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Solar Just Hit a Record Low Price in the U.S

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Re: Solar Just Hit a Record Low Price in the U.S

#161

Post by preparedzebra »

BigChiefSmokem wrote: post #72
preparedzebra wrote: post #65

The internal combustion engine seems to have been milked for all the efficiency our current materials can get out of it, while new materials and economies of scale in solar tech keep pushing prices lower. However, material science could also revolutionize the efficiency of engines and make them cost competitive with solar again. Solar-ification seems to be the trend, but it is not guaranteed.

That is not true. My new 2019 Mustang EcoBoost has 310hp and 350ft/lb of torque (key for acceleration) and is considered an entry-level mid-range vehicle. As recently as the early 2000s anything past 300hp was considered a race car. Advanced software (in modern automatic transmissions for example) and material advancements have made all the difference in the advancement of combustion engines in the past 15 years and…

horsepower is not fuel efficiency

Re: Solar Just Hit a Record Low Price in the U.S

#163

Post by mikec3010 »

inputcoffee wrote: post #71

The true price of solar is the price to produce reliable, continuous energy. That requires something to smooth out the signal and store the energy, most probably a battery. The solar + battery price is also going down, though not as fast as the solar only piece. But that's the metric we should be following. When that hits $30 per MWh, it'll be game over.

> reliable, continuous energy.

That's the job of the inverter, right? It uses free solar energy first and maintains reliability by supplementing it with costly grid power.

Re: Solar Just Hit a Record Low Price in the U.S

#164

Post by Max_aaa »

heisenbergs wrote: post #155
jartelt wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment gets made in every single solar article put on HN. The true price of solar is what the market is willing to pay for it. If the solar was ruining the grid or was way more expensive than what it seems, we would not keep seeing solar installed at this pace and at these costs. We need to get out of the mindset that all power generators need to produce a steady amount of power 24/7. A flexible grid made of ma…

Not only that. Solar energy production follows the sun, which incidentally is what humans also follow and when they are typically active and using most energy. Hence, solar producing energy when it is actually needed and in most demand (peak energy). This is even more so the case in hotter places that need AC.

Typically peak residential energy use is actually early morning and evening. And those tend to be the worst times for solar.

Solar is great for businesses and schools, well basically anything that operates mainly or totally during the day.

Re: Solar Just Hit a Record Low Price in the U.S

#165

Post by toomuchtodo »

duxup wrote: post #157

My house faces south westish. I have a lot of roof on the back side that I think would be good for solar but all the automated online stuff seem to indicate it was be expensive and not pay off for a LONG while. At least around here in MN there's not a lot of residential push for it. Hopefully as prices drop it becomes more viable.

I’d get three quotes from solar installers [1] and have them include your 30% federal tax credit, state incentives, and any utility or SREC incentives. Your payback period is most likely less than 10 years, and your ROI on cash invested would be higher than the S&P500 [2]. Ensure you’re not paying more than $3/watt pre-incentives if you select a quote to proceed with.

[1] https://www.energysage.com/

[2] https://solarpowerrocks.com/infographics/solar-infographic-s...

Re: Solar Just Hit a Record Low Price in the U.S

#166

Post by samcheng »

duxup wrote: post #157

My house faces south westish. I have a lot of roof on the back side that I think would be good for solar but all the automated online stuff seem to indicate it was be expensive and not pay off for a LONG while. At least around here in MN there's not a lot of residential push for it. Hopefully as prices drop it becomes more viable.

Solar is quite location (and latitude) dependent.

Duluth gets about half of the annual Global Horizontal Irradiance that Tuscon does, and that's before accounting for the fact that snow will sometimes cover the panels. In addition, Minnesota has significantly lower electricity prices than the big coastal states (partially due to the great wind resource in the SW corner of the state, partially due to political reasons).

There are other things you can do to make an impact in MN, though. An obvious one is roof and window insulation...

Re: Solar Just Hit a Record Low Price in the U.S

#167

Post by chillydawg »

craftyguy wrote: post #115
eigenvector wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not net zero impact to pollution, because polluters are forced to buy credits, which increases the costs of their pollution and incentivizes them to reduce it, while non-polluting technologies are subsidized by the income they can get from selling unused credits. The key is how many total credits you allocate to begin with - they should be sufficiently scarce that large emitters need to buy credits - and continu…

> which increases the costs of their pollution and incentivizes them to reduce it Or, they pass the cost to the very consumers that sold them the credits.

But that's fine, it'll increase the cost of whatever good is being produced and put pressure on the producers to reduce that price based on competitors polluting less making the same thing.

Re: Solar Just Hit a Record Low Price in the U.S

#168

Post by derefr »

Max_aaa wrote: post #164
heisenbergs wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only that. Solar energy production follows the sun, which incidentally is what humans also follow and when they are typically active and using most energy. Hence, solar producing energy when it is actually needed and in most demand (peak energy). This is even more so the case in hotter places that need AC.

Typically peak residential energy use is actually early morning and evening. And those tend to be the worst times for solar. Solar is great for businesses and schools, well basically anything that operates mainly or totally during the day.

Most energy consumption in the world is industrial, right? We wouldn't need to have nearly as many power plants (of any kind) if all those power plants needed to do was to sustain residential usage.

If you think of it as two power grids, then "the big power grid"—the industrial grid—can be fully powered by solar, and the residential grid, i.e. "the small power grid", is kind of trivial to solve in comparison.

Re: Solar Just Hit a Record Low Price in the U.S

#169

Post by BioMeditate »

epistasis wrote: post #102
tombert wrote: post #69

I'm of course a supporter of solar, and I don't want to be "that guy", but is there a strategy for handling solar power at night? In these areas that are mostly solar, how do they store the energy, or do they resort to natural gas or coal or something?

There are oh-so-many ways to address this and it's not clear what the market will pick. First off, 100% solar is not likely to win out unless it's a small grid on an island. Any realistic grid will have wind and solar and hydro. New nuclear is already far more expensive than lithium ion batteries + solar, so that's out of contention for new builds unless a government is trying to subsidize the industries that are com…

There was a company trying to do compressed air with good efficiency but they aren't doing so well right now

https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/lightsail-energ...

Re: Solar Just Hit a Record Low Price in the U.S

#170

Post by Taniwha »

jbrownpa wrote: post #147
rsynnott wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pumped storage is great where the geography makes sense, but there are a limited number of good sites which can be economically connected where needed to grids. Long-term, I'd have more hope for currently emergent tech (flow batteries etc).

it is true that pumped storage and great solar locations are often in different locations. maybe there is a possibility for retrofitting some existing dams that are used primarily as resevoirs and not power plants, since pumped-storage are net-neutral on resevoir storage. example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parker_Dam ...but i am NOT an expert by any means, and it's probably way more complicated than that.

I think the easy way to do this is simply to build extra generation capability on existing hydro dams, then letting the dams fill while the sun shines and the wind blows and empty out faster when they don't
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