"Almost all heat on Earth is solar in origin, including the majority that we don’t use." yes and it's spread out thinly which is why it doesn't kill us.Your so

"Almost all heat on Earth is solar in origin, including the majority that we don’t use." yes and it's spread out thinly which is why it doesn't kill us.Your solution is to take the least energy dense form and spend material, huge areas of land and money to build a solution that is inferior to all the other solutions. Scales up to Kardashev III" In theory not in practice. You are speculating not actually proving anything. "Only looks like lots of land because there’s 7 billion people." Ehh we are going to be 9 billion. Not sure what exactly you think it proves. You are playing excel sheet scientist not actually proving the application in reality. "No more complex than anything else in the modern world, therefore calling it complex as a criticism is false." There is a world of difference between having a nuclear power plant or using oil or gas or coal which all have the energy STORED in themselves vs having to convert thin layers of energy into batteries which again aren't even close to be able to deliver the kind of utility the other sources can. "Can be forecast reliably a week ahead in great detail" No it can't and it isn't and will require backup from other sources. Again excel sheet acrobatics isn't really useful here. "Less than the alternatives, again only looks big because there’s 7 billion people." We are going to be 9. It's a reality and you aren't actually dealing with it. It's not going to go away. Batterie are not demonstrated as being a solution by any metric what so ever so no. You keep comping up with speculative solutions which wont actually work nor solve anything as the grid will never be flexible enough and batteries can't actually deliver what you seem to be dreaming they can. "Literally Dyson swarms." Again more speculcation. Come back when energy from wind and solar is more than 10% of the worlds energy consumption. "“PV + battery” is two items, calling that a Rube Goldberg machine is like dismissing the wheel because you get the most out of it by adding an axel." I am not. I am calling all your other solutions to solve the issues with intermittency like grids and weather forcasting PLUS batteries plus storing of energy in batteries and PV for rube goldberg machines.