‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world • Hacker News Board

Re: ‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world

#181

Post by Gibbon1 » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 5:19 AM UTC

conradev wrote: post #96

puranjay wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think researchers underestimated how much solar simply “makes sense” to the average person. Once the price is reasonable enough, people are very easily able to latch onto the idea of using what they already know and feel - the sun’s heat. Whenever I mention the solar panels in my parents house, the first question is always about the price. When I tell them they will break even in a few years, their next question is…

My favorite part of PV is that you can scale it to fit any power generating capacity, from a residential roof all the way up to a 50MW farm. It’s fairly linear, too, in terms of land usage and cost, which makes it easy to understand.

The other thing to is the massive redundancy with solar. Friend mine worked on installing a giant GE Gas Turbine for a power plant. They fired it up and it threw its blades. And it was down for 9 months. Doesn't really happen with solar.

Re: ‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world

#182

Post by apatheticonion » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 5:22 AM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #2

Relevant quote: "Every time you double producing capacity, you reduce the cost of PV solar by 28%." Current worldwide PV manufacturing capacity is roughly 165 GW [1] [2], with a utility scale price close to $0.01/kWh [3]. Manufacturing capacity is doubling every ~4 years. Global PV capacity in service is ~600 GW. IEA Average global annual capacity additions in main and accelerated cases, 2023-2025: https://www.iea.or…

Let's run the numbers!

   - Every 4 years our production doubles
     - Meaning every year our production capacity increases by .5 (or 5 times every decade).
   - The first year (2020) starts at 165GWh capacity production
   - The total energy use of the world (in 2013) was 157,000 TWh.
   - Annual growth in energy demand was 40% between 1990 and 2008.
     - 20% for the US
     - 150% for China

Let's calculate solar energy generation capacity using the growth estimates provided.

   2020: 165GWh
   2030: 825GWh
   2040: 4.1TWh
   2050: 20.6TWh
   2060: 103,1TWh (estimated global demand of 400TWh by this point)
   ----
   2061: 154,1TWh

So assuming:

   - Production capacity and panel efficiency does not increase (which it likely will)
   - Solar will be the only source of energy (it's more likely to be one of a few technologies used)
   - We don't factor infrastructure changes, space or installation time.
   - We don't factor the consumers being ready for energy in the form of electricity (electrifying industry, cars, homes)
   - We don't factor in the environmental impact of producing panels.
   - We assume grid scale batteries that can handle buffering exist already and are installed

Seems like there is reason for cautious optimism. We have to see how governments go about rapidly normalising our energy usage to electricity (banning new purchases of gas cars?), upgrading infra and how they will generate the remaining electricity (LNG, nuclear, coal?).

We can expect to see our 2013 energy usage met with solar alone by 2060. Might be reasonable to use solar exclusively by the turn of the century (2100)

If the growth in energy demand continues to rise at its current levels, by 2060 we might see an energy demand of 400TWh. This indicates that with the currently predicted solar production scaling, solar can cover half of our energy requirements.

There are enormous challenges with things like rapidly electrifying the automotive industry, mining the materials required to meet our grid scale demand, fabrication of the components, integrating a technology that isn't plug-and-play compatible with our grid infrastructure and supporting an IO model from every node.

Source (I know it's just wikipedia but come on, this is just a comment on HN):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_consumption#Trend...

Re: ‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world

#183

Post by hilbertseries » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 5:22 AM UTC

robocat wrote: post #132

johne20 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not op but we just installed 12kw system in Seattle and will have cost us $23k after federal tax credit. Approximately $2/watt. Get quotes from 3+ credible local companies. Also check energysage.

If you have a mortgage then you are effectively borrowing $23k from the bank for the period of your mortgage - so the total interest could be a significant chunk of money. Assuming that you have some leeway to pay your mortgage off quicker (depending on your exact terms).

How does interest factor in here? Your mortgage is fixed with the bank.

Re: ‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world

#184

Post by roenxi » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 5:36 AM UTC

CryptoPunk wrote: post #170

FooHentai wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm, difficult to agree with that as a blanket statement. Generally that kind of absolutist thinking is as flawed as the same in the other direction. The optimum is likely somewhere in the middle. For example, failure to price in externalities in a 'free' market is one of the biggest flaws, and exactly why we find ourselves in a situation of having way too much CO2 in the atmosphere.

I don't think any serious free market advocate thinks the government doesn't have a place in restricting and producing negative and positive externalities, respectively. A free market generally means one where one's control over their person and private property is not restricted as long as that control is not being exercised to violate other's equal right to their person and private property, and to the commons . Bu…

Maybe technically, in the sense that there has to be some sort of overarching enforcement and regulation to have a market.

But the major advantage that the free market has is that it is much better than the government at assessing the relative size of positive and negative externalities.

The government consistently underestimates the positive externalities of free market activity. Much like in this case - the people advocating that the government subsidise solar power and commit early have all been shown to have badly misjudged the situation. The free market is much better at getting clean power to people than they thought.

Re: ‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world

#185

Post by hebrox » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 5:50 AM UTC

apatheticonion wrote: post #182

toomuchtodo wrote: post #2

Relevant quote: "Every time you double producing capacity, you reduce the cost of PV solar by 28%." Current worldwide PV manufacturing capacity is roughly 165 GW [1] [2], with a utility scale price close to $0.01/kWh [3]. Manufacturing capacity is doubling every ~4 years. Global PV capacity in service is ~600 GW. IEA Average global annual capacity additions in main and accelerated cases, 2023-2025: https://www.iea.or…

Let's run the numbers! - Every 4 years our production doubles - Meaning every year our production capacity increases by .5 (or 5 times every decade). - The first year (2020) starts at 165GWh capacity production - The total energy use of the world (in 2013) was 157,000 TWh. - Annual growth in energy demand was 40% between 1990 and 2008. - 20% for the US - 150% for China Let's calculate solar energy generation capacity…

When I look at this chart [0], seeing that we’re wasting about 2/3 of our energy, I expect the energy demand to drop significantly if we electrify everything and have more local energy sources.

[0]: https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/

Re: ‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world

#186

Post by adgjlsfhk1 » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 5:56 AM UTC

jjoonathan wrote: post #122

toomuchtodo wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m satisfied with the data and contents of the post to substantiate my assertion. You are free to cite your own sources if you disagree. I believe the Brookings Institute to be a reportable source. My intent in no way is to deceive or put forth bad data.

Your source doesn't support your assertion, but I suppose you're free to ignore that little problem if you want to. In the meantime, we should be talking about how best to make storage happen, because anyone who isn't busy playing semantics games can see that storage (critically: paying for storage) is going to dominate the back half of this transition.

IMO, the solution isn't storage. It's ways to use cheap energy. As solar energy becomes an increasingly large part of the grid, there are huge incentives to re-structure electricity demand around when solar is producing heavily. One possible way this plays out is that we start doing things like water desalinization to produce fresh water, and electrolysis to produce hydrogen during the day when electricity is free, and getting heavy energy industry like aluminum smelting to shut off in periods where demand is higher. Some amount of grid storage will be necessary, but I'm guessing a lot of the solution will be shifting demand rather than supply, since it's a lot easier to turn off machines than to store enough electricity to keep them on.

Re: ‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world

#187

Post by Fomorian » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 6:00 AM UTC

kragen wrote: post #174

BurningFrog wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's probably how the Chinese refer to it? You can also interpret it as meaning "insignificant". A poor city with the same population as London has a much lower profile.

I don't think Wuxi is insignificant. Wuxi has been a city for 2200 years, since London was a scattered group of Celtic-speaking villages. Even earlier, in the Spring and Autumn Period, the capital of the State of Wu, Meili, was probably in what is now Wuxi, though it may have been a few kilometers to the southeast in Suzhou. This is where the famous war of Wu against Chu began, a century after Romulus was said to hav…

London was never Gaelic. The populations living in Southern England would have spoken Brythonic languages, not Goidelic.

And at any rate... it's pretty obvious he was referring to Wuxi today. I don't think anybody's about to have an issue referring to the Sparta of today as insignificant, its historical significance being whatever it might be.

Re: ‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world

#188

Post by apatheticonion » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 6:03 AM UTC

hebrox wrote: post #185

apatheticonion wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's run the numbers! - Every 4 years our production doubles - Meaning every year our production capacity increases by .5 (or 5 times every decade). - The first year (2020) starts at 165GWh capacity production - The total energy use of the world (in 2013) was 157,000 TWh. - Annual growth in energy demand was 40% between 1990 and 2008. - 20% for the US - 150% for China Let's calculate solar energy generation capacity…

When I look at this chart [0], seeing that we’re wasting about 2/3 of our energy, I expect the energy demand to drop significantly if we electrify everything and have more local energy sources. [0]: https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/

This is a good point. Seems like there is reason to be optimistic. I certainly think it's possible for the US to be carbon neutral by 2050 - but ya'll better start banning gas cars sooner rather than later (seeing as modern cars will last 20-30 years).

Re: ‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world

#189

Post by mulmboy » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 6:05 AM UTC

laurencerowe wrote: post #135

mulmboy wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah you're right. But, tracking solar (and solar with fixed positioning that maximises energy output later in the day) largely applies for more sophisticated sites such as commercial and industrial. I've seen such setups that forego around 20% of solar energy production to maximise production during more expensive time of use windows (including offsetting time of use demand charges). Residential installations are us…

> One up and coming trend which might have a significant impact on this is for residential retail tariffs to be directly linked, at 30min resolution, to the wholesale energy market prices. From what happened in Texas recently that sounds like a nightmare for consumers. https://www.npr.org/2021/03/06/974417969/texas-wont-reduce-1...

yeah - you shift the risk from the retailer onto the consumer. Usually these deals will have some kind of faux-insurance arrangement baked in where the consumer will never have to pay more than something like $300/MWh

Re: ‘Insanely cheap energy’: solar power continues to shock the world

#190

Post by fsh » Sun, Apr 25, 2021, 6:11 AM UTC

ArtTimeInvestor wrote: post #175

Is Tesla the only company that offers solar roofs? I would love to get an overview of what happens in this space. I don't mean solar panels that can be put on roofs. I mean roofs that are made of solar panels.

Solar shingles have been on the market from several companies for many years. They have never really taken off since they are a lot more expensive and have worse performance than regular solar panels.