Hacker News Reader

That's not what renewable means. Renewable energy means that the source is naturally replenished within a human lifetime. In other words, the source isn't permanently depleted by tapping into it.

This is the case with solar energy: the Sun's energy output doesn't change depending on whether we use it or not. Renewable doesn't mean perpetual - that'd be physically impossible for all we know.

View on HN

But also the sun is burning fuel and eventually that will run out and we don't really have any means of renewing that fuel (I don't know where to order intergalactic hydrogen).

Sadly it is not even means of intergalactic hydrogen. The game is over once the hydrogen in the core is fused :( Tidal energy would probably never go mainstream to cause major issues (too easy to break during the storms, not all places are good to build it, other types of energy sources are more attractive).

The whole article sounds like something that fuel companies would sponsor to make the renewable energy look bad (look, tidal is not renewable too, so buy our gas/oil).

Reply on news.ycombinator.com