Jim

A Solar Boom in Rural Nigeria Lights Up Local Economies The diesel-powered generators that have long powered the Nigerian economy are making way for solar panels, thanks in part to a $750 million World Bank campaign.

‘As much as 75GW of electricity is supplied by gasoline and diesel-fired generators…the national grid capable of supplying about 4GW of power’

Roughly, 240 million people, sixth largest nation on earth, largest African nation.

4 fucking GW of electricity for these people. We’ve got so far to go.

Please keep in mind there are tens if not hundreds of millions of people in the US who share every ounce of your feelings for Darth Cheeto and his minions.

YES!

We constantly hear about landowners fighting against solar - but at some point - some folks are gonna realize, we only need 1% of all land to power the world.

& If you don't act soon - you're gonna miss out on one of the greatest wealth generation opportunities of our lifetimes.

Same

I suspect the cycle of upgrading rapidly advancing GPUs every couple of years will be a challenge for this model

Time for 2025 updates to my annual “opinions about solar” thread. If you like these, you might like the second edition of my book, Solar Power Finance Without The Jargon. A 30% discount code WSQ0437 is valid on publisher website until end of November 2025.

www.worldscientific.com/worldscibook...

Africa and other Emerging Markets... impact of energy abundance. What does this enable? Also - what innovations in solar are not now, but could become big in 5-10 years? (solar windows, solar mural coverings, solar cars... IDK, go crazy)

When does this make sense? "solar on a boat" has got to be generally more difficult than on land (ht @solarchase.bsky.social) I see the Bohai see has mean depth of only 60 feet and is somewhat calm, while Qinhuangdao is pretty mountainous. So maybe its cheaper than land here? What else?

Seriously folks, this is fucking massive and awesome.

And it’s also what I want to do with community solar in the USA, except 5X in size per unit: 5MWac solar + 5 MW DC coupled battery, with the capacity side of the solar and storage varying by location.

From left to right, Dr. Albert Mulenga, William Tae Heung Kim, Dr. Thu Thuy Nguyen, Dr. Alex Kiarie Gaithuma, Dr Hassan Hakimi and Emily Bencosme Cuevas. Kim is a Texas A&M researcher who was detained in San Francisco last Monday despite being a permanent resident of the United States and a green card holder. COURTESY OF TEXAS A&M UNIVERSITY

I NEED to tell you the story of Tae Heung “William” Kim.

He's a graduate student at Texas A&M where he's working on a vaccine for Lyme disease.

He's a *legal permanent resident* of the United States.

And he's been in ICE detention for 12 days & counting, transferred Tuesday to South Texas.

David Roberts on X: "If you're on the right, shitting on Dems is how you demonstrate the shared hatreds that make you part of the tribe. If you're on the center-left, shitting on Dems is how you demonstrate the above-it-all independence that earns the admiration of peers. If you're on the left ..." / X If you're on the right, shitting on Dems is how you demonstrate the shared hatreds that make you part of the tribe. If you're on the center-left, shitting on Dems is how you demonstrate the above-it-all independence that earns the admiration of peers. If you're on the left ...

This you? x.com/drvolts/stat...

So if you are looking for a project that really makes the world better...

develop a simple and cheap solar+battery+stove for Africa

Is the data available in table form anywhere?

ChatGPT - Energy Subsidies Comparison Shared via ChatGPT

How do the subsidies compare? I asked O3 to compare and it said basically fossils fuels get ~ $1.3/MWHR while renewables got $10-40 per mwhr. Is that remotely accurate? chatgpt.com/share/6852de...

Please do the same story for Texas 🙏

Same

On a Stanford @siepr.bsky.social abundance panel today, I offered this analogy for how US generator interconnection works outside ERCOT, which I was told was helpful: 🔌💡

Anyone want to start a charity to distribute high quality kits? I’ll buy the first ten and work the bill of materials.

‘a tiny solar panel paired w/a battery that provides indoor lighting and charges mobile phones can save ~$70/ye, exceeding the one-time hardware cost of the solar-plus-battery kit’

In other words does Elmo’s famous“Idiot Index” suggest any areas of focus?

Theoretically, what difference would it make if all the hardware was priced at raw material cost (e.g. clamps and wires)? Is there room for improvement in standardization and mass production of those or other balance of system components? How many types of inverters do we need?

Neat! Is the magic something like "bedrock is close to surface so we can anchor directly without deep pilings" ?

MAGA 2017: "Trump-Russia is a hoax and a slur."

MAGA 2025: "Trump-Russia is the basis for our foreign policy and anybody who doesn't agree should be primaried out of the party."

@volts.wtf

How do they decide what to curtail? I thought gas and coal were supposed to be dispatchable. Can they not turn them off?

Two new solar records in ERCOT today: 24,818 megawatts of solar production equal to 54% of demand this AM. Tomorrow, if grid operators allow it, Texas could be 100% renewable for a large part of Texas Independence Day! Beautiful example of the "cowboy hat curve" tomorrow.

Crystal medicine

Power demand is sky high in ERCOT this morning. This is the first time ERCOT has ever served 80,000 megawatts in the winter. We have a new battery storage record with 4,578 megawatts deployed at 7:15. Once again, batteries are playing a major role to keep the heat on. #txlege

Another solar record in ERCOT today, this time with exactly 24,000 megawatts of output just a few minutes ago. That's 7,000 megawatts more than this time last year, a 40% increase in one year. Prices, of course, are low, <$15 per megawatt-hour.

@volts.wtf #balconysolar