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Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

electrek.co

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Re: Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

#31

Post by lnsru »

almosthere wrote: post #17
willvarfar wrote: post #3

Ignoring the politics, we have to say that China has done the world collectively as a whole a major service in strategically developing and mass producing super cheap solar panels.

They are so cheap, infact, that no other country in the world is able to compete even with huge tariffs.

They are not cheap. They are extremely efficient at manufacturing. The 201st panel look exactly the same as 1st one. Definitely no human labor involved. Huge well readable serial numbers placed on multiple places of the panel for camera based identification. Usually no single failing panel in shipping container. The bad ones were clearly damaged during transportation. This efficiency looks scary when I see output of my workplace in Germany.

Re: Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

#32

Post by SideburnsOfDoom »

willvarfar wrote: post #3

Ignoring the politics, we have to say that China has done the world collectively as a whole a major service in strategically developing and mass producing super cheap solar panels.

For all the people hyping LLM AI in order to raise lots of cash, solar and battery is the real transformational technology of our time. But it gets less press, as it just doesn't benefit a few, who need the press hype.

Re: Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

#33

Post by jimt1234 »

tasty_freeze wrote: post #15
willvarfar wrote: post #3

Ignoring the politics, we have to say that China has done the world collectively as a whole a major service in strategically developing and mass producing super cheap solar panels.

For years I've been hearing one excuse for the US not doing more about climate change is that China is polluting more and if they aren't doing something about it then why should we? The argument always seemed disingenuous. For sure, China produces a lot of pollution as they are modernizing, but they are also investing a lot in the direction of sustainability. If we take the balance of (pollution produced - pollution…

Latest excuse: sustainable energy is a scam.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Ending...

Re: Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

#34

Post by jacquesm »

hangonhn wrote: post #12
willvarfar wrote: post #3

Ignoring the politics, we have to say that China has done the world collectively as a whole a major service in strategically developing and mass producing super cheap solar panels.

It really is a huge service not just to the developed world that needs to decarbonize but also a huge service to the developing world. Solar can be put up quickly and cheaply and is good for about 2 decades and can be paired with cheap LiFo batteries to give round the clock electricity. Both of these are relatively portable. It can really bootstrap the economies of local communities where infrastructure hasn't been b…

The biggest bottle neck to really solving the energy problem is now the price and fragility of high voltage DC long haul connections. Between those and solar you can have energy anywhere any time.

Re: Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

#35

Post by mock-possum »

trollbridge wrote: post #23
vondur wrote: post #16

Wish they would do this in California where wholesale power can go negative for the same reason.

And they actually charge you a fee if you generate. My brother in law unhooked from the grid because back feeding was charging him $100 a month. To give away power.

Is that a California thing? In OR it’s like ~$15 to interlink (or whatever the term is)

Re: Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

#36

Post by jocaal »

jl6 wrote: post #26
willvarfar wrote: post #3

Ignoring the politics, we have to say that China has done the world collectively as a whole a major service in strategically developing and mass producing super cheap solar panels.

Let's hope someone can do the same for grid-scale seasonal storage. "Excess" solar electricity won't be free in (noon, summer) if you can easily bank it for (night, winter).

Power travels near the speed of light. In theory, the entire globe can be connected and countries with daylight can supply those at night in a cycle.

Re: Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

#37

Post by svara »

jacquesm wrote: post #34
hangonhn wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really is a huge service not just to the developed world that needs to decarbonize but also a huge service to the developing world. Solar can be put up quickly and cheaply and is good for about 2 decades and can be paired with cheap LiFo batteries to give round the clock electricity. Both of these are relatively portable. It can really bootstrap the economies of local communities where infrastructure hasn't been b…

The biggest bottle neck to really solving the energy problem is now the price and fragility of high voltage DC long haul connections. Between those and solar you can have energy anywhere any time.

Great point, you might dream of long range connections sending solar energy from the day into the night around the world.

But, what exactly do you mean by fragility? In what way are they fragile?

Re: Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

#39

Post by almosthere »

lnsru wrote: post #31
almosthere wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are so cheap, infact, that no other country in the world is able to compete even with huge tariffs.

They are not cheap. They are extremely efficient at manufacturing. The 201st panel look exactly the same as 1st one. Definitely no human labor involved. Huge well readable serial numbers placed on multiple places of the panel for camera based identification. Usually no single failing panel in shipping container. The bad ones were clearly damaged during transportation. This efficiency looks scary when I see output of…

Sorry I should have used the word "inexpensive" I was not referring to the quality, I was referring to the price. I own many Chinese built panels.

Re: Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

#40

Post by bryanlarsen »

hangonhn wrote: post #12
willvarfar wrote: post #3

Ignoring the politics, we have to say that China has done the world collectively as a whole a major service in strategically developing and mass producing super cheap solar panels.

It really is a huge service not just to the developed world that needs to decarbonize but also a huge service to the developing world. Solar can be put up quickly and cheaply and is good for about 2 decades and can be paired with cheap LiFo batteries to give round the clock electricity. Both of these are relatively portable. It can really bootstrap the economies of local communities where infrastructure hasn't been b…

Starlink isn't necessary. In India you can get 1GB/day of cell phone data for $4/month, and other developing nations aren't far behind.

The solar+battery revolution is doing for power what cell phones did for communications in the third world in the 90's and 2000's.

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