- these are just a few points, many more could be made…
“The backlog of solar panels stockpiled in U.S. warehouses is so large that it could fulfill a year and a half of demand, according to the IEA.” kudos to Thomas J Shepstone from Energy Security and Freedom for this info.
SHANGHAI, April 22 (Reuters) – China’s state planner expects an intensified price war among automakers of electric cars and plug-in hybrids this year because of overhanging supply…
solar
Approaching a saturation point is similar to the Law of Diminishing Returns. In each case, the ‘low hanging fruit’ is picked first. After that, there becomes less and less incentive to put any more time, energy, or money into ventures or projects.
With solar, the better your southern exposure, the more efficient your solar panel productivity will be. So naturally, the homes with roofs that slope to the south will get more out of their rooftop solar panels than homes with roofs that slope east and west. The same is true, of course, with the advantage of homes with a southern exposure that is unobstructed by trees or nearby buildings or a close mountain ridge that blocks out early and late sunshine, especially when the sun’s route is lower in winter. The economics of solar aren’t too great anyway, so the poor locations will not have much incentive. After nearly all of the best locations have already installed rooftop solar, demand will slow down and saturation will come into play.
The proliferation of thousands of acres of solar panels installed on prime farmland is another potential saturation point. Sooner or later, enough people will acknowledge that food is essential and we can’t live without it, while solar is easily replaceable with other forms of energy, like thermal power plants including nuclear, that take up much less acreage. As more and more farmland is covered with solar panels, the price of food will rise until there is a backlash against taking up valuable farmland.
Note: The day after this post was published, I added what Irina Slav just wrote: “…there appears to be so much money to be made from solar that all other considerations take second place. Or tenth. And while in Bulgaria using prime farmland for solar is still illegal, so you need to bribe people to do it, elsewhere it is perfectly legal and actively encouraged by the government. Solar is taking over farmland — finite, food-producing farmland.
Whatever could go wrong?”
Wow - here’s an additional update, this one about a 445 acre solar installation by NextEra, excerpted from Energy News Beat.
“sub-contractors graded Duttlinger’s fields to assist the building of roads and installation of posts and panels, he said, despite his warnings that it could make the land more vulnerable to erosion…Crews reshaped the landscape, spreading fine sand across large stretches of rich topsoil, Duttlinger said. When Reuters visited his farm last year and this spring, much of the land beneath the panels was covered in yellow-brown sand, where no plants grew…“I’ll never be able to grow anything on that field again,” the farmer said. About one-third of his approximately 1,200-acre farm – where his family grows corn, soybeans and alfalfa for cattle – has been leased.”
EVs
things got nasty in chicago last winter
EVs are a niche item. They are expensive and have relatively short lives and poor trade-in values compared to ICE vehicles, so they are primarily bought by the rich. They work better in some areas than others, and they make more sense for short commutes than for longer trips. In the south where temps can get well over 100F fairly often, the Li-ion batteries have a significantly shorter lifetime. In the north or in high mountains, driving a battery powered car or truck doesn’t make any sense during extremely cold weather, so why buy one? The cold reduces battery output, which is double affected by using additional battery for the interior car heat.
The original excitement about EVs is wearing off quickly. Like any promotion of a new product, only the positives were emphasized. Now we’re all learning about the negatives, and there are many of them. Some are quite severe, like getting stranded with a dead battery in a blizzard, or the other extreme - an battery explosion and fire. I suspect that soon only stubborn diehards will continue to buy EVs, and a saturation point will be reached where sales plateau and quit rising. Caveat - hybrid sales still make sense.
There are many more reasons why a saturation point for EV and solar panels may soon be reached, but the elephant in the room is… subsidies
If sales are already slowing, what will happen when the massive subsidies are cut back?
Love your article - thanks for the share.
I have a comment on the utility scale saturation - it would be nice to see it slow up, but I feel that will not happen anytime soon here in Texas. Prime farmland is being taken up at an astonishing rate. The best l;and is in the triangle between Dallas, San Antonio and Austin, blackland prairie, and then down to the coast, between Houston and Corpus. It is being covered with solar. See the recent hail storm damage. Having dealt with solar developers, their attorneys and land owners - I think greed from both sides will win the day and the actual use of the land will take second fiddle! Our politicians don't seem to care, maybe some are starting to pay attention, with many people like myself complaining! And of course food comes from the grocery store!
The other thing that bothers me is the tax credit situation and those transfers. I believe that those regulations have been ironed out and if so, then there will be a boom in the industry as those transfer fuel the fire!
I would like to be more optimistic, but I don't see them backing off any time soon. ERCOT's dire predictions don't help and all they can give is is more wind and solar and a flood of worthless, expensive batteries.
Hold onto our wallets, it's going to be a rough ride!
“In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual.”
Galileo Galilei
Believe = religion
Think = opinion
Know = science
Here is what I know.
What do you know that’s different?
GHE theory fails because of these two erroneous assumptions:
Earth is warmed by GHE/GHGs preventing it from becoming a 33 C cooler, 255 K, -18 C ball of ice.
Wrong.
&
Earth’s surface radiates “extra” LWIR energy as a black body creating an upwelling, looping, trapping warming effect.
Wrong.
Earth is cooler w the atmos/WV/30% albedo not warmer.
YouTube: Greenhouse Effect Theory Goes Kerbluey (terminated)
Ubiquitous GHE heat balance graphics use bad math and badder physics.
YouTube: Atmospheric Heat Balances That Don't (terminated)
Kinetic heat transfer modes of contiguous atmos molecules render a BB surface model impossible.
Search: “Bruges group kerbluey”
Consensus science has a well-documented history of being way wrong and abusing those who dared to challenge it (Bruno drawn & quartered) & the current consensus is wrong about GHE & CAGW.
GHE theory & CAGW climate “science” are indefensible pseudo-science rubbish forcing alarmists to resort to fear mongering, lies, lawsuits, censorship and violence.