4 ms·

Solar is indeed long term cheaper to install but subject to periodic down-time. Wind blows at night and when it is cloudy. Also the nature of our atmosphere is

Solar is indeed long term cheaper to install but subject to periodic down-time. Wind blows at night and when it is cloudy. Also the nature of our atmosphere is that there is always some wind somewhere. So, they are complementary. Right now everybody is focused on getting to 100% carbon neutral. However, the question must be asked: why stop there and not go to something like 500 or even 1000% energy generation. There will be plenty of things we can do with the excess energy. I think this will play out over the next few decades. Mass produced solar will go on any available surface just because we can. There are already some lower efficiency but potentially very cheap to produce solar systems based on e.g. organic materials that can be printed on flexible surfaces (i.e. not glass). Having that stuff put all over the place is going to make an impact. Solar is already regularly creating surpluses regularly. It's a huge problem for energy providers because they have to shut down more expensive to manage production when that happens. Any time you see a wind mill not spinning, don't assume it is because it is broken and instead consider that there might be too much wind power temporarily. A structural surplus will create supply of very cheap (often negatively priced even) energy. There are all sorts of valuable things we can do with that.

mdale 5y ago
Like more hashing :)
ishtanbul 5y ago
Carbon neutrality and excess energy are not a measurement of the same thing. Nevertheless, the energy supply demand balance doesn’t work the way you describe. Most power plants are contracted with a specific energy buyer such as distribution utility or an industrial buyer that is meeting a specific load need or as part of their resource planning. So there is rarely more excess capacity beyond a reserve margin. These plants are very capital intensive and investors demand a minimum rate of return so if you don’t know who will buy the power and at what price for many years, the plant will not be funded or built. Source: i work in the power financing industry
- jillesvangurp 5y ago
  That's only how it works now. It's an obsolete way to operate our energy markets. Carbon neutrality will require electrifying large markets that currently aren't electrified. That overall market is much larger than the current electricity market. By the time even a small portion of that market has been addressed, most electricity generation will long be renewable. That's happening a lot faster than some people seem to think/hope for. Existing gas/coal plant generation will be a tiny portion of that market. And there won't be a whole lot of new capacity going forward. Arguably, new gas plants are already a very dubious investment. Most new capacity will either be new players (e.g. Tesla is planning to be a virtual power provider) in the market without a sunk investment legacy or existing players that compete on divesting/isolating their sunk investments the fastest. Either way, this pushes a lot more renewable energy in the market. That in turn accelerates the demise of more expensive things in the market. Including plants that are still under construction which were financed under the assumption that they would operate for a few decades at high price points for energy. I don't think that industry can afford a major drop in cost for renewables. Yet that seems exactly what might be happening. https://www.rethinkx.com/implications https://www.rethinkx.com/implications Rethinkx published an interesting perspective on this recently. They point out that the financial incentives of new technology are making this happen much faster than many incumbent players have planned/hoped for. They are calling out a feasible date of decarbonizing 90% by 2035 using existing technology depending on how governments incentivize and stimulate scaling and deploying that. It's a very aggressive and provocative timeline. But the reasoning behind it has some merit. We can haggle about how far they are off but I doubt it will be measured in decades.
gonzo41 5y ago
Once we've gotten to 100% renewable energy, Excess that isn't sopped up mining bitcoin (I'm probably joking), would best used to reduce the price of things like smelting metals, running heavy industry, and recycling plastics or even better trying to clean the carbon from air.
- jillesvangurp 5y ago
  I think 100% in general is a vague notion. 100% of what? Current demand would be mostly excluding things that in the future would be included. Things like heating houses (mostly gas currently in a lot of countries). Or powering the things you mention. Or creating vast amounts of hydrogen. Or powering most forms of road transport. All of those things are starting to happen. Carbon neutrality involves most of those things happening on a very large scale. Our current electricity demand is a small portion of that overall future demand.

mdale 5y ago

Like more hashing :)

ishtanbul 5y ago

Carbon neutrality and excess energy are not a measurement of the same thing. Nevertheless, the energy supply demand balance doesn’t work the way you describe. Most power plants are contracted with a specific energy buyer such as distribution utility or an industrial buyer that is meeting a specific load need or as part of their resource planning. So there is rarely more excess capacity beyond a reserve margin. These plants are very capital intensive and investors demand a minimum rate of return so if you don’t know who will buy the power and at what price for many years, the plant will not be funded or built. Source: i work in the power financing industry

jillesvangurp 5y ago
That's only how it works now. It's an obsolete way to operate our energy markets. Carbon neutrality will require electrifying large markets that currently aren't electrified. That overall market is much larger than the current electricity market. By the time even a small portion of that market has been addressed, most electricity generation will long be renewable. That's happening a lot faster than some people seem to think/hope for. Existing gas/coal plant generation will be a tiny portion of that market. And there won't be a whole lot of new capacity going forward. Arguably, new gas plants are already a very dubious investment. Most new capacity will either be new players (e.g. Tesla is planning to be a virtual power provider) in the market without a sunk investment legacy or existing players that compete on divesting/isolating their sunk investments the fastest. Either way, this pushes a lot more renewable energy in the market. That in turn accelerates the demise of more expensive things in the market. Including plants that are still under construction which were financed under the assumption that they would operate for a few decades at high price points for energy. I don't think that industry can afford a major drop in cost for renewables. Yet that seems exactly what might be happening. https://www.rethinkx.com/implications https://www.rethinkx.com/implications Rethinkx published an interesting perspective on this recently. They point out that the financial incentives of new technology are making this happen much faster than many incumbent players have planned/hoped for. They are calling out a feasible date of decarbonizing 90% by 2035 using existing technology depending on how governments incentivize and stimulate scaling and deploying that. It's a very aggressive and provocative timeline. But the reasoning behind it has some merit. We can haggle about how far they are off but I doubt it will be measured in decades.

gonzo41 5y ago

Once we've gotten to 100% renewable energy, Excess that isn't sopped up mining bitcoin (I'm probably joking), would best used to reduce the price of things like smelting metals, running heavy industry, and recycling plastics or even better trying to clean the carbon from air.

jillesvangurp 5y ago
I think 100% in general is a vague notion. 100% of what? Current demand would be mostly excluding things that in the future would be included. Things like heating houses (mostly gas currently in a lot of countries). Or powering the things you mention. Or creating vast amounts of hydrogen. Or powering most forms of road transport. All of those things are starting to happen. Carbon neutrality involves most of those things happening on a very large scale. Our current electricity demand is a small portion of that overall future demand.