> our needs (there is a LOT of heat down there). We also say solar is renewable, even though the sun does not last forever. But within our frame of reference - it does.
Photovoltaic cells surely dont last as long as the sun...
Photovoltaic cells surely dont last as long as the sun...
So no one meant literally indefinite energy here, it was meant, "potentially way more energy, than we currently need". And this is correct.
Likewise while PV has non-zero impact, the impact is sufficiently small and of a nature that basically doesn't matter.
Fossil fuels are about a hundred times more polluting than volcanoes[0][1], so a factor of about one hundred in reduced emissions per unit of useful output compared to setting things on fire takes you down to the environmental impact of one part of geology.
[0] at least the CO2 is, but what matters for PV is everything else except the CO2 because in a world powered by renewables all the energy used in production doesn't produce CO2 in the first place; volcanoes do also release sulphur compounds etc.
[1] there is a certain degree of irony that one of the memes used by climate change deniers is to precisely invert this ratio.