tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-709368055628407749.post8830248477960675850..comments2012-01-04T09:58:52.404-08:00Comments on The Future is Weird: The Problems with SolarHanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06774781064008268665noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-709368055628407749.post-31836084221846103752012-01-04T09:58:52.404-08:002012-01-04T09:58:52.404-08:00By the way, wind power has the same problems and t...By the way, wind power has the same problems and the same solution: intermittancy and storage. <br /><br />Also by the way, you don't have to worry about storage when you're only making 2% of the total usage, because the power you make just gets cut out of the total made by other means. To understand why, consider this example: <br /><br />Say tap-water suddenly costs one dollar a gallon, so you can save money by supplementing your drinking water with rainwater. The easiest thing to do (assuming you're not squeezed for cash) is to drink rainwater when it was raining, and faucet-water when it wasn't. This would cut down on your faucet-water usage and save you a couple bucks. But if you want to switch entirely over to rain (say tapwater goes to 10$/gallon), you need to build cisterns and save up the water while its falling, because you're going to get thirsty on days when it's not raining too.<br /><br />If solar gets cheap and easy enough, we will see a substantial amount of electricity generated from solar power. To really make that transition, we'll need to build solar cisterns of some kind to save up sunshine for a rainy day.Hanshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06774781064008268665noreply@blogger.com