If you like the independence/flexibility solar is marginally interesting. There it's probably a no-brainer.
Installation, mounting, etc. all add up to be a big chunk of the cost of solar these days. Even making the physical panel size bigger drives down system cost, merely by reducing the number of panels that need to be mounted.
Other parts are
- HVDC cables to move the power to where it is needed.
- grid scale batteries to buffer power, and even it out.
- transformers. Hitherto grid transformers were all built as bespoke parts, but this is being standardised for lower lead time and economies of scale.
Green energy reduces that dependence, as does the use of electric vehicles.
I don’t have any idea how much this is a consideration, I imagine it is quite a powerful one.
melling•7mo ago
That is impressive.
The US is abandoning some of our clean energy goals.
Both public and private: https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2025-corporate-climate-br...
jfengel•7mo ago
I genuinely don't know which approach will pay off, but I've got some guesses.