Live data from Hacker News

Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

pv-magazine-usa.com

91–100 of 226 posts

Re: Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

#91
post #77
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alas is right, China is poised to dominate battery, solar, and EV technology and to translate it to military technology as well. Meanwhile the Republicans are blowing up US alliances and sabotaging the battery/EV industrial development policy that was actually making progress in giving the US hope in catching up.

It’s the innovators dilemma. We have so much not just technical but cultural and political sunk cost in fossil fuels and traditional industrial era infrastructure. The Chinese are just developing now and don’t have so much of that sunk cost. So they can think like it’s the future. We are stuck in the past. Eventually there may come a day when it’s China that is stuck in the past, looking back to the early 21st centur…

>I really felt like Trump’s 2024 election was the moment it became the Chinese century.

You must have been asleep at the wheel or living under a rock to have mised China's rise over the last decades. They didn't wait for Trump to get elected in 2024 and then flipped a switch from third world country to global superpower.

"Damn, this hot cup of coffee burned my tongue. Why would Trump do this?"

-HN comments

Re: Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

#92

The scaling up of battery manufacturing for EVs and now solar storage has lead to prices I would have never imagined I'd see in my lifetime. It's one of the success stories that, having lived through it, has been a real joy. I know that folks might have been able to point to a graph years ago and said we'd be here eventually, but I had my doubts given the scale required and hacking through all the lobbying efforts we…

You are certainly not alone in your beliefs, but it always amazes me which technologies get the benefit of doubt and which are severely penalized by unfounded doubt. Solar and especially batteries are completely penalized and doubted in a way that defies any honest assessment of reality. The EIA and IEA forecasts are as terrible as they are because the reflect this unrealistic doubt (random blog spam link, but this o…

https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulat...

10 new plants at USD 2.7 Billion each. They take six years to build. USD 2/Watt. They have standardised designs, have invested in grownig their manpower and know-how.

Re: Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

#93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this take is too shallow, and based on hindsight. Germany has had fossil gas ties to Russia since the Soviet time. https://dw.com/en/russian-gas-in-germany-a-complicated-50-ye... When the iron curtain fell pretty much all of Central Europe liberalized and democratized. The sole exceptions being Belarus and Russia. Thinking they wouldn’t choose the same path is revisionist. I remember growing up and gaming onl…

‘We were all wrong’: how Germany got hooked on Russian energy - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jun/02/germany-depend... - June 2nd, 2022 > An arrangement that began as a peacetime opening to a former foe has turned into an instrument of aggression. Germany is now funding Russia’s war. In the first two months after the start of Russia’s assault on Ukraine, Germany is estimated to have paid nearly €8.3bn for Ru…

>> “I was wrong,” the former German finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble, says, simply. “We were all wrong.”

So when are they retroactively giving back their salaries and pensions for having fucked up the livelihoods of their taxpayers?

Politicians have no incentive to ever make good decisions for the future of their country without any skin in the game from which their personal riches are derived.

>We win or we learn.

Jensen Huang said that failure is learning but sometimes failure is just failure and you should know when to cut your losses before the failure goes from learning to bankruptcy. And Germany did far more failure than actually learning.

Re: Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

#94

Has any production battery become cheaper than LEAC ACID for computer UPS ? I have not seen new cheaper UPS getting launched.

Eaton and APC at least have models with LFP chemistry, with comparable prices across power ratings. The LFP will be more expensive though due to the increased longevity, at least until lead-acid ones stops being produced.

Re: Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

#95
post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s the innovators dilemma. We have so much not just technical but cultural and political sunk cost in fossil fuels and traditional industrial era infrastructure. The Chinese are just developing now and don’t have so much of that sunk cost. So they can think like it’s the future. We are stuck in the past. Eventually there may come a day when it’s China that is stuck in the past, looking back to the early 21st centur…

>I really felt like Trump’s 2024 election was the moment it became the Chinese century. You must have been asleep at the wheel or living under a rock to have mised China's rise over the last decades. They didn't wait for Trump to get elected in 2024 and then flipped a switch from third world country to global superpower. "Damn, this hot cup of coffee burned my tongue. Why would Trump do this?" -HN comments

No I saw it. I just felt like that was the moment it tipped.

Re: Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

#96
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Non-renewable energy is simply inferior, and will only become more so. you simply can't say this. despite the lobby against it, solar and wind energy have lifespans of around 20 years and afterwards, it's a freaking mess to deal with recycling and often times, garbage we don't know what to do. not even counting the amount of NASTY chemicals going into the production of solar panels. these are sometimes permanent an…

> it's a freaking mess to deal with recycling and often times, garbage we don't know what to do I love that this is followed by “so go nuclear!”

i recommend you starting with something easy to digest like this: https://www.amazon.com/Energy-Society-David-Pimentel-Ph-D/dp...

then you can move on and judge what't the panorama of closed/paywalled science found out there (Nature) that evaluates impacts of solar panel not even considering numbers of last batches of thrash from ~ 2010 (which still have 10-15 years till they start filling the world with chemicals like lead)... then may dive into electricity security and distribution and recycling technology to bring up a single ignorant phrase comment downsizing nuclear generation, despite it being safer and ecological on the long-term compared to photovoltaics in LOTS of places, for example

Re: Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

#97
post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I really felt like Trump’s 2024 election was the moment it became the Chinese century. You must have been asleep at the wheel or living under a rock to have mised China's rise over the last decades. They didn't wait for Trump to get elected in 2024 and then flipped a switch from third world country to global superpower. "Damn, this hot cup of coffee burned my tongue. Why would Trump do this?" -HN comments

No I saw it. I just felt like that was the moment it tipped.

[flagged]

Re: Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

#98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their energy prices are an outcome of incompetence, having tied their energy prices to Russia and a gas supply from them. In hindsight, economic diplomacy is not the path to keeping an authoritarian in check; a strong military and energy independence is. German energy prices will decline with battery storage and more renewables pushing out the last of their coal and fossil gas generation. Should’ve kept the old nucle…

I think this take is too shallow, and based on hindsight. Germany has had fossil gas ties to Russia since the Soviet time. https://dw.com/en/russian-gas-in-germany-a-complicated-50-ye... When the iron curtain fell pretty much all of Central Europe liberalized and democratized. The sole exceptions being Belarus and Russia. Thinking they wouldn’t choose the same path is revisionist. I remember growing up and gaming onl…

> Thinking they wouldn’t choose the same path is revisionist.

Societies tend to not change how things work no matter who is in charge.

Re: Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

#99
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Non-renewable energy is simply inferior, and will only become more so. you simply can't say this. despite the lobby against it, solar and wind energy have lifespans of around 20 years and afterwards, it's a freaking mess to deal with recycling and often times, garbage we don't know what to do. not even counting the amount of NASTY chemicals going into the production of solar panels. these are sometimes permanent an…

As opposed to coal that pump out NASTY chemicals right now?

i'm not defending coal. i'm just saying that solution to energy is much more broad than the OP seems to pass on "being cheaper to destroy a coal plant and substitute with batteries and solar". i wouldn't be surprised trey sightread titles and didn't realized that it may be economical to re-use an OLD coal plant to produce solar energy but well... my last comment on this thread has it all, great book

Re: Analysis finds anytime electricity from solar available as battery costs plummet

#100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this take is too shallow, and based on hindsight. Germany has had fossil gas ties to Russia since the Soviet time. https://dw.com/en/russian-gas-in-germany-a-complicated-50-ye... When the iron curtain fell pretty much all of Central Europe liberalized and democratized. The sole exceptions being Belarus and Russia. Thinking they wouldn’t choose the same path is revisionist. I remember growing up and gaming onl…

‘We were all wrong’: how Germany got hooked on Russian energy - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jun/02/germany-depend... - June 2nd, 2022 > An arrangement that began as a peacetime opening to a former foe has turned into an instrument of aggression. Germany is now funding Russia’s war. In the first two months after the start of Russia’s assault on Ukraine, Germany is estimated to have paid nearly €8.3bn for Ru…

A self inflicted wound. Europe keeps entering into spot gas supply contracts and paying through the nose instead of signing longer-term contracts for lower prices. The Russians have always been reliable suppliers even after sanctions took place, and calls from some hotheads to use gas as leverage was never seriously followed through by the real decision makers. And Habeck is an idiot. Lately Germany has not been buying enough summer gas to keep the storage full, and of course the storage gets emptied during the winter - people need to keep warm. To imply that Gazprom is somehow stealing gas from these facilities to exert political pressure is ludicrous, expecially since Gazprom has not even owned these facilities since 2022.
Post reply on HN