How you otherwise shore up the necessary capital resources for global/monumental industrial change without charging for access to them. Risk is everywhere. Failure is frequent. How do you overcome that inevitability without assigning a cost to borrow resources to try? Who would lend the resources to create economies of scale necessary to make semi conductors, solar energy, and (soon) batteries affordable? Are you suggesting volunteers in their basement can collectively get together and somehow develop a billion(s) dollar battery factory or an entire city dedicated to the manufacture of polysilicon solar panels?

I think you are right. It has been surprisingly difficult for me to come to terms with that over the years. I guess win-win, if they win by squeaking out 6-9% margins on old assets while renewables grow to terrawatts by 2025, expanding 100x like the have over the past decade. Seems like a bizarre choice: 6x return over 10,000x, but I'm not complaining! Only 100x to go.

yes, really. EIA publishes the costs of generation annually. solar is cheaper than all 7 types of new coal generation facilities, all fuel cell and nuclear facilities, both types of biomass facilities, wind, geothermal, solid waste, small hydro, even new large hydro facilities.

Did you know that Chinese solar panels have 25% to 300% tariffs in the US ? Full stop. Haha, what is the ITC subsidy your clamoring on about again? Similar arrangement in the EU. They could sell for .55 $/kWh, but they sell for mid 0.70s because US mfgrs (actually German owned, fake US corp, asian mfgers) lobbied for tarrifs because they cannot compete against state of the art chinese solar manufacturing cities, who have completely up to date US made equipment and better economies of scale. To be blunt, you parrot talking points of people who most likely have no idea what they are talking about or 2) have some other agenda (preserving their depreciated energy production assets)

solar (arguably) remains more expensive than ~3-4 of 5 types of natural gas generation, but given the uncertainty of natural gas prices over the next 30 years and the fact solar is cheaper than all 5 types of at only moderately higher gas prices, it seems like a fairly conservative economic hedge. Solar and natural gas also pair wonderfully. Solar also will not be subject to export competition when LNG terminals are built and export capacity ramps... to sell gas at 3x the price to europe/asia

Solar today is installed at a fraction of the cost of most of California's gas infrastructure (and astonishingly expensive peaking gas infrastructure) -which is major factor in their costs...

Solar plants are going up for $1200-$1300/ W these days, without subsidies, international developer/manufacturers are making 20% gross margin in these projects.

Solar only appears expensive when compared against fully depreciated, dirty coal infrastructure. When it comes to the inevitable grid modernization solar fills a massive hole (20-40%), there is ample opportunity for hundreds of billions of dollars of cost effective solar investment. Approximately 35 to 40% of those costs is literally revenue that the US and EU gave away to Chinese solar conglomerates, mostly due to myopic thinking of entrenched institutions and the failure of smart people (probably yourself) to assess the progress and trajectory of the solar industry over the past 30 years.

The commoditization of solar energy into the most accessible low cost energy resource has gone according to plan (predictions) for over 30 years actually its convincingly ahead of schedule since 2005, mainly due to the Chinese factor. The idea that in 2015 when renewables (wind+solar) are now the largest (annual production addition) and fastest growing energies on earth and I'm still combating against the same ignorant arguments is hilarious.

I've now realized there will be no "ah ha" moment, where I told you so. No daay will come where my industry will be thanked for growing the economy and modernizing our infrastructure and perhaps alleviating co2 production. The ignorance will just slip into the darkness, as it has over the last decade as monied interests quietly switch sides, and we'll have to pretend it was never really there. Oh well, at least I put my money where my mouth is a decade ago. Thankfully so have hundreds of billions of dollars of private investment. Its an unstoppable force. =) From these hundreds of billions we will reap trillions because the cost of capital of solar energy has been the last hurdle. And hilariously, features that were nonsensically attacked as the weaknesses of solar by agenda driven institutions, are now recognized as the strengths. A solid state device aimed at the sun for 25+++ years with 1% OP EX, competetively installed today with guaranteed fixed pricing. Game over. Good luck hedging natural gas costs for the next 30 years at 2015 prices. LoL.

In 2014, the UK was the largest market for solar energy in the EU.

Considering the pace at which this energy was added to the grid, it is news worthy. Considering coal (and large hydro and nuclear) are all about ~9% each in California, it will only be a handful of years until solar surpasses power production from each coal, nuclear, and large hydro.

Perhaps then solar detractors will rubber neck at the remarkable progress in the industry. It will be hilarious over the coming decade as the raw economics drive us to abandon domestic resources (coal, gas) in favor of Chinese (or Malaysian) manufactured solar panels. Exporting billions of dollars to China after handing them this giant industry (inevitably one of the world's largest) on a silver platter.

I wonder how the myopic thinkers will react to this scenario. Of course, we'll have to wait a decade for them to realize what has already happened.

let me know when you complete this irrelevant wandering and we can get back on topic, which was that the capricious and diminutive support of renewable energy in the US will be the most costly squandered opportunity in the history of capitalism.

Your right it has nothing to do with the insignificance of nuclear energy in China. Also coal is no longer the benchmark of cheap energy generation. Its natural gas. Welcome to the 21st century.

Ridiculous non sequitur. No one is pushing back against this perspective because it is not being advocated or practiced. Freedom has nothing to do with it, unless you speak of the freedom to stomp on others to enrich oneself.

Nice speculation, I wager it's been shared shared by numerous past societies on the brink of collapse. Please comment on top soil depletion, aquifer depletion, uncontrollable erosion, over grazing, deforestation, and collapsing fishing stocks. None of the current rates of these activities are sustainable today, let alone 9-12 billion people, let alone any increase in quality of life for under developed regions.

Others mentioned heat pumps, but even an standard efficiency natural gas furnace or wood stove is likely more efficient, in that you are directly using the primary fuel for heating, rather than converting it to electricity at lower efficiency and then losing some to transmission before it hits your resistor.

Any business or industry of sufficient size is lobbying in its own interest to maximize tax incentives and direct subsidies...

Sadly the question was rhetorical. Somehow the gap between the self-perceived and actual critical faculties is somehow larger on slashdot than it is in the general population.

Natural gas costs $1000/kW + 0.015 $/kWh fuel + ~0.01 $/kWh opex. Costs are flat, fancy natural gas is 2x more expensive

Coal costs $2-3000/kW + 0.02 $/kWh fuel + ~0.019 $/kWh opex. Costs are trending up.

Solar costs $1800/kW + no fuel and +1% opex. Already competitive solar costs are trending down sharply.

This isn't a 1% issue. This is a widespread ignorance issue, much like the following opinion:

According to who? Not anyone who has studied and published on the issue for the last 15 years (Including every major US and international investment bank, government energy agency, analyst, and even many fossil fuel companies). In fact, you could only make this statement from a position of neglectful ignorance. Presently a ~$125 billion dollar industry with annualized growth exceeding 20%, better than any industry of its size or larger. 50GW+ in 2015. According to a recent Agora report, which effectively models prior growth and ramps it down (before you slam models, historically we've underpredicted the rise of solar) places scenarios of zero technological innovation have it sustaining itself at 200 GW/yr in the next decade, larger in financial scope than the coal mining industry. At technological breakthrough we might get 1700 GW/yr, or something as large as the oil industry, the biggest industry on earth.

Time matters and Solar, Wind and Hydro aren't going to get us where we need to go before some major sea level rise and climate dislocations are locked in.

Funny, while you prattle on or lobby or do whatever it is you do that doesn't result in more nuclear energy, the present solar industry is adding capacity at 6 to 9 times the rate of the fastest nuclear timeline I've encountered at a run rate of 50 reactors a year, increasing YoY at 20%.

No fucking contest. And its purely economic.

AC output of solar energy is typically more like 12-16%. No it isn't a serious hit, it is more than sufficient, for example, to power non heating and cooling loads for most people on earth based on population density.

This is crazy nonsense. Virtually every industry and business, especially manufacturing, gets subsidies and tax breaks. Economics have nothing to do with it.