Though I think the world is going to be a better place. We're headed for a very difficult political reality in my lifetime. We have a whole lot of challenges coming up, and our leaders don't know what to do about them.
Luckily, on our current trajectory, its not as bad as you'd think. Even without additional political support, clean energy can finally stand on its own.
TL;DR The question is no longer if we'll make it, just when.
* Solar and wind are stupid cheap now, and getting cheaper, fast. In over 25 states, rooftop solar is a better investment than the S&P500. [1] You're seeing Power Purchase Agreements under 3 cents/KwH. [2] Solar will only get cheaper. Wind is still being built like crazy in Texas and the central Midwestern US. Some utilities even offer power for free at night wind power is so plentiful (and transmission capability lacking). [3] Tesla/SolarCity has already moved into Florida now that the utility-sponsored Amendment 1 failed. (Which was an underhanded utility attempt to hinder rooftop solar deployment)
* Utility scale battery storage has arrived. Again, its only going to get cheaper (Tesla's Gigafactory is a big deal, but lots of other players in the market as well) [4] [5] [6]. Tesla has already installed a microgrid on an island in the Pacific that satisfies all of the island's power needs, removing the need for their diesel generators to produce island power.
* Tesla will deliver its Model 3 in the next 12-18 months. I have no doubt Elon will drive Tesla into scaling up to 1 million vehicles/year in production (relying primarily on their recent German manufacturing automation acquisition) [7]. While I would like to see Nissan and GM make EVs that aren't purely compliance cars (Bolt? Pleasssssse), I think they're good enough for urban dwellers or car share networks where you're sticking to major metros. (Full disclosure: TSLA investor)
* OPEC has finally agreed (after 8 years) to reduce supply to push oil prices back up. Even with US shale coming back online at those profitable market prices ($60-80+/barrel) and some of OPEC cheating on those cuts (who wants to reduce their revenue artificially?), that only does one thing: accelerates the transition to EVs. [8]
* Repealing the Clean Power Plan will not be able to stop the phase out of coal power due to cheap natural gas. Market forces at work. [9]
* Federal electric vehicle subsides will phase out within the next 2 years for all manufacturers due to hitting the sales quotas dictated by the statute's phaseout provisions [10]. No point in trying to remove them.
* Solar and wind ITC tax credit extensions (to 2021) agreed to by Congress were bipartisan. In exchange, restrictions were removed on the export of crude oil from the US. This agreement will not be unwound.
Urban dwellers park on the street a few blocks away from their upstairs apartment if they're lucky. Rooftop solar and a charger in a garage are pretty much only an option for suburban homeowners (and only those without range anxiety).
I agree this is a tough nut to crack, although I've seen success in EV chargers on the street in Amsterdam, Oslo, Copenhagen. It can be done.
Renters or condo owners can elect to buy solar and or wind from their utility without having to install their own hardware. They can still install Powerwalls to be part of the distributed virtual demand response system (while receiving the benefit of avoiding demand or time of use charges).
Without the solar ITC and wind PTC most projects wouldn't be feasible. I'm skeptical these will last past a major tax overhaul as planned this year. I don't think your view on oil prices is correct. Even if supply cuts work US shale producers will pick up any slack. And I don't agree with your long term take on electric cars. Gasoline cars are just better for anyone who actually needs their car. Electric is a luxury and not necessarily cheaper at current gas prices.
* Wind does not require any ITC credits to be competitive, solar will require them for another 1-2 years. [1]
* Shale production is not nimble, and OPEC can always profit at lower prices. Saudi Arabia can profit at $12/barrel. Shale is barely profitable at $40/barrel, and needs $50-60/barrel to really be worth the production.
* Gasoline cars are twice as expensive per mile to operate compared to electric cars. EV drivetrains last forever. The internal combustion engine is not long for this world (witness how badly VW had to cheat to pass emissions standards). OPEC participants can't balance their budgets at current market prices, so the price must go up, making EVs even more attractive. [2]
Mind you, I don't really care if you agree with me. We're already on a trajectory; I'm simply describing that trajectory.
Seriously,EV drivetrains last forever? What about battery packs that will be fucking dead after a few years of driving?
Have you ever worked with actual machinery? Electric motors can fail just as well, the windings might break or burn out, the bearings wear out, there is still some gearing in the car as well
Solar and wind is ruinously expensive (just look at german energy prices before and afrer start of their retarded experiment - and remember they pretty much drove out a lot of energy intensive heavy industry to China)
Do you really think its a good thing energy prices go negative because of generators that provide miniscule amounts od total required energy?
Tesla warranties their battery pack and electric motors for 8 years/unlimited miles. Their CTO has stated they expect 10-15 year lifetimes, minimum, from their stationary storage battery packs. Existing Model S data has shown their battery packs only degraded 6% over ~180k miles of use. The drivetrain will last the entire lifetime of the vehicle.
Electric motors are more reliable than internal combustion engines. Full stop.
Wind is cheaper than all other energy sources. Solar is still expensive, but that's what subsidies are for.
Yes, it's absolutely fine for energy prices to go negative when renewables are over producing.
I'll back you up on the electric motors being more reliable than gasoline engines. Gasoline engines by design have all sorts of moving parts where there is sliding friction mediated by partial lubrication[1]. Wear is inescapable.
Simple math gives you an estimate for the max run time of a gasoline engine.
200,000 miles / 30 mph => 6600 hours.
So after 7000 hours of run time a gasoline engine is shot. Industrial electric motors easily achieve run times that are ten times that number as do the power electronics needed to drive them.
[1] Partial lubrication means you have metal to metal contact. Full lubrication ala a pressure fed journal bearing is a different story. There the bearing surfaces are separated by a film of fluid. These types of bearing can an do last for decades.
Yes, a lifetime of realism is worth more than a few selective quotes.
You want a quote - here's one from the CBC:
"The province will drop the guaranteed rate for small rooftop solar projects from 80.2 cents per kilowatt hour to 54.9 cents, while larger solar installations will get between 34.7 cents and 44.5 cents a kWh."
The Canadian government pays citizens 80 cents a Kw/h to generate solar electricity.
They sell it back to consumers at about 12 cents a Kw/h.
So you tell me with a straight face how they're going to get '80 cents Kw/h' down to '12 cents Kw/h' in 2 years?
Or even 10.
Not going to happen in most of North American for a very long time.
Thank you so much for putting this together. Any place where I can keep up with summaries like this? It's nice to read something optimistic on clean energy sources.
I put this together based on my habitual consumption of Bloomberg.com, utilitydive.com, reddit.com/r/solar, reddit.com/r/teslamotors, energy-specific posts in reddit.com/r/worldnews, and consumption of every report produced by the US EIA.
I'd recommend energy specific Bloomberg articless, utilitydive.com and EIA's mailing list. That should get you most of the type of information I summarized.
Globally solar represents more than 1% of electricity.[1] The long term growth rate has been around 40% p.a.[2] If that growth rate stays for 10 more years, the global energy market is going to look very different.
93% of new generation capacity coming online each month is from renewables, according to the EIAs "Electric Power Monthly" and "Electricity Monthly Update" reports.
EDIT: I included natural gas in the total generation mix. That's my mistake.
I don't discount additional natural gas coming online; that's a good thing. It throttles faster than nuclear and coal, and produces far less CO2 than coal generation. Natural gas is almost a requirement as renewables scale up until batteries for utility scale storage have dropped in price to be competitive. This is already happening: Tesla is contracting with several utilities to replace their natural gas peaker plants with battery storage substations.
"Electric generating facilities expect to add more than 26 gigawatts (GW) of utility-scale generating capacity to the power grid during 2016. Most of these additions come from three resources: solar (9.5 GW), natural gas (8.0 GW), and wind (6.8 GW), which together make up 93% of total additions. If actual additions ultimately reflect these plans, 2016 will be the first year in which utility-scale solar additions exceed additions from any other single energy source."
It doesn't make sense to include natural gas. We added 15GW of renewable energy to our 1068 GW. We really need to do a lot better. Your optimism is unfounded.
So, we should do less? The first 1% is the hardest, the next 1% slightly easier, by the time it gets to 10% probably 80% of the hard challenges will be overcome. Successful adoption curves always look like hockeysticks, which means a slow early grind. Less carbon is always better, and taking the gains we can now is better than waiting for perfection.
