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A quick search on converting photons to electrons turned this up:

http://cleantechnica.com/2013/...

A new discovery by researchers at the ICFO has revealed that graphene is even more efficient at converting light into electricity than previously known. Graphene is capable of converting a single photon of light into multiple electrons able to drive electric current.

So that could be where the extra electrons are coming from.

WRONG.

I'm not going to retype this:

Some renewables are intermittent? Not a problem: Solutions to a 100% renewable and sustainable energy supply worldwide include but are not limited to hydro-electric and pumped hydro, geothermal, solar pv, wave-power, tidal lagoons and other tidal, onshore and off-shore wind in conjunction with better home insulation, heat pumps - ground source and air source, storage heaters, solar water heating, battery storage and charging electric cars whilst renewables output is high. Vehicles, ships and trains can be powered by electricity and hydrogen fuel cells, aircraft could run on liquid hydrogen.

$500 Billion A Year In Fossil Fuel Imports Could Be Saved In US, EU, & China In 100% Switch To Renewables | CleanTechnica

China Government Study Sees 86% Renewables by 2050

New Study: 95% Renewable Power-Mix Cheaper Than Nuclear And Gas | CleanTechnica

The world can be powered by alternative energy in 20-40 years, Stanford researcher says

        German grid more stable in 2013 â" German Energy Transition

â- Powering the World With Wind, Water, and Sunlight: Mark Jacobson at TEDxPaloAltoHighSchool - YouTube

The storage necessity myth: how to choreograph high-renewables electricity systems - YouTube

WRONG.

I'm not going to retype this:

Some renewables are intermittent? Not a problem: Solutions to a 100% renewable and sustainable energy supply worldwide include but are not limited to hydro-electric and pumped hydro, geothermal, solar pv, wave-power, tidal lagoons and other tidal, onshore and off-shore wind in conjunction with better home insulation, heat pumps - ground source and air source, storage heaters, solar water heating, battery storage and charging electric cars whilst renewables output is high. Vehicles, ships and trains can be powered by electricity and hydrogen fuel cells, aircraft could run on liquid hydrogen.

$500 Billion A Year In Fossil Fuel Imports Could Be Saved In US, EU, & China In 100% Switch To Renewables | CleanTechnica

China Government Study Sees 86% Renewables by 2050

New Study: 95% Renewable Power-Mix Cheaper Than Nuclear And Gas | CleanTechnica

The world can be powered by alternative energy in 20-40 years, Stanford researcher says

        German grid more stable in 2013 â" German Energy Transition

â- Powering the World With Wind, Water, and Sunlight: Mark Jacobson at TEDxPaloAltoHighSchool - YouTube

The storage necessity myth: how to choreograph high-renewables electricity systems - YouTube

WRONG.

I'm not going to retype this:

Some renewables are intermittent? Not a problem: Solutions to a 100% renewable and sustainable energy supply worldwide include but are not limited to hydro-electric and pumped hydro, geothermal, solar pv, wave-power, tidal lagoons and other tidal, onshore and off-shore wind in conjunction with better home insulation, heat pumps - ground source and air source, storage heaters, solar water heating, battery storage and charging electric cars whilst renewables output is high. Vehicles, ships and trains can be powered by electricity and hydrogen fuel cells, aircraft could run on liquid hydrogen.

$500 Billion A Year In Fossil Fuel Imports Could Be Saved In US, EU, & China In 100% Switch To Renewables | CleanTechnica

China Government Study Sees 86% Renewables by 2050

New Study: 95% Renewable Power-Mix Cheaper Than Nuclear And Gas | CleanTechnica

The world can be powered by alternative energy in 20-40 years, Stanford researcher says

        German grid more stable in 2013 â" German Energy Transition

â- Powering the World With Wind, Water, and Sunlight: Mark Jacobson at TEDxPaloAltoHighSchool - YouTube

The storage necessity myth: how to choreograph high-renewables electricity systems - YouTube

http://www.ukpower.co.uk/home_...

Note the chart you linked is 5 years out of date, 2010 vs 2015, it looks like prices have fallen back.

If you look at the prices on the page I linked you'll see that you can purchase electricity for about 10p per kwh now - very similar to ten years ago.

Onshore wind costs about 3-4p per kwh - the same as coal if you ignore the massive external costs of coal. Nuclear is being offered 9.25p per kwh and they are still not sure if they want to build. Offshore wind is now closer to nuclear, the latest wind farm in the north sea was commissioned by the Danes, price of 7.5p per kwh. Off-shore wind has barely begun to be implemented, the price will likely fall as more off-shore wind farms are placed and firms find efficiency gains.

There have been some subsidies for solar - but since it's subsidised that doesn't affect peoples electricity bills because the subsidies are completely seperate and come from general taxation.

$500 Billion A Year In Fossil Fuel Imports Could Be Saved In US, EU, & China In 100% Switch To Renewables | CleanTechnica

Also, with renewables the costs are constantly dropping, so past prices are not very relevant:
Price history of silicon PV cells since 1977 - Cost of electricity by source

Wind turbine prices are also falling but at a slower rate - wind turbines are a fairly mature tech, but they are still improving - taller turbines access winds that are higher and more consistent and energy is to the cube of wind speed so every little bit helps.

When you say post-scarcity in other words you are saying abundance:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

In this video it's explained how the price of solar power is on a similar Moore's law-track like a lot of electronics.

And if you have cheap solar power, you have cheap power, when you have cheap power can convert salt/unclean water to clean water cheaply. When you have cheap water and power you can grow food pretty darn cheaply.

What they didn't know when they made the video is that energy storage is also on a Moore's law track:
http://rameznaam.com/2015/04/1...

The prediction in 2014 was: grid-parity in Germany in summer of 2016
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

Now that really is abundance:
- cheap electronics
- cheap computing
- cheap decentralized power
- cheap power storage
- cheap water
- cheap food
- we already have cheap software with free- and open source software
- silicon photonics was delayed by one year says Intel, but supposedly we should have cheap networking and other connections too.

And they think they can make at least certain parts of health care cheap too.

Now it isn't all great there are big society challenges ahead when automation takes away all the simple tasks and keep moving up the ladder.

Renewable Energy = 98% of New Electricity Generation Capacity in February (US) | CleanTechnica

February isn't just a one off, coal power stations are closing, most new installations are renewable, solar is doubling every 2-3 years, it's at 1.6%, if that continued for 15 years the US would end up with 48% solar by 2030.

assuming electricity prices remain constant.

Which is a big assumption since this technology is going to allow a large portion of the population to greatly reduce their dependence on utilities. With utilities still thinking in terms of 20 ~ 80 years when planning their capacity investments, I think it is pretty certain we will start seeing significant increases in electricity prices as huge, misguided fixed asset investments have to be allocated across a smaller and smaller population. This will just cause more people to defect. So begins the Utility Death Spiral.

It's also time to hit the fools with some hard facts:

The Last Time Oceans Got This Acidic This Fast, 96% of Marine Life Went Extinct | Motherboard

Acid Test: Rising CO2 Levels Killing Ocean Life | Conservation Climate

Air Pollution Linked to 1.2 Million Deaths in China - NYTimes.com

Full Cost of Coal $500 Billion/Year in U.S., Harvard Study Finds | CleanTechnica

Coal's hidden costs top $345 billion in U.S.-study | Reuters

I don't care if people believe in global warming or climate change, fossil fuels are still killing us and this planet regardless.

[About new solar power] There of course is great publicity whenever that happens, but you have to look a the numbers.

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

Great, more government money paying for systems that otherwise wouldn't make sense.

If you read it closer, while the numbers sound impressive, the systems are very small and the total amount of power produced is minor.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S...

That is a better way to look at it. Right now, solar accounts for about 1% of the world's total power production. I have no doubt that number will rise, but the question is, will it rise because total production is rising, or because older power plants are being replaced?

What is the total amount of coal burned every year? Will it actually go down any time soon?

Answer: No, it won't. It might dip a bit, mostly replaced by natural gas. Is it going to 50% of current levels? No, it won't.

So what will be accomplished? Nothing much, other than a whole lot of money trading hands and a bunch of people getting rich off tax dollars.

I would not believe all the nonsense you hear.

Germany is going to bankrupt itself trying... The cost of power there is already stupid high and it will only go higher.

It is not. Compared to our surrounding countries it is pretty on par, and since about 2 years power prices are dropping due to super cheap renewable power.

BTW, how much natural gas does Germany import from Russia? Isn't that part of the geo-political problem there?
A lot. But no it is no geo political problem. The geo political problem is a few 1000 km more in the east, especially in the Ukraine.

[About new solar power] There of course is great publicity whenever that happens, but you have to look a the numbers.
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

What percentage of the world's power comes from solar? What was the percentage last year? What will it be next year?
First of all this is irrelevant, as main stream solar is a new thing. Obviously no one invested much into it 30 or 20 years ago, except germany, So the percentage "of the world" is meaningless.

Run the numbers and you'll find it is a fantasy.
Why don't you do that yourself? You easy figure a new wind plant with the same capacity as a new coal plant is cheaper. Solar is catching up quickly and in a decade or so a new solar plant is cheaper than a coal plant, too.

You are out of date.

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

As Jaffe noted, the $180/kWh price paid by Tesla compares to about $1500/kWh even five years ago, maybe seven years ago when it was $1200 to $1500 per kilowatt-hour. âoeSo $180 per kWh is the price of those batteries, not the manufacturing cost but the price that theyâ(TM)re paying for them,â he said.

>Batteries need to come down in cost before it makes sense to switch to an off-grid solution.

ALL HAIL IRON MAN. BUILDER OF LION BATTERIES.

What?
A monopoly dragged kicking and screaming into the modern world is refusing to update its own business processes and instead just wants everything to stay the same and make its customers shoulder a burden that wouldn't even be a burden otherwise?

I am not surprised.

Keep that up for too long and customers will start finding creative ways to cut the utility out of the loop.

http://cleantechnica.com/2015/...

Solutions don't have to be simple. Is a computer chip simple? No, does it work? Yes.

EU already has high fuel taxes, the trick is to keep ratcheting up the tax when the oil price falls. I'm not saying there should be one massive instant tax hike, that'd never work. Cigarette taxes in the UK have gone up relentlessly year after year. People are also addicted to their cars, the same method should be used.

Now is the perfect time to increase gasoline taxes in the US because the price is low. Then, increase the tax a small amount every 6 months. Use the proceeds to subsidise the purchase of electric cars and put systems in place to encourage people to charge their cars when renewable output is high.

The cost of dealing with global warming will far outweigh the cost of avoiding it.

Renewable energy dominance is inevitable, solar energy is forecast to drop to 2c per kwh vs nuclear's 10c. Nuclear is not getting any cheaper. Wind turbines are getting taller and cheaper because there is a more consistent stronger supply of wind higher up and there is ongoing technical innovation. Wind is already going for under 4c per kwh without subsidy.

This is now:
Texas city opts for 100% renewable energy - to save cash, not the planet

Cheapest solar - SunEdison sells solar PV output at 5c/kWh ...

How Low Can Wind Energy Go? 2.5c Per Kilowatt-Hour Is Just

The relentless fall in renewables cost has a long way to go yet.

Battery prices are also continually falling:
EV Battery Prices -- The Disruptive Drop In Prices Will Continue

Renewable energy dominance is inevitable, solar energy is forecast to drop to 2c per kwh vs nuclear's 10c. Nuclear is not getting any cheaper. Wind turbines are getting taller and cheaper because there is a more consistent stronger supply of wind higher up and there is ongoing technical innovation. Wind is already going for under 4c per kwh without subsidy.

This is now:
Texas city opts for 100% renewable energy - to save cash, not the planet

Cheapest solar - SunEdison sells solar PV output at 5c/kWh ...

How Low Can Wind Energy Go? 2.5c Per Kilowatt-Hour Is Just

The relentless fall in renewables cost has a long way to go yet.

Battery prices are also continually falling:
EV Battery Prices -- The Disruptive Drop In Prices Will Continue

OK. Possibly I misunderstood what was required to allow a push connection to the electrical grid. OTOH, it was a couple of decades ago that we put in solar panels (with a grid connection, and, obviously, not Solar City), so also perhaps the rules have changed.

The bank would also want security for the loan, perhaps you could get better terms from them. If the Solar City salesman you contacted said they don't do "off the grid" installations...that doesn't seem to be what the company currently says. Maybe they didn't, maybe it's flim-flam, maybe your salesman didn't want to do it. From your description he was clearly lousy at his job.

OTOH, this http://www.greentechmedia.com/... might be related to your experience. However this http://blog.solarcity.com/put-... seems to bolster your point. But this http://cleantechnica.com/2012/... disagrees with that. These were all published at different points in time, so quite possibly the position is in flux. Their site doesn't seem to address the question directly for residential customers.

So I think you are basically correct, if you want an "off the grid" solar installation you should go with someone else until they are ready to make a clear statement. But for the larger installations that they are talking about in this Press Release, attaching to the grid appears to be an afterthought. (It couldn't really be an afterthought, but it seems designed for locations where good grid connections cannot be assumed.)

You seem to have made a mistake about solar energy payback times, which are about a year. http://cleantechnica.com/2013/...

It does seam coal in general is being reduced though.

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

Dunald Trump has been trying to prevent Scotland from building an offshore wind farm because he says they would ruin the view from a golf course he's building on a protected area of sand dunes. Trump also thinks that wind farms cause something called Wind Turbine Syndrome.

I'm with you that insulation and LEDs are the way to go but even I think 10x is optimistic (back to: you're making shit up).

LED is on par with existing technologies, but might be a 2X improvement over some LED. But I see references to the contrary:

http://cleantechnica.com/2011/...

I would guess that there is overlap and - at some point - LED will compete on initial price and, hopefully, kick butt on initial costs and actual longevity.

WRT insulation, installation costs dominate. So how that is factored in matters. If you're just pressing batts into an open cavity, payback can be the same season. If you tear down your drywall .... who knows?

if you want to play the money card... George Soros.

Only Soros spends a LOT more. And is wholly partisan in a way the Koch Brothers are not.

More than anything, the Koch Brothers seem to be some kind of hallucinogen, the way Democrats react to any mention of them.

I'd be careful of throwing that rock too hard from your ivory tower made of frosted glass...

Where do you think he's getting all of these ideas for spaceships, cars, and hyperloops? With a name like "Elon Musk", he's not even trying to fool anyone. No way that name originated on planet Earth!

Really, it's pretty obvious that he's here to soften us up in preparation for an invasion. He's used his alien technology (a "software update" to improve 0-60 performance? yeah right!) to win over thousands of Teslacolyte converts already, with more joining his religion every day. His spaceship company is poaching the top talent from NASA, who otherwise would have been our best defense against alien attack. His electric cars can be crippled via software update and, if allowed to further propagate, will eventually lead to a reduction in our current fuel infrastructure that is outside of their control. Now he's talking about making whole-home batteries, meaning he could cripple all of our homes instantly too. And stuff like his hyperloop concept? It'll be used to get us to turn on each other as we fight over whether or not to accept the aliens and their promises of technological advancement.

Hyperloop in one tentacle, and a ray gun to betray us in the other. Just you wait and see.

Quite right. It's 400% over 4 years. My bad.

Cite: US solar growth at 400%

So 4% in 4, 16% in 8, 64% in 12, nearing 100% in 16.

Still a very rosy short term outlook.

Chevy just introduced a concept car called the Bolt. http://cleantechnica.com/2015/...

Capitalists want to improve efficiency of the manufacturing process so its cheaper and they get richer. Try reading http://cleantechnica.com/ for a while and see how the incumbent fossil fuel utilities and their government poodles are trying to put as many road blocks in front of the progress of solar use in their areas.

If all new housing was built close to passive house standards, i.e. properly insulated, heat/air recovery system etc then the demand on the utility will be a lot lower. There are houses here in the UK built to this german standard and they effectively get free heating/lighting because they have a solar system to generate power. Here are a couple of examples how 2 places in Europe have been clever about their power generation. http://cleantechnica.com/2014/... and http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

If all new housing was built close to passive house standards, i.e. properly insulated, heat/air recovery system etc then the demand on the utility will be a lot lower. There are houses here in the UK built to this german standard and they effectively get free heating/lighting because they have a solar system to generate power. Here are a couple of examples how 2 places in Europe have been clever about their power generation. http://cleantechnica.com/2014/... and http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

see how someone got jail time for useing about $0.04 of power to change there car. Comcast needs to do some hard time. They can start at 26 and california

http://cleantechnica.com/2013/...

Investing in Chinese companies is probably a tactic to get on the good side of the Chinese government.
Consider what Intel is doing in China: giving away subsidised SoC's that compete directly with local Chinese companies. That sort of anti-competive behavour normally attacts tariffs (a similiar sort of thing has happen before US Department of Commerce Ignores WTO, Imposes Preliminary Anti-Dumping Tariffs of 26-165%

An electric car does not have to have reduction gearing at all. In fact there are electric cars that do not. Repeat, do not. Believe it. In fact you can also do away completely with mechanical brakes.

If Tesla and GM and Nissan and others were all too timid or conservative to do it right, that is their problem.

Now who is wrong?

An electric car does not have to have reduction gearing at all. In fact there are electric cars that do not. Repeat, do not. Believe it. In fact you can also do away completely with mechanical brakes.

If Tesla and GM and Nissan and others were all too timid or conservative to do it right, that is their problem.

Now who is wrong?

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...
Nice try, though

You can't "invent" cheaper tech--it only gets cheaper if you invest in mass-producing it. They gave up 3 years ago, and since then market forces have actually achieved price parity for renewables in a lot of the world. It wasn't any new "magic bullet" research that did it, but incremental improvements driven by economies of scale. Yes, government played a big role, but primarily as a driver of demand and investor in manufacturing.

The climate does not have time to wait for a new technology to be developed and go through the whole sequence of commercialization and commoditization. The solar panels, wind turbines and batteries we already have can do the job--and the more we build, the cheaper they get.. This is one place I wish market purists would get on board--put a price on carbon, and solutions will come out of the woodwork and plummet in price.

Sorry, that is nonsense. Modern wind turbines have no gear boxes.

Which ones are those? The biggest and most modern to date certainly has a gearbox: http://cleantechnica.com/2012/...

As a gearbox is something you'd really like to get rid of, and since Vestas is the largest manufacturer in the world, you'd think they'd know what they were doing.

I don't think a wind turbine designed to last 25+ years actually lasting 25+ years is astounding. Some wind turbines are lasting 30 to 40 years. Modern wind farms are already good value, that value will be great when only parts of the turbines need to be replaced in 25 years to get continuing cheap energy.

How Low Can Wind Energy Go? 2.5c Per Kilowatt-Hour Is Just the Beginning

http://theconversation.com/baseload-power-is-a-myth-even-intermittent-renewables-will-work-13210

http://www.ceem.unsw.edu.au/sites/default/files/uploads/publications/MarkBaseloadFallacyANZSEE.pdf

http://www.skepticalscience.com/print.php?r=374

http://bze.org.au/media/newswire/living-green-power-renewables-131007 (and that's from the energy market!)

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/08/08/rmi-blows-lid-baseload-power-myth-video/

have a read of this then, its a small scale start. http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

Coal consumption already leveled out:
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

http://www.chinafaqs.org/libra...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

The US and China are signing this deal because they can see that they are already headed in the right direction and they know that renewables investment is good for the economy.

Wrong on so many counts:

People driving around in cars is only a tiny part of it.

Other poster has covered that "In total, the U.S. transportation sectorâ"which includes planes, trains, ships, and freightâ"produces around thirty percent of all U.S. global warming emissions."

Heavy industry, HVAC in homes and businesses - that's what does it. The solution is nukes or one form or another. Solar and wind can't put a dent in it

Explain to me how Solar PV is not well suited to supplying electricity for Air Conditioning. Seriously, it's a perfect match. It is also a good match for 9-5 businesses. Wind energy is so cheap now it'd be nuts not to take advantage of it. Solar is well on it's way to becoming the cheapest source of energy.

http://costofsolar.com/cost-of...

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

http://bxhorn.com/wp-content/u...

China's not going to stop putting a new coal-fired power plant online EVERY WEEK any time soon.

Completely wrong. Chinaâ(TM)s Coal Consumption Has Finally Decreased

Wrong on so many counts:

People driving around in cars is only a tiny part of it.

Other poster has covered that "In total, the U.S. transportation sectorâ"which includes planes, trains, ships, and freightâ"produces around thirty percent of all U.S. global warming emissions."

Heavy industry, HVAC in homes and businesses - that's what does it. The solution is nukes or one form or another. Solar and wind can't put a dent in it

Explain to me how Solar PV is not well suited to supplying electricity for Air Conditioning. Seriously, it's a perfect match. It is also a good match for 9-5 businesses. Wind energy is so cheap now it'd be nuts not to take advantage of it. Solar is well on it's way to becoming the cheapest source of energy.

http://costofsolar.com/cost-of...

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

http://bxhorn.com/wp-content/u...

China's not going to stop putting a new coal-fired power plant online EVERY WEEK any time soon.

Completely wrong. Chinaâ(TM)s Coal Consumption Has Finally Decreased

which Angela Merkel is cutting at present

Here are some citations to get you started:

• Merkel is deliberately cutting green energy subsidies
• her predecessor left directly to Gazprom
• first link out of Google about Hungary
• more on Merkel

register here for ideas, slashdot seems a strange place to ask the question about fossil fuel dependency http://cleantechnica.com/

Slapshot is a strange place to ask ANY question with so many biggoted twits that think they own the frigging world on here and as for registering only if you want the drugged up whacked out moderators to piss you around . As for the Main Question the simple answer is yet another panic started by the yanks panic panic panic panic ...---... -.- ..
    Stupid pox infested site cant even read morse code pile of wank crap ..

register here for ideas, slashdot seems a strange place to ask the question about fossil fuel dependency http://cleantechnica.com/

Seems like the Australian solar sector is growing rapidly. http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

Those figures are completely wrong and very out of date. Power Purchase Agreements have recently bought wind energy for $0.0365 per kwh - that is half the figure on the table linked. That cost includes subsidies, the actual agreement was $0.025 per kwh. For solar the PPA is for $0.05 per kWh (0.08 inc subsidy), with the price of solar falling rapidly I'd expect cheaper PPA's to be struck going forward.

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

Those figures are completely wrong and very out of date. Power Purchase Agreements have recently bought wind energy for $0.0365 per kwh - that is half the figure on the table linked. That cost includes subsidies, the actual agreement was $0.025 per kwh. For solar the PPA is for $0.05 per kWh (0.08 inc subsidy), with the price of solar falling rapidly I'd expect cheaper PPA's to be struck going forward.

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

Because I recall explaining it to you already, just a few weeks ago

Yes, your fable about the German renewable energy program is the narrative coming out of the energy industry and the right-wing press. However, it's pretty much phony, or at best, misleading. Whenever you find that story told, you will invariably also find adverts for fossil fuel companies. You find statements like this one:

In other words - when wind blows, if you're running a nuclear or coal plant, you cannot sell any of your produced electricity until your wind/solar competitors sold everything they produced. At the same time, you are not allowed to shut the plant down, because you need to sit on the grid as spinning reserve for when wind blows too hard or stops blowing to pick up the slack.

Which is basically like saying, "Hey, there's an inherent flaw in our method of producing energy, so if you come up with something better, it's your fault if there are problems". Seriously, think for a minute about that Luckyo quote and what it means. There's so much nonsense coming out of the energy industry right now that it's not even funny. And it's a worldwide, coordinated effort to spread FUD (and things like the "Sun Tax" and "Solar Surcharge" and other alternative energy tariffs).

However, the Brattle Group's recent study tells a different story about Germany's experiment:

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/...

Here's the Brattle Group's actual study:

http://www.brattle.com/system/...

In fact, the program is so successful that Angela Merkel is now pushing reductions and eventual phasing out of the subsidies.