User talk:Maxellus

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Hello, Maxellus, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful: I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your messages on discussion pages using four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question on this page and then place  before the question. Again, welcome! bodnotbod (talk) 09:32, 12 September 2011 (UTC)
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CdTe
You wrote "Despite the good performance, concerns over cadmium toxicity combined with low availability of Te have prevented wide spread adoption of this technology." The article says "At the present time, the price of the raw materials cadmium and tellurium are a negligible proportion of the cost of CdTe solar cells and other CdTe devices." Don't you see how these are contradictory?

Everyone who discusses the Te problem says that it might in the future prevent widespread adoption, although it's controversial. Nobody thinks that Te availability has already prevented widespread adoption, because "At the present time, the price of the raw materials cadmium and tellurium are a negligible proportion of the cost of CdTe solar cells and other CdTe devices." The idea is that eventually people might use up the tellurium and only then will the price spike up and kill the business.

For cadmium toxicity, your statement is that this is the primary reason that the technology has not become widespread. First Solar sold $2.5 billion of CdTe solar cells last year. If cadmium were not toxic, how much would they have sold? $25 billion?? $2.6 billion? I don't know. I don't think you know either! But the statement that you put in the article definitely implies that we know for sure that First Solar's revenue would be much much higher, maybe 10 times higher, if cadmium was not toxic. Since we don't know that for sure, you shouldn't say it! --Steve (talk) 13:02, 17 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your note. You don't seem to understand the difference between "availability" and "cost." Also, have you polled every single person who discusses the Te problem to confirm your statement above? Finally, I did not imply a connection between toxicity and the revenues of a single company. Thus, your statements are unclear and non-cogent. Maxellus (talk) 07:33, 18 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Since you added the statement to the article, you have the burden of proof that the statement is true. I just want to delete what you wrote, and I need no reference for that. See WP:V.
 * With almost no exceptions, a shortage of some raw material leads to less consumption of it through the mechanism of cost. The cost of the material goes up, therefore the cost of the products using it go up, therefore less of the products are made and purchased. This is one of the most basic concepts in economics: See supply and demand.
 * If you think people have already (as of 2011) chosen not to buy and produce CdTe solar cells because the Te will someday run out, even though Te is very cheap today, please tell me who has made that unusual decision and how you know. I have never seen a consumer advertisement or campaign with the slogan "Please people, don't buy CdTe solar cells because Te will someday run out." (I've seen these campaigns for oil but not Te.) Since Te doesn't increase the cost, and since there is no widespread consumer boycott of Te-containing products that I know of, then I cannot imagine how the eventual possible shortage of Te could already (today) be having significant effects on the market. What is the mechanism? And what is your reliable source reference on this?
 * For toxicity, OK, I'll be general. In 2010, X megawatts of CdTe solar cells were produced and sold. (I don't know the exact number.) If Cd was not toxic, then in this hypothetical world Y megawatts of CdTe solar cells would have been produced and sold in 2010. What you wrote in the article implies that Y is much much greater than X, many times greater. How do you know??? What is your reliable source reference on this?
 * (How many more fluorescent lamps would be sold each year if they didn't contain mercury? How many more laptops would be sold each year if they didn't contain lead and chromium? I don't know! These are difficult and interesting questions and can only be answered through surveys of customers and manufacturers. You can't just guess the answer off the top of your head!) --Steve (talk) 15:03, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your note. Si cells are less expensive than CdTe cells, thus the demand is lower for CdTe cells despite enhanced performance. Also, there are life cycle cost concerns regarding adoption of Cd in any products. This is clear in regulations such as RoHs and lead free solder. You may want to start with a good primer on economics, to help understand these concepts. Maxellus (talk) 03:41, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't know what you think I'm arguing. I'm not advocating that people should buy CdTe solar cells, and I'm not saying that Cd toxicity is no problem. (Maybe it's a problem, maybe it's a heinous problem, maybe it's an insurmountable problem!) I'm just objecting to that statement you wrote.
 * What you wrote implies that if cadmium were not toxic and tellurium were not rare, many times more CdTe solar cells would have been produced and sold to date. This might be true, it might not. An expert who is familiar with the market and has surveyed manufacturers and consumers might be able to argue that this is true. I don't think you are such an expert, but anyway you need a reliable source. WP:V. I'm deleting the statement until you find a source for it. (I'm highly skeptical that Te supply has been harming sales, because I can't see how. It's not harming sales through the price mechanism that I learned about in economics class. So how? I have no idea how big an effect Cd toxicity has on sales and production. Certainly some nonzero effect. Maybe a small, manageable effect like the mercury in fluorescent bulbs. Maybe an overwhelmingly large effect, like lead solder in Europe. I don't know. How is it that you know?) --Steve (talk) 11:31, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I agree. I don't know what you think you're arguing.Maxellus (talk) 06:49, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I rewrote the whole paragraph, based on sources. You originally complained that Cd toxicity and Te rarity should be discussed immediately. Now they are. But they are discussed based on sources. If you think the discussion is misleading you are welcome to rewrite it based on sources. :-) --Steve (talk) 14:55, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Minor edit flag
This was a good edit but it was not a minor one. Please see Help:Minor edit and please do not mark non-minor edits as minor. Thanks, --John (talk) 07:56, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

CAUTION: Consensus and working with other editors
Hi, welcome. If you haven't already done so, please review this policy: WP:CONSENSUS. Now take a look at your edit statistics. Note that over 90% of your edits are to articles and less than 2% are on article discussion pages. I haven't reviewed all your edits so maybe there was no reason to expect anyone to object. I'm just suggesting that if you stick around the climate change articles, you won't have a very warm reception if you engage in Edit Warring. Instead, please use the talk pages to talk about proposed changes, especially when changes to the section you want to change are being actively discussed. When joining those discussions please follow the Talk Page Guidelines. Happy editing, NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 13:11, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

WARNING How to deal with unsourced statements
WARNING - You just [deleted some article text] an hour after I wrote you the cautionary message about working with other editors in a consensus manner to avoid edit wars. The text you deleted was simply unsourced. As a new editor, please be advised this is a very controversial approach to dealing with unsourced text, and amounts to throwing down a gauntlet. My personal view is that you should not use that approach unless you happen to have personal knowledge in the subject area and know the statement is bogus. The way well meaning editors maintain a neutral point of view when confronted with unsourced text (and when they lack personal knowledge) is to tag the text with the template. In the example I just provided, I happen to know a great deal about the subject and I know the unsourced statement is true. So I reverted your deletion and tagged the text so another editor can supply a citation. I strongly suggest for a couple days you spend less time editing and more time studying the pages on basic editing at Help:Contents/Editing_Wikipedia  Happy doing your homework before doing your editing,  NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 14:17, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Blocking

 * Hi M, note that you have two pages, a USER page and a USERTALK page. This is the latter.  Answers to some your questions can be found by looking at your USER page, and following the links in the administrator notice about the block.  Just to be clear this is a friendly note in case you genuinely are a new editor confused by these events.  I had, have, and will have nothing to with the blocking issue and do not have any more info than you about it. NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 10:17, 30 September 2011 (UTC)