This is more from a lot of coal power plants being converted to gas over the past 20 years than solar overtaking the outputs of those power plants. Coal output shrinking, solar output rising, the lines have crossed.
Coal is unpopular in all but a few areas where coal mining is still a part of the local econonmy. I used to work near a coal plant and every day I'd go out to my car and it would have little black particles all over it. Nobody likes that, no matter what the President says.
Retric 3 minutes ago [-]
Total electricity produced by coal + gas is down over the last 20 years. Total electricity production is up, the difference is from wind and solar.
toomuchtodo 9 minutes ago [-]
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%.
SoftTalker 5 minutes ago [-]
Storage is the issue. You still need to supply base load (well, all load) at night.
Retric 21 seconds ago [-]
Not quite. A great deal of nighttime load is caused by current rates being cheapest at night. People don’t set their EV’s to charge from 11-5AM because that’s the only time their cars are plugged in.
Grid batteries are being deployed everywhere every day and the cost including storage is now lower than fossil fuels.
pstuart 3 minutes ago [-]
True, but battery advancements are ongoing at a rapid pace. Sodium-ion is now viable and will be a mainstay in grid storage. Ignoring ideology, this path is plain cheaper than anything else.
SubiculumCode 17 minutes ago [-]
Oil next.
sourcegrift 17 minutes ago [-]
Guardian probably has it in the contract with their employees that their articles on an average must have 1 mention of Trump. That's how you sell news.
Coal is unpopular in all but a few areas where coal mining is still a part of the local econonmy. I used to work near a coal plant and every day I'd go out to my car and it would have little black particles all over it. Nobody likes that, no matter what the President says.
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