[RAM-bunctious]

I think it's clear that solar panels, while working today, clearly haven't been able to solve today's problems, or else this discussion wouldn't be happening. But we should keep investing in them, one way or another.

Similarly, we should keep investing in the prospect of commercially viable fusion reactors. The harnessing of fusion reactors would be instantly revolutionary as opposed to the incremental progress solar promises. Therein lies the difference. Once is not necessarily better than the other.

And it's not a zero-sum game.

[audunw]

I would say it’s clear that solar panels are absolutely working extremely well today, at least as long as you don’t live too close to the poles.

Renewables all together is growing faster than nuclear ever did. And solar is now a huge part of that.

We have models where solar or solar+wind is providing all the power to everything from small remote weather stations through houses to large islands. Some small countries and regions are getting close too.

It’s clear that we have all the technologies we need to do 100% renewables. There’s studies that indicate that the long term costs of this is lower than the traditional fossil and nuclear energy infrastructure. We just need to build the factories to continue scaling up. And of course the transition is more expensive than it’ll be when we just maintain and expand on the system.

[ffgjgf1]

> all the power to everything from small remote weather stations through houses to large islands

Not without very large capacity gas/etc. plants available on standby (unless you’re fine with will below 99% availability)

[more_corn]

That’s funny. My take is exactly the reverse.

Solar power can 100% solve our energy needs today. It’s cost effective at the unit level. It works at scale. It decentralizes nicely. Did I mention that it works? Every home could have rooftop solar for less than it costs to produce centralized power plants. (I have rooftop solar and it cost significantly less than a new car now my power costs won’t go up for 20 years at which point the panels might need a refresh but that part of the system is the cheapest part)

We could easily flip from subsidizing fossil fuels to subsidizing rooftop solar today and realize significant gains (higher roi by shifting the investment). If you spent one years investment in fusion and fossil fuel subsidies on deploying rooftop solar and grid scale batteries you’d change the energy story permanently. Energy would suddenly be plentiful. Fossil fuels would permanently shift out of relevance. Fission reactors would look like quaint and staggeringly expensive tools of a bygone age. And fusion which DOES NOT WORK. Would look even more like a silly dream.(We are no closer to fusion than we were 30 years ago.)

Why the fuck are we still talking about fusion when we have something that works?

[bruce511]

I agree with everything you say about rooftop solar. If you have a suitably unshaved roof, and you are in a reasonably sunny climate, the current economic math works. And as energy costs go up, and capital costs come down it works better all the time.

That said, we still need a grid to distribute electricity to places that consume more energy than roof space. Think apartment blocks, factories etc. And yes, a huge chunk of that load can still be supplied by grid-scale solar and wind etc.

Even with large-scale storage (another fruitful place to spent investment money) there's going to need to be peak-generation.

However you look at it, I don't think fusion will be the answer. Since fusion was first proposed and the landscape of requirements have shifted. By the time it's practical, it'll be solving a problem we dont have.

The science may lead to a working reactor. But no one will build it at scale because it simply won't solve the problem well have then.

[jandrese]

Grid scale storage has lagged behind solar and wind generation, but it's starting to catch up. By the time we have a viable commercial fusion power plant all of the grid storage issues will have been long since solved.

[romski]

Find the graph of GW of solar installed over time