation technology...even so we have still had 3G access for about 10 years now. That and finally last time I checked cellular technology is not government controlled so I don't understand your erroneous blame on Bush. Im not saying I supported the guy just he is not to blame for this.

This is a great step forward for China, I would like to see the US follow suit. I remember an article from pop-sci a few months ago in regards to highway windmills sidewalks that generate electricity from the energy of walking wave farms and the such.

lol political talk rofl

it looks like the solar panel buildings in appleseed

@ James

You should also take note that China has only a few places where G3 can be obtained, where in the us G3 is in pretty wide usage, even in the country. If you go to farm areas in China you would have to use a satellite phone in order to get coverage.

Actually Justin, there is government regulation in cellular development. However, it is mostly for the benefit of advancement, not as James suggests. Example. With the Sprint-Nextel merger the FCC and DoJ set conditions requiring new wireless technologies be deployed within a certain time frame. I will agree that the US wireless infrastructure is moving along just fine. Granted, it's profit driven, but money makes the world go 'round.

O ya. How can you spend that much money on a sun dial that doesn't work?

thanks great pst

Solar cells do not and have never produced more energy than it took to create them. I wish someone would talk to real engineers that work at PV production companies. They seem to know that creating PV cells takes a lot of energy. More than will ever be produced by the cells. Places that have hydroelectric are good places to put PV plants but energy was needed to obtain all the raw materials (fossil fuels). Energy is only being transferred by using PV cells.

There is always a down side to building such a large space. I cannot imagine the production costs and the energy used to build this amazing piece of architecture. Is it sustainable and worthwhile this will remain to be seen? The technology is current, but as with everything humans produce, we abuse it and often cause the redundancy that in turn promotes further exploration and research for improved materials.

www.appliedworkplace.co.uk