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Comment by cure | Hacker News Reader

> I don't see how wind and solar don't make sense.

Wind and solar make total sense. All we need to do is overbuild wind/solar generation + invest in energy storage capacity. This can be done relatively quickly, certainly much more quickly than building new nuclear plants.

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What kind of grid scale storage can be built quickly?

Compared to building reactors, anything is quick.

Not really, a reactor is operational in 10-20 years, while expanding lithium mining and battery production will easily take much longer. Not to mention the energy and CO2e cost of manufacturing the batteries.

hydro, but thats also something we do not built because it's not environment friendly (takes a lot of space and kills species living there and might need to move people). keep in mind we are not china they basically do everything lately to grow their energy, hydro, nuclear, wind, solar the full mix, something which would not be possible in germany, because people would go full madness, heck even wind already is something that some people do not like.

In Nissan Leafs alone (450k) there is over 10GWhr of battery capacity. Grid scale batteries are just a capital problem. No breakthroughs necessary.

There is no excess battery manufacturing capacity available. It is constrained by both facilities and raw materials. Capacity will increase but at a slow rate. More capital can't solve that problem, it's like pushing on a string.

This is exactly how capital works. We can make more battery factories.

Eventually yes, but that will take many years. It won't do anything to prevent power shortages in Germany over the next 5 years or so. I don't think you understand how long it takes to ramp up production across the entire supply chain, and that allocating more capital won't significantly accelerate timelines.

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