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Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

newyorker.com

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Re: Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

#81

Post by MisterTea »

notTooFarGone wrote: post #40
LetsGetTechnicl wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What "critical look" is there to take? How about the way that the US gov't subsidizes the oil and gas industry, and is about to restart the coal industry? For some reason gov't investment in industry is only bad when China does it.

China bad when it's the only country that actually does something meaningful. Cheap batteries are fueling energy transition and the demand is only met by huge overproduction by china. China is actually carrying our lazy asses.

> China is actually carrying our lazy asses.

Its not laziness, its corruption. The USA has a government that's tainted by moneyed interests who don't want their established gravy train derailed no matter how much it's fucking the entire planets environment. Now add to that, the current administration is too stupid and short sighted to ever incentivize change.

Re: Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

#82

Post by georgemcbay »

arh5451 wrote: post #24

Nice article explaining solar energy policy. I think the article still doesn't address the mismatch between solar energy production and consumption, which needs to be filled by storage mechanisms. Also would have been nice to have a critical look at how the Chinese were able to corner the Solar market via state sponsored means.

> Also would have been nice to have a critical look at how the Chinese were able to corner the Solar market via state sponsored means.

What if... (stick with me here because this is about to get crazy)... free market capitalism isn't the best solution for everything...?

Re: Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

#83

Post by ryukoposting »

kccqzy wrote: post #64
ryukoposting wrote: post #29

> offering a plausible check to not only the climate crisis but to autocracy. Instead of relying on scattered deposits of fossil fuel—the control of which has largely defined geopolitics for more than a century—we are moving rapidly toward a reliance on diffuse but ubiquitous sources of supply. A lot of this article was clearly written with rose-colored glasses on, but this might be the silliest line of all. The auth…

The demand for fossil fuel is continuous. The demand for solar panels is one-time: when you first install it.

That's blatantly false. The panels themselves are typically rated for a 25-year service life [1,2]. Inverters are typically rated for about a decade [3,4]. Solar panels also must be cleaned periodically [5], otherwise their output is reduced. It's a power plant. It will need maintenance. As PV technology improves, there's also pressure to buy better solar panels [6] to replace older, lower-performing panels, resulting in disposal problems that hardly need explanation.

I'm all for solar, generally. Among current renewables, it's the most feasible solution for much of the US. But the idea that they're a "one-time" cost is fantasy.

[1]: https://www.epa.gov/hw/end-life-solar-panels-regulations-and... [2]: https://solar.huawei.com/en/blog/2024/lifespan-of-solar-pane... [3]: https://www.igs.com/energy-resource-center/energy-101/how-lo... [4]: https://www.pv-magazine.com/2023/09/13/how-long-do-residenti... [5]: https://www.nrel.gov/news/detail/features/2021/scientists-st... [6]: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S221282712...

Re: Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

#84

Post by kjkjadksj »

aaomidi wrote: post #66
arh5451 wrote: post #24

Nice article explaining solar energy policy. I think the article still doesn't address the mismatch between solar energy production and consumption, which needs to be filled by storage mechanisms. Also would have been nice to have a critical look at how the Chinese were able to corner the Solar market via state sponsored means.

US was giving $7500 for each car sold to Tesla. But sure, CHYNAAA

Imo that didn’t do much but push people into tesla that were in the market for new cars already. Teslas are cheap enough on a lease as it is.

Re: Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

#85

Post by margalabargala »

LetsGetTechnicl wrote: post #35
arh5451 wrote: post #24

Nice article explaining solar energy policy. I think the article still doesn't address the mismatch between solar energy production and consumption, which needs to be filled by storage mechanisms. Also would have been nice to have a critical look at how the Chinese were able to corner the Solar market via state sponsored means.

What "critical look" is there to take? How about the way that the US gov't subsidizes the oil and gas industry, and is about to restart the coal industry? For some reason gov't investment in industry is only bad when China does it.

That's a really uncharitable way to read that.

A "critical look" from a US magazine would explore how, with solar power clearly being the future, the US has abdicated its energy dominance to another country. It would discuss the potential ramifications of us not owning our energy infrastructure supply chain the way we do with oil/gas, and what might be done about that.

The New Yorker is a US magazine. From the US perspective, yes, it is "good" when we do it and "bad" when China does it in a way that could negatively impact us.

Re: Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

#86

Post by xnx »

destitude wrote: post #34
arh5451 wrote: post #24

Nice article explaining solar energy policy. I think the article still doesn't address the mismatch between solar energy production and consumption, which needs to be filled by storage mechanisms. Also would have been nice to have a critical look at how the Chinese were able to corner the Solar market via state sponsored means.

I'm fully off grid (even had utility power but had them remove it). Cook on electric, have electric water heater, using AC and have enough panels and batteries to not even need a backup generator.

This is very cool. I'm guessing you must live somewhere with mild winters. Insulation can do wonders, but it can be overcast for weeks in the north.

Re: Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

#87

Post by bryanlarsen »

pydry wrote: post #63
bryanlarsen wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My google-fu is failing to resurface the links, but IIRC: One study determined the cheapest energy grids for many countries. IOW, if you had to rebuild the energy grid from scratch today, what would be the cheapest way to meet your needs? And the answer was 90 - 95% renewables, depending on country. Solar + wind + batteries for 90 - 95% of the power, with natgas peakers for the rest. And that 90-95% number increases…

One of the reasons I dont expect the australia storage model I cited to be wildly different to, say, Finland is that areas of the world which dont get a lot of sunlight tend to have a lot more wind and hydro potential per capita. I doubt there are any places in the world where some carbon free combination of solar, wind, hydro, pumped storage, batteries and syngas isnt economic.

Unfortunately, natgas has a large sunk cost advantage. If we were building from scratch in 2025, syngas for the last 2-10% would be competitive. But we have a lot of natgas infrastructure. Syngas's advantage is that it can be locally produced and stored. Natgas has to be shipped large distances, but we already have the infrastructure to do that.

Re: Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

#88

Post by testing22321 »

aaomidi wrote: post #66
arh5451 wrote: post #24

Nice article explaining solar energy policy. I think the article still doesn't address the mismatch between solar energy production and consumption, which needs to be filled by storage mechanisms. Also would have been nice to have a critical look at how the Chinese were able to corner the Solar market via state sponsored means.

US was giving $7500 for each car sold to Tesla. But sure, CHYNAAA

They gave that same rebate to all EV manufacturers. It had nothing to do with any one brand.

Re: Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

#89

Post by triceratops »

fragmede wrote: post #58
IsTom wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With some investment you can make solar panels locally, you can't produce new oil deposits.

Isn't that what biofuels are? Sun -> plants (corn) -> liquid that goes in (modified) cars

Sun (+ fertilizers made using petroleum)

Re: Solar power has begun to transform the world’s energy system

#90

Post by triceratops »

coldspoon95 wrote: post #47
dgacmu wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not entirely. California now handles its peak using solar+storage quite effectively. https://blog.gridstatus.io/caiso-solar-storage-spring-2025/ It's not entirely 1:1. CA has about 20GW of solar production, and the solar+storage together completely replace about 5GW of fossil capacity. (But don't discount wind. Wind+solar combine pretty well, and if you throw that in, you'll see that CA is actually replacing about 10…

Exactly my point. Solar and Wind being intermittent require additional expense of grid storage which other forms of energy do not need. So to scale, for each GW of solar, you’ll need a GW of storage plus the energy reserve to take through the night. Can’t rely on wind here as that’s also intermittent. And grid storage is energy intensive and sets up twisted incentives for those playing to get rich with energy arbitra…

> twisted incentives for those playing to get rich with energy arbitrage

You're saying energy arbitrage doesn't happen right now?

> Think solar farm generators owning their own grid storage and reducing solar output to sell at higher $ from storage

If enough generators do that they'll drive down the price of power at night and increase the price of power in the daytime. This will incentivize the opposite behavior.

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