US solar market is projected to triple in size by 2028
Due in part to strong Q1 2023 numbers and a demand surge, the US solar market is now expected to triple by 2028, according to a new report.
The USA should be making China-level investments in solar. They should be building their own companies and more tax dollars should go to solar than weapons.
What are modern wars fought over? Energy.
and batteries for charging the cars at night
I mean, the solution seems to be right there... Cars are batteries. And many (most?) cars don't need their 100%, so just let the cars that happens to be charged sell some of it back during the night?
Or just have tons of chargers and offices and whatnot so they can charge during the day when the sun is out.
Honestly investing in just one type of green energy isn't smart specially solar, they should go with all of them in case scientific development proves one is superior to the other and to diversify. Primarily nuclear but I assume they are going the solar way because it can generate more consumption because individuals need to buy their owm panels unlike nuclear where the State builds a plant. It is similar to the trains versus cars scenario.
More investment, for sure. That's why I was so surprised with the green new deal, I had no suspicions that the US was actually going to start investing in its infrastructure and energy again.
I don't know what you mean by modern wars are fought over energy?
The Russian-Ukraine war is about pride, territory and farmland, the genocides going on right now around the world are about race/pride, a lot of conflicts in sub-Saharan African countries about who gets to be the leader, which wars are you referring to specifically with regard to energy and what type of energy are you talking about?
Ahh, let me revise; I meant resources not just specifically energy.
So in global political economic theory, wars over race/pride/territory are the superficial reasons for the war. The underlying cause is usually due to resources, or scarcity of. Consider that the people who start these wars are usually starting them because they want more resources. Russia invaded Ukraine because they want that territory in their sphere of influence, not the west's. But there are a couple pipelines that run through Ukraine that generate several billion dollars a year in transit revenue for both Ukraine and Russia.
Syria for example, the US instigated the Arab spring in that country and still occupies the eastern part so they can extract oil. The attempted coups in Bolivia was for Lithium mining rights. African ethnic rivalries are often over resources, etc.
If everyone had enough, most people would be happy, and if they're happy they wouldn't be fighting wars.
We definitely need to be investing in power-to-gas for better storage and transport of all this renewable energy
I don't know about power-to-gas, can you break it down for me real quick and then I'll look up specifics later once I know what you're talking about?
Always interested in learning something new.
You take renewable energy and make a high density gas. Typically you make hydrogen (easy) then methane. Methane, unlike hydrogen, is highly dense and can be sent with existing gas pipelines.
It's a way to store and trsnsport enormous excess energy usage thats far better than electrical butteries.
It's already in use, but further research would only make it more efficient.
Will this make the tech get cheaper or more expensive? I could see it going either way
It'll make energy cheaper, but asking if solar power will make technological gadgets cheaper is kind of like asking if having a faster computer makes you a better writer. They're just different fields. Energy and energy infrastructure will become cheaper and simpler to maintain.
That said, I don't think prices will go up overall because energy is just part of the picture.
Some technology might become more expensive at a rate we probably wouldn't notice anyway(not solar panels apparently, cheaper everyday) as infrastructure, battery tech, compatible alloys and everything catches up with solar panel technology, but comprehensively, I can't see how solar technology could push prices up.
I think about it like motorcycles versus electric bikes. There's the up front cost, which can be similar only because batteries are so expensive right now, even though they're getting cheaper every year.
But after that up front cost? You have one motor with two parts vs an ICE with what 200 moving precision parts? That are being kicked by micro explosions multiple times a second to move the vehicle?
No oil changes. No coolant; aside from brake fluid, no fluid or fluid changes required for the life of the electric vehicle. You don't have to change any air/oil/fuel filters, no pumps, no cracking hoses, spark plugs, there's just no maintenance cost with an electric vehicle compared to a fuel driven vehicle. Even if the battery degraded after a decade, the cost of that versus just the regular maintenance cost of an ICE motorcycle over a decade is maybe 20 percent, maybe a top of the line $2,000 new electric battery versus $10,000 easily spent as $1,000 per year on parts and labor, regular wear and tear.
Maintaining an electric vehicle versus a fuel driven vehicle saves so much money on top of saving you time, which saves you more money.
So when I use a technology like solar panels, just the no moving parts alone constitute such a savings that, coupled with the rapidly decreasing cost in watt per dollar for PV, convince me that overall the price of energy will go down the more countries invest in solar technologies.
Those savings of money and I think more importantly, time, could not directly drive prices up.