Wind now competes with fossil fuels, and solar almost does
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Re: Wind now competes with fossil fuels, and solar almost does
#2Using real money accounting or funny money accounting?
Re: Wind now competes with fossil fuels, and solar almost does
#3The frustrating part about this is that fossil fuels have had the scales tipped in their favor via 1) subsities, and 2) not accounting for externalities in the price. The economic costs of particular emissions, CO2, mercury, and other pollutants are very real, and astronomical, but a classic tragedy of the commons.
If we factor those into the price, renewables like solar and wind would be much more competitive.
Re: Wind now competes with fossil fuels, and solar almost does
#4Using real money accounting or funny money accounting?
Using real money, taking into account much of the complexity of real world accounting: i.e. considering lower current interest rates, and many places where many of fossil fuel's externalities have to be paid for by the users of the fuel.
Re: Wind now competes with fossil fuels, and solar almost does
#5The frustrating part about this is that fossil fuels have had the scales tipped in their favor via 1) subsities, and 2) not accounting for externalities in the price. The economic costs of particular emissions, CO2, mercury, and other pollutants are very real, and astronomical, but a classic tragedy of the commons. If we factor those into the price, renewables like solar and wind would be much more competitive.
You make a valid point, but I'd be curious to what extent this applies on both sides. I know I certainly hear a lot of buzz about the subsidies provided for "green energy", installing panels, that sort of thing. I was also under the impression that we haven't fully moved away from using certain rare earth metals/other compounds in the panels/large electric generators, which likely have a heavy cost externality in mining.
Really wish there was some repository of what the "true costs" of the things we use are, this has got me thinking about even more mundane goods when you consider the whole supply chain.
Re: Wind now competes with fossil fuels, and solar almost does
#6The frustrating part about this is that fossil fuels have had the scales tipped in their favor via 1) subsities, and 2) not accounting for externalities in the price. The economic costs of particular emissions, CO2, mercury, and other pollutants are very real, and astronomical, but a classic tragedy of the commons. If we factor those into the price, renewables like solar and wind would be much more competitive.
You make a valid point, but I'd be curious to what extent this applies on both sides. I know I certainly hear a lot of buzz about the subsidies provided for "green energy", installing panels, that sort of thing. I was also under the impression that we haven't fully moved away from using certain rare earth metals/other compounds in the panels/large electric generators, which likely have a heavy cost externality in min…
The true fully-internalized cost of fossil energy is enormous. Mass extinction, crop failure, mass human migration, ocean ecosystem collapse. You think you can put a price on that? Do you think it's going to look cheaper than a couple tens of billions of dollars spent incentivizing solar panel installation?
Re: Wind now competes with fossil fuels, and solar almost does
#7The article uses euphemisms and double-talk:
As more countries and states enact market systems that put a price on carbon emissions, clean energy technologies will actually become cheaper than fossil fuel technologies
Translated into plain English:
As more governments raise the price of fossil fuels through increased taxation, solar and wind may cost less than fossil fuels.
What does the author have to gain by obfuscating something so obvious?
What is the impact on people when their energy costs are raised? (Hint: energy - vast amounts of it - goes into everything, from growing food to producing artificial heart valves.)
Re: Wind now competes with fossil fuels, and solar almost does
#81. This is excellent. It means we're well on our way to sustainable energy generation. Wind and solar are only going to get cheaper. Even without subsidies, there is no reason to ever build another coal or oil fired generation facility. Natural gas will stick around until utility scale batteries ramp up, to where peaking plants are too expensive compared to utility scale batteries.
2. Nuclear is dead. Very dead. Thorium. Fast breeder. Pebble bed. I don't care which you pick, no one is going to pour 10 years and $1-4 billion into a plant that won't be cost competitive when it turns up (maybe some governments, but you can't fix that; it'll just get mothballed).
3. Utility scale batteries are going to be needed to make up for solar and wind's capacity factor (availability). Tesla is going to clean up with its Gigafactory. Well done Elon. I hope Mars treats you well.
4. Any pollutants or negative externalities of both solar panel and battery production can be much better contained and managed than the output of a coal plant.
5. Cheaper renewables means even cheaper power available for the transition to electric vehicles.
6. First world demand for renewables will continue to drive down costs, allowing third world countries to piggyback off the cost savings. Remember how Africa leapfrogged with cell phones instead of land lines? Imagine battery packs and solar roofs in every home instead of traditional utilities. It's already feasible with current economics.
Did I cover everything? Anything missing?
Re: Wind now competes with fossil fuels, and solar almost does
#9The article uses euphemisms and double-talk: As more countries and states enact market systems that put a price on carbon emissions, clean energy technologies will actually become cheaper than fossil fuel technologies Translated into plain English: As more governments raise the price of fossil fuels through increased taxation, solar and wind may cost less than fossil fuels. What does the author have to gain by obfusc…
I don't think what the author mentioned and what you implied are one and the same. From author's perspective, when you look at the actual price of fuel including the carbon emissions that they are causing, which cause expenses in other ways like health/environment, clean energy technologies are actually getting cheaper than fossil fuel technologies.
Re: Wind now competes with fossil fuels, and solar almost does
#10The frustrating part about this is that fossil fuels have had the scales tipped in their favor via 1) subsities, and 2) not accounting for externalities in the price. The economic costs of particular emissions, CO2, mercury, and other pollutants are very real, and astronomical, but a classic tragedy of the commons. If we factor those into the price, renewables like solar and wind would be much more competitive.
You make a valid point, but I'd be curious to what extent this applies on both sides. I know I certainly hear a lot of buzz about the subsidies provided for "green energy", installing panels, that sort of thing. I was also under the impression that we haven't fully moved away from using certain rare earth metals/other compounds in the panels/large electric generators, which likely have a heavy cost externality in min…
Fossil fuels get on the order of 100+ billion per year in direct and indirect subsidies in the US as a conservative estimate. By far the largest subsides for 'Green Energy' go to corn ethanol which is mostly political football. After that there really more rounding errors than anything else.
PS: Nuclear seems to be popular on a lot of tech sites, but it needs massive subsides to come close to break even.