[HN Gopher] Renewables reached nearly 50% of global electricity ...
___________________________________________________________________
Renewables reached nearly 50% of global electricity capacity last
year
Author : Growtika
Score : 235 points
Date : 2026-04-02 15:26 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theregister.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theregister.com)
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Report: https://www.irena.org/Publications/2026/Mar/Renewable-
| capaci...
| Ancalagon wrote:
| Wait this is actually amazing, I had no idea it was that high. I
| can't even believe what the US admin is doing, this is clearly
| the winning technology.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-capaci...
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/renewable-energy
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/modern-renewable-energy-c...
|
| https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/indias-electrotech-...
|
| (global solar PV deployment is just a bit below ~1TW/year at
| current deployment rates)
| cucumber3732842 wrote:
| Installed capacity is a misleading number. If you assessed
| the trucking industry by simply sum-ing the rated capacity of
| all the hardware you'd be rightfully laughed and and called a
| liar on the basis of all the times the trucks are empty and
| all the trucks that run out of volume before weight.
| Renewables is a similar situation.
|
| Some panel in a solar farm in Canada is not gonna see the
| conditions that let it produce rated capacity nearly as often
| as one in Arizona. So the guy in Canada installs more
| capacity to get the same power. Meanwhile the guy in Arizona
| doesn't have enough copper leading out of his site to handle
| the power he could produce at peak on the best days, because
| he over-provisioned too, in order to be able to produce a
| given amount earlier/later in the day. The actual generation
| hardware is so cheap that this is just the sensible way to
| deploy renewables, but it makes for stupid misleading
| numbers.
|
| Legacy power generation has much different numbers and isn't
| subject to the whims of the weather so installed capacity is
| a number that means something in that context.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| This is a common rebuttal, but not grounded in reality.
| Even assuming ~20% capacity factor for "apples to apples"
| comparison to legacy thermal and nuclear, solar and
| batteries are the cheapest form of power to install.
| Current geopolitical events spiking LNG costs make the math
| even more favorable towards renewables.
|
| https://ember-energy.org/latest-updates/24-hour-solar-now-
| ec...
|
| https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-
| electricity-e... ("104$/MWh: Achieving 97% of the way to
| 24/365 solar in very sunny regions is now affordable at as
| low as $104/MWh, cheaper than coal and nuclear and 22% less
| than a year earlier.")
|
| > Legacy power generation has much different numbers and
| isn't subject to the whims of the weather so installed
| capacity is a number that means something in that context.
|
| Legacy power is ridiculously expensive in comparison. Who
| will invest in fossil gas generation when ~20% of LNG
| exports have been taken offline for the next 3-5 years?
|
| https://www.lazard.com/media/eijnqja3/lazards-lcoeplus-
| june-... (page 8)
|
| _Strikes on Qatar 's LNG Ras Laffan plant Will Reshape the
| Future of Fossil Gas_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47484246 - March 2026
|
| Fossil fuels are over, it's just how fast we get to "done."
| Enough sunlight falls on the Earth in 30-60 minutes to
| power humanity for a year. Solar PV and battery
| manufacturing continues to spool up, and year by year, more
| fossil generation is pushed out.
|
| California is routinely operating at 80% renewables, 90%
| low carbon generation during daylight hours as they work
| towards installing battery storage to replace their fossil
| generation (~52GW target by 2045), for example, while
| having plans for 10s of GWs of additional solar to come
| online over the next decade.
|
| https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/US-CAL-
| CISO/live/fi...
|
| https://www.energy.ca.gov/data-reports/energy-
| almanac/califo...
|
| https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/solar/were-
| harvesting-t...
| cucumber3732842 wrote:
| I didn't say they weren't cheap. I said you were being
| misleading. I'm not rebutting your thesis. I'm rebutting
| your defense of it.
|
| They're so cheap they get over-provisioned on purpose.
| Can you imagine some guy speci'ng switchgear and
| transmission lines for a coal or gas plant that can't
| handle the plant running full tilt? Yeah me either. But
| that's exactly how it's done for renewables because
| that's where the sweet spot of cost-benifit is.
|
| A dozen 10mw turbines might be fed through 100mw of
| transmission hardware. They can never produce their rated
| 120mw because liquid copper would happen if they did. But
| they were intentionally provisioned that way so that
| based on weather patterns and whatnot they'd be able to
| expect say 80mw a certain number of days per year.
|
| There are untold numbers of renewable installations out
| there that cannot supply their nameplate capacity to the
| grid in such a manner.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| There is nothing wrong with over provisioning cheap
| renewable power generation when it is economically
| superior to building fossil assets that will end up
| stranded. As long as grid demand is met and it is cheaper
| to build renewables and batteries to do it, it will be
| done, and that is the path we're on.
|
| If gas plants cannot economically compete, they will not
| be built or fired. And the evidence shows they cannot
| compete, regardless of their competing capacity factor
| and dispatchability.
| pepperoni_pizza wrote:
| Do you have some links to how someone scaled up storage?
| I know that scaling up solar is easy, but I don't know of
| any nation that build significant storage.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| https://about.bnef.com/insights/clean-energy/global-
| energy-s...
|
| https://www.iea.org/commentaries/global-battery-markets-
| are-...
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false
| &qu...
| myrmidon wrote:
| You are still arguing against a strawman. Cucumber3732842
| is just saying that nameplate capacity is a
| systematically flawed metric when comparing renewable
| generation, because their capacity factor is consistently
| lower than for conventional plants.
|
| A better metric would simply be annual production, where
| we're in the ~30% range globally
| (https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-electricity-
| renewab...). Even that comparison portraits renewables
| very favorably, because dispatchable power is easier to
| handle than the same output from intermittent sources.
|
| If you look beyond electricity (heating/total primary
| energy use) the picture gets even worse.
|
| This is not an argument against renewables, this is
| against premature cheering and misleading use of numbers.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| I think you misunderstand. We are cheering trajectories,
| not the point in time. Renewables and storage will
| continue to be deployed, fossil fuels will remain
| expensive, and build outs will continue over the next
| decade or two. If these trajectories hold, and growth
| rates continue to grow for clean energy deployments, what
| happens? The outcome is obvious, is it not?
|
| The thesis is simply this chart:
| https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-
| capaci...
|
| Of course, there is nuance, but the facts are that in the
| next 10-20 years, renewables and storage will have
| destroyed demand for fossil fuels for electrical
| generation. That's progress. We might go faster or
| slower, depending on policy and other factors, but this
| is the trajectory we are currently on, based on the data
| presented in this piece.
|
| The Economist wrote a piece explaining this, if that is
| helpful:
|
| _The exponential growth of solar power will change the
| world_ -
| https://www.economist.com/leaders/2024/06/20/the-
| exponential... | https://archive.today/lp9pZ - June 20th,
| 2024
|
| > To call solar power's rise exponential is not
| hyperbole, but a statement of fact. Installed solar
| capacity doubles roughly every three years, and so grows
| ten-fold each decade. Such sustained growth is seldom
| seen in anything that matters. That makes it hard for
| people to get their heads round what is going on. When it
| was a tenth of its current size ten years ago, solar
| power was still seen as marginal even by experts who knew
| how fast it had grown. The next ten-fold increase will be
| equivalent to multiplying the world's entire fleet of
| nuclear reactors by eight in less than the time it
| typically takes to build just a single one of them.
|
| > Solar cells will in all likelihood be the single
| biggest source of electrical power on the planet by the
| mid 2030s. By the 2040s they may be the largest source
| not just of electricity but of all energy. On current
| trends, the all-in cost of the electricity they produce
| promises to be less than half as expensive as the
| cheapest available today. This will not stop climate
| change, but could slow it a lot faster. Much of the world
| --including Africa, where 600m people still cannot light
| their homes--will begin to feel energy-rich. That feeling
| will be a new and transformational one for humankind.
|
| > To grasp that this is not some environmentalist fever
| dream, consider solar economics. As the cumulative
| production of a manufactured good increases, costs go
| down. As costs go down, demand goes up. As demand goes
| up, production increases--and costs go down further. This
| cannot go on for ever; production, demand or both always
| become constrained. In earlier energy transitions--from
| wood to coal, coal to oil or oil to gas--the efficiency
| of extraction grew, but it was eventually offset by the
| cost of finding ever more fuel.
|
| So! The transition is going fast (~1TW/year), and it is
| likely to continue to increase in speed (more solar
| manufacturing and battery storage will continue to be be
| built year over year, increasing annual production and
| deployment rates from today's rate(s)), based on all
| available data and observations. This is the good news to
| cheer. Nameplate and capacity factor arguments are
| meaningless in this context. We are at the hockey stick
| inflection point: look up.
| Ancalagon wrote:
| I am from the USA, and from the numbers it looks like
| China will save the planet.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Strongly agree. China will soak the world in clean tech.
| It is a component of their five year plans.
|
| https://ember-energy.org/data/china-cleantech-export-
| data/
|
| > As the world's largest manufacturer of clean
| technologies, data on China's cleantech exports provide
| an important early insight into the pace and scale of the
| energy transition. In 2024, China produced around 80% of
| the world's solar PV modules and battery cells, and 70%
| of electric vehicles.
|
| Clean tech printer goes brrr.
| B56b wrote:
| This forum is oddly hesitant to accept good news, a weird
| feature of online communities.
| jacquesm wrote:
| And is irrationally in love with nuclear power.
| dalyons wrote:
| this should be the top comment, it neatly captures almost
| everything important about this moment.
| chickenbig wrote:
| > There is nothing wrong with over provisioning cheap
| renewable power generation when it is economically
| superior to building fossil assets that will end up
| stranded.
|
| Solar cannibalises solar, so the price when the sun
| shines may tend to zero, but that does not ensure the
| price to the consumer of the electricity they need tends
| to zero, or even lower than it was.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Australia is currently giving away free power for the
| peak three hours of sunlight a day, due to solar
| overcapacity until battery uptake increases. They are
| also working on a market scheme to transition primary
| grid services from thermal generators to battery storage.
|
| They only have 22GW of coal generation remaining to
| replace, which should take no longer than 5-10 years.
| These generators are already at the end of their life, so
| they have no other choice but to go forward with
| renewables and storage.
|
| A glimpse into the future, as is Spain, as is California.
| Some are further on their journey than others. Those at
| the frontier will teach the rest of us how to solve for
| the hardest parts.
|
| https://www.pv-tech.org/australia-mandates-three-hour-
| free-s...
|
| https://openelectricity.org.au/analysis/40-renewable-and-
| ris...
| cbmuser wrote:
| Compare the price and carbon density of the French
| electricity grid with that of California to understand
| why that rebuttal is justified.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| France had to nationalize EDF due to the exorbitant cost
| of their nuclear fleet, and they cannot get a reactor
| built within reasonable capital costs. Spain plans to
| deprecate their remaining nuclear for renewables for
| similar reasons. California will achieve a low carbon
| generation profile for far cheaper than it cost France
| (refer to the Lazard LCOE data product I've cited in my
| other comment in this thread).
|
| _EDF fleet upkeep will cost over 100 billion euros by
| 2035, court of auditors says_ -
| https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/edf-fleet-upkeep-
| wil... - November 17th, 2025
|
| _French utility EDF lifts cost estimate for new reactors
| to 67 billion euros_ - Les Echos -
| https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/french-utility-
| edf-l... - March 4th, 2024
|
| _Explainer-Why a French plan to take full control of EDF
| is no cure-all_ -
| https://www.euronews.com/next/2022/07/07/edf-
| nationalistion - July 7th, 2022
|
| _Spain's Nuclear Shutdown Set to Test Renewables Success
| Story_ -
| https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-11/spain-
| s-n... | https://archive.today/4fB7K - April 11th, 2025
| ("Spain is a postcard, a glimpse into the future where
| you're not going to need baseload generators from 8am to
| 5pm" with solar and wind providing all of the grid's
| needs during that time, said Kesavarthiniy Savarimuthu, a
| European power markets analyst with BloombergNEF. Still,
| she said, there is a reasonable chance this goal may take
| longer than expected and "extending the life of the
| nuclear fleet can prove as an insurance for these
| delays.") (My note: As of this comment, Spain has 7.12GW
| of nuclear generation capacity per ree.es, and assuming
| ~2GW/month deployment rate seen in Germany, could replace
| this capacity with solar and batteries in ~17 months; per
| Electricity Maps, only 15.45% of Spain's electrical
| generation over the last twelve months has been sourced
| from this nuclear:
| https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/ES/12mo/monthly)
| adev_ wrote:
| > France had to nationalize EDF due to the exorbitant
| cost of their nuclear fleet
|
| That's just wrong.
|
| EDF nuclear fleet is highly profitable with around 92TWh
| exported in 2025 and more than 5 Billions of benefits for
| the country and the company.
|
| https://www.sfen.org/rgn/le-nucleaire-en-
| chiffres-923-twh-de...
|
| The reason EDF had to be nationalized is because the
| government used the company as a "price shield" to
| protect consumer against energy price rise on the
| European market in 2022 with a mechanism named TRV (Tarif
| Regule vente). That digged up EDF dept tremendously.
|
| > Spain plans to deprecate their remaining nuclear for
| renewables for similar reasons
|
| Span deprecated their nuclear government because their
| current Socialist government is aligned with Ecologists
| that are, like everywhere in Europe, antinuclear.
|
| Additionally, the lack of spinning generator in Spain is
| currently partially what caused the Blackout in Spain in
| 2025 due to a lack of inertia in the system.
|
| > EDF fleet upkeep will cost over 100 billion euros by
| 2035, court of auditors says
|
| This is over 25 years and will prolong-ate the lifetime
| of the 56 reactors by 20 more years. These produce 70% of
| the country need in electricity.
|
| In comparison, the German energiewende cost 400 billions
| for 37% of electricity of 2025 produced by solar and
| wind. With production medium that will need to be
| entirely renewed in 20 years.
|
| > California will achieve a low carbon generation profile
| for far cheaper than it cost France (refer to the Lazard
| LCOE
|
| That is also wrong.
|
| Because LCOE calculation does not take into consideration
| the price of the grid consolidating necessary for
| renewable nor the necessity of backup generation in case
| of dunkleflaute.
| Kon5ole wrote:
| >> France had to nationalize EDF due to the exorbitant
| cost of their nuclear fleet >That's just wrong.
|
| No, it's correct, the total costs of the 2022 bailout was
| almost 10bn, and that was to get control over a company
| that had over 50bn in debt.
|
| Furthermore it was discovered that the plants had
| neglected maintenance that had to be undertaken
| rightaway, that had nothing to do with the TRV.
|
| Of course, the TRV didn't help, it caused a loss of 18bn
| in 2022 on top of everything else, but things were bad
| already.
|
| So even if the mentioned 5 bn export now was pure profit
| - which is isn't - it would take 15-20 years to cover the
| bailout that has already taken place. The 100 billion of
| investments until 2035 is in addition to that.
|
| And they will have to sell their power on markets that
| will increasingly often have free electricity from solar
| and wind. How do you pay 1000 educated plant operators
| when electricity prices are negative?
|
| Unfortunately nuclear power isn't the kind of thing you
| can try and then walk away from when it turns out to be a
| bad idea. Which is likely the main reason it's still
| around.
| adev_ wrote:
| > No, it's correct, the total costs of the 2022 bailout
| was almost 10bn, and that was to get control over a
| company that had over 50bn in debt.
|
| Bailout of 2022 alone was around 22bnEUR, which was added
| on top of it the historical debt.
|
| Revenue of EDF in 2025 is over 100bnEUR to put things
| into perspective.
|
| > Furthermore it was discovered that the plants had
| neglected maintenance that had to be undertaken
| rightaway, that had nothing to do with the TRV.
|
| That is also wrong. The immediate maintenance in 2022 was
| related to "corrosion sous contrainte" which has nothing
| to do with carelessness. It was mainly the French nuclear
| regulator (ASN) over-reacting to some non-critical cracks
| find in some pipes. They have themselves said afterward
| that the immediate actions were not necessary. The
| actions were overreactive (from EDF side) and the
| calendar was very unfortunate.
|
| > So even if the mentioned 5 bn export now was pure
| profit - which is isn't -
|
| Indeed. Profits in 2025 were currently over 8bnEUR, so
| well over 5bnEUR.
|
| 5bnEUR just concern the profit made by the exports.
|
| This is not hard to understand: Making a profit by
| selling valuable nuclear energy during evening peak
| consumption while buying cheap intermittent solar during
| low consumption time is an easy game.
|
| People generally do not understand that Nuclear is a
| CAPEX game, not an OPEX one.
|
| > And they will have to sell their power on markets that
| will increasingly often have free electricity from solar
| and wind. How do you pay 1000 educated plant operators
| when electricity prices are negative?
|
| By selling nuclear electricity at 180EUR/MWh every night
| when the sun do not shine.
|
| (This is the average price, every evening peak this
| month)
|
| Meaning-while, the profitability of solar operators will
| sink to the ground due to the overcapacity causing
| negative price during the day as soon as the sun shine.
| Many of them will die if not state subsidized with public
| money.
|
| > nuclear power isn't the kind of thing you can try and
| then walk away from when it turns out to be a bad idea
|
| It is currently the best low-carbon energy around. And
| will continue to be for the next 2 decades.
|
| The current Co2/kwh emission of France is 27g/kwh.
|
| The comparison with country like Germany (397g/kwh) or
| state like California (190g/kwh) that spend >100Bn$ on
| renewable speak for itself.
|
| I can safely bet that in 15y from now, the French grid
| will still be greener than the German one.
| natmaka wrote:
| > making a profit by selling valuable nuclear energy
|
| EDF adjusted economic debt at the beginning of 2026:
| EUR81.7 billion After decades of massive help
| (nationalisations building it, monopoly, gift-loans, debt
| cancellation...
|
| > the profitability of solar operators will sink to the
| ground due to the overcapacity causing negative price
|
| Wait for storage (V2G...) and hydrogen to kick in.
|
| > France > Germany
|
| France's transition to nuclear power began in 1963 and is
| now complete.
|
| In other countries (Germany...), transitions to
| renewables began with the advent of their industrial
| versions, around 2005. The current context makes these
| transitions more challenging, and they are still
| underway.
|
| Therefore, any comparison of their results, for example,
| greenhouse gas emissions, must be based not on snapshots
| (which currently favor France since its transition is
| complete), but on their progress: speed, costs, impacts,
| etc.
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/carbon-intensity-
| electric...
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-
| generation-fr...
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/consumption-based-
| carbon-...
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co-emissions-per-
| capita?t...
| natmaka wrote:
| > EDF nuclear fleet is highly profitable with around
| 92TWh exported in 2025
|
| Nope. Electricity exports are officially exported at a
| loss, since the average price per MWh exported is
| generally slightly lower than the average French spot
| price ( https://assets.rte-
| france.com/prod/public/2025-04/2025-04-09... , page 87).
| According to the sound approach established by Mr.
| Boiteux, this price must compensate for production costs
| as well as investments.
|
| The average market price is decreasing because the
| renewable energy sector is expanding across the
| continent, thus supplying more and more electricity at a
| production cost that is increasingly lower than that of
| nuclear power.
|
| According to RTE, France will export 92.3 TWh in 2025
| (page 75), paid EUR5.4 billion (page 15), meaning that
| the average price per MWh will be EUR58.7. However, this
| renewable energy sector (considered fully amortized) will
| produce electricity at a cost of EUR60.3 according to the
| CRE (which considers it fully amortized and therefore
| neglects the bulk of the investment), and at around EUR78
| according to EDF ( https://www.edf.fr/sites/groupe/files/
| epresspack/6300/CP_Con... ), which wants to build EPR2
| reactors and therefore needs to have the necessary funds.
|
| In short, France is exporting at EUR58.70 a year when it
| needs to sell for at least EUR78 to finance its future
| reactors, thus "using up" its current fleet without
| setting aside enough money to replace it.
|
| Worse still: if the costs of the EPR2 reactors exceed
| forecasts, as all EPR construction projects (Finland,
| France, China, and the UK) have done, the deficit will
| increase even further.
|
| Fixed costs (investments, maintenance, depreciation of
| the EPR alone, etc.) are by definition paid whether the
| fleet produces or not. Therefore, exporting at a price
| higher than the variable costs (paid only if the plant
| produces) is a lesser evil because the difference covers
| a portion of the fixed costs: it is less expensive to
| export at a slight loss than not to produce and lose more
| (in technical terms: the gross margin helps cover fixed
| costs).
|
| However, claiming that nuclear power is profitable simply
| because of electricity exports is misleading, and the
| ideal solution would be to produce electricity at the
| lowest possible cost, therefore using renewable energy
| sources.
|
| Furthermore, a portion of France's electricity is
| generated from renewables, so attributing exports solely
| to nuclear power is misleading.
| natmaka wrote:
| > the government used the company as a "price shield" to
| protect consumer against energy price rise on the
| European market in 2022
|
| EDF's accounts show that the government compensated for
| the effect on its revenues of this price shield ( https:/
| /www.ccomptes.fr/sites/default/files/2024-03/20240315...
| , page 184).
| natmaka wrote:
| > the German energiewende cost
|
| The cost of the energy transition in Germany is sometimes
| cited as EUR300 billion, EUR500 billion, or even EUR1.5
| trillion.
|
| These figures are worthless because no reputable source
| publishes a specific figure along with the scope of the
| project (some aspects of the investments needed for the
| electricity grid are independent of the energy source)
| and at least a timeframe.
|
| These figures are actually projections published by
| various sources, covering distant deadlines (2050, etc.)
| and the entire electricity system, including non-
| renewable energy sources (whose additional costs are
| often overestimated).
| pepperoni_pizza wrote:
| > This is a common rebuttal, but not grounded in reality.
| Even assuming ~20% capacity factor for "apples to apples"
| comparison to legacy thermal and nuclear, solar and
| batteries are the cheapest form of power to install.
|
| I looked it up because I was curious, according to
| Wikipedia average PV capacity factor is 25 % in USA, 10 %
| in the UK or Germany.
|
| Nuclear has 88 % capacity factor worldwide. Meaning to
| replace 1 GW of nuclear installed capacity you need 8.8
| GW of PV installed capacity in Germany or 3.5 GW of PV
| installed capacity in US.
|
| Which might still be economically worth it, I don't know.
| But it is a number that surprised it.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| It takes ~10 years to build a new nuclear generator from
| breaking ground to first kw to the grid, and tens of
| billions of dollars or euros. Germany deploys ~2GW/month
| of solar, the US ~4-5GW/month. Total global nuclear
| generation capacity is ~380GW as of this comment. At
| current global solar PV deployment rates, even assuming
| capacity factor delta between solar and nuclear, you
| could replace total global nuclear generation with ~18
| months of solar PV deployment.
| pepperoni_pizza wrote:
| Yes, the biggest advantage of solar and wind is that they
| can be built as many small projects, instead of few
| gigaprojects we seem to have lost the ability to execute
| in the West.
|
| I wish I didn't live in coal and NIMBY land.
| lostlogin wrote:
| > I wish I didn't live in coal and NIMBY land
|
| Money will eventually win the war. Depressing way to get
| there but this crisis will accelerate the change.
| hparadiz wrote:
| Why is this even a crises? Sure there's fossil fuel price
| shocks but watching mission control for Artemis and
| comparing it to the Apollo missions the difference in
| tech can't be understated. We've made massive progress in
| only 50 years as a civilization collectively. We used to
| basically waste energy powering giant displays. Now we
| use a fraction of the energy on far better ones. 50 years
| from now we're likely to have so much solar and batteries
| deployed that it might actually hit "almost free" levels.
| mustyoshi wrote:
| Nuclear fills a base load role better than solar+battery
| though, imo.
|
| A healthy power network will have a variety of
| generations sources available.
| fundatus wrote:
| Modern grids favour flexibility over fixed baseload
| generation (like nuclear) though. When you turn off a
| nuclear power plant its operating costs basically stay
| the same, which is horrible when you could cover your
| whole consumption with basically free solar/wind.
| dalyons wrote:
| actually nuclear is terrible in a grid increasingly full
| of nearly-free variable sources (solar&wind). The nukes
| need to stay at 100% all the time selling their power at
| a high fixed price to have any remote chance of being
| economical. Cheap variables push nuke's expensive power
| off the grid during the day, and increasingly into the
| evenings with batteries. This is deadly to the economics
| of nuclear.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| This is what France faces today.
|
| _France 's EDF Warns Solar, Wind Surge Straining Nuclear
| Fleet Costs_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47037839 - February
| 2026
| derefr wrote:
| Refer to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_b
| y_electrici...
|
| The largest electricity consumers all have good places to
| put solar farms.
| tzs wrote:
| > Installed capacity is a misleading number. If you
| assessed the trucking industry by simply sum-ing the rated
| capacity of all the hardware you'd be rightfully laughed
| and and called a liar on the basis of all the times the
| trucks are empty and all the trucks that run out of volume
| before weight. Renewables is a similar situation.
|
| OK, but what if someone looked at the rated capacity of all
| trucks and noted that in the last 5 years it went up by
| 24%, 22%, 28%, 54%, and 45%? That would strongly suggest
| that the amount trucks actually being used is growing
| rapidly because people aren't going to be buying new trucks
| unless they have to.
| ithkuil wrote:
| Yes, unless people had some incentives to show an
| increase in the trucking capacity in order to meet some
| metrics and get more funding etc. (not saying that's
| what's happening, but just as a counterpoint to your
| logic)
| jeffbee wrote:
| The Trump administration is secretly the head of a renewable
| energy accelerationist front, or at least that's the effect in
| practice.
| pepperoni_pizza wrote:
| > The Trump administration is secretly the head of a
| renewable energy accelerationist front
|
| "accelerationist" yes, not sure about the other parts.
| HerbManic wrote:
| Trump could become an accidental environmental ally in the
| same way the 2008 credit crisis and Covid did. Just blunders
| in and in the wreckage might be something ok.
| recursive wrote:
| Well see, we're sick of winning.
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| It's like watching people invest in Blockbuster Video stores
| after you've used Netflix.
| RRWagner wrote:
| At the time, I stupidly thought Blockbuster would see what
| was coming and use their at the time larger size to pivot and
| do what Netflix had demonstrated would work. Kind of like
| when the Yellow Pages bought early Google. Oh wait...
| zadikian wrote:
| Blockbuster did start offering mail in DVD rental
| subscriptions just like Netflix, in fact it was better
| because you could return it to a nearby store if you didn't
| want to wait for mail. But it was too late. (This was even
| before streaming.)
| 0xbadcafebee wrote:
| US is divesting from renewables because it planned to go to war
| with the rest of the world, which it depends on for renewables
| (rare earth materials). As a result it's forced to focus on oil
| and coal instead because it can produce that within the
| northwestern hemisphere. New strategic plan is likely to take
| over greenland, drill in arctic, expand rigs in gulf of mexico,
| spin up coal plants, and do deals with govt they install in
| Venezuela. This is the "America First" plan - reject globalism,
| completely control the home turf like Russia, build up
| warfighting apparatus, use that to go take over more countries
| and extract wealth there. (Guess who came up with the plan? US
| isn't a threat to Russia if US stays on its side of the ocean)
| Night_Thastus wrote:
| Makes sense - solar especially. It's just more financially smart
| to buy something that will generate electricity for 20-30 years
| with little to no maintenance than a plant that requires constant
| fuel, and is fairly complex mechanically with fluids and heat
| exchangers and turbines and so on. Panel efficiency keeps going
| up and prices keep going down, it's a snowball at this point.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> it's a snowball at this point._
|
| That's why Putin attacked in 2022, and didn't wait any longer
| to build a stronger military. He knew he was on the clock as
| Europe slowly switched to renewables his fossil fuel leverage
| got weaker.
|
| Unrelated, but doomer version of me expects that China will
| wait for the US to exhaust it's cruise missile supply bombing
| Iran, then move over Taiwan. Hope I'm wrong about this.
| kibwen wrote:
| China would have no need to wait for the US to exhaust its
| cruise missile supply before attacking Taiwan. The amount of
| firepower that China can muster from the mainland is enough
| to completely overwhelm any amount of conventional firepower
| that the US can bring to bear in the region. All US ships and
| airbases closer than (and including) Guam are toast in a
| serious war.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _The amount of firepower that China can muster from the
| mainland is enough to completely overwhelm any amount of
| conventional firepower that the US can bring_
|
| A lesson we learn again in 2026: one can't seize and hold
| territory with air power alone.
|
| China can almost certainly deny U.S. warships access to the
| Taiwan Strait. They can probably deny U.S. access to the
| South China Sea. But the U.S. (and Taiwan and Japan) can do
| the same back, similarly from a distance, and that's the
| equilibrium currently keeping the peace.
| Gander5739 wrote:
| Relevant xkcd: https://xkcd.com/3226/
| lifty wrote:
| Solar capacity is always misleading because it's intermittent.
| Capacity of a gas power plant can't be compared to capacity of a
| solar power plant, even though it sounds like you are comparing
| the same thing. Would love to know total kWh generated.
| adrithmetiqa wrote:
| Yep. The key difference is that a gas power plant can be cut
| off completely at any time. For example if a trigger happy
| leader decided to cause military mayhem in an unpredictable
| region supplying a large proportion of the world's gas. The
| sun, however, keeps on shining.
| lifty wrote:
| I didn't mean to compare them, implying that gas or anything
| else is better. I'm a big fan of renewables, especially
| solar, but just wanted to bring this aspect up. It's
| confusing to me because I get excited when I see these
| numbers only to later deflate when I figure out the total
| generated kWh quantity. It would be great if there would be a
| "synthetic" calculation which takes into account the
| estimated generation and smoothing out using batteries, which
| would also take into account the extra cost of batteries.
| That would be a more apples to apples comparison both in
| terms of net generation and cost.
| _aavaa_ wrote:
| I understand why people are downvoting you, but we still have a
| bit to go before renewables make up 50% of yearly electricity
| generation.
|
| Not as far as you'd think though. According to [0] in 2024 it
| was 6.9% solar, 8.1% wind, and 14.3% hydro, I.e. 29%
| renewables. Given the trajectory I wouldn't be surprised if
| that total was ~33% in 2025.
|
| [0]: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-
| source-s...
| rendang wrote:
| By your definition/chart, we were 0% solar, 0% wind, and 20%
| hydro in 1985 for 20% total renewables. So, 20% -> 29% in 4
| decades
| myrmidon wrote:
| Yes, but thats a bad extrapolation because per-capita
| electricity consumption was still rising then but is mostly
| flat/decreasing in western countries since 2000 or so, and
| the significant rise in reneably fraction mostly started
| _after_ 2000.
|
| The hydro fraction is also a really bad indicator in
| general, because it basically just reflects geography of a
| country and not really its effort to reduce CO2 emissions.
| lostlogin wrote:
| > The hydro fraction is also a really bad indicator in
| general, because it basically just reflects geography of
| a country and not really its effort to reduce CO2
| emissions.
|
| As a 'clean green New Zealander', your comment is
| perfect.
|
| We trash our country in such appalling ways. The fact
| they there aren't many of us and that the easy way of
| getting power is hydro is coincidence, not a national
| conscience.
| tootie wrote:
| IEA had been predicting 2030 as peak fossil fuel usage up
| until recently. They revised it back upon Trump's election
| and shifting policy, but it's possible the Iran War has moved
| it forward again. Either way, it's within reach.
|
| That being said, peak fossil fuels is the future date at
| which we are burning more than ever followed by the slow
| decrease. Meaning we are still accelerating CO2 emissions and
| even if we emit less, every emission is still cumulative so
| the march towards actually fixing the climate will only start
| at peak fossil fuels. We still need to remove all that GHG.
| cesarvarela wrote:
| Sadly, my country (Uruguay) is not on that map. Right now,
| ~99% of the energy we get comes from renewables.
| akamaka wrote:
| What's the point of saying one stat is better than another,
| when all of them are meaningful in a different way? When
| renewables reach big numbers of TWh, someone will say "total
| generation is misleading if doesn't line up with demand; what
| matters is capacity for power when we actually need it".
| richwater wrote:
| > what matters is capacity for power when we actually need it
|
| uh,...yea?
| ZeroGravitas wrote:
| And due to weird nuclear fetishism, people seem unaware
| that solar lines up really well with when people need
| power.
|
| Both on daily cycles and seasonally for anywhere that uses
| airconditioning. It's a good fit for 2/3rds of the global
| population.
|
| Some people live nearer the poles and wind lines up better
| with their heating needs. And of course you can combine
| them because they anti-correlate.
| cbmuser wrote:
| Capacity doesn't matter, generation does.
| boringg wrote:
| True but having capacity allows for generation - doesn't work
| the other way around.
|
| AKA the forward march of progress.
| butvacuum wrote:
| We can also time shift many of the things we do. Does your
| fridge need to run between 3-5pm in the heat of summer? or
| can it make sure its a little cooler to avoid running then?
| (trivial example, probably not a good one)
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| Batteries are also getting cheaper and cheaper
| zekica wrote:
| And they are the only real solution. Demand fitting
| production is never going to work unless we give up all
| the autonomy.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| This is why a major part of the solution is electric
| vehicles. Why put batteries in a warehouse and then run
| vehicles on petroleum when you can put batteries in a
| vehicle, install twice as many renewables because you now
| have more demand for electricity, and then charge the
| vehicles when generation is a large percentage of rated
| capacity and still have enough to run the rest of the
| grid when it's a smaller percentage?
| jonatron wrote:
| Demand response for things like hotel air conditioning is a
| thing: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-
| environment-23343211
| aydyn wrote:
| I'm sure there are better examples, but your fridge idea
| doesn't work. Fridges already operate on the edge of
| freezing, so if you make it a little cooler you will ruin
| all your food. Also 3-5pm is peak hangry time.
| Filligree wrote:
| A modern fridge also uses approximately five watts, on
| average. There are far better targets.
| rembal wrote:
| I'm too lazy to double check the numbers, but as far as I
| remember, Germany in order to increase it's average
| generation by 10% had to expand capacity by 70% in solar plus
| wind. With stats like this, there's a thin line between
| progress and waste. And all this while we have nuclear. (How
| the world really works, Vaclav smil if anybody is less lazy
| than me)
| ceejayoz wrote:
| > With stats like this, there's a thin line between
| progress and waste.
|
| Humanity does far more wasteful things than build some
| extra solar panels.
| lnsru wrote:
| I would say as electrician in Bavaria: there are enough
| empty roofs for solar. Especially in poorer neighborhoods.
| I saw similar numbers and they are scary: to reliably
| replace conventional power plant one needs 20x the power of
| wind and solar. And this hardware must be imported from
| China, there is no large scale production of solar
| equipment in Europe.
| mhh__ wrote:
| You have to massively overprovision some renewables
| Analemma_ wrote:
| So massively overprovision them. It's _still_ cheaper than
| fossil fuels, especially if you price in all the
| externalities. Seems like all these hungry datacenters
| we're building can soak up any excess capacity anyway.
| mhh__ wrote:
| What does cheap mean? You aren't paying for the same
| thing - a ccgt plant is super fast and works independent
| of the weather.
|
| I'm in favour of having it but the reason why you need to
| over provision is because of the intermittency. This can
| also push out proper base load (e.g. nuclear) although
| it's not simple.
|
| You have to think about the portfolio.
|
| In Britain at least there is also a bit of a sleight of
| hand where the marginal costs are reported but not the
| CFD strike prices used to incentivise the buildout.
| svara wrote:
| This is correct in the sense that, if you were to build a
| zero emissions energy system from scratch with today's
| technology, your conclusion would be that you'd eventually
| have to do this.
|
| But in much of the world, setting up PV is economically
| sound simply because it _displaces_ a certain amount of kWh
| generated over the course of a year from other sources that
| are more polluting and more expensive.
|
| In this regime, the dynamics of production over time don't
| matter yet.
|
| At some point, when renewable generation has very high
| penetration, you'll reach a point where building more is
| uneconomical, and to then displace the remaining other
| power sources you'll need to overpay (ignoring
| externalities).
|
| However, that's assuming no technological change on the way
| there, which is a whole separate topic.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > True but having capacity allows for generation - doesn't
| work the other way around.
|
| The issue is that comparing "capacity" as a percentage is
| misleading. A baseload generation source can have average
| generation above 90% of its rated capacity, solar at
| something like 25%, wind something like 25-40%. Which means
| that saying "nearly 50%" of capacity can imply something
| closer to 15% of generation, and potentially even less if the
| amount of local capacity is _high_ , because then you get
| periods when renewable generation exceeds _demand_ and the
| additional generation has nowhere to go, which effectively
| reduces the capacity factor even more.
|
| And on the other side, natural gas peaker plants can have a
| capacity factor even lower than solar and wind because their
| explicit purpose is to only be used when demand exceeds
| supply from other sources, so that "nearly 50%" in a grid
| which is entirely renewables and peaker plants could actually
| imply _more than 50%_ of total generation. This is much less
| common in existing grids but it makes looking at the
| nameplate capacity even more worthless because you can 't
| just multiply it by a fixed factor to get the real number.
|
| Whereas if they would just publish the percentage of actual
| generation, that's what people actually want to know. But
| then you'd have to say "13%" or "24%" or whatever the real
| number is, instead of "nearly 50%".
| boringg wrote:
| The point is that its a proxy for more renewables being
| deployed on the grid. Thats the take away. It is a piece of
| good news. From one fellow energy nerd to likely another
| one - don't get hung up on the details. There is still a
| lot of work left to do.
| ninkendo wrote:
| > solar at something like 25%
|
| The graph at https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/solar-pv-
| energy-consumpti... seems to indicate the real world
| outcome is something more like 12.9%. That is, pick a dot
| on the graph and look at the capacity (watts) versus how
| much was generated in 2024 (watt-hours), and the number
| ends up vaguely looking like 1000 watt-hours generated for
| every watt of capacity. Given that there's 8760 hours in a
| year, that's vaguely in the 12% range.
|
| The number for "World" is 2,110,000 GWh consumed for 1,866
| GW of capacity, which means 2110000/(1866x8760) = 12.9% of
| "capacity". Running the numbers for every country (there's
| a csv!) shows expected cloudy/northerly countries down near
| 8-9% (UK, germany, norway) and the sunnier ones near 20%...
| The USA is 19.8% which tracks given how popular solar is in
| the sunnier regions in particular.
|
| Nobody in their right mind should be surprised by this,
| since the sun doesn't always shine, it gets dark at night,
| etc... it's unrealistic to assume this number will ever
| meaningfully change for solar. It's just the baseline
| expectation.
|
| So yeah, "capacity" is misleading indeed. It means that for
| solar, "50% of global capacity" would mean something more
| like "6% of energy consumed".
|
| But it's still super exciting to see the clear exponential
| growth here. (Speaking as someone who installed a 14KW
| array on his roof last year, solar makes me super excited.)
| Manuel_D wrote:
| A lot of renewables have intermittent generation. If daytime
| electricity demand is already saturated, adding more solar
| panels increases capacity but doesn't increase generation (or
| to be more specific, it doesn't increase generation that
| actually fulfills demand).
| ziga wrote:
| Unless you add battery storage, which is increasingly the
| case:
|
| https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2026/02/25/solar-and-storage-
| to-...
| epistasis wrote:
| Can't have generation without capacity...
| mentalgear wrote:
| This is far higher than I expected: a much needed, remarkably
| good reason to be cheerful about the future after all !
| cucumber3732842 wrote:
| A lot of people who are cheering right now are going to be
| screaming bloody murder in 10-20yr when the "below this
| population density generation and storage makes more sense than
| grid" threshold creeps up into the lower end of suburban
| population densities and some industrial users can just buy the
| fields or hills around their factories and put up panels or
| wind turbines rather than negotiate with a bunch of entities.
|
| Energy independence is a two way street. This is essentially a
| domestic internal soft power lever that is going to go away or
| be nerf'd.
| JuniperMesos wrote:
| Why is it bad if some industrial users of electricity buy
| fields around their factories and set up their own power
| generation there instead of hooking up to the power grid?
| myrmidon wrote:
| I honestly don't see a big problem with that.
|
| First: The same argument applies to suburban population,
| where autarky is even easier/cheaper than for industrial
| consumers: Just slap panels on the roof and a bunch of
| batteries into a shed, done. We won't even need much cheaper
| panels _nor_ cells, really; it 's mainly labor, integrator-
| margins and regulations that make this less (financially)
| attractive than the grid _right now_ (pure cells are already
| in the $60 /kWh range for single-digit quantities).
|
| Second: If industrial consumers stop contributing towards
| electric grid costs and the general public dislikes it, you
| can just regulate against it, problem solved. But in practice
| governments already try to make the energy situation as
| appealing as possible for industry, so there is very little
| actually leveraged power that you really give up anyway.
| cucumber3732842 wrote:
| You're absolutely right it applies to suburbia too, not
| just rural areas and industry in rural areas.
|
| > you can just regulate against it, problem solved
|
| I think that is exactly what you'll lose the ability to do.
| If Marvin Heemeyer didn't need the town's septic connection
| we wouldn't know his name.
|
| A huge fraction of regulatory enforcement exists in the
| gray area of "the government is wrong, or their enforcement
| of it is wrong but it's cheaper to bend over and take it
| than to fight it through a courtroom". If farmer Johnson
| can slap up a building kit on his property and power it
| with stuff he bought online and doesn't need the power
| company, Joe Schmo can do the same with an ADU. Yeah,
| they'll both get dragged through court but $50-100k of
| court costs to be proven right is a much smaller threat
| when the project can be done and generating income for the
| duration of the court case (it also renders the typical
| tactic of dragging out such cases much less effective).
|
| And at a slightly larger scale, if some business interest
| can negotiate purely with a municipality to take over some
| disused factory and bring it back into use and get their
| power via bunch of panels and not get bogged down with
| state permitting to get a transmission line and substation
| the state loses a huge number of levers over the business
| interest and also they lose levers to control poorer
| municipalities (who'd happily take the business). Once
| again, they'll get dragged through court by the state, but
| spending 5yr and $200k just to be right isn't a dealbreaker
| when your widget factory has been operating the whole time.
|
| Yes, of course governments can do worse things if they feel
| like it, but they run into problems of political optics and
| will more or less instantly.
|
| You already see this kind of thing in some of the highest
| cost areas. Certain demographics in the greater NYC area
| often do building and land development things this way. It
| costs the same at the end, but by doing it without asking
| you get to use it while the whole process runs.
| lostlogin wrote:
| > industrial users can just buy the fields or hills around
| their factories and put up panels or wind turbines rather
| than negotiate with a bunch of entities.
|
| Domestic users can just do the same. Some of us already have.
|
| Yes, it's not alway possible but a huge portion of domestic
| usage can be covered with a small install. Payback 5-10
| years.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| The electrical utility DTE, in Michigan, required Google to
| do this for their new datacenter ("Project Cannoli") to avoid
| increasing consumer energy prices. They are building solar
| and battery storage to serve the load, as it is the cheapest
| and fastest new generation that can be built.
|
| I see nothing wrong with power users committing to clean
| energy and storage to accelerate their development plans, or
| to allow them at all. I am unsure who is going to complain
| about this model. Lease or buy as much land as you need to
| deploy clean energy.
|
| https://blog.google/innovation-and-ai/infrastructure-and-
| clo...
|
| Regulatory filing: https://mi-
| psc.my.site.com/s/case/500cs00001amKTrAAM/in-the-...
|
| > Google's data center operations will be served by 2.7
| gigawatts (GW) of new resources for the grid, including solar
| power, advanced storage technologies and demand flexibility.
| This Clean Capacity Acceleration Agreement with DTE (the same
| structure as the Clean Transition Tariff) will bring new,
| clean resources online, while supporting the state's
| transition away from coal-fired power. As part of our
| standard approach to building new data centers, Google will
| fully cover its electricity costs and infrastructure needs,
| helping to ensure that its growth protects local ratepayers
| and actively bolsters the long-term resilience of the state's
| electricity grid.
| philipkglass wrote:
| It takes time for statistical agencies to compile reports. I
| haven't yet found reports covering the growth in renewable
| _generation_ (actual terawatt hours) for all of 2025. But this
| covers 3 quarters of the year:
|
| https://ember-energy.org/latest-updates/solar-and-wind-growt...
|
| _In the first three quarters of 2025, solar generation rose by
| 498 TWh (+31%) and already surpassed the total solar output in
| all of 2024. Wind generation grew by 137 TWh (+7.6%). Together,
| they added 635 TWh, outpacing the rise in global electricity
| demand of 603 TWh (+2.7%)._
| reitzensteinm wrote:
| Ember is an absolute treasure. Often you'll see articles on HN
| from places like Elektrek which are blogspam linking back to
| Ember's original reporting.
|
| Their electricity data explorer is to my knowledge the most
| complete on the open internet.
| pzo wrote:
| worth to keep in mind electricity usage != energy usage. We are
| far away from replacing oil, lpg.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| If you discount the inefficiencies inherent to fossil fuels,
| all energy usage in the world is around 3 times the electricity
| usage.
|
| And we are already in the process to replace non-electricity
| energy.
| PunchyHamster wrote:
| And all we got to show up for it are higher electricity prices
| etiennebausson wrote:
| Of course, huge investment need to be paid for somehow.
|
| Still a worthwhile investment in most case.
| didgetmaster wrote:
| >At the global level, 2025 also saw a sharp rebound in non-
| renewable additions, which nearly doubled compared to 2024,"
| IRENA noted. China led that drive, with 100 GW of non-renewable
| capacity added last year, most of which was coal.
|
| Why is China adding so many new generation plants powered by
| coal? On this and other forums, I see claims all the time that
| solar is cheaper than coal. As the world's leading producer of
| solar panels, you would think that they would utilize it even
| more if those claims are true.
|
| Is it just the need for power when the sun is not shining? Or is
| it something else?
| danny_codes wrote:
| Inertia I imagine. Planning cycles can be 10, 20 years, perhaps
| longer for big infrastructure projects.
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| My understanding is that China is planning to build a coal-
| backed renewable grid. Renewables, including storage, will
| provide the majority of the electricity generation, and then
| coal will step in when renewables aren't available. This
| involves building modern coal plants that can be spun up and
| down as needed, and then paying them not to generate. This is
| why actual emissions have plateaued and dropped, even as new
| coal capacity comes online.
|
| We are (or were) doing something similar in the US, just using
| natural gas as the fuel rather than coal.
| tdb7893 wrote:
| There's a recent AP article talking about this some (I don't
| know enough to know the quality of the article):
| https://apnews.com/article/china-coal-solar-climate-carbon-e...
| marcosdumay wrote:
| - They need something to provide electricity when the sun is
| not shining, while they install enough batteries and more than
| enough solar to use during the day and charge those batteries.
|
| - They need some backup in case the Sun is dimmed for a few
| days, while they install enough solar to not need this anymore.
|
| - They need some backup in case they grow too fast and the
| solar installations don't keep up.
|
| - They need some backup in case there's some natural
| catastrophe, or some stupid dictator somewhere decides to start
| a war or something and destroy some vital energy
| infrastructure.
|
| Their government has explained this a few times, but not on
| those words. It probably helps that those are government
| projects, and failing to deliver government projects is a very
| rude attitude that can end people's careers. But the rationale
| is sound too.
| fred_is_fred wrote:
| "and the solar installations don't keep up.".
|
| Whats the average time it takes to build a solar plant versus
| a coal one? I would assume solar is a lot faster to first
| production?
| pixl97 wrote:
| Probably better to ask how long it takes to build
| equivalent name plate capacity if both.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| That's completely irrelevant to the issue, though.
| decimalenough wrote:
| Part of China's "new" coal capacity is modern, efficient coal
| plants with lower emissions being built to replace old,
| inefficient, highly polluting ones.
| Veedrac wrote:
| More than anything it's a supply limit. Solar is consistently
| scaling about as fast as any manufacturing industry scales. The
| TAM is just big.
| 0xbadcafebee wrote:
| Mostly it's that solar doesn't work at night. That means you
| have to use batteries, which are impractical to store more than
| a certain amount of energy, after which you need another very
| large and stable energy source. So a nation-state that can't go
| dark must have a constant load source, such as nuclear, hydro,
| or coal. There's also limitations of geography, industry,
| production capacity, and other issues.
| ww520 wrote:
| The problem is in power transmission. Transmission fee is a big
| part of the cost. Anything helping for at home generation should
| be encouraged.
|
| Right now plug in solar is starting to appear. It is big in
| Germany. Utah has passed a law to cut the red tapes to allow home
| owners to install plug in solar themselves. More states should
| follow.
| cptskippy wrote:
| The rub is that people don't want transmission networks to go
| away. They just don't want to pay for the maintenance.
|
| In many US municipalities the cost of infrastructure is rolled
| into the per unit fee meaning high consumers pay more. This
| works fine until folks adopt solar and their consumption goes
| negative.
|
| The right answer is a connection fee based on the cost to
| maintain your hookup to the grid.
| chris1993 wrote:
| [delayed]
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Used to be this was almost entirely explained by hydro. Not a lot
| of new dams going in, and they take a long time.
|
| The solar component is usually with caveats: the majority of
| growth. Because growth is slow otherwise. Solar is what part of
| renewables now? I couldn't easily see that stat in the noise.
| layoric wrote:
| Worked on the software side of increasing the rate of solar
| penetration in electricity networks between 2016-2020 via global
| solar radiation forecasting. The uptake of the software was slow
| the first year but then rapid once more electricity networks were
| struggling with knowing how much solar was in the network. Once
| it is easier to predict, the network becomes easier to manage,
| and more can be safely added, and make it economically
| profitable. Sucks this was a commercial operation, but excited to
| see all the hard work across various industries is solving
| problems to get more renewable energy into networks.
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