• @JubilantJaguar
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    15822 hours ago

    Daytime energy is soon going to be free in much of the world. The advances in green tech, especially solar and batteries, are real. Much faster progress than even the optimists were predicting a decade ago. The revolution is reaching a tipping point where it becomes self-sustaining and requires no state subsidies. I am not a tech utopian, and this alone will not save us. But there’s no denying it’s good news. It’s all happening far too late but it does look like humans are going to kick their fossil habit after all.

    Inconvenient footnote: thank China.

    • @crystalmerchant
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      1312 hours ago

      Optimistic of you to assume pricing is cost-plus not willingness-to-pay. US utilities (and their foreign counterparts) will only too gladly keep charging you

      • @JubilantJaguar
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        28 hours ago

        Agreed. In theory that problem can be dealt with by properly regulated competition.

    • @kreskin
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      513 hours ago

      Capitalism only encourages innovation when its profitable. Its a bit of a flaw.

    • @perviouslyiner
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      3822 hours ago

      It’s gotten so good that China might be restricting output to keep the prices high…

      (their onshore wind, and pumped hydro storage, are also great success stories, as is the EV industry there)

      • @JubilantJaguar
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        2922 hours ago

        Indeed. China is such a paradox. An absolute anathema in terms of culture and politics. It’s almost impossible for us Westerners to grasp how a people could accept that level of authoritarianism, how they could value their personal freedom so little. And yet, and yet. Without China we would be royally screwed. They are pulling the weight of the green transition basically alone. So personally I’ve decided to hold off on China-bashing for now.

        • @[email protected]
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          312 hours ago

          Tiananmen Square was not that long ago. There are lots of living people who would have seen their fellow students get crushed by tanks and rinsed down a drain.

          That will keep a generation and their children quiet. Their children have also now seen how risings are punished via Hong Kong.

          I don’t think it’s even possible to imagine what you would do having seen your government enact that kind of violence on your peers. So I certainly don’t judge.

          • @JubilantJaguar
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            28 hours ago

            In a way it’s even scarier than that. Most younger Chinese do not even know those things happened. I can confirm this incredible fact from personal experience. At this point “Tiananmen Square 1989” has more meaning to the average educated Westerner than it does over there. It has been scrubbed from history.

        • AmidFuror
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          1620 hours ago

          It’s almost impossible for us Westerners to grasp how a people could accept that level of authoritarianism, how they could value their personal freedom so little.

          This assumes that they have an alternative to authoritarianism that they could enact if they wanted. For some reason, the authorities don’t allow that. And the authorities also don’t like when people talk about it, so it’s difficult to discuss and convince others that authoritarianism is bad.

          • @captainlezbian
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            12 hours ago

            True but it’s not like China has never decided enough was enough and replaced their leadership by force

          • @JubilantJaguar
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            620 hours ago

            Yes sure but China has never been anything remotely like a Western democracy. It would be difficult to keep the lid on a billion people if they really wanted to live differently. Political culture runs deep.

            • AmidFuror
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              -119 hours ago

              If they want to defer to authority, they can just keep voting in the ruling party. Democracy doesn’t mean no choices.

              • @JubilantJaguar
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                618 hours ago

                Voting? Democratic elections are literally not a thing in China, at least not higher than the level of the village. There are no political parties other than the Communist Party. But for Western democracies I do agree. We have no excuses.

                • AmidFuror
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                  313 hours ago

                  My later comment was misunderstood. If being ruled by strong Communist leaders is the “political culture” of China, then fine. Give them a choice every few years and they will keep selecting that.

                  But we all know that the “revolution” needs to maintained by not giving the people the choice. If given a choice, the people might be “fooled” by Western influence and select someone other than the Communists. So the Communists pick all the candidates and then let the people choose only between them.

                  The fact is that the “political culture” that supposedly backs authoritarianism would not survive free and open elections. The political culture being unwaveringly Communist is a sham and a lie.

                  • @JubilantJaguar
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                    18 hours ago

                    Fair point. I just looked into this and what I said was roughly correct: there are indeed somewhat open elections at the local level in China, but further up the pyramid everything is locked down by the Communist Party hierarchy, as you say.

                    Turns out to be a pretty complicated system in theory, and it must work to some degree because China just had 40 years of incredibly successful development.

              • @MutilationWave
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                318 hours ago

                Voting is absolutely meaningless in Xi’s China. But I gotta give it to them for their solar panel work. Too bad it’s all about to jump in price due to the idiotic tariffs.

        • @cm0002
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          621 hours ago

          Westerners to grasp how a people could accept that level of authoritarianism,

          So personally I’ve decided to hold off on China-bashing for now.

          You just did, according to .ml users, because ACkShuLly cHiNa iSnT aN AuThoRitArIaN CounTRy

          • @JubilantJaguar
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            1921 hours ago

            Joke’s on them: not only authoritarian, but capitalist authoritarian.

    • Yes, but, we depend on fossil fuels for far more than just energy. We still get most of our plastics from them, and most of our fertilizer, without which we can’t feed most of the developed countries. And while renewables are great for stationary use, we still don’t have anything with the energy density of fossil fuels for cars, shipping, air travel, and cargo. And, whether anyone thinks it’s a good use or not, war is entirely, inefficiently, and intensely run on oil.

      There are a lot of other issues entirely unrelated to power grid energy production we have to solve first, the most challenging being our own aggressive human nature. We’re a long way from kicking the oil habit.

      • @JubilantJaguar
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        1318 hours ago

        The energy density of batteries just keeps increasing, for cars at least it’s now good enough. I agree completely about the rest but this was meant to be a happy thread! I agree with OP that we need to talk about good news too sometimes.

    • @Zonetrooper
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      719 hours ago

      Is there a good place to ask about independent (non-grid-connected) solar for an otherwise grid-connected structure? I’d love to set something like this up, but can’t find any systems which don’t require wiring into the gird.

      • @[email protected]
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        12 hours ago

        I’ve set up an off grid solar system out of necessity. Used to be an electrician so I know a good bit (but not everything by any means). What are your questions I can maybe point you in the right direction.

        Based on your initial question, it depends on local zoning. You can likely legally grid tie a set up and have a battery backup. I think if you want to be legal I’d go that route.

        If you want I think you could set up a completely separate system in a more sneaky fashion that is completely isolated from the grid / your existing house circuitry. But when grid tying (including into your house circuitry) you have to be pretty safe because that power can go upstream and feed the grid or the house when workers think the power is off, which is obviously very dangerous and could get you in a lot of trouble if it went wrong.

      • @[email protected]
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        8 hours ago

        Why would you pass up on the free money of selling the power? You’re probably looking for a hybrid system if you just want to keep the lights on during a service outage. Or I guess you can just build an off grid system and wire it to a generator transfer switch if you want to power your house circuits but only during an outage.

        Most half decent solar installers can help either way.

      • @JubilantJaguar
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        418 hours ago

        Best ask in a more specialized forum. Personally I rent so I have to take what I’m given.

    • @[email protected]
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      318 hours ago

      This IS good news!

      I hope I live to see a modular, upgradable, repairable laptop with a ridiculously ludicrous battery life. (Without it being powered by some sort of highly volatile fusion core or something Lol)

    • @[email protected]
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      -321 hours ago

      You wish, if we keep going towards everything has a battery power demand is only going to go up

      • @JubilantJaguar
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        420 hours ago

        Sure, but energy efficiency is always improving, distribution and storage are always improving. And the full electrification of transport (which is what you seem to be alluding to) is not going to happen overnight.