Time to make 2024 updates to my annual “opinions about solar” thread. If you like these, the second edition of my book, Solar Power Finance Without The Jargon, is new this year. A 30% discount code WSQ0437 is valid on publisher website until end of Oct.

worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/… It's the book I should have read before trying to get a job in renewable energy. Reviewers describe as “to the point, important, and taught me a lot” and “surprisingly entertaining, don’t be put off by the title”.

My family finally became Swiss citizens after a 4-year application process. Photo shows information for our first referendum vote.

Since I cannot be refused citizenship now, it is time to say what I *really* think of this country. Thread. Britain's cheese and beer are *much* better than those of Switzerland and it's not even close. Also, British tea may be made of floor sweepings, but at least we pour hot water directly onto it instead of serving as a cup of lukewarm water with a sad teabag on the side.

As a solar analyst, every time I see "if renewables are so cheap why aren't we building more of them?" I tap my head lightly on the wall and go back to updating the database of rapidly rising build numbers. We need to build a lot of grid to connect new wind. But we built 437GW of solar last year (yeah this is a slight restatement downwards due to changing ILR assumption for China residential - may creep up again). That's, er, not a little.

My team get criticism for our solar forecasts being too low (and sometimes some for being too high). People think the new build should keep growing at >30%.

We forecast just below 6TW cumulative PV capacity in 2030. Total world *power* capacity at end of 2022 was about 8.5TW... There's no reason PV capacity can't be much greater than peak power demand, of course. But if you don't imagine negative feedback mechanisms to solar build will start to kick in at these penetrations, you aren't forecasting, you're blindly extrapolating.

Time to make 2023 updates to my annual “opinions about solar” thread.

If you like these, the second edition of my book, Solar Power Finance Without The Jargon, comes out very soon (just sent final proofs to publisher!)



worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/…
amazon.co.uk/Solar-Power-Fi… It's the book I should have read before trying to get a job in renewable energy. Edition 1 was “too valuable, and entertaining, to be ignored” according to @pvmagazine. I rewrote Edition 2 quite a bit after the 2022 energy crisis, and included a lot more batteries and hydrogen.

This is the PV experience curve. My team and I have been maintaining this version since 2007. I reckon I'm a bit of an expert on it.

The thing about the law of the experience curve, it's really more like a set of guidelines. You make so many choices, like what inflation index to use. Like sweet summer children, we forget that inflation in the 1970s and 1980s was very significant - the nominal price in 1976 was $25/W, but that's $98.9/W in 2021 dollars (and I'm trying to update for 2022).

This is a (only mildly facetious) map of solar policy and support worldwide at the end of 2018, which I used in my book. How things change. India's going to miss that 100GW (which I think was AC) target by the end of 2022 - we're expecting it to have 77GW(DC).

I was checking which European countries are already in the '5% PV in electricity' club (I don't think Poland will be in 2022, though probably next year) and all of EU Europe together got 5.52% of electricity from PV in 2021, according to our generation tracker. The ">8% electricity from PV" club in EU Europe for 2021: Germany, Spain, Greece, Italy, Netherlands

">5% PV in 2021" club: Belgium, Austria, Switzerland

The future is coming, slowly and then all at once.

1. Time to make 2021 minor updates to my annual “opinions on #solar” thread.

If you like these, you’ll like my 2019 book, Solar Power Finance Without the Jargon, a little old but still valid, five stars on Amazon.
tinyurl.com/y6lc3ohl 2. Solar Power Finance Without the Jargon is for STEM-educated people interested or seeking to work in renewable energy planning or finance.

Link to 2021 thread. 2020, 2019, 2018 and 2017 are linked from there so you can see what I got wrong or changed. tinyurl.com/mpd2rpcx

It's weird how an article about how pressing the need is for solar recycling in the US cites a. several solar recyclers complaining of small volumes and b. most solar panels are no longer toxic enough to be considered hazardous waste.

latimes.com/business/story… Solar panel recycling companies are doing the Lord's work but they're talking their own book here. They can't exactly say "well, it's nothing compared to all the other crap that ends up in landfill but we WOULD like some subsidies please".

Hmm. According to BNEF's data (@FeliciaAminoff ), Germany's 2020 final energy consumption target was 18% and it managed 19%. Electricity target was 39% and it did 44.7%.

Admittedly, Germany missed RE heating & cooling 2020 target (14.5% vs 16%).

bnef.com/insights/29019

https://twitter.com/heimbergecon/status/1538853863528222721

Also, 2020 was an easy year for targets because consumption went down. But I think it's a bit much to ask your average Italian to distinguish the technicalities of different German renewable energy sub-targets.

Just for the record, solar panels do not generally contain chromium, most of them are not made in Xinjiang, and there is no unforeseen tsunami of solar waste coming our way.

See, for example,

https://twitter.com/solar_chase/status/1407726096020344840

There's no significant wafer, cell or module manufacturing capacity in Xinjiang (there's a single ingot plant). About 50% of solar-grade polysilicon production was made in Xinjiang last year, it's a little lower this year as new factories are in other provinces.

1. Time to make 2021 minor updates to my annual “opinions on #solar” thread.
If you like these, you’ll like my 2019 book, Solar Power Finance Without the Jargon, a little old but still valid, five stars on Amazon.
tinyurl.com/y6lc3ohl 2. Solar Power Finance Without the Jargon is the book I should have read before seeking a job in renewables 16 years ago.
Link to 2020 thread. 2019, 2018 and 2017 are linked from there so you can see what I got wrong or changed. tinyurl.com/yr2memtx

Thread: a brief and only mildly facetious guide to BNEF solar build outlooks.

This will not cover IEA, IRENA or BP solar build outlooks because those are not *my* problem.

There was roughly 788GW of PV installed worldwide at the end of 2020 (plus 7GW solar thermal). 1. BNEF New Energy Outlook Economic Transition Scenario, 2020. This is a "business-as-usual" modelling scenario based on economic uptake. 2.4TW of solar by the end of 2030, providing 10% of world electricity.

This deserves a serious answer.

Germany started in a terrible place for renewable energy action. It's not very windy, it's not sunny, it's quite densely populated and heavily industrialised.

https://twitter.com/isaboemeke/status/1332769445463293952

I remember my parents in the UK worrying about milk and mushrooms because of events in far-off Ukraine. I don't blame Germans for saying no to nuclear in the late 1980s-90s. It wasn't the right decision, but you can't exactly dismiss their fears as unreasonable.

Important clarification on the Swiss 2050 Net Zero study/plan: it's no *net* electricity imports. So, Switzerland will export electricity in summer and import in winter. (Fine, but all north Europe will be planning the same...).

newsd.admin.ch/newsd/message/… It hangs a lot of hope on "steeply tilted PV and facades", letting us generate 32% of our electricity from solar in winter halfyear.

Hmmm. Parts of Switzerland have much clearer skies in winter than my foggy valley, but that's still a lot of winter sun being assumed.

The @IEA says solar is king. Worth noting we @BloombergNEF say "wind retakes the lead from solar" because (very basically) with more granular modelling, wind electricity is just more useful at high penetrations. Blows in the early morning, in winter, etc.

about.bnef.com/new-energy-out… I mean, we of Team Solar @BloombergNEF say "well next year we'll have a lower capex forecast and a slightly higher capacity factor figure assuming bifacial modules, so GAME ON" but that may not actually change the result here.

1. Time to make minor updates to my annual “opinions on #solar” thread.
If you like these, you’ll like my 2019 book, Solar Power Finance Without the Jargon. Five stars on Amazon, apparently “entertaining” and writer knows her stuff”. Also available here: tinyurl.com/y6lc3ohl 2. Solar Power Finance Without the Jargon is the book I should have read before seeking a job in renewables, from the perspective of having worked in this for 14 years.

Link to 2019 thread. 2018 and 2017 are linked so you can see what I got wrong. tinyurl.com/y56zx5qc

About 80% of U.S. gas open cycle gas turbines for peak power ran below 15% capacity factor in 2019, according to my colleague @YayoiSekine 's note, and about 60% never ran for more than 6 consecutive hours last year.

(Paywalled but bnef.com/insights/23449 ) Anyway that seems to be the main reason there's 8.9GW of PV with storage in the U.S. pipeline by 2023, and 69GW in the interconnection queue (basically hoping for a grid connection).

First you replace the peakers, and then you come for the CCGTs.

Although I don't agree with much of this analysis, it is right that solar will be incredibly cheap, and thought-provoking.

(I think the fundamentals of applying learning curve analysis to a LCOE are slightly dodgy, and 30% is too high a rate even for capex).

https://twitter.com/ramez/status/1261011825354657792

Specifically, I'm a little concerned that a lot of the falls in cost of capital, O&M cost and non-module cost over the last decade have been one-offs. Cost of capital has dropped worldwide for everything, for example.

Easter weekend holiday has been lovely. I finally got to do some jobs I wanted done.

These included cleaning the windows. Since I am proud to be a trained window cleaning professional, here follows a short thread on how to clean windows quickly and well. (1/n) You really need: a good squeegee with a rubber (not plastic) blade. Once the rubber degrades, replace it (this will be decades in household use).
An old towel or rag
Sponge
A "scrim" cloth. A baby muslin or worn linen dish towel will do fine as this.
A bucket helps a lot (2/n)