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If I were a VC or PE firm, this is exactly where I’d be putting a lot of money in the next year or two. Right now there’s a lot of fear given the stance of the

If I were a VC or PE firm, this is exactly where I’d be putting a lot of money in the next year or two. Right now there’s a lot of fear given the stance of the current administration, which makes it pretty ripe for smart money willing to play the long game (as Buffett famously noted). The technology keeps improving, clean energy is increasingly shaping up to be a new arms race with China, and politics these days tend to swing back and forth wildly. By 2028+, it’s very plausible we’ll see things 180 and there'll be plenty of government attention given to clean energy. Even the current administration could change their tune if it's positioned as "beating China" (or even for no reason at all, because who knows with them). Spending a couple years to prop it up and become a well-established player by then could be a huge advantage.

fromwilliam 1y ago
Do you mean investments in solar panel manufacturing, or something else? From what I understand solar panels are somewhat commoditized, and China has massive subsidies for their manufacturers. I wouldn't want to get in that game. If you mean battery R&D + manufacture, I think that could be promising
- ipdashc 1y ago
  I wonder how much is being invested into reducing the costs of inverters and MPPTs and such. ("Balance of system" seems to be the term?) I'm looking into a DIY install, and it's looking like the microinverters are going to basically be just as expensive as the panels themselves. A quick Google seems to imply this is similar for utility-scale installs: the BoS costs are less than, but still comparable to the costs of the actual panels. On one hand I get it; panels are very simple, robust devices, while inverters need to interface with the grid and usually have network connectivity and so on. On the other hand, there's a lot less material in an inverter, and they're still relatively simple electronics? Which we're pretty good at mass producing cheaply. You'd think there's a lot of room there to get the cost down.
- dv_dt 1y ago
  On solar panel investments, at the time TSMC got into the chip game, I think most people might have said something very similar to a TSMC. Chips are commodotized, and the existing entrants are highly capitalized, and why TSMC do you think you can outdo the likes of 1987 Intel TI, Motorola, NEC et al. Perkskovites to name one tech, will probably be a generational shift in solar panel technologies, the US would be stupid to miss it if they want to be a future world energy player outside the slow inevitable decline of fossil fuels. For who has the stomach to fund it, there is available maybe another order of magnitude in cost performance in solar, and say two or three orders of magnitude of cost performance available in batteries?
thijson 1y ago
Brookfield is investing in it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTd02-0BiOM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTd02-0BiOM

fromwilliam 1y ago

Do you mean investments in solar panel manufacturing, or something else? From what I understand solar panels are somewhat commoditized, and China has massive subsidies for their manufacturers. I wouldn't want to get in that game. If you mean battery R&D + manufacture, I think that could be promising

ipdashc 1y ago
I wonder how much is being invested into reducing the costs of inverters and MPPTs and such. ("Balance of system" seems to be the term?) I'm looking into a DIY install, and it's looking like the microinverters are going to basically be just as expensive as the panels themselves. A quick Google seems to imply this is similar for utility-scale installs: the BoS costs are less than, but still comparable to the costs of the actual panels. On one hand I get it; panels are very simple, robust devices, while inverters need to interface with the grid and usually have network connectivity and so on. On the other hand, there's a lot less material in an inverter, and they're still relatively simple electronics? Which we're pretty good at mass producing cheaply. You'd think there's a lot of room there to get the cost down.
dv_dt 1y ago
On solar panel investments, at the time TSMC got into the chip game, I think most people might have said something very similar to a TSMC. Chips are commodotized, and the existing entrants are highly capitalized, and why TSMC do you think you can outdo the likes of 1987 Intel TI, Motorola, NEC et al. Perkskovites to name one tech, will probably be a generational shift in solar panel technologies, the US would be stupid to miss it if they want to be a future world energy player outside the slow inevitable decline of fossil fuels. For who has the stomach to fund it, there is available maybe another order of magnitude in cost performance in solar, and say two or three orders of magnitude of cost performance available in batteries?

thijson 1y ago

Brookfield is investing in it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTd02-0BiOM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTd02-0BiOM