Bottlenecks in the Solar Industry
Frequent commenter John Roche writes: Regarding bottlenecks associated with the adoption of solar, many groups have said that infrastructure and power lines are issues, namely getting new power lines in and expanding old ones–and that it could take years. Bottlenecks will reduce the return on investment on solar which might reduce its installation.
Yes, indeed there are many bottlenecks here, of which four come immediately to mind: limited capacity to transmit energy of large distances, virtually no ability to store it cost-effectively, the need to shift load to the day, and rewriting the charter we have with the utilities to encourage faster adoption of solar. And yes, these will take years, perhaps a decade, to work themselves out. Of course, in the process, the cost per Watt of solar will continue to fall, and our capacity to install large solar farms on otherwise low-value land will increase.
The one thing that seems to cut through many of these “bottlenecks” is on site energy storage. To this end the “powerwall” and similar storage devices will move to make some infrastructure obsolete.
Other regulations and recommendations also lean toward making structures “energy independent.” It may be that the primary reason for an electrical connection shifts to the ability to sell power.