BuT SoLAr rEQuiReS StORaGe!

Warning, rant ahead…

There’s this assertion that wind and solar are ‘unreliable’ because they are intermittent.

True- the wind blows when it wants to blow and however much it wants to blow and the sun shines only during a few hours (in Tucson- about 5-6 hours).

Outside of the wind blowing or sun shining- these systems do not actively create power, and that’s a real issue. An issue that has many solutions that are not only well developed, but reliable and well understood. And, I might add, one area where advancements are happening at a rapid pace.

This is all true. You get power production when the sun shines, no power production when the sun doesn’t shine.

The solution is to make the power in excess of demand and store the excess for use later. That works. Period.

It is this storage that some folks would like to point their finger at to say solar is unreliable, but they conveniently leave out a glaring issue…

Consider a fossil fuel plant- coal, nat gas, etc.

This base fuel has to be found, drilled, pumped, refined, delivered, and STORED for future use to be converted to usable electrical power.

Solar and wind? There is no finding, drilling, pumping, refining, or delivering of wind or sunlight- it shows up all on its own. There it gets converted to usable electrical power and the excess is stored.

All forms of power (wind, water, nuclear, solar, fossil fuels) require storage.
The ONLY difference between them is where in the process the storage happens.

Calling solar unreliable because it needs storage to operate 24/7 is like calling cars unreliable because they need to be refilled with gas periodically.

This argument that ‘renewables are unreliable’ is a patently false narrative created by the legacy oil industry that is losing market share in the energy market.

To be clear, I don’t see a future where legacy oil is replaced- I see a future with more wind and solar providing more options for power production.

I advocate for residential and/or rooftop solar, and I think there is a place for the ‘renewables’ in the larger aspect of the grid. Various sources of power are better suited in various applications- but they all involve storage of one sort or another…

And that doesn’t make them ‘unreliable’- that makes them have various advantages and disadvantages in various applications. Most specifically, rooftop solar at the scale of a single family home is reliable, viable, and in many cases affordable.

When you’re out and about listening to these claims of ‘unreliability’, ask yourself- is this a discussion of which power source is best suited for a particular application, or is it an attempt to discredit an entire type of power source in favor of another one… That might help keep things in perspective.

If you are looking into rooftop solar for your home or business, I have a book coming soon that addresses this and other concepts so that you can get straight to what you need and not get taken advantage of in the process.

Click here to be notified when I release Tucson Solar Insider Desk Guide for Buying Solar.

Be Good!
Curtis