Solar energy is often perceived as a political topic because environmental activists promoted solar and advocated for government subsidies when it was clearly a more expensive form of energy than fossil fuels.
Folks who disagreed with those policies may still be wary of solar power, but I’m hoping to change your mind, because in recent years, solar power has become the cheapest form of power generation! Solar should no longer be a political issue.
Just look at how much solar power China is building compared to the US — and we all know that China doesn’t have any climate change activists guiding their policies. The reason China is building solar is because solar is cheaper.
Just because solar power is cheap, doesn’t mean that’s the whole picture. We can’t replace all other forms of power generation with solar until we develop economical solutions for two other problems: energy storage and grid inertia.
Batteries are getting exponentially cheaper. But damage to the environment caused by mining lithium is a real concern. Lithium ion batteries also more suited for electric vehicles than grid storage.
Luckily, there are many companies working on grid-scale battery technology, ranging from iron flow batteries to zinc air batteries. These technologies have different priorities than lithium ion because they don’t need to be small and lightweight.
The real holy grail is already on the horizon — sodium ion batteries. Not only are they cheap, but their much less toxic to the environment.