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Comment by toomuchtodo | Hacker News Reader

By "here", do you mean solar already cheaper than utility power in 36 states [1], it estimated to reach grid parity in all 50 states next year [2], and US solar generation capacity surging to almost 40GW by the end of 2016? [3]

Because that is where "here" is.

[1] http://news.investors.com/technology/061515-757277-tesla-see...

[2] http://reneweconomy.com.au/2014/deutsche-bank-sees-50-us-sta...

[3] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-05-26/solar-as-f...

EDIT: Want to save the world? Build out solar and wind as quickly as possible. We have a lot of coal, natural gas, and nuclear generation to replace quickly (in that order).

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Solar and wind are decent, and I agree that we should build more, and reaching carbon neutrality is a great goal.

However, since you care about this subject, I feel compelled to point out that:

- Neither produce power all the time (i.e. at night for solar), and can be transiently unreliable (i.e. weather). This is OK if all you care about is moving water around from one large reservoir to another, but less so for anything else.

- Both are (currently, granted) much more expensive than nuclear if you care about generating large amounts of power.

- They both kill about 5x more people than nuclear (deaths/injuries per tWh), even taking into account nuclear waste disposal.

Subsidizing rooftop solar is one of the stupider things we have done as a society. Subsidizing large plants makes a lot more sense, since at least large scale solar plants are somewhat safe.

> Neither produce power all the time (i.e. at night for solar), and can be transiently unreliable (i.e. weather). This is OK if all you care about is moving water around from one large reservoir to another, but less so for anything else.

As I've mentioned elsewhere in this thread, utility scale battery storage, or home storage if you prefer (Tesla PowerWall).

> Both are (currently, granted) much more expensive than nuclear if you care about generating large amounts of power.

Both are already cheaper than nuclear without subsidies, to the point where Exelon (who operates the largest US fleet of commercial nuclear generators has to pay consumers to take their power 10-20% of the time due to wind generation).

> They both kill about 5x more people than nuclear (deaths/injuries per tWh), even taking into account nuclear waste disposal.

I concede that utility solar and wind are safer than rooftop solar. I'd argue you can make installing solar on roofs pretty damn safe if you follow OSHA guidelines.

Energy storage (battery, flywheel, etc) would solve the transient energy problem, you are correct. Something like the Tesla PowerWall could potentially be scaled up to commercial energy production, but honestly we probably still have 30 years to go there.

As for cheaper, it's still slightly more (30%) for PV solar than for nuclear (as far as I can tell). That will continue to come down, which is great. The cheapest clean energy is actually geothermal, but there are only so many places where the plate tectonics work with our current drilling technology. Ironically, drilling advancements for fracking and deep wells will open up the field for geothermal in many more places.

As for safety, the 5x number was for plant solar, not rooftop. Production of silicon PV panels is not clean, nor is it safe shipping millions of them around the world. However, the safety is so much higher than coal that I shouldn't really be complaining.

Yes, solar is cheaper than the retail with massive subsidies, not having to pay for storage (they don't supply power in the evening nor at night), and not paying for grid (hence cheaper than retail).

From your third link: "New York State’s Public Service Commission is overhauling its rate system to keep transmission owners profitable as more consumers produce their own power". So the rest of us are subsidizing solar owners through income taxes (federal) and the rates we pay for electricity.

> Yes, solar is cheaper than the retail with massive subsidies

The numbers I quote are without subsidies. Wind is already cheaper than nuclear without subsidies, even taking into account nuclear power plants receive enormous liability waivers that wind doesn't require (they're only liable for the first $13 billion USD in damages from an accident; the US government picks up the rest).

> So the rest of us are subsidizing solar owners through income taxes (federal) and the rates we pay for electricity.

And the rest of us our subsidizing cheap coal by not paying for the damage it does through carbon dioxide and radioactive material release. Your point?

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