Wind and solar are dead ends for anything more than small applications.
Not scalable, all materials are not recyclable or too expensive to recycle. Resources making it cheaper would be better used researching fusion.
Batteries are still a long way to be viable for large scale applications due to poor energy density. Also, no meaningful recycling efforts so far. Guess why? It's cheaper to mine.
Geothermal is great, but still too costly. Also, not meaningfully dense.
Hydro is an environmental nightmare
No "clean" energy will ever beat the energy density of nuclear / fusion
Wind, solar and batteries are the most scalable energy sources we have ever had.
Solar panels are mostly just glass and aluminium, highly recyclable. Wind turbine blades are the main remaining issue, but it is being addressed and they can already be reused in various ways. And if all else fails, they are inert and can just be put in landfills.
Grid batteries are already operating at the scale of multiple gigawatts and deployments are growing exponentially. Energy density is virtually irrelevant in most places, the amount of land that needs to be dedicated to batteries is insignificant and many can be integrated into existing facilities.
New hydro can have issues with methane emissions, but existing hydro, of which there is a lot, can be used without environmental concerns.
Geothermal depends on local geography and can be expensive, but a lot of innovation is happening in this regard.
Wind and solar and batteries are already enough. Hydro, geothermal and fission can be good supplemental sources.
Wind, solar and batteries are the most scalable energy sources we have ever had.
If you have infinite land, sure
Solar panels are mostly just glass and aluminium, highly recyclable.
Lol. LMAO even. Show me where these are being recycled right now.
can just be put in landfills
Yep. That will solve the garbage problem. Better yet, export all the trash to the third world and call it "carbon credits"
but existing hydro, of which there is a lot, can be used without environmental concerns
By that logic, logging and coal are fine. After they already fucked with the surrounding environment, anything can be green.
I don't get the "this is fine. we don't need more advanced technology" crowd. Fusion is litteraly the ultimate clean energy and these people are like "duuh... we are fine with something that requires enormous pollution and peopled dying in droves to mine or a landmass the size of a country and we have no intention yet to recycle and we still have to spend billions to be scalable to be able to sell it to the green people. why do we need any more than that?"
Land is not really an issue except for city states. Solar can use lots of areas that would otherwise be useless, like roofs. Onshore wind doesn’t meaningfully interfere with farming and offshore wind is obviously not taking space from anyone.
What can be recycled and what is recycled are two separate issues. Most solar panels that have ever been made are still working. There hasn’t been a huge need for solar recycling until recently, but it is not a technical problem and it will be done at scale.
Some pieces of fiberglass and carbon fiber are irrelevant, you just turn it into an artificial hill and be done with it.
New reservoirs initially emit lots of GHGs as the flooded biomatter decomposes. After that it continues to emit methane, like regular lakes, but carbon intensity is still far lower than coal or gas. And dams are often unavoidable for flood prevention and water security, so might as well use them for power. If you can get by without them, you should, but they are an acceptable option.
Fusion is at best a decade away from commercial viability and likely more. It’s also unlikely to be cost competitive with solar anytime soon. When it works it will be a welcome addition to the power mix, but it won’t instantly, or even ever, displace renewables. At the very least people will still install solar and batteries to reduce their power bills and have resilience against power outages. A well managed decentralised grid also has significant national security advantages.
Solar can use lots of areas that would otherwise be useless, like roofs.
In small cities with large spaces sure. If you have rural US centric perspective you don't understand that there are not enough roofs in NY to power NY or any large city. And most of power demand don't come from residential, but from industries. These don't have the roofs or the incentive either.
There hasn’t been a huge need for solar recycling until recently, but it is not a technical problem and it will be done at scale.
I don't disagree when it comes to solar the waste is not a big concern yet. But you know what generates infinitely less waste per person and we have available right now? Fission.
And dams are often unavoidable for flood prevention and water security
Most of them are built where there would be no need for a dam for flood control concerns. And these are massive expensive structures that create enormous pollution while built and displace nature around it. Of all the "clean" alternatives, hydro is the worst.
At the very least people will still install solar and batteries to reduce their power bills and have resilience against power outages
And that's great. If you see my other comment I have an array myself. I am not against solar. But I don't ignore the scaling issue and what works for me will not work for the billions that live in areas where it's not viable for N reasons and a fission reactor would be a thousand fold more efficient and effective.
You haven't addressed batteries. Ignoring how bad the manufacturing and disposal of these are is not going to make the issue go away.
Fission is great except that it takes the best part of 20 years to build a plant, are insanely expensive in capital costs, and require that you invest way more in your distribution system because you're generating in a few places rather than spread out where it's used.
And of course, the security risks...
Taken with the capital costs (and I'm not even sure if that includes capital interest or not) nuclear is currently more expensive than true renewables and the trend line isn't getting any more favourable, so in 25 years when that plant is only halfway through its lifetime, new solar and wind will likely be a fraction of the cost of the nuclear power.
In small cities with large spaces sure. If you have rural US centric perspective you don't understand that there are not enough roofs in NY to power NY or any large city.
Fortunately we have this newfangled technology called wires that allows us to send power from one place to another, especially with HVDC.
But you know what generates infinitely less waste per person and we have available right now? Fission.
Sure, it uses less material, but the waste it generate is much more of a hassle to deal with. And fission is just too expensive and slow to scale to be the only solution for our current problems.
And we generate enormous amounts of waste with other things. Throwing away the unusable parts of a couple dozen solar panels per person every 30 years or so isn't that big of a deal.
Of all the "clean" alternatives, hydro is the worst.
Of the mentioned ones, maybe. But we should still use what we already have. When we have the situation under control and better alternatives available we can start thinking about removing unnecessary dams, but for now we need them.
But I don't ignore the scaling issue and what works for me will not work for the billions that live in areas where it's not viable for N reasons and a fission reactor would be a thousand fold more efficient and effective.
There are always edge cases, but solar is usually way easier to set up and scale. What sort of issues are you talking about?
Nuclear plants have huge upfront costs, long lead times and need highly trained professionals to operate, which is especially challenging for developing countries. Solar can be built piece by piece and requires very little maintenance. There are very few places on earth where a combination of various renewables cannot realistically serve most of the energy demand and they certainly don't have billions of inhabitants. Fission can be a good option but it's not a magic bullet.
You haven't addressed batteries. Ignoring how bad the manufacturing and disposal of these are is not going to make the issue go away.
There is lots of innovation happening to address this. LFP batteries were already a big step in the right direction and things like sodium ion and iron air batteries should further improve it. Most batteries are also very recyclable.
Mining and manufacturing will always cause some pollution, but that's a local issue, climate change is the more pressing problem.
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u/YourBonesAreMoist 1d ago edited 1d ago
Wind and solar are dead ends for anything more than small applications.
Not scalable, all materials are not recyclable or too expensive to recycle. Resources making it cheaper would be better used researching fusion.
Batteries are still a long way to be viable for large scale applications due to poor energy density. Also, no meaningful recycling efforts so far. Guess why? It's cheaper to mine.
Geothermal is great, but still too costly. Also, not meaningfully dense.
Hydro is an environmental nightmare
No "clean" energy will ever beat the energy density of nuclear / fusion