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Solar is hardly over-hyped. It has always over-delivered since the first panels were built in the 19th century. No one predicted such a success and so incredibl

Solar is hardly over-hyped. It has always over-delivered since the first panels were built in the 19th century. No one predicted such a success and so incredibly low prices even 20 years ago. Could you explain what you mean by "hyped in a marginalist way"?

glogla 5y ago
I've seen a lot of suggestions that solar can be used as the only energy source for humanity, that we don't need anything else, just build more solar! That's not realistic. Of course, the limitations that solar has are very much solvable, and having solar is better than not having it. Solar is important, and it is our future. But the solutions to solar's limitations seem to be in their infancy (new types of storage), hard to scale (battery storage), not really helpful (just build more coal and gas peakers!) or not considered at all. Which does not inspire confidence.
- colechristensen 5y ago
  You see this quite a lot. There does come a point where adding more solar … when a certain percentage of your production is already solar … there comes a point where more solar is a whole lot more expensive and less reasonable. But that’s really more of a “80% of our power is solar” problem and the US isn’t even at 3%. The percentage of usage which could be handled by solar is usually far underestimated. We don’t need to care about limitations of solar for a long long time.
  - Robotbeat 5y ago
    I agree, however your point about 3% isn’t quite true. Look at the last 12 months rolling and estimated total solar and divide by total electricity and you get about 3.7%: https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.php?t=epmt_1_01 https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.ph...
  - onlyrealcuzzo 5y ago
    Would 80% be ideal? I would imagine Solar would start getting iffy over 50%. Presumably you want a lot of hydroelectric, wind, and nuclear so you don't need a lot of batteries, and you have enough sources of power when the sun isn't shining. Maybe I'm being un-imaginative - but is anyone envisioning a global energy grid so we could have solar energy from Australia and Sahara shipped to North America during our night - and back to Asia and Europe from the Southwest during our day?? ^ This seems nonsense science fiction.
    - ac29 5y ago
      > Would 80% be ideal? I would imagine Solar would start getting iffy over 50%. Depends on how much storage you have. There is very, very little right now so even 50% might be a stretch. > Maybe I'm being un-imaginative - but is anyone envisioning a global energy grid so we could have solar energy from Australia and Sahara shipped to North America during our night - and back to Asia and Europe from the Southwest during our day?? I'd think you'd need a relatively inexpensive superconducting cable for that to make any sense. Running cables between continents has been a thing for over 150 years, but I'd think resistance losses would make it wildly impractical to power, say, Los Angeles with solar power collected in Australia.
      - shakna 5y ago
        > but I'd think resistance losses would make it wildly impractical to power, say, Los Angeles with solar power collected in Australia. Allow me to present to you the "Australia-Asia Power Link" [0], exporting solar power a distance of about 4,500km, which is still less than half of LA to Australia, but not insignificant. What governs the practicality is often more complex than just power loss. Carbon credits, local taxation, and plain ol' bureaucracy can make it more profitable to export than to consume. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia-Asia_Power_Link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia-Asia_Power_Link
      - pydry 5y ago
        Grid scale batteries became cost effective within the last year or so, though. It's at the same point solar/wind were a few years ago when they were the cheapest form of energy but received a lot of criticism for making up a small % of total production. Naturally that changed.
  - kryogen1c 5y ago
    > You see this quite a lot. There does come a point where adding more solar … when a certain percentage of your production is already solar … there comes a point where more solar is a whole lot more expensive and less reasonable. this is a lesson factorio can teach us. from[1]: "A single solar panel outputs an average of 42 kW over a day and requires 0.84 accumulators to sustain a constant power output through the night. It takes 23.8 solar panels to operate 1 MW of factory and charge 20 accumulators to sustain that 1 MW through the night." the rules are contrived and simplistic, but the principles apply. the effectiveness of solar generation varies relative to net consumption rate and storage capacity. of course, some inefficiency may be desirable to avoid severe weather problems, but our imprecise climatalogical models dont positively affirm a sense of impending doom. hard to tell what the correct path is. [1] https://wiki.factorio.com/Solar_panel https://wiki.factorio.com/Solar_panel
    - jnsaff2 5y ago
      Let me get this right. You are using numbers from a computer game wiki in a discussion about real world? Numbers which are by the way off by 2 orders of magnitude. Don't have any nuance in them, don't account for any seasonal variance nor in fact for weather.
      - mjevans 5y ago
        It's game-ified and an alien planet. Could be a tool to learn how to think of the problem. Quick ballpark numbers. Common solar panels are between 15 and 20% efficient. Numbers for the _surface_ of the earth (not the upper atmosphere) are quoted as about 1000W per square meter in a search. I assume that's a peak number. Since I don't want to think about weather, calculus, or any other factors for a napkin estimate, can we agree that's 8 hours of useful output at 1KW of input power per hour? So over a day 1 meter of solar panel would generate between 1.2 and 1.6 KW / day? I'd also very crudely extend that to 75% of the daily output must exist as a storage buffer. (Gut feeling more than anything else.) 1.2KWd to 1.6KWd of daily generation per square meter. 0.9KW to 1.2KW storage; per square meter for a day. I have trouble visualizing that though. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep-cycle_battery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep-cycle_battery Suggests that the discharge should only be to 50% on a regular basis for the most economy of material use (and thus cost). Double the above estimates for the storage bank. Searching for "deep cycle battery solar" I see many results for 12V 110AH batteries, just a tiny bit more than the 1200KW storage value I guestimated earlier. Around 200 dollars per battery, about 13 x 7 x 8.5 inches (rounded up). So a big honking consumer 'truck' / SUV battery sized deep cycle battery, but double that up for wear prevention. Though I still prefer baseload generation capacity for industrial and 24/7 loads. Solar can be a good peaker for AC use and waking consumer stuff.
- youeseh 5y ago
  > But the solutions to solar's limitations seem to be in their infancy We're further along than you think.
- photochemsyn 5y ago
  Yes, you could run a civilization entirely on solar if you had a robust storage, conversion and distribution system. After all, the entire fossil fuel reserves of planet Earth were generated over time by photosynthesis, i.e. the solar-powered capture of atmospheric carbon and its reduction to the hydrocarbon state from the carbon dioxide state. The problem is the scale of the effort needed to replace current generation with solar generatioin. Practically, it would take decades and a vast amount of work. However, there are no technological barriers, and if the world had exhausted its fossil fuel reserves in say, 1970 then we'd already have much of the solar infrastructure in place. As far as storage solutions, you can find dozens of strategies. My favorite is using solar energy to capture carbon for carbon fiber building materials, 'aerochemical' products (as opposed to petrochemical) for industrial needs (dyes, solvents, etc.) and of course RP1 jet/rocket production. Clearly such an approach will be needed for interplanetary travel as well (Mars seems to have enough CO2 and H2O to make this viable). It's not surprising that people are so poorly informed, however, as the fossil fuel sector runs massive propaganda operations targeting childhood education onwards.
  - tigerBL00D 5y ago
    > Yes, you could run a civilization entirely on solar if you had a robust storage, conversion and distribution system. Just don't want to let it become a single point of failure. Earth's history is punctuated by periods of low sunlight at sea level.
- jluxenberg 5y ago
  Storage will be a solved problem once everyone has an electric vehicle with a 65kWh battery sitting in their garage. Power your home overnight from your car, then recharge during the day when the sun comes out. If you have a large home or need to always have a fully charged car, spend $15k on a home battery. We need to get out of this mindset that electric utilities will provide unlimited power at a fixed price. With some investment from individual homeowners we can reduce peak to average ratios for utilities and make it much cheaper and possible to use intermittent green energy sources like wind and solar.
  - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
    > everyone has an electric vehicle with a 65kWh battery sitting in their garage. That's a solution I hope that neither I nor my children live to see. It's a solution I hope never happens unless a new battery technology arrives that for a start eliminates our need to once again fuck over some very poor countries in order to get our hands on rare resources. Lithium battery tech is quite miraculous, but it's also not appropriate as the basis for the entire electrification of human civilization. Also, lots of people will have neither cars nor garages.
    - Anchor 5y ago
      > unless a new battery technology arrives that for a start eliminates our need to once again fuck over some very poor countries It is already here. Google LFP batteries.
      - adamparsons 5y ago
        I’m a big fan of LFP don’t get me wrong, but it still requires mining and refining lithium, which indeed does fuck over the environment quite badly
        lanstin 5y ago
        https://nbcpalmsprings.com/2021/04/29/salton-sea-lithium-gold-mine/ https://nbcpalmsprings.com/2021/04/29/salton-sea-lithium-gol... I can’t vouch for this of my own knowledge but as lithium is such a light element it is sensible that it would be easy to find and use.
- rndgermandude 5y ago
  >But the solutions to solar's limitations seem to be in their infancy (new types of storage), hard to scale (battery storage), not really helpful (just build more coal and gas peakers!) or not considered at all. Which does not inspire confidence. You're not wrong, but also not right. We have renewables that run at night (wind, water, geo-thermal heat pumps), we have some storage solutions/"batteries" as well, such as pumping stations or water-based heat storage. And even peakers that burn fuel are not that bad for the environment if you only run them a limited time. Coal/gas peakers that only run when needed would not kill the environment if the main sources of energy production are renewable - a coal plant burning only some nights is still a lot better than one burning 24/7 - and peakers can be fueled by renewable sources as well, not just stuff you dig out of the ground, making them carbon neutral over the grow-burn circle. The problem right now is that switching over to such a mixed energy production requires a lot of investment and construction, and we have a lot of infrastructure (especially housing) that cannot be easily retrofitted. E.g. right now, be it in the US, be it in Germany where I live, be it in other places, solar and wind deployment is severely hampered by the lack of transmission lines. This isn't a problem of high investment cost either, it's "locals" fighting tooth and nail against new transmission lines being build in the vicinity of where they live because "it ruins the view".
- 7952 5y ago
  Battery storage seems eminently scalable compared to other energy developments. A commodity that can be manufactured in a factory and that we would need anyway for cars. Small components that can be built into enclosures, and racked in a container. And the sites are nice and simple. A fence, some substation gear, a concrete pad.
  - pydry 5y ago
    Particularly nuclear.
- Robotbeat 5y ago
  Not true. Check out https://model.energy https://model.energy
- johnrgrace 5y ago
  I think you have not looked at all the of EV vehicles currently being built and how much of a change those vehicles are going to have on the power grid 1. a large portion of the batteries in those vehicles are going to find 2nd lives as stationary battery storage. 2. The vehicles themselves are also storage.
- adrianN 5y ago
  There are proven, scalable technologies for storing large amounts of energy. For overnight storage you can melt salt. For seasonal storage you can make Methane (or Hydrogen). Every country has strategic gas storage infrastructure already built. Batteries are only interesting because they might become cheaper than these. Currently we don't store large amounts of energy because it's cheaper not to, not because it's impossible to build the necessary infrastructure.
  - pydry 5y ago
    It is now cheap to store using batteries. It just hasnt been that way for very long.
    - adrianN 5y ago
      That depends on the scale I think. It's getting close to economical for private electricity use, but we're still pretty far away from the manufacturing capabilities that would allow us to store a week of power for the whole grid. And even further away if you also include energy that is currently not supplied as electricity (e.g. for heating).
      - pydry 5y ago
        It's economical to combine it with solar/wind on the grid. Both California and Hawaii are doing this right now. This form of energy is about 1/3 the cost per MWh of nuclear (as opposed to solar/wind alone which is about 1/6th the cost). It just hasnt been that cheap for very long. Hydro as storage, better grid interconnects, demand shaping (e.g. using smart storage heaters that turn on when electricity is cheap) can bring down the cost still further.
Ericson2314 5y ago
> low prices This is the stupid marginal ism I am talking about. Cranking out more solar panels is easy. Actually making the grids larger or have more storage requires the type of planning competence and cordination we suck at. Solar panels are popular precisely because they don't require that planning competence and coordination. So if we go full solar wind, we will slam into a wall we are utterly unprepared for, despite, yes, getting better at solar and wind themselves with volume.
- Tade0 5y ago
  Going full solar and wind is going to take some time(20 year-ish?) and in the meantime energy storage will get there in terms of scale and cost. LiFePO4 packs already started trading below $100/kWh in 2020: https://evilmartians.com/chronicles/a-no-go-fantasy-writing-go-in-ruby-with-ruby-next https://evilmartians.com/chronicles/a-no-go-fantasy-writing-... CATL is pushing sodium-ion batteries: https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/catls-new-sodium-ion-battery-help-ease-lithium-shortages-2021-08-03/ https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/catls-new-sodium-ion... You don't even need a lot of storage to greatly increase maximum stable solar and wind share. Exiting times ahead of us.
  - zdragnar 5y ago
    Our electric grids aren't designed for distributed generation- they are centrally planned and maintained. Every person that generates their own electricity stops paying their fair share of maintaining the grid, forcing poorer people who cannot afford their own rooftops to subsidize them. It is actually quite regressive- the denser the population center, the less electricity per person can be generated by solar. The electricity might be free, but the cost of maintaining the grid never goes away.
    - ajbourg 5y ago
      > Every person that generates their own electricity stops paying their fair share of maintaining the grid This isn't true, at least not in Colorado. I pay a number of fees for maintaining the grid and these aren't going away when I have my net meter installed later this week. (hopefully)
amelius 5y ago
Building and shipping solar panels costs energy and material resources.
- tsol 5y ago
  Doesn't everything? It's not an issue so long as across it's life it results in less carbon production than alternative sources do per kW
- Lio 5y ago
  That’s true but it’s also true for fossil and nuclear fuels.
- ben_w 5y ago
  And in a 100% solar economy, the energy to build and ship the panels would be solar. This is fine, as they output enough energy to make themselves in 1-4 years depending on which study you look at.
  - amelius 5y ago
    Using energy still generates heat, as per the laws of thermodynamics.
    - ben_w 5y ago
      Yes, and?
      - drdeca 5y ago
        Perhaps they are mixing up the “there is therefore a maximum safe rate of worldwide energy use (however far away we are from that)” point with the “CO2 emissions from fossil fuels contribute to greenhouse effect” point, and... ok, I’m not sure either
    - PeterisP 5y ago
      Converting sunlight to electric energy and then using that energy generates the exact same amount of heat as if that sunlight was simply absorbed by the ground without the solar panel being in the way, as per the laws of thermodynamics.
diogenescynic 5y ago
Solar still relies on fossil fuels (coal!) and other rare earth metals that will be not be sustainable for many years (if ever). Solar prices are dropping, but I don't see how we ever fully divest from fossil fuels.
- stephen_g 5y ago
  That's not true - basically no commercial solar panels contain rare earth metals (the place they're actually used is in permanent magnets in electric motors and generators for things like electric cars and wind turbines, maybe you were confusing that? But there's a lot of interest in eliminating those, e.g. e-motors). Solar panels don't rely on fossil fuels either - perhaps you're confused by reporting that currently they're produced using a fair bit of energy from coal etc.? But that is reducing and improving all the time as grids get greener.
  - diogenescynic 5y ago
    No, they directly use coal and silicon to produce solar panels. And panels only last ~10 years. So there is a constant need for fossil fuels. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335083312_Why_do_we_burn_coal_and_trees_to_make_solar_panels https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335083312_Why_do_we...
- kragen 5y ago
  None of this is correct.
samstave 5y ago
>>since the first panels were built in the 19th century. ? Any interesting things to point me at on this topic? --- This says 1954 https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/200904/physicshistory.cfm https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/200904/physicshisto... --- Let me know if you have something else.
- adrianN 5y ago
  Non-silicon cells are older, but still fall in the 20th century[1]. Maybe copper oxide cells are older still? [1] https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2021/10/how-to-build-a-low-tech-solar-panel.html https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2021/10/how-to-build-a-low...
- tim333 5y ago
  >Charles Fritts installed the first solar panels on New York City rooftop in 1884 >created the first solar cell by coating selenium with a thin layer of gold from https://brewminate.com/a-brief-history-of-solar-panels-since-the-19th-century/ https://brewminate.com/a-brief-history-of-solar-panels-since...
batushka3 5y ago
EU is experiencing surge in electricity prices, thanks to green idiocity. Wind and solar subsidized so heavy, nuclear closing, coal bad. But double the price of electricity is fine!
- ntp85 5y ago
  This is fundamentally wrong on so many levels. Let's just pretend you would have any resemblance of a point there: Firstly, renewables are much cheaper than fossil or nuclear power - both in construction and operation. Secondly, the surging electricity prices, at least speaking for Germany here, are a result of the idiotic "EEG-Umlage".
- brabel 5y ago
  The price surge is mostly due to natural gas prices and increased, unexpected higher demand [1]. Countries that have access to renewables are actually doing much better than others! > Since most countries still rely on fossil fuels to meet all their power demands, the final price of electricity is often set by the price of coal or natural gas. If gas becomes more expensive, electricity bills inevitably go up, even if clean, cheaper sources also contribute to the total energy supply. [1] https://www.euronews.com/2021/10/28/why-europe-s-energy-prices-are-soaring-and-could-get-much-worse https://www.euronews.com/2021/10/28/why-europe-s-energy-pric...
- nextaccountic 5y ago
  > coal bad I agree on nuclear, but let's talk coal. Your point is that coal is good?
- akie 5y ago
  That's a completely false statement. Nothing about it is true. The whole world is experiencing surges in electricity prices, not just the EU. Even within the EU, countries like France, which gets up to 70% of its energy from nuclear power, has rising electricity prices. Subsidizing wind and solar has nothing to do with this. Stop spreading lies.

glogla 5y ago

I've seen a lot of suggestions that solar can be used as the only energy source for humanity, that we don't need anything else, just build more solar! That's not realistic. Of course, the limitations that solar has are very much solvable, and having solar is better than not having it. Solar is important, and it is our future. But the solutions to solar's limitations seem to be in their infancy (new types of storage), hard to scale (battery storage), not really helpful (just build more coal and gas peakers!) or not considered at all. Which does not inspire confidence.

colechristensen 5y ago
You see this quite a lot. There does come a point where adding more solar … when a certain percentage of your production is already solar … there comes a point where more solar is a whole lot more expensive and less reasonable. But that’s really more of a “80% of our power is solar” problem and the US isn’t even at 3%. The percentage of usage which could be handled by solar is usually far underestimated. We don’t need to care about limitations of solar for a long long time.
- Robotbeat 5y ago
  I agree, however your point about 3% isn’t quite true. Look at the last 12 months rolling and estimated total solar and divide by total electricity and you get about 3.7%: https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.php?t=epmt_1_01 https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.ph...
- onlyrealcuzzo 5y ago
  Would 80% be ideal? I would imagine Solar would start getting iffy over 50%. Presumably you want a lot of hydroelectric, wind, and nuclear so you don't need a lot of batteries, and you have enough sources of power when the sun isn't shining. Maybe I'm being un-imaginative - but is anyone envisioning a global energy grid so we could have solar energy from Australia and Sahara shipped to North America during our night - and back to Asia and Europe from the Southwest during our day?? ^ This seems nonsense science fiction.
  - ac29 5y ago
    > Would 80% be ideal? I would imagine Solar would start getting iffy over 50%. Depends on how much storage you have. There is very, very little right now so even 50% might be a stretch. > Maybe I'm being un-imaginative - but is anyone envisioning a global energy grid so we could have solar energy from Australia and Sahara shipped to North America during our night - and back to Asia and Europe from the Southwest during our day?? I'd think you'd need a relatively inexpensive superconducting cable for that to make any sense. Running cables between continents has been a thing for over 150 years, but I'd think resistance losses would make it wildly impractical to power, say, Los Angeles with solar power collected in Australia.
    - shakna 5y ago
      > but I'd think resistance losses would make it wildly impractical to power, say, Los Angeles with solar power collected in Australia. Allow me to present to you the "Australia-Asia Power Link" [0], exporting solar power a distance of about 4,500km, which is still less than half of LA to Australia, but not insignificant. What governs the practicality is often more complex than just power loss. Carbon credits, local taxation, and plain ol' bureaucracy can make it more profitable to export than to consume. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia-Asia_Power_Link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia-Asia_Power_Link
    - pydry 5y ago
      Grid scale batteries became cost effective within the last year or so, though. It's at the same point solar/wind were a few years ago when they were the cheapest form of energy but received a lot of criticism for making up a small % of total production. Naturally that changed.
- kryogen1c 5y ago
  > You see this quite a lot. There does come a point where adding more solar … when a certain percentage of your production is already solar … there comes a point where more solar is a whole lot more expensive and less reasonable. this is a lesson factorio can teach us. from[1]: "A single solar panel outputs an average of 42 kW over a day and requires 0.84 accumulators to sustain a constant power output through the night. It takes 23.8 solar panels to operate 1 MW of factory and charge 20 accumulators to sustain that 1 MW through the night." the rules are contrived and simplistic, but the principles apply. the effectiveness of solar generation varies relative to net consumption rate and storage capacity. of course, some inefficiency may be desirable to avoid severe weather problems, but our imprecise climatalogical models dont positively affirm a sense of impending doom. hard to tell what the correct path is. [1] https://wiki.factorio.com/Solar_panel https://wiki.factorio.com/Solar_panel
  - jnsaff2 5y ago
    Let me get this right. You are using numbers from a computer game wiki in a discussion about real world? Numbers which are by the way off by 2 orders of magnitude. Don't have any nuance in them, don't account for any seasonal variance nor in fact for weather.
    - mjevans 5y ago
      It's game-ified and an alien planet. Could be a tool to learn how to think of the problem. Quick ballpark numbers. Common solar panels are between 15 and 20% efficient. Numbers for the _surface_ of the earth (not the upper atmosphere) are quoted as about 1000W per square meter in a search. I assume that's a peak number. Since I don't want to think about weather, calculus, or any other factors for a napkin estimate, can we agree that's 8 hours of useful output at 1KW of input power per hour? So over a day 1 meter of solar panel would generate between 1.2 and 1.6 KW / day? I'd also very crudely extend that to 75% of the daily output must exist as a storage buffer. (Gut feeling more than anything else.) 1.2KWd to 1.6KWd of daily generation per square meter. 0.9KW to 1.2KW storage; per square meter for a day. I have trouble visualizing that though. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep-cycle_battery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep-cycle_battery Suggests that the discharge should only be to 50% on a regular basis for the most economy of material use (and thus cost). Double the above estimates for the storage bank. Searching for "deep cycle battery solar" I see many results for 12V 110AH batteries, just a tiny bit more than the 1200KW storage value I guestimated earlier. Around 200 dollars per battery, about 13 x 7 x 8.5 inches (rounded up). So a big honking consumer 'truck' / SUV battery sized deep cycle battery, but double that up for wear prevention. Though I still prefer baseload generation capacity for industrial and 24/7 loads. Solar can be a good peaker for AC use and waking consumer stuff.
youeseh 5y ago
> But the solutions to solar's limitations seem to be in their infancy We're further along than you think.
photochemsyn 5y ago
Yes, you could run a civilization entirely on solar if you had a robust storage, conversion and distribution system. After all, the entire fossil fuel reserves of planet Earth were generated over time by photosynthesis, i.e. the solar-powered capture of atmospheric carbon and its reduction to the hydrocarbon state from the carbon dioxide state. The problem is the scale of the effort needed to replace current generation with solar generatioin. Practically, it would take decades and a vast amount of work. However, there are no technological barriers, and if the world had exhausted its fossil fuel reserves in say, 1970 then we'd already have much of the solar infrastructure in place. As far as storage solutions, you can find dozens of strategies. My favorite is using solar energy to capture carbon for carbon fiber building materials, 'aerochemical' products (as opposed to petrochemical) for industrial needs (dyes, solvents, etc.) and of course RP1 jet/rocket production. Clearly such an approach will be needed for interplanetary travel as well (Mars seems to have enough CO2 and H2O to make this viable). It's not surprising that people are so poorly informed, however, as the fossil fuel sector runs massive propaganda operations targeting childhood education onwards.
- tigerBL00D 5y ago
  > Yes, you could run a civilization entirely on solar if you had a robust storage, conversion and distribution system. Just don't want to let it become a single point of failure. Earth's history is punctuated by periods of low sunlight at sea level.
jluxenberg 5y ago
Storage will be a solved problem once everyone has an electric vehicle with a 65kWh battery sitting in their garage. Power your home overnight from your car, then recharge during the day when the sun comes out. If you have a large home or need to always have a fully charged car, spend $15k on a home battery. We need to get out of this mindset that electric utilities will provide unlimited power at a fixed price. With some investment from individual homeowners we can reduce peak to average ratios for utilities and make it much cheaper and possible to use intermittent green energy sources like wind and solar.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
  > everyone has an electric vehicle with a 65kWh battery sitting in their garage. That's a solution I hope that neither I nor my children live to see. It's a solution I hope never happens unless a new battery technology arrives that for a start eliminates our need to once again fuck over some very poor countries in order to get our hands on rare resources. Lithium battery tech is quite miraculous, but it's also not appropriate as the basis for the entire electrification of human civilization. Also, lots of people will have neither cars nor garages.
  - Anchor 5y ago
    > unless a new battery technology arrives that for a start eliminates our need to once again fuck over some very poor countries It is already here. Google LFP batteries.
    - adamparsons 5y ago
      I’m a big fan of LFP don’t get me wrong, but it still requires mining and refining lithium, which indeed does fuck over the environment quite badly
      - lanstin 5y ago
        https://nbcpalmsprings.com/2021/04/29/salton-sea-lithium-gold-mine/ https://nbcpalmsprings.com/2021/04/29/salton-sea-lithium-gol... I can’t vouch for this of my own knowledge but as lithium is such a light element it is sensible that it would be easy to find and use.
rndgermandude 5y ago
>But the solutions to solar's limitations seem to be in their infancy (new types of storage), hard to scale (battery storage), not really helpful (just build more coal and gas peakers!) or not considered at all. Which does not inspire confidence. You're not wrong, but also not right. We have renewables that run at night (wind, water, geo-thermal heat pumps), we have some storage solutions/"batteries" as well, such as pumping stations or water-based heat storage. And even peakers that burn fuel are not that bad for the environment if you only run them a limited time. Coal/gas peakers that only run when needed would not kill the environment if the main sources of energy production are renewable - a coal plant burning only some nights is still a lot better than one burning 24/7 - and peakers can be fueled by renewable sources as well, not just stuff you dig out of the ground, making them carbon neutral over the grow-burn circle. The problem right now is that switching over to such a mixed energy production requires a lot of investment and construction, and we have a lot of infrastructure (especially housing) that cannot be easily retrofitted. E.g. right now, be it in the US, be it in Germany where I live, be it in other places, solar and wind deployment is severely hampered by the lack of transmission lines. This isn't a problem of high investment cost either, it's "locals" fighting tooth and nail against new transmission lines being build in the vicinity of where they live because "it ruins the view".
7952 5y ago
Battery storage seems eminently scalable compared to other energy developments. A commodity that can be manufactured in a factory and that we would need anyway for cars. Small components that can be built into enclosures, and racked in a container. And the sites are nice and simple. A fence, some substation gear, a concrete pad.
- pydry 5y ago
  Particularly nuclear.
Robotbeat 5y ago
Not true. Check out https://model.energy https://model.energy
johnrgrace 5y ago
I think you have not looked at all the of EV vehicles currently being built and how much of a change those vehicles are going to have on the power grid 1. a large portion of the batteries in those vehicles are going to find 2nd lives as stationary battery storage. 2. The vehicles themselves are also storage.
adrianN 5y ago
There are proven, scalable technologies for storing large amounts of energy. For overnight storage you can melt salt. For seasonal storage you can make Methane (or Hydrogen). Every country has strategic gas storage infrastructure already built. Batteries are only interesting because they might become cheaper than these. Currently we don't store large amounts of energy because it's cheaper not to, not because it's impossible to build the necessary infrastructure.
- pydry 5y ago
  It is now cheap to store using batteries. It just hasnt been that way for very long.
  - adrianN 5y ago
    That depends on the scale I think. It's getting close to economical for private electricity use, but we're still pretty far away from the manufacturing capabilities that would allow us to store a week of power for the whole grid. And even further away if you also include energy that is currently not supplied as electricity (e.g. for heating).
    - pydry 5y ago
      It's economical to combine it with solar/wind on the grid. Both California and Hawaii are doing this right now. This form of energy is about 1/3 the cost per MWh of nuclear (as opposed to solar/wind alone which is about 1/6th the cost). It just hasnt been that cheap for very long. Hydro as storage, better grid interconnects, demand shaping (e.g. using smart storage heaters that turn on when electricity is cheap) can bring down the cost still further.

Ericson2314 5y ago

> low prices This is the stupid marginal ism I am talking about. Cranking out more solar panels is easy. Actually making the grids larger or have more storage requires the type of planning competence and cordination we suck at. Solar panels are popular precisely because they don't require that planning competence and coordination. So if we go full solar wind, we will slam into a wall we are utterly unprepared for, despite, yes, getting better at solar and wind themselves with volume.

Tade0 5y ago
Going full solar and wind is going to take some time(20 year-ish?) and in the meantime energy storage will get there in terms of scale and cost. LiFePO4 packs already started trading below $100/kWh in 2020: https://evilmartians.com/chronicles/a-no-go-fantasy-writing-go-in-ruby-with-ruby-next https://evilmartians.com/chronicles/a-no-go-fantasy-writing-... CATL is pushing sodium-ion batteries: https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/catls-new-sodium-ion-battery-help-ease-lithium-shortages-2021-08-03/ https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/catls-new-sodium-ion... You don't even need a lot of storage to greatly increase maximum stable solar and wind share. Exiting times ahead of us.
- zdragnar 5y ago
  Our electric grids aren't designed for distributed generation- they are centrally planned and maintained. Every person that generates their own electricity stops paying their fair share of maintaining the grid, forcing poorer people who cannot afford their own rooftops to subsidize them. It is actually quite regressive- the denser the population center, the less electricity per person can be generated by solar. The electricity might be free, but the cost of maintaining the grid never goes away.
  - ajbourg 5y ago
    > Every person that generates their own electricity stops paying their fair share of maintaining the grid This isn't true, at least not in Colorado. I pay a number of fees for maintaining the grid and these aren't going away when I have my net meter installed later this week. (hopefully)

amelius 5y ago

Building and shipping solar panels costs energy and material resources.

tsol 5y ago
Doesn't everything? It's not an issue so long as across it's life it results in less carbon production than alternative sources do per kW
Lio 5y ago
That’s true but it’s also true for fossil and nuclear fuels.
ben_w 5y ago
And in a 100% solar economy, the energy to build and ship the panels would be solar. This is fine, as they output enough energy to make themselves in 1-4 years depending on which study you look at.
- amelius 5y ago
  Using energy still generates heat, as per the laws of thermodynamics.
  - ben_w 5y ago
    Yes, and?
    - drdeca 5y ago
      Perhaps they are mixing up the “there is therefore a maximum safe rate of worldwide energy use (however far away we are from that)” point with the “CO2 emissions from fossil fuels contribute to greenhouse effect” point, and... ok, I’m not sure either
  - PeterisP 5y ago
    Converting sunlight to electric energy and then using that energy generates the exact same amount of heat as if that sunlight was simply absorbed by the ground without the solar panel being in the way, as per the laws of thermodynamics.

diogenescynic 5y ago

Solar still relies on fossil fuels (coal!) and other rare earth metals that will be not be sustainable for many years (if ever). Solar prices are dropping, but I don't see how we ever fully divest from fossil fuels.

stephen_g 5y ago
That's not true - basically no commercial solar panels contain rare earth metals (the place they're actually used is in permanent magnets in electric motors and generators for things like electric cars and wind turbines, maybe you were confusing that? But there's a lot of interest in eliminating those, e.g. e-motors). Solar panels don't rely on fossil fuels either - perhaps you're confused by reporting that currently they're produced using a fair bit of energy from coal etc.? But that is reducing and improving all the time as grids get greener.
- diogenescynic 5y ago
  No, they directly use coal and silicon to produce solar panels. And panels only last ~10 years. So there is a constant need for fossil fuels. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335083312_Why_do_we_burn_coal_and_trees_to_make_solar_panels https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335083312_Why_do_we...
kragen 5y ago
None of this is correct.

samstave 5y ago

>>since the first panels were built in the 19th century. ? Any interesting things to point me at on this topic? --- This says 1954 https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/200904/physicshistory.cfm https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/200904/physicshisto... --- Let me know if you have something else.

adrianN 5y ago
Non-silicon cells are older, but still fall in the 20th century[1]. Maybe copper oxide cells are older still? [1] https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2021/10/how-to-build-a-low-tech-solar-panel.html https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2021/10/how-to-build-a-low...
tim333 5y ago
>Charles Fritts installed the first solar panels on New York City rooftop in 1884 >created the first solar cell by coating selenium with a thin layer of gold from https://brewminate.com/a-brief-history-of-solar-panels-since-the-19th-century/ https://brewminate.com/a-brief-history-of-solar-panels-since...

batushka3 5y ago

EU is experiencing surge in electricity prices, thanks to green idiocity. Wind and solar subsidized so heavy, nuclear closing, coal bad. But double the price of electricity is fine!

ntp85 5y ago
This is fundamentally wrong on so many levels. Let's just pretend you would have any resemblance of a point there: Firstly, renewables are much cheaper than fossil or nuclear power - both in construction and operation. Secondly, the surging electricity prices, at least speaking for Germany here, are a result of the idiotic "EEG-Umlage".
brabel 5y ago
The price surge is mostly due to natural gas prices and increased, unexpected higher demand [1]. Countries that have access to renewables are actually doing much better than others! > Since most countries still rely on fossil fuels to meet all their power demands, the final price of electricity is often set by the price of coal or natural gas. If gas becomes more expensive, electricity bills inevitably go up, even if clean, cheaper sources also contribute to the total energy supply. [1] https://www.euronews.com/2021/10/28/why-europe-s-energy-prices-are-soaring-and-could-get-much-worse https://www.euronews.com/2021/10/28/why-europe-s-energy-pric...
nextaccountic 5y ago
> coal bad I agree on nuclear, but let's talk coal. Your point is that coal is good?
akie 5y ago
That's a completely false statement. Nothing about it is true. The whole world is experiencing surges in electricity prices, not just the EU. Even within the EU, countries like France, which gets up to 70% of its energy from nuclear power, has rising electricity prices. Subsidizing wind and solar has nothing to do with this. Stop spreading lies.