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darth_avocado 2 hours ago

> Make Solar Energy Economical

Isn’t it already?

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glenstein an hour ago | parent | next [-]

Definitely pretty far along imo. But maybe they consider the progress bar to be at 75% or 80% rather than 100%.

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Marha01 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Not enough. The more economical it is, the better.

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frollogaston an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

People on HN keep saying it is, but I'm still not seeing it. Companies are building datacenters in vast, sun-blasted deserts and still choosing to power those with natural gas. This in turn makes people complain about emissions pledges being reversed, but if it were economical, no pledge would be needed.

Of course, USA has cheaper oil/gas than other countries. But if you look elsewhere, rich countries are subsidizing solar, poor ones are basically not using it.

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jarpschope an hour ago | parent | next [-]

I don't think you have an updated view of energy production.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2026/07/20/how-globa...

In the chart for section 3, how many countries have seen their share of electricity being generated by fossil fuels increase in the last 5 years? Only Canada.

Take a look at the charts for Pakistan, Australia, Nigeria, and China for the last few years. Pretty dramatic drops for fossil fuels generation.

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frollogaston 42 minutes ago | parent [-]

They cherrypicked 15 countries. And still, some of those still had renewables decrease since 2000 like Nigeria, others saw an increase but it's still way less than fossil, and others like China are heavily subsidizing solar. I don't doubt that it's economical for individuals when the govt is subsidizing it.

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blahblaher 19 minutes ago | parent [-]

Look at Australia then. Millions of homes already using solar yo basically power their homes for free most of the time. Yes it was subsidized, like oil was and still is. Solar without subsidies is already miles better than oil and gas.

	▲	frollogaston 12 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Australia is a rich country that subsidizes solar

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ravst3s 40 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Solar is dirt cheap in China, where 85% of panels are produced. The problem is they're made in China and face tariffs/import bans in the US/Europe.

Nat gas is preferred for AI DCs because it has faster time-to-market, doesn't have the intermittency issues. Training on solar + storage is an issue because of network synchronization.

	▲	frollogaston 26 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		I get the gas turbine for semi-temp power when there's not enough grid support, but they're talking about doing this long-term: https://www.gstatic.com/marketing-cms/79/80/fb229abf40efa81e... . Not a single mention of "solar" or "renewable" in there. Are they just trying to appease Trump administration?

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UncleOxidant an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> poor ones are basically not using it.

I don't think that's true: https://rmi.org/resources/the-global-souths-cleantech-revolu...

	▲	frollogaston 36 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		"RMI drives investment to scale clean energy solutions"

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jay_kyburz 13 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

Data centers need lots of power 24/7 and regardless of cloud cover. Solar is great to reduce your daytime bills but you still need other methods to cover the downtime.

I would be surprised if data centers didn't put in gas _and_ solar.