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Solar and wind are not serious solutions to the energy needs of the planet today or in the future. As billions more people become part of a global middle class

Solar and wind are not serious solutions to the energy needs of the planet today or in the future. As billions more people become part of a global middle class our energy requirements will expand dramatically from today.

ceejayoz 4y ago
> As billions more people become part of a global middle class our energy requirements will expand dramatically from today. https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy04osti/35097.pdf https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy04osti/35097.pdf "In the United States, cities and residences cover about 140 million acres of land. We could supply every kilowatt-hour of our nation’s current electricity requirements simply by applying PV to 7% of this area—on roofs, on parking lots, along highway walls, on the sides of buildings, and in other dual-use scenarios." "We would need only 10 million acres of land—or only 0.4% of the area of the United States—to supply all of our nation’s electricity using PV."
- robertlagrant 4y ago
  I really wish this sort of thing would either be better thought through or better articulated. 10 million acres is enormous. And is it continuous supply (if so, how?) Or just supply when it's sunny?
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    Isn't it amazing that no one has ever thought about these things before you dropped in?
    - robertlagrant 4y ago
      You've missed my point.
      - ncmncm 4y ago
        Everybody has known all along that renewables generation is intermittent. Mentioning it adds no light. And renewables happily coexist with other uses of the same land, so none is used up.
        robertlagrant 4y ago
        > Everybody has known all along that renewables generation is intermittent That doesn't mean it's made clear in statistics. I've read plenty of people say "X generates as much as Y", where X is intermittent and Y is suitable for base load. Certainly enough to disagree that everyone knows it and is able to discern that from context-free statistics.
        ncmncm 4y ago
        Literally every single person on Earth who even knows what renewables are knows they are intermittent. No one imagines solar panels produce peak power all the time, or any power at night.
        robertlagrant 4y ago
        You've missed my point again. Every time someone says "renewables supply 80% of power required" or similar, without stating the context of what that means, it creates false impressions in people's minds. Is it 80% on the sunniest day ever? 80% of actual load but using storage? 80% of the load 5% of the time? I'm not saying if people think it through they won't understand it, I'm saying that context-free stats like that create false impressions in some people's minds based on whatever the assume about the stat, and annoy people like me who'd like to know where the stat came from.
- didericis 4y ago
  0.4% of the entire country is a massive amount of land. That’s 10 million acres of wires, maintenance, habitat and all kinds of mischievous creatures, not least of which are humans. And it only works when the weather is good. And not all countries have the grid or engineering and maintenance capacity of the United States. It’s not a realistic solution. By all means, lets put solar panels everywhere we already have buildings and roofs and power hookups and make a dent. Maybe at some point it’ll be possible to use solar alone, and we can keep up the maintenance. Going all in on solar right now would be suicide. It’d be worse than the effects of anthropogenic warming. People are going to freeze to death this winter in Germany because they bought into the promise of renewables before it delivered and didn’t diversify their energy supply. You should only phase something out when you can meet demands without it. Nuclear is a way to do that. Natural gas is a way to do that. Renewables are a way to do that. But you have to actually exceed demand and have a solid diversified base before you panic switch because of climate change. Otherwise you kill and impoverish more people than climate change.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    The argument from incredulity has rather a poor history. Are you sure you want to join in with all its previous failures?
    - pfdietz 4y ago
      I'm waiting for him to realize that agriculture will use two orders of magnitude more land than is needed to power the US with renewables. Will he conclude that eating is impossible?
      - didericis 4y ago
        One of the things I like about this site is the restraint (at least in comparison to other places) in substituting an argument this kind of snarky scoffing and engagement. It’s brainless. Agriculture is already working, or was until its been starting to be shut down and curtailed due to alleged environmental issues like in the Netherlands. You can manage much larger chunks of land with plows and combines and other vehicles because of how you interact with the land when farming. You can’t plant solar panels and have them just grow out of the ground and repair themselves and reproduce largely independently. It’s a totally different type of land use. Managing solar farms is magnitudes more effort to build and maintain than agriculture.
- nprz 4y ago
  Isn't the intermittency of the energy source the issue? And there's currently no scalable solution to efficiently store excess energy generated from solar panels?
  - ceejayoz 4y ago
    Sure, that's why no one proposes only solar, nor do they propose solar in only one place at a time.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    Intermittency means you need storage too. So, you build out storage too. The observation is vacuous. A renewable grid includes storage. Storage is cheap and getting cheaper.
  - pfdietz 4y ago
    It's rather amazing that you think that people haven't already thought of this issue and addressed it. In fact, it's long been addressed, and the cost of dealing with intermittency of renewable sources appears acceptable. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9837910 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9837910 > Even former critics must admit that adding e-fuels through PtX makes 100% RE possible at costs similar to fossil fuels. These critics are still questioning whether 100% RE is the cheapest solution but no longer claim it would be unfeasible or prohibitively expensive.
switchbak 4y ago
I think the truth is in the middle. Solar is becoming ridiculously cheap, but even if the panels were free there's still a lot of other costs to factor in. As explained elsewhere, a mix of energy sources is necessary. And your statement is devoid of context. Solar is already working well in North America (and elsewhere), and uptake will continue to increase. It won't be a panacea for the rest of the world, and solar+wind won't replace all other generation types.
- nemo44x 4y ago
  Yes by all means deploy it but by no means is it a strategic solution.
  - switchbak 4y ago
    It's an important component of a strategic solution. Where it makes sense, aka: not in the artic circle. Not sure why you're dismissing it so out of hand. I agree it's not the panacea that many want it to be, but it's still very important, especially given its recent cost declines (solar specifically here).

ceejayoz 4y ago

> As billions more people become part of a global middle class our energy requirements will expand dramatically from today. https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy04osti/35097.pdf https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy04osti/35097.pdf "In the United States, cities and residences cover about 140 million acres of land. We could supply every kilowatt-hour of our nation’s current electricity requirements simply by applying PV to 7% of this area—on roofs, on parking lots, along highway walls, on the sides of buildings, and in other dual-use scenarios." "We would need only 10 million acres of land—or only 0.4% of the area of the United States—to supply all of our nation’s electricity using PV."

robertlagrant 4y ago
I really wish this sort of thing would either be better thought through or better articulated. 10 million acres is enormous. And is it continuous supply (if so, how?) Or just supply when it's sunny?
- ncmncm 4y ago
  Isn't it amazing that no one has ever thought about these things before you dropped in?
  - robertlagrant 4y ago
    You've missed my point.
    - ncmncm 4y ago
      Everybody has known all along that renewables generation is intermittent. Mentioning it adds no light. And renewables happily coexist with other uses of the same land, so none is used up.
      - robertlagrant 4y ago
        > Everybody has known all along that renewables generation is intermittent That doesn't mean it's made clear in statistics. I've read plenty of people say "X generates as much as Y", where X is intermittent and Y is suitable for base load. Certainly enough to disagree that everyone knows it and is able to discern that from context-free statistics.
        ncmncm 4y ago
        Literally every single person on Earth who even knows what renewables are knows they are intermittent. No one imagines solar panels produce peak power all the time, or any power at night.
        robertlagrant 4y ago
        You've missed my point again. Every time someone says "renewables supply 80% of power required" or similar, without stating the context of what that means, it creates false impressions in people's minds. Is it 80% on the sunniest day ever? 80% of actual load but using storage? 80% of the load 5% of the time? I'm not saying if people think it through they won't understand it, I'm saying that context-free stats like that create false impressions in some people's minds based on whatever the assume about the stat, and annoy people like me who'd like to know where the stat came from.
didericis 4y ago
0.4% of the entire country is a massive amount of land. That’s 10 million acres of wires, maintenance, habitat and all kinds of mischievous creatures, not least of which are humans. And it only works when the weather is good. And not all countries have the grid or engineering and maintenance capacity of the United States. It’s not a realistic solution. By all means, lets put solar panels everywhere we already have buildings and roofs and power hookups and make a dent. Maybe at some point it’ll be possible to use solar alone, and we can keep up the maintenance. Going all in on solar right now would be suicide. It’d be worse than the effects of anthropogenic warming. People are going to freeze to death this winter in Germany because they bought into the promise of renewables before it delivered and didn’t diversify their energy supply. You should only phase something out when you can meet demands without it. Nuclear is a way to do that. Natural gas is a way to do that. Renewables are a way to do that. But you have to actually exceed demand and have a solid diversified base before you panic switch because of climate change. Otherwise you kill and impoverish more people than climate change.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  The argument from incredulity has rather a poor history. Are you sure you want to join in with all its previous failures?
  - pfdietz 4y ago
    I'm waiting for him to realize that agriculture will use two orders of magnitude more land than is needed to power the US with renewables. Will he conclude that eating is impossible?
    - didericis 4y ago
      One of the things I like about this site is the restraint (at least in comparison to other places) in substituting an argument this kind of snarky scoffing and engagement. It’s brainless. Agriculture is already working, or was until its been starting to be shut down and curtailed due to alleged environmental issues like in the Netherlands. You can manage much larger chunks of land with plows and combines and other vehicles because of how you interact with the land when farming. You can’t plant solar panels and have them just grow out of the ground and repair themselves and reproduce largely independently. It’s a totally different type of land use. Managing solar farms is magnitudes more effort to build and maintain than agriculture.
nprz 4y ago
Isn't the intermittency of the energy source the issue? And there's currently no scalable solution to efficiently store excess energy generated from solar panels?
- ceejayoz 4y ago
  Sure, that's why no one proposes only solar, nor do they propose solar in only one place at a time.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  Intermittency means you need storage too. So, you build out storage too. The observation is vacuous. A renewable grid includes storage. Storage is cheap and getting cheaper.
- pfdietz 4y ago
  It's rather amazing that you think that people haven't already thought of this issue and addressed it. In fact, it's long been addressed, and the cost of dealing with intermittency of renewable sources appears acceptable. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9837910 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9837910 > Even former critics must admit that adding e-fuels through PtX makes 100% RE possible at costs similar to fossil fuels. These critics are still questioning whether 100% RE is the cheapest solution but no longer claim it would be unfeasible or prohibitively expensive.

switchbak 4y ago

I think the truth is in the middle. Solar is becoming ridiculously cheap, but even if the panels were free there's still a lot of other costs to factor in. As explained elsewhere, a mix of energy sources is necessary. And your statement is devoid of context. Solar is already working well in North America (and elsewhere), and uptake will continue to increase. It won't be a panacea for the rest of the world, and solar+wind won't replace all other generation types.

nemo44x 4y ago
Yes by all means deploy it but by no means is it a strategic solution.
- switchbak 4y ago
  It's an important component of a strategic solution. Where it makes sense, aka: not in the artic circle. Not sure why you're dismissing it so out of hand. I agree it's not the panacea that many want it to be, but it's still very important, especially given its recent cost declines (solar specifically here).