Even if you were in a cashless planned economy, dumping excess watts into a grid when they’re not required would be creating negative value. Solar plants would avoid that by curtailment or diversion, but this is still defined as a problem that needs solutions like load shifting and storage.
That is the obvious solution to variable demand not correlated with variable output, yes, so is MIT saying that “the problem with solar is that we aren’t building enough storage capacity to manage peak usage that occurs outside of peak production times”?
Is their concern inherently driven by a a capitalist profit motive?
If so, and I suspect it is, then it’s accurate enough.
Even if you were in a cashless planned economy, dumping excess watts into a grid when they’re not required would be creating negative value. Solar plants would avoid that by curtailment or diversion, but this is still defined as a problem that needs solutions like load shifting and storage.
That is the obvious solution to variable demand not correlated with variable output, yes, so is MIT saying that “the problem with solar is that we aren’t building enough storage capacity to manage peak usage that occurs outside of peak production times”?
No?
Why not?
The MIT article is pro solar and pro renewable, and does discuss storage, hvdc transmission, load shifting and subsidies to reduce costs.
Why is that? Perhaps the problems the article poses with storage solutions boil down to: