Baseload is indeed meaningless unless you put a number on it in gw and gwh actually needed. People wielding the term without doing that (i.e. most of them), are

Baseload is indeed meaningless unless you put a number on it in gw and gwh actually needed. People wielding the term without doing that (i.e. most of them), are basically insisting on unspecified amounts of energy to be needed for unspecified amounts of time for unspecified calamities that may need said unspecified capacity. It's usually accompanies by some handwavy statements about clouds, weather, and seasonal darkness and the suggestion that we should instead put all our resources into building nuclear plants. This indeed bullshit. Because as soon as you specify these numbers these things, it becomes a simple engineering challenge with some clear economics that you can model for different solutions. Numbers for domestic solar indeed are such that most installations pay back within a few years in most parts of the world. The largest cost these days is not even the hardware but the installation cost and getting the time of the certified experts that can do this. But even factoring in all that, you basically end up earning your money back. If you plop down enough panels and batteries, you won't need anything else.