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Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

theguardian.com

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Re: Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

#221

Post by ZeroGravitas »

boznz wrote: post #158
Torkel wrote: post #94

The growth of solar is astounding. I dug into data a while back and tried to do some visualizations of it, mainly for my own understanding: https://torkeldanielsson.se/solar-energy-forecasts/ Solar is already by far our cheapest source of energy. As solar expands, the learning rate means solar will be even cheaper. We should expect solar to be the single largest source of energy on earth by 2035.

A shame electricity is not the whole picture when it comes to energy. The resurgence in EV sales off the back of high gas prices is awesome, but almost 100% of bulk transport costs still rely on oil. Also, unlike EV's which can be plugged in at home for most of their needs, bulk-transport will require considerable new infrastructure to make the transition. Still a way to go.

There was a global agreement to shift ocean transport from oil.

The US killed it.

The US and Israel attacked Iran causing chaos in oil markets and put it back on track.

https://www.imo.org/en/mediacentre/pressbriefings/pages/imo-...

Re: Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

#222

Post by oblio »

thewhitetulip wrote: post #219
oblio wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LOL "Asia" is a Greek name, fully Eurocentric. The entire continent doesn't even make sense. Geographically, sure, culturally, absolutely not. It should either be Eurasia or probably about 5 different continents (South of Himalaya aka Indian subcontinent, North of Himalaya aka Siberia + Central Asia + China + South East Asia, South of Caucasus + Kopet Dag aka Middle East, etc).

But the correct term is West Asia and not middle east (I live here and yet I didn't know it until this was shown as West Asia war on the news)

The entire region needs a better name. It's own name, something that's not meant to be "in the middle, between more important regions", "west of what people consider more important".

I was actually thinking about that and stuff like "Fertile Crescent" would be more neutral (but it risks not covering places like Arabia).

I wonder if locals have a generic name for the entire region that's more appropriate.

Re: Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

#223

Post by TitaRusell »

rtkwe wrote: post #73
tedggh wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of comes from state initiatives too. Texas being conservative also happens to be very pro solar. I’m in the business and we have some great projects there. The US military is also pushing solar at their facilities. Then you have many private-state partnerships like tolls investing a lot in solar. The outlook in general is pretty positive in the US, a lot more than what people would think.

True though one of the major things they have been able to do because it's mostly in the federal purview is killing offshore wind.

This is hilarious to me. In my country people prefer to have wind turbines 20 kilometres off the coast line instead of near their house...

Offshore wind is the perfect NIMBY solution.

Re: Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

#224

Post by fooblaster »

Broken_Hippo wrote: post #135
pdq wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High load in the day during sunlight is mostly true for summer heat, but in the winter you have cold evenings which requires base load or storage, combined with solar angle/efficiency being worse in the winter.

Actually, the US uses more power during the day in the summer - there is a dropoff in the night for both summer and winter. Night time use is somewhat similar. [1] Cooling takes more energy than warming, so the summer daytime use is higher. Summer = warm evenings. I'm from Indiana - it was almost always cooler at 10am than 7pm, even in the winter. It takes time to heat up or cool down. I'll also mention that nights a…

Cooling doesn't really take more energy than warming, because cooling is warming if you have a heat pump. Are you not just observing here the usage of fossil fuels for heating, which is extremely common?

Re: Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

#225

Post by Broken_Hippo »

fooblaster wrote: post #224
Broken_Hippo wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, the US uses more power during the day in the summer - there is a dropoff in the night for both summer and winter. Night time use is somewhat similar. [1] Cooling takes more energy than warming, so the summer daytime use is higher. Summer = warm evenings. I'm from Indiana - it was almost always cooler at 10am than 7pm, even in the winter. It takes time to heat up or cool down. I'll also mention that nights a…

Cooling doesn't really take more energy than warming, because cooling is warming if you have a heat pump. Are you not just observing here the usage of fossil fuels for heating, which is extremely common?

How common are heat pumps in the states now - and is this something your average worker can afford? I looked into it some time before I moved - and before they were as popular - and installation costs were prohibitive. Moved to Norway over a decade ago. Heat pumps are popular but most homes don't have them here, especially in the cities. I can't imagine that rentals are upgrading, considering its rare to even update insulation in the cheapest rentals.

Are heat pumps common for factories and offices, which account for a lot of energy usage during the week?

Anywhere they aren't common, cooling generally is going to require more traditional methods and the energy cost is greater than just heating. If it were the other way around, poor folks would use a window air conditioner to heat. Cooling pretty much always creates warming - which is the reason it is vented outside.

The energy use I linked to doesn't actually consider where the energy comes from - just the use itself. These methods aren't going to use more or less energy depending on where the energy comes from. Heat pumps would make less usage due to efficiency.

Re: Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

#226

Post by dalyons »

boznz wrote: post #158
Torkel wrote: post #94

The growth of solar is astounding. I dug into data a while back and tried to do some visualizations of it, mainly for my own understanding: https://torkeldanielsson.se/solar-energy-forecasts/ Solar is already by far our cheapest source of energy. As solar expands, the learning rate means solar will be even cheaper. We should expect solar to be the single largest source of energy on earth by 2035.

A shame electricity is not the whole picture when it comes to energy. The resurgence in EV sales off the back of high gas prices is awesome, but almost 100% of bulk transport costs still rely on oil. Also, unlike EV's which can be plugged in at home for most of their needs, bulk-transport will require considerable new infrastructure to make the transition. Still a way to go.

Something like half of all bulk transport is moving fossil fuels around. So there’s already a huge win

Re: Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

#227

Post by rtkwe »

leonidasrup wrote: post #186
rtkwe wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's part of what's notable about this. The administration hasn't been able to reverse the trend despite putting a massive thumb on the scale against projects like offshore wind and tariffs on solar panel imports. There's probably a delay in the effects though since projects started before they took office are probably starting to thin out and finish up. We'd have to look into the permitting of new projects…

Tariffs on solar panel imports should stimulate domestic solar panel production, but only when they are high enough and applied long enough to justify investments into new solar panel manufacturing facilities.

You can do it with targeted tariffs with assurances they'll last but these broad tariffs make it harder to get the base materials you need to build the panels out of in the first place plus they're so crazy they're almost guaranteed to be wiped out in a few years if not sooner so as a manufacturer they don't have the confidence that the cost equalization of the tariffs will be around long enough to not bankrupt them.

Another way to do it would be guaranteed buys for electrifying military etc and grants for projects using US made cells instead of foreign ones that could also effectively subsidize local production.

It's like a lot of things done by this administration they do it such hamfisted and obvious ways that they don't accomplish their nominal goals. See a lot of the court cases where they've been blocked in implementation because they said the quiet part out loud. eg: it's usually REALLY hard to prove malicious prosecution but they keep saying out loud "we're prosecuting this person in retaliation for their protected activities".

Re: Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

#228

Post by rtkwe »

gimmeThaBeet wrote: post #197
rtkwe wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True though one of the major things they have been able to do because it's mostly in the federal purview is killing offshore wind.

It's sort a "broken clock right twice a day" thing, but I agree with not doing offshore wind in the US. The divergence immediately follows in that I wish they would just push onshore wind. It's sort of a circular issue, it's madly expensive because we haven't built a lot and aren't super good at it, and we don't get much of it built because we aren't great at it and it always is ludicrously expensive. The US has a un…

Ocean winds are strong and predictable in ways that are really beneficial to the wind farms so the extra costs are balanced out by the fact that there's always a strong usable wind to harness too.

Also the "we're bad at this because we don't do the so we can't do this" is throwing away a great project and solution because of a temporary problem. Once we start doing it in significant numbers we'll rapidly get better at doing it too.

Re: Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

#229

Post by Schiendelman »

int_19h wrote: post #209
tolciho wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> have little black particles all over it. Nobody likes that, no matter what the President says. Should you live near one of those big noisy "freeway" things you may note the little black particles over everything in the surroundings but nobody likes to tear down the interstate.

I have two things to say to that. First, I live 150 yards from a major freeway - I-90 in WA, it's three lanes in each direction here. There are no tiny black particles over everything in surroundings, and my outdoors AQI (from my own sensor) is normally in single digits and basically only ever gets above 50 if it's wildfire smoke or the neighbors are burning something. But second, if we developed a reliable and cheap…

How are you measuring your AQI, and what particle size? Tire particles aren't PM2.5 AFAIK and are very hazardous to your health.

Re: Solar generates more energy in US than coal for first time

#230

Post by Schiendelman »

SoftTalker wrote: post #6
toomuchtodo wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The world is, roughly, deploying 1TW/solar PV a year at current rates. It took a while to get here, it won’t take as long to get to 100%. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-capaci...

Storage is the issue. You still need to supply base load (well, all load) at night.

It turns out battery prices have dropped so much that this isn't difficult anymore either.
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