ZH version is available. Content is displayed in original English for accuracy.
Advertisement
Advertisement
⚡ Community Insights
Discussion Sentiment
59% Positive
Analyzed from 4201 words in the discussion.
Trending Topics
#energy#china#solar#years#panels#batteries#oil#fossil#power#production
Discussion (151 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews
I honestly think renewables will grow exponentially from now all fosil fuel is dead.
We just have to be careful there. My fellow Europeans here will remember what resulted out of depending on an adversary for energy, in our case Russian NG. We don't want another energy crisis as the result of geopolitical tensions.
We shouldn't import foreign DRM, our critical infrastructure should not utilize foreign-hosted or proprietary IoT, and we should invest in local manufacturing utilizing automation.
Solar panels and batteries are a stock. Oil is a flow. This leads to a very different dependency situation.
If you're concerned about energy sovereignty, just buy more solar panels now. If you're still concerned, buy even more. Keep buying them until you're not concerned anymore.
Nobody can prevent your country/region from developing own solar or battery supply chains. Alternatively, buy from other countries that are not China for a little bit more.
" String Inverters: The most common residential choice, lasting 10–15 years on average and boasting impressive cost-performance.
Microinverters: Mounted directly on individual solar panels, these often reach 25 years—nearly matching the lifespan of solar panels themselves. Industry data highlights lower failure rates for microinverters, though they come with a higher upfront cost.
Central Inverters: Typically used for larger residential or commercial and industrial systems, central inverters last 10–15 years. "
Without an solar invertor a solar panel is just a black panel.
https://digitalpower.huawei.com/en/blogs/how-long-will-a-lit...
"Generally, lithium-ion batteries used in ordinary consumer electronics have a cycle life of about 300 to 500 times. After reaching this number of cycles, the battery capacity will drop to about 80% of its initial capacity. For example, if the lithium-ion battery of a smartphone undergoes a full charge-discharge cycle every day, its performance will significantly decline after approximately 1 to 1.5 years.
In contrast, lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles, due to advancements in technology and craftsmanship, can achieve 1,000 to 2,000 charge-discharge cycles, with a correspondingly longer service life of 5 to 8 years or even more. Lithium-ion batteries for data centers have an even longer cycle life of approximately 5,000 cycles and a service life of up to 10 years, meaning there’s no need to replace batteries during the UPS’s full lifecycle. However, these are only theoretical estimates, and the actual service life is affected by various factors."
We used to have a battery developer, but they went instant bankrupt when the almost exclusive funding through government subsidizes stopped. They even rejected an offered loan from the government as not being what they wanted.
There is zero party platforms advocating for wind and batteries for weeks/months long storage. No party advocating a overprovisioning of solar either, possible because output during worst winter month generally reaching single digit percent.
The only political platforms that exist currently are either wind and thermal power plants to burn fuel during non-optimal weather conditions, or to expand the nuclear fleet, and it seems fairly similar when you look at other nearby European countries. Batteries are used as a grid balancer when switching between different form of production, but not as a replacement for the natural gas which is the primary form of fuel being burned in the thermal power plants. Election prediction is that voters are going to demand that construction of something is getting started as the Iran war is likely to trigger new spikes in fossil fuel prices, and thus this will be one of the major issues for the election. Other European countries will likely see similar election debates.
The consumption numbers for the worst month is a bit over 16 000 GW/h of electricity, with a steady growth each year (despite the transport sector being quite slow to electrify), and for a seasonal battery storage you would likely need capacity a few times of that. I would welcome it if a political party would adopt such strategy however, if nothing else because then we would have an alternative to the current two strategies being debated. They could calculations on what it would cost, either by buying it from china or building the production domestically.
Replacing fossil fuels with renewables is a shift in the vulnerability vector. The issue isn't even that China controls the production of solar panels and batteries. Production can be launched domestically. China controls 70-90% of refining - the processing chains of critical minerals (rare earth metals, polysilicon, lithium).
Renewables work perfectly for low-density consumers (residential sector, regular commerce). For heavy infrastructure, this won't work.
For example, let's look at AI data centers. AI data centers consume gigawatts of dense energy. Renewables are low-density energy. The problem comes down to spatial energy density (Watts per square meter — W/m²). A server rack for AI training consumes up to 40-100 kW. Solar and wind energy are diffuse (scattered) sources. Their density is about 5-20 W/m². A hyperscaler data center is a concentration of colossal energy in a minimal area (hundreds of megawatts per building).
Training LLM models cannot be interrupted when the sun goes down or the wind dies down. AI requires 24/7 baseload (base generation). The capacity factor of solar is 15-25%, wind — 30-45%. Batteries can smooth out peaks for 2-4 hours, but cannot provide seasonal or multi-day baseload.
Where do we plan to build solar and wind parks? - In deserts and offshore zones. This will require a radical expansion of the grids. We will run into a copper deficit (and things aren't smooth with aluminum either).
Long-term structural capital will go into nuclear energy, gas generation (as a backup), and copper/uranium mining.
being from a 3rd world country and having lived in Europe & the US.
you quickly learn there's nothing called an adversary when adopting technology.
you adopt what works - ruminating about where something comes from, is a luxury.
then after you can either work towards self-sufficiency or keep being vulnerable.
Europe has been kept in this loop of talking about problems while not solving them.
the US - knowin' about the problems, but actively ignoring them due to politics.
Most countries have days to, at most, months of imports of oil in reserve. In contrast, a panel embargo wouldn’t have disastrous effects for years. But reliance it is the same. If you’re dependent on Chinese panels, China can cap your energy growth at whim. The degradation will be slow thereafter, but present nevertheless.
Using foreign panels for anything other than bootstrapping domestic or allied production would be the EU repeating its follies first with Russia and then with American LNG.
I'm happy the OP was able to take advantage of the current prices, cheap technology, and the amicable perfidious relationship. I would avoid anything internet-connected for good reason, and of course, burying anything in our infrastructure.
How have you still not learned? By god Europe's in an awful place if you still don't get it.
You first import them en masse. You reverse engineer, learn how to do everything. Then you slowly invest in local manufacturing. China has shown you the way.
German industry does not want to pay anyone, imports cheap foreigners for tasks that have to be done in Germany and outsources the rest.
Sure, it's great to be independent when you can, but of all the groups you depend on, and all the ways you depend on them, this doesn't rank high!
Given the hysteria involved in Great Power warmongering circles, much of it designed to increase military-industrial outlays, this is highly unlikely at present, especially in the USA where fossil fuel demand destruction is something the investors in the fracking boom and the oilfield and refinery operators don’t want to see, just look at Exxon and Chevron profits over the past month. I doubt the affiliated investor-owned utilities would be thrilled about an explosion in US rooftop solar installations either, as that cuts directly into their revenue stream.
Now, if you want to build monocrystalline Si PV at scale from scratch to catch up to China, that’s going to take a lot of investment over a decade, and given the historical and present reluctance of the US government to fund such R & D at scale (tiny DOE budgets), it’s all going to be private, and private rentier-finance capital is not going to fund a major competitor to fossil fuels in the USA - margins are tighter, you replace a commodity stream with a one-time purchase of equipment with a minimum 20-yr lifespan, and unless you tightly control the equipment and the electrical generation, there go your rents, I mean profits.
If Russia stops gas deliveries you are immediately without energy.
If China stops exporting your PV and battery while just continue to work for 20 years.
By all means, it would be great if EU countries ramp up their own production of batteries and solar panels. But this is worlds apart of depending on fuel from Russia.
Dependency is only problematic if you lack an alternative, and nobody is developing alternatives.
My gawd, lots of people in Netherlands want to contribute to the green ecosystem but govt can't even get permitting straight and everything is gridlocked. The electric grid is full and new houses and companies can't be connected to the grid, wnd if you want to install a heat pump or an AC then there are thousands of rules and anybody else in the neighborhood can block you for the slightest thing.
Less talking and more doing. The Chinese at least are all do and almost no talk.
If you buy a solar panel, it produces power for the next 20-50 years. It doesn't require constant flow from China. If China suddenly decides to stop buying solar panels (why would they?) then what? Nothing. Your solar panels still produce power.
It's particularly bizarre when the alternative is supply lines to countries like Russia and the GCC countries. Russia tried to use Europe's natural gas dependency to invade Ukraine. That's still ongoing.
And what has China done that warrants a similar kind of fear? Absolutely nothing other than the US has declared China an enemy for some reason.
I know it sounds like satire, but there is a good reason tech exploded in the US 30 years ago while Europe is still making cars like it's the 1960's.
It was already a easy financial case to be made, let alone the extra comfort. But now it's a no-brainer. I get €100 back every month now, while others around me pay up to €300 per month.
The way the Chinese manufacturers are scaling production of batteries is something to behold.
In 2022 I bought 20kWh + 10kW inverter + installation for €7500.
My buddy just ordered a 54kWh battery for €6500... And it's not slowing down, they're only gaining speed with the introduction of over cheaper materials like Sodium batteries.
The Chinese are the only reason I remain somewhat optimistic of our chances of combatting climate change.
Europe is too lazy, the US just gave up, really.
We don't ever get those temps so I should be fine.
My biggest issue is not cold but mist. I live near a river in a valley and have underestimated how much mist hurts performance around ~1c outside.
It needs to defrost often, because of the high moisture content in the outside air where I live.
But it also has a normal, resistive heating 9kW backup. But for financial reasons this is considered 'emergency only'.
We also got solar, our entire power bill (all heating, cooking, lights, computers, etc) is $500 for the year. Best decision ever.
But induction is a game changer. It makes everything else (including gas) seem weak. I can make my steel wok glow red within 20 seconds.
And then there's the flammable gas in your house. I had it for 20 years, it works fine when installed properly but the risk is never 0.
They're a startup trying to get to the minimum amount of MWh to become a 'virtual power plant'.
It seems it's 48kwh, apologies. And it seems the cheapest batch is already sold out: it's now €6500.
correction: they may have spent $450M: https://climatepower.us/news/new-report-oil-and-gas-industry...
And then the Americans elected him in a landslide.
They gave up.
Green tech is a fledgling industry trying to challenge a dominant, well established one.
Any such industry needs basic government support, but at the very least, predictable government regulation.
Unfortunately not only have we not seen support, we’ve seen opposition from the government, and the stability has been laughable.
Meanwhile that’s exactly what the Chinese government is providing which means the entire industry (outside of a now small section of wind power in Europe, which preceded green tech becoming political football) is Chinese, so you and I and pretty much everyone outside China has been cut off from benefitting from it as an investment and can only benefit from it as consumers.
There is hope that the Europeans might finally get their act together here, but hoping the Europeans may get their act together in investment, industrial and financial policy has so far been a fool’s game. There’s little to no hope for America getting its act together for at least a few years in the green tech supply chain, although the actual green tech consumption seems to be growing even with the political headwinds.
Of course I believe oil lobby doesn't want competition, so it will be a rich guys' fight.
Green energy is challenging because it has many times less density then every other form out there, among other reasons.
I wish that was true…
Illuminate USA in Ohio claims to be going even bigger than T1. Over 5 GW/year (10 million panels). But they just seem to manufacture panels and not batteries.
Some others include: Tesla, Qcells, Mission Solar, First Solar, Ambri, Enphase, Ørsted, TotalEnergies, and Generac.
Not all are fully vertically integrated and many still rely on global supply chains...
Now that the public has heard the term “Trillions” whether it relates to defense spending or company valuations, that term is now somewhat more meaningless for grand scale ideas. Couple that with rising energy costs and you have a potential public appetite for a massive push for renewable and storage of all kinds.
e.g. they've cultivated / funded and basically created a formerly extremely fringe "Alberta separatism" movement and are actively trying to disassemble the Canadian state. Things have gotten to the point that they're willing to light fires of instability right in the heart of the "stable" heartland of North America.
Formerly international capital benefited from stability. But the fossil fuel sector sees the writing on the wall and is trying to make as much hay while the sun shines as it can. They profit from the chaos, as we've seen from the last two months.
American oil companies: "It doesn't pay, oil prices are too low to make drilling worth while."
Donald Trump: "War, baby, war!" (Oil prices go up)
The rest of the world: "Renewables!"
Five or ten years from now, when renewables have largely replaced oil, gas and coal in most of the world, the US will be the only major country still using fossil fuels. And the rest of the world will be better off; the US, not so much.
Heating is slower to change, but new homes and buildings could come with solar walls and ceilings.
Four out of our last five Presidents were born within 4 years of each other [1]. Three (Bush Jr., Clinton and Trump) were born in 1946.
Good news: 2024 was probably the last election where Boomers’ vote share was above 25%. In 2028, a significant number of states, including California and Texas, will have fewer than 20% of votes cast by Boomers. (194 EVs in 2028 and, using 2020 Census numbers, a further 243 EVs in ‘32.)
[1] https://www.loriferber.com/amp/research/presidential-facts-s...
I’d love to be proven wrong on this.
We should absolutely stop burning them, though.
For instance, modern medicine requires petroleum and there's no real alternatives at this time.
Now we are supposed to buy solar panels from China while the US is depicting China as the greatest threat, senate hearings demand usage of US bases in Asia without the approval of the host countries and the US started the Iran war to maintain a blockade to control both the EU and China.
I wonder if Bilderberg group member Radoslav Sikorski will be gloating on Twitter when secondary sanctions will be imposed on the EU if they import Chinese solar panels.
Where are you getting this from? That’s not even remotely close to my understanding of the situation
It remains true that the actual total costs of using hydrocarbons are not factored into their actual real world market exchange rate. And every time we've made modest steps to try to make that happen (carbon taxes, regulation) the resistance has been swift and brutal.
Until there is a regulatory model which forces the externalities to be accounted for, it's just a race to the bottom.
Bloom has done a good job of late and Watt Fuel Cell is another company I am keeping an eye on. I truly believe that this is a major path forward in the US as the infrastructure already exists and we are the best in the world at gas extraction.