Pumped storage and batteries for short term energy storage - hours to weeks. Australia is already building one pumped storage battery which should provide them with roughly 350GWh - roughly half of the short term storage they'd need if they had a 100% solar and wind based grid. With one plant. You can't do this in, e.g. Florida but the geography to build this is more than plentiful enough in most of the world (this topic is pretty well settled: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-14555-y but for some reason people keep disputing it).
Hydrogen for seasonal storage - for weeks when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine. Roughly 2-3% of power will need to be stored this way on a 100% solar/wind grid. It's not efficient and expensive to generate hydrogen from electricity and then turn it back into electricity but still cheaper than generating and using nuclear power at the point of generation. It is cheap to store enormous amounts of power for long periods this way though.
But it seems hardly replicable say in central Europe.
(I am speaking about central Europe or more specifically Poland)
In Europe there's some geography known as "the alps" which has been used for years this way by the countries surrounding it.
Poland's environmental record is atrocious on almost every level. I guess the coal lobby must run the government or something because nobody else in Europe that reliant on fuel that dirty. They're a model of how not to do anything right.
Well, that is hardly solution for Poland.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludington_Pumped_Storage_Power...
Though
> The plant takes advantage of the natural steep sand dune landform of eastern Lake Michigan
- Ukraine conflict's impact on gas prices
- Cost of renewables from over 10 years ago when Germany jumpstarted the solar industry using subsidies.
- An ill-advised by highly popular switching off of nuclear plants. The Germans preferred higher energy prices now for less hassle and worries due to having Nuclear plants.
None of these points have any impact on the argument that solar is the clear winner of becoming the dominant energy source until 2050.