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You racist troll-baiter. You just love your pure Aryan couplings only, right you little Nazi?

As far as solar goes, 10 to 25% efficiency during rain. You're not just a racist troll, you're an ignorant fuck as well. Most likely an SJW INCEL wanking in your mom's panties, right?

But you pussy liberals have to go to Texas to acquire your energy needs. Which by the way is being produced in a number of different ways. Including renewable.
Funny, listing off the top 10 states that produce renewable energy. Texas is there, FUCKING CALIFORNIA IS NOT. Yup, those god damn hill billy's are producing more renewable energy then you bigoted fucking pussy liberals.
https://www.renewableenergywor...

Caves aren't needed for underwater compressed air storage. There are prototypes of air bladders that you place down in the water. You store energy by pumping air into them. Then when you want the energy back you just open the valve and the higher pressure in the water will push the air out of the bladder.

There are also shipping container homes and offices, and shipping container hospitals
https://inhabitat.com/cite-a-d...
http://www.clinicinacan.org/

They are already doing farms in a container
http://cropbox.co/index.php/cr...

Not forgetting shipping container server rooms
https://www.renewableenergywor...

There are also mobile solar power plants in containers

And lowering poly cost was, of course, one of the many technical achievements of the old DOE program.

And your proof of this is what? Simply matching up two trends since two years doesn't prove anything -- that's correlation, not causation. CO2 emissions have been rising since 1980...by the same logic, you might as well correlate the price of poly to the inverse of our CO2 output. Where's your proof that links the poly price drop to the govt program?

Here's a graph of solar cost from 1977, about when the ERDA program started: https://www.sunrun.com/sites/d... That drop from 1.31 to 0.50 you talk about is the tiny little bit at the end. You can see it if you kinda squint.

Again, literally all that graph shows is that the price of solar panels has decreased dramatically since 1977. Nowhere in there is the drop in polysilicon price attributed to any kind of govt program, nor would I expect it to be. The scarity of a resource does not change dependent on any kind of tech advancement. You might as well try to tell me you can make gold cheaper because "tech", rather than finding a more abundant supply of it.

There aren't many studies or reports on solar/poly prior to the ~2000s, but studies even as far back as 2008 state "What's easy to see is that the costs are driven by materials - polysilicon makes up a huge cost of the module":

http://www.renewableenergyworl...

Polysilicon costs came down when we started mining a shitload more of it and panels also saw a drastic drop in cost due to economies of scale from mass production (particularly out of China). Tech advances outside of manufacturing have been a minor factor in cost over the life of the solar industry. Seriously, show me a study, any study, that links any kind of significant cost declines to the govt programs you're referring to. I've looked.

The fact that you don't seem to know about the decades-long ERDA and DOE programs doesn't mean that they didn't exist

And likewise, just because they existed doesn't mean they had a causal effect on solar panel prices. Everything I've seen of those programs has shown they drive tech improvements towards things like solar cell efficiency. And panel efficiency has not been the largest cost driver that caused that massive plunge in costs you illustrated.

http://www.renewableenergyworl...

I assume that is what you are referring to? They would need a storage capacity of about 150 times what they are installing for your "days" of electricity to be accurate. Completely and utterly out of the question to be cost effective.

I'm calling BS on this one. Even Cape Wind, the most expensive wind power in the US (really more of a research project), is only 18.7 cents per kWh. And the first power it's displacing some crazy-expensive oil-fired power. Wind currently averages 2.5 cents per kWh to produce in the US. Now, that's the cost to the grid operator, not the consumer, and you have to pair it with peaking, which will add a penny or so to the cost per kWh. But it's gotten absurdly cheap. US solar contracts are now starting to come in at under 4 cents per kWh. And at low penetration, they actually reduce peaking requirements rather than raising it.

Furthermore, your claim "overall bill used to be 6 c/kw but now 9 c/kw and climbing, all due to wasteful subsidies" makes me even question whether you know what a subsidy is. If you were being hurt by a subsidy, it'd show up on your taxes, not your bill. If anything, your bill would get lower. And the $7B per year in subsidies for renewable electricity (which includes, by the way, research) equals $1.70 per month per person in the US. How does that compare to your electricity bill?

Where are you, by the way?

To your original question. no one is going 100% solar and using batteries for the night. It simply makes no sense.

We'd be paving over land with concrete to put in solar panels and batteries.
No we would not.
Arizona alone has more sunshine than the entire planet needs for electric power ... several times, I believe.

And solar panels can be placed over the crops ... or on buildings. Plenty of places can place solar panels in "the fields" where they don't disturbe anyone.

http://www.renewableenergyworl...

So how long do they last? You castigate Ravenshrike for pulling things out of his butt, but you do the same and say they will be active for much longer than 20 years.

Additionally, direct spray isn't needed to corrode your metal. Ask anyone who lives near the ocean - direct exposure isn't needed, and most salt spray/salt fog tests do not need to directly spray saltwater at the object - just high salt content moisture in the air is damaging.

Lastly, given that Denmark has extremely high power rates (about 3X that in the US), perhaps they are the perfect example of why offshore wind is not really a good bet - the power generated is very expensive due to very high maintenance costs. What I see is that offshore wind maintenance costs are on par with the TOTAL cost of electricity for much of the US. Just maintenance alone costs more than the entire cost of power generation. That's not a good sign...

China is making great strides in terms of emissions, so people need to stop using that canard.

Over the past five years, 40 percent of all newly added renewable energy power was generated by China, while the country’s investment in clean and renewable energy exceeded the combined total invested by Europe and the U.S.

As the world’s largest energy consumer, China sees the challenge presented by climate change as a historical opportunity in the transformation of energy development.

At the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation conference in Beijing last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Barack Obama issued the U.S.-China Joint Announcement on Climate Change. The U.S. intends to reduce emissions to 26 percent to 28 percent below its 2005 level in 2025, while China intends to increase the share of non-fossil fuels in primary energy consumption to around 20 percent and achieve the peaking of CO2 emissions by around 2030.

India does still have plans to build a lot of new coal plants, so that is a concern. I have a feeling they are trying to get some concessions or incentives to ramp down that coal expansion, time will tell. They are also planning on rolling out a massive amount of solar as well as promoting electric vehicles, so that is somewhat of a mitigating factor.

Oh and only an idiot would think you could grow plants under opaque objects.

I guess people in japan are idiots.

Also, if you took the 2 seconds to follow the link I provided in my original post you'd see that I searched for desert solar farms. It's not very surprising that plants don't grow very well in a desert. It was a selective use of evidence to argue for a particular point even though the solar farm was a red herring for why the plants really didn't grow.

Rubes like you would probably blame them for making the tomato plants cancerous though.

It's rubes like you that are to blame for not understanding sarcasm, even obvious sarcasm clearly indicated with /s.

One of the examples here has the maximum temperature as low as 70C.
http://www.renewableenergyworl...

Did you discuss it with these chaps?

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/...

http://www.renewableenergyworl...

http://news.stanford.edu/pr/20...

It does take up more land to do this - about 2.5 times as much if you use the Japanese system and crop spacing.
But you're not killing farmland, you're having a fairly minor impact on crop yield if the land is healthy and current FiTs provide a much better income for most farmers than they'll get from crops alone.

The reflected light is for the grass / plants under the panels; the panels will track the sun. There are a considerable number of edible plants that prefer shade and there have been attempts at making this work in Japan & America

http://www.treehugger.com/sust...

http://www.renewableenergyworl...

The CLNR project is funded by Ofgemâ(TM)s Low Carbon Network Fund and electricity distribution network operator Northern Powergrid.

Doesn't sound like a 'manufacturer' to me. The point was not to see if the particular project would be cheaper but more to investigate the effectiveness of different levels of storage and to have something concrete upon which to base future cost estimates. The cost today is not what the cost 2-5 years will be when the cost of battery storage and solar continue to plummet.

Gas peaker electricity is very expensive, far higher than nuclear etc. I think it could easily be replaced by replacing hydro with wind, solar etc and then only using the hydro when wind output is low, geothermal is also ideal for this kind of situation, Germany is investing a lot in geothermal, hopefully that will bring down the price of that tech a lot.

I agree that there is no magic simple just build a million solar panels and that's it done scenario. Yes, managing power grids is complicated, that doesn't mean that solar + wind +storage + hydro + geothermal etc can't make up 90%+ of the energy mix.

Did the sun stop shining for 4 days, did geothermal potential disappear? Anyway I think it would cost a bit less than a $trillion and of note Germany are already spending about over $200,000,000,000 a year on electricity, so from a long term perspective a day or two of country size storage could be a good investment - after battery technology and price improves.

Geothermal sources could supply Germany's electricity needs 600 times over,

http://www.renewableenergyworl...

More:
http://www.technologyreview.co...

http://www.technologyreview.co...

http://www.nrel.gov/analysis/r...

http://www.elp.com/articles/20...

http://www.renewableenergyworl...

http://phys.org/news/2011-01-p...

http://theenergycollective.com...

Portugal reached 100% renewable energy.

I'd prefer a 100% nuclear powered grid (and electric trains and cars, nuclear powered ships, synfuels for the remaining transportation needs, ammonia from nuclear powered SSAS plants for fertilizer) over that renewable pipe dream.

Well then you are really going to hate the future because sooner or later it is going to be 100% renewable.

http://www.renewableenergyworl...

http://dqbasmyouzti2.cloudfron...

http://i0.wp.com/cleantechnica...

Let's face it, no-one knows where to put nuclear waste and that doesn't look like it'll change anytime soon.

http://www.renewableenergyworl...

Here's a story about investors in traditional power generation plants in Texas looking at losses because of new alternative energy power production:

http://www.renewableenergyworl...

As I mentioned, you are entitled to your opinions, but you are NOT entitled to your own facts. Coal usage in the EU is decreasing, renewable use (not fossil fuel generation) is increasing:
http://theenergycollective.com...
http://www.renewableenergyworl...
(older data) http://www.eea.europa.eu/data-...
While the price per kWh in Germany is high, it's not even the highest in the EU and certainly not the highest in the world. That statement is just plain WRONG. The price in Germany is not even that far out of line with the rest of the EU where prices are generally at least double the US rates:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E...

(Link heavy...) I think you got the wrong end of the stick, there.

Some studies have been done that show a minimum 30% penetration is possible for *any* region (and this one stopped their modeling at 30%, so its likely higher)...
http://www.renewableenergyworl...

An earlier study from Europe (no link at moment) put the figure around 40%.

Another US study comes in around 45%...
http://arstechnica.com/science...

UK study comes in at >90%...
http://www.gizmag.com/uk-natio...

German study comes in at 100%...
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com...
More on this...
http://www.renewablesinternati...

Some of these show cost savings from adding renewables, another one showed costs rising about 10-15%.

Iowa already got over 25% of power from renewables in 2013; not sure about the mix but I don't recall hydro being a big player there. The state has set a 40% target for 2015!

As for diverse power generation, that is a good rule of thumb, however the non-renewable generators cannot continue to operate in the long-term and nuclear in particular is even worse than variable renewables as the latter has a large correlation with demand curves. Anyone scanning the field for the past few years, however, is getting the idea that a diversity of storage will be at least as important. And there are a LOT of different options. The state of the art in this field has moved completely beyond the 1990s consensus that your post is predicated on.

Hydropower operating permits are up: http://grist.org/news/america-...

In Germany, they have closed a deal with Norway which has vast hydropower resources.

Batteries are considered the least economic storage solution, but I suggest you google "flow batteries". Here are some examples other storage types:

Zynth batteries
http://www.eosenergystorage.co...

Battery EV storage pilot in US
http://www.latimes.com/busines...

Ice bears (cold storage for hot nights)
http://www.renewgridmag.com/e1...

Undersea pumped hydro (you read that right)
http://cleantechnica.com/2013/...

Power-to-gas
http://www.nasdaq.com/press-re...

Molten salt
http://spectrum.ieee.org/energ...

Looks like that may not work quite so well yet with peanut oil, at least for biodiesel: http://www.renewableenergyworl...

Also the CAISO stats are missing up to 3GW of PV as the 150,000 rooftop units already deployed are only passing along net metering data.

Since California intends to put up a million solar roofs, this is a rapidly growing problem

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2013/07/californias-invisible-solar-problem

You are essentially right, and the effects are felt in many sectors of the econemy.

Bio fuel corn is exactly the same as livestock corn, and often the same mills turn out the same product (distillers dried grains, or DDGs) for both uses. The farmer isn't put in a box of having to sell only to one market.

But what does happen is the price of beef and pork rises, to the point where feedlots can't survive meaning cattle ranchers have to resort to more costly means of feeding a herd longer on range land.

Government subsidies have paid about 45 cents for every gallon of Ethanol produced.

In addition there has sprung into being an entire secondary market for RINs (Renewable Identification Numbers) like bitcoin without the math or verifiability). This has actually boosted ethanol production above demand, which causes them to over-blend (slamming the racks) ethanol to the point where you can't be sure what you are getting at the pump.

No, our power consumption isn't going up, so there's no need to dam more rivers.

That doesn't even make sense. Your supply is shifting from the reactor you're shutting down to the hydro power you're buying from Quebec Hydro.

Here's the map. Notice how the lines from Northern Canada terminate just north of Vermont? See the four interconnects into Vermont?

Quebec Hydro is developing gigawatts of hydro power, new dams in other words, to supply customers like you. Stop lying to yourself.

Actually, depending on how you define best (do laboratory samples count?) I think they're past 40% now

If you read closely on how they achieve the more than 40% efficiency you would see that they are not "1 sun" PV structure

Case in point, Solar Junction ( http://www.sj-solar.com/ ) came out with the "lattice matched 942X" which has 44% conversion rate

That "942X" denotes "942 suns", which means, the PV from Solar Junction is not flat panel type of PV, but rather, achieve its high efficiency with the use of focusing optics

Allow me to quote from http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2012/10/solar-junction-does-it-again-sets-new-cpv-efficiency-record

" ... Think of a magnifying glass. Basically, you have a very high performance solar cell that sits at the focal point of these focusing optics. The solar cell converts the photon flux into electrons, and power

large upfront costs ... takes 20 years ... half-way cancelled project

Bullshit.

That phenomena is unique to Western nations that indulge pressure groups and their abuse of the legal system, coupled with a leadership vacuum. China builds a reactor in under 24 months. The completed cost of an AP-1000 reactor in China is $2 billion as of 2009.

other forms of energy such as solar will have since grown cheaper

Even if that ancient promise were to one day come true it won't matter. Building will not be permitted. Period.

Do you realize you are suggesting going up against Big Oil, one of the most influential forces on the planet, or are you only accidentally dispensing staggeringly bad advice? At best it will amount to pissing in the wind.

40 million dollars is not "pissing into the wind": http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2010/12/top-25-u-s-energy-lobbyists-of-2010
It's in fact about one-third of what Big Oil/Gas is spending.

I might also add the fossil fuel industry is currently contracting while renewables are expanding, and renewable gets the lion's share of subsidies:http://money.cnn.com/2012/03/07/news/economy/energy-subsidies/index.htm

SolarCity is under investigation for pricing shenanigans. Basically they overstate the installed cost of the system in order to cash in on larger direct subsidies and tax incentives. They all do it to some degree, because all that paperwork has to be filed WAY ahead of time and only an estimated job cost is available, but some do it worse than others...

Now overall they probably do good work... just a bit sleazy on the finances when it comes to public funds.
=Smidge=

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2012/03/impact-of-curtailment-on-wind-economics

10 percent of wind power in Texas was not generated

Japan's panic-driven abandonment of nuclear is not anybody's model for a smooth and orderly transition to renewables. Offshore wind could supposedly take the place of nuclear in Japan, but it would/will take years, and offshore wind is expensive, compared to onshore wind which is quite cheap.

I just ran across an article discussing this very issue. It turns out that the price of solar in Hawaii is already financially viable without any extra incentives, and with incentives many areas are hitting the current maximum of 15% solar per interconnection.

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2012/08/hawaii-drives-past-solar-power-cost-barrier-surprised-by-additional-roadblocks

That post and the associated report covers the issues of increasing solar in Hawaii better than I can.

How many GM cars are sold in China? What is the number 1 selling car in China, and what does it look like?

The top selling car right now is the Buick Excelle manufactured by GM Daewoo and assembled in China by Shanghai General Motors Company Limited. This is a legitimate arrangement.

This is why you won't see a Chinese manufacturer open a plant in America.

Suntech Opens New U.S. Manufacturing Plant
China offshores manufacturing to the U.S.
Chinese Open First Car Plant in Europe

IP created in China belongs to the people

The United States successfully ignored international copyright and patent claims for over a century; it is hardly surprising that other nations that do not have a developed IP industry would follow the same route: An Economic History of Copyright in Europe and the United States

The U.S. was long a net importer of literary and artistic works, especially from England, which implied that recognition of foreign copyrights would have led to a net deficit in international royalty payments. The Copyright Act recognized this when it specified that "nothing in this act shall be construed to extend to prohibit the importation or vending, reprinting or publishing within the United States, of any map, chart, book or books ... by any person not a citizen of the United States." Thus, the statutes explicitly authorized Americans to take free advantage of the cultural output of other countries. As a result, it was alleged that American publishers "indiscriminately reprinted books by foreign authors without even the pretence of acknowledgement." The tendency to reprint foreign works was encouraged by the existence of tariffs on imported books that ranged as high as 25 percent.

The United States stood out in contrast to countries such as France, where Louis Napoleon's Decree of 1852 prohibited counterfeiting of both foreign and domestic works. Other countries which were affected by American piracy retaliated by refusing to recognize American copyrights. Despite the lobbying of numerous authors and celebrities on both sides of the Atlantic, the American copyright statutes did not allow for copyright protection of foreign works for fully one century. As a result, American publishers and producers freely pirated foreign literature, art, and drama.

solar panels still never even come close to putting out energy that comes close to the energy used in manufacturing the panels

Hmm. I wonder what I'll turn up if I google "solar myths".

Myth #5: Making solar panels takes more energy than it could ever produce.

A report by the National Renewable Energy Lab shows that solar photovoltaic panels actually payback the energy used to produce the panels in 1 to 4 years depending on the type of panel. Because solar panels last at least 30 years, PV systems will provide at minimum 26 to 29 years of pollution-free electricity for your home!

Source

Why not use the wind energy to make hydrogen, and store the hydrogen (as a gas, as a liquid, or in metal hydrides)?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_storage

Or why not use the wind to make compressed air, and store the compressed air?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compressed_air_energy_storage
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_economy

Or why not use the wind to charge batteries?
http://arpa-e.energy.gov/ProgramsProjects/GRIDS/ARobustandInexpensiveIronAirRechargeableBat.aspx

Or why not use the wind to heat up molten salts, and use a steam turbine to make power? Solar does it, but so could wind:
http://grist.org/solar-power/2011-07-05-groundbreaking-solar-plant-in-spain-generates-24-hours-of-power/

Or why not use the wind energy to produce liquid synthetic fuels from carbon from the air?
http://www.staxera.de/announcement.105+M5320325207d.0.html?&L=1

Or why not use the wind energy to run energy-intensive industrial processes that can run intermittently (like grinding up rocks for fertilizer or chilling nitrogen out of the air)? And so on.
http://www.remineralize.org/

There are solutions for the lack of buffers for renewable energy. Put them all together, and you have a way to use wind.

That said, LENR and cheap solar panels seem more likely to succeed, one because it is compact (if it really works) and the other because it has now moving parts and requires little maintenance.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/12/01/15/0226219/can-nasa-warm-cold-fusion
http://cleantechnica.com/2011/05/29/ge-solar-power-cheaper-than-fossil-fuels-in-5-years/

"A Road Not Taken: Solar Panels, Jimmy Carter, and Missed Opportunities for Change "
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2010/06/a-road-not-taken-solar-panels-jimmy-carter-and-missed-opportunities-for-change
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2010/09/obama-no-thanks-to-carter-solar-panels

The true cost of fossil fuels:
http://www.treehugger.com/energy-policy/true-cost-fossil-fuels.html
"For decades now, fossil fuel company executives and D.C. politicians have worked together to ensure that coal and oil prices stay low enough to keep the American people hooked. In his new book Greedy Bastards, Dylan Ratigan explains how "vampire industries" like oil and coal have forged "an unholy alliance with government based not just on the money that they contribute to political campaigns and spend on lobbying but on their ability to hypnotize us with false prices." Industry gets tax breaks, subsidies, military support in volatile regions, the right to use our air and water like a sewer, and assurance that the government will clean up its environmental messes. Politicians get campaign contributions, a steady flow of dirty energy, and a talking point to brandish about how they kept gas affordable. But the Ame

Why not use the wind energy to make hydrogen, and store the hydrogen (as a gas, as a liquid, or in metal hydrides)?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_storage

Or why not use the wind to make compressed air, and store the compressed air?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compressed_air_energy_storage
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_economy

Or why not use the wind to charge batteries?
http://arpa-e.energy.gov/ProgramsProjects/GRIDS/ARobustandInexpensiveIronAirRechargeableBat.aspx

Or why not use the wind to heat up molten salts, and use a steam turbine to make power? Solar does it, but so could wind:
http://grist.org/solar-power/2011-07-05-groundbreaking-solar-plant-in-spain-generates-24-hours-of-power/

Or why not use the wind energy to produce liquid synthetic fuels from carbon from the air?
http://www.staxera.de/announcement.105+M5320325207d.0.html?&L=1

Or why not use the wind energy to run energy-intensive industrial processes that can run intermittently (like grinding up rocks for fertilizer or chilling nitrogen out of the air)? And so on.
http://www.remineralize.org/

There are solutions for the lack of buffers for renewable energy. Put them all together, and you have a way to use wind.

That said, LENR and cheap solar panels seem more likely to succeed, one because it is compact (if it really works) and the other because it has now moving parts and requires little maintenance.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/12/01/15/0226219/can-nasa-warm-cold-fusion
http://cleantechnica.com/2011/05/29/ge-solar-power-cheaper-than-fossil-fuels-in-5-years/

"A Road Not Taken: Solar Panels, Jimmy Carter, and Missed Opportunities for Change "
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2010/06/a-road-not-taken-solar-panels-jimmy-carter-and-missed-opportunities-for-change
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2010/09/obama-no-thanks-to-carter-solar-panels

The true cost of fossil fuels:
http://www.treehugger.com/energy-policy/true-cost-fossil-fuels.html
"For decades now, fossil fuel company executives and D.C. politicians have worked together to ensure that coal and oil prices stay low enough to keep the American people hooked. In his new book Greedy Bastards, Dylan Ratigan explains how "vampire industries" like oil and coal have forged "an unholy alliance with government based not just on the money that they contribute to political campaigns and spend on lobbying but on their ability to hypnotize us with false prices." Industry gets tax breaks, subsidies, military support in volatile regions, the right to use our air and water like a sewer, and assurance that the government will clean up its environmental messes. Politicians get campaign contributions, a steady flow of dirty energy, and a talking point to brandish about how they kept gas affordable. But the Ame

That's where you're wrong.
You wish to argue about solar plants. I am arguing about putting solar panels on houses. Area is a severe restriction in Western-Europe. Find an area in Western-Europe that doesn't have a city in the immediate neighbourhood. It's pretty much impossible at this point. As such putting solar panels on roofs is an easy solution indeed. Loads of space there and they're out of the way. But they're largely useless during the winter and at night. So energy storage is a must have with photovoltaic systems. Heating water or salt (direct or indirectly) is indeed another way that is used in solar plants. But downscaling makes it useless. Now you can't reserve a few square kilometre for these things without having to throw somebody out of their house. And the energy generated / area unit is still very low compared to nuclear power. Due to this the space required can't be justified morally at all.

And actually, many power plants are very close to cities, harbours, and large industrial areas. If you wish to argue that isn't the case with nuclear reactors. Then you're also wrong. You'll often find a nuclear reactor within 50km of a city centre. In fact in Belgium you'll find one at a bit less than 20km from a city centre if memory serves right. And if you wish to know something that's probably going to terrify the heck out of you. Many of the RBMKs are still in use today (the type of reactor in the Chernobyl incident). With modifications mind you. The simple reason is that these reactors have such a high output that it's near impossible to replace them with anything but hydroelectric at large scale. The largest windmill farm on land takes up 400km ( http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/10/ec-r-completes-780-mw-roscoe-wind-farm ) and only delivers 780MW at most. On the other hand the RBMK will output well over 1000MW using only a fraction of that land. Try competing with that using your green power.

but if you calculate the amount they burnt to actually build them......

... then they still burn less.

Japan expects to make geo-thermal about 10% PRIOR to the nuke over the next 15 years.

Japan currently has 18 geo-thermel wells for a total of 540 MW of power. As far as I know there
are no extensive plans to increase that amount drastically. The US already has over 3,000 MW of
geothermal energy, even though Japan has much more potential. This excellent article
outlines some of the problems that are associated with geothermal power generation
in Japan: http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2011/05/japans-geothermal-resources-gets-a-closer-look

If you have a reference for plans for getting to 10% in 15 years (highly aggressive since
it takes a good 10 years to develop a well), I would love to see it. I live in Japan and
have been advocating geothermal energy to others when I can, but even the local
environmental groups around here seem to have blinders when it comes to
geothermal.

Are you asking me to do your research for you? Okay, I'll do it, but only this once:

"Bloomberg New Energy Finance identified US$43–$46 billion last year allotted by governments for renewable energy. Meanwhile, oil, coal and gas received $557 billion"

So, renewables got about one-twelfth the money that hydrocarbons got. Is that what you were asking? So, the hydrocarbon industries have something like twelve times the sway on government spending than renewable-energy industries? And thus government conspiracies would be twelve times as likely to fund anti-AGW science as pro-AGW science? Is that the kind of argument you are trying to make?

Not me. I'm just trying to point out that it is absurd, preposterous, and demonstrably wrong to suggest that somehow the tree huggers have taken over government, resulting in a gigantic multinational conspiracy to push the false myth of AGW onto an unsuspecting public in order to advance an anti-human ideological agenda. That argument is retarded, and people who make it are kooks.

In 2010, Solar PV accounted for 2% of all electric power generated.

Solar has come a long way in the last couple of years and it looks like it may be about to out-compete most other energy forms, for instance - "The potential of solar power was noted in a recent report by consultants Ernst & Young, which concluded that falling prices could make solar power cost competitive in the UK without subsidy from 2017 onwards." Competitive in cloudy Britain!!!!! If it can be competitive this far north then it can be competitive in most of the world.

Sources:
http://www.energyefficiencynews.com/policy/i/4275/
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2011/07/anatomy-of-a-solar-pv-system-how-to-continue-ferocious-cost-reductions-for-solar-electricity
http://news.google.com/news/search?aq=f&cf=all&ned=us&hl=en&q=solar+power+competitive&btnmeta_news_search=Search+News

At current rates solar will be as cheap as coal power before 2020.

All that's needed is more investment in energy storage technologies and to ramp the scale of these up a bit. (some energy storage is already at over 90% efficiency)

I wish I could invest in Solar, the returns will be very good, as for nuclear investment, ha ha - wouldn't touch that expensive horror show with a barge pole.

http://www.nationmaster.com/country/gm-germany/ene-energy

As you can see, they use fossil fuels for most electrical generation and 30% for nuclear (slighly old numbers, as they've increased renewable generation since then to 17% of their total power generation). Now to put their solar growth alone into perspective, "Germany set a new world record installing 7,400 MW of solar PV in one year. The country also reached a renewable energy electricity penetration of more than 30% on February 7th, 2010." http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2011/03/new-record-for-german-renewable-energy-in-2010??cmpid=WNL-Wednesday-March30-2011

It has doubled the amount of energy from solar panels and, before their nuclear decision, already targeted to have 35% of electricity generation from from renewables by 2020. So while Luddites tell us that France will be selling nuclear power (which France has to heavily subsidize with taxpayer dollars) France already has 6.7% of its energy generation supplied by renewables with their goal of having at least 20% by 2020.

Meanwhile nuclear plants don't even have their storage issues worked out.

We're putting 90 percent of the subsidies in deployment — this is true in Europe and the United States — not in R&D.

And as a result the manufacturers get income which they can invest in R&D. Sounds better to me than blindly throwing money at them and hoping that one day they may produce something useful. It seems to work fine with both wind turbines and solar panels, both of whose costs have come down significantly over the last 10 years and whose performance also has increased drastically. Trickle-up economics at its finest. And moreover a large market with quite a lot of small players, rather than a few multinationals raking in all of the cash.

Of course, with nuclear power there's the problem that you have to invest billions in research, wait for 10 years for the technology to mature, then another 10 years for the pilot projects to get built (not because people are inept or companies corrupt, but because the technology is so complex and the safety requirements are so high), and once it gets accepted then you need 40 years or more before you get a new significant market for the next technology node because it takes a long time for the initial investments to get recouped. And all the time you need all kinds of governmental support to keep the financial side of the picture bearable (insurance, research subsidies, administration of waste processing/disposal, security, ...).

And once the costs have been recouped, companies obviously want to keep the existing plants running for as long as possible since that's free cash, while dismantling gobbles up a lot of money.

BTW, UK has started into geo-thermal. And note the fact that geo-thermal has little to do with volcanos (though they are good sources).

Google's also been really involved in enhanced geothermal, one of my favorite techs. For those not familiar, here's a good rundown of its promise and pitfalls. Namely, it's baseload, works basically anywhere on the planet (all that changes is the required depth of the borehole), is renewable with virtually no environmental impact, and can provide thousands of times more power than we currently consume. At the same time, it's not widespread currently for one main reason -- not that it doesn't work, but that it doesn't work *reliably*. When you fracture the rock to pump in water to heat, the fractures go wherever the heck *they* want, and in many cases your water just seeps away (also, the fraccing can cause minor -- up to just over mag. 5 in theory in most places, lower in practice -- earthquakes). Here's one of the latest ways around those pitfalls, using a closed-loop system with an underground heat exchanger instead of fraccing a new reservoir. That also has the advantage (or potential disadvantage, depending on how you look at it) of not bringing minerals back up with the water.

But it is not down to coal or nuclear.
    http://www.nanosolar.com/power-plants/technology-advantages
    http://www.maglevwindturbine.com/

And maybe even:
    http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2011/05/swedish-skeptics-confirm-nuclear-process-in-tiny-4-7-kw-reactor

And there are other alternatives.

Conventional nuclear and "fossil" fuels only have semed cheaper becuase we have ignored their externalities in the marketplace (like health impacts, enviromental impacts, security costs, and risks); from 1982 about the USA, but probably applies to Germany as well (as big centralized money can corrupt politics anywhere):
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brittle_Power
"According to the authors, a resilient energy system is feasible, costs less, works better, is favoured in the market, but is rejected by U.S. policy.[1] In the preface to the 2001 edition, Lovins explains that these themes are still very current. [2]"

That said, thorium reactors if you want ear-conventional nuclear, seems the way to go. They were not developed by the West precisely beause they are safer and you can't easily make bombs from them compared to uranium and plutonium reactors. China and India are now forging ahead with them.

ORLY?

In 2010 nearly 17% (more than 100 TWH) of Germany's electricity supply (603 TWH) was produced from renewable energy sources.

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2011/03/new-record-for-german-renewable-energy-in-2010??cmpid=WNL-Wednesday-March30-2011

Agree. Geothermal binary cycle is costly up front, but it has many advantages and according to the DOE it's ten percent cheaper than advanced nuclear in the long run. Japan is rich in geothermal energy resources - the third such richest nation in the world. It's a closed loop, so there's no emissions at all. There is no fuel, so running out of imported fuel is not a problem. It produces no waste, uses far less water than even nuclear. It's hugely scalable. It works all the time and capacity factors of up to 97% have been achieved. The turbines wear out or need upgrading, but the plants themselves don't so once the cost of building the thing is paid it's straight profits from then on. The geothermal plants in the Sendai neighborhood are still operating.

So what's not to like about geothermal? Cheaper, reliable, available, waste-free, riskless. The new methods weren't available when the Fukushima plants were built, but they are now. Japan is probably going to give geothermal a closer look as they turn from nuclear power.

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2011/05/swedish-skeptics-confirm-nuclear-process-in-tiny-4-7-kw-reactor
http://www.nanosolar.com/power-plants/technology-advantages