[Tell It Right]

Nope. Not even close.

I have solar on my home. And it makes 70% of the power I consume. But that doesn't include my gas appliances nor my car (I don't have an EV). And I live in Alabama where I get plenty of sunshine.

Is it good for me? Yep. Is it something that can be done everywhere with good results. Nope.

[Dr. Sivana]

You are correct. My new house has solar included, and we are in Phoenix, which is even sunnier than Alabama. To the solar's credit, I do generate more electricity than I consume in air conditioning during peak usage hours, but I am including a snapshot below of the net. The part below the line is when I am making more than I am using. It isn't close. And solar is zilch at night, so we will need something better than current battery technology for night time.

[PGR88]

For silicon photovoltaic (PV) cells, the physics boundary is called the Shockley-Queisser Limit: a maximum of about 33% of incoming photons can be converted into electrons.

State-of-the-art commercial PVs achieve just over 26% conversion efficiency—in other words, near the boundary. Just like there is only so much potential energy locked up in the molecules contained in a barrel of oil, there is only so much energy available per square meter of sunlight on a surface area.

While researchers keep unearthing new non-silicon options that offer tantalizing performance improvements, all have similar physics boundaries, and none is remotely close to manufacturability at all — never mind at low costs. There are no 10-fold gains to be had.

https://www.manhattan-institute.org/green-energy-revolution-near-impossible
Mark Mills, Manhattan Institute

[Sequoyah101]

And what do you do for power at night and on cloudy days?

[richardtavor]

How often to you have to clean your colle tors? If you don’t clean them ebmvery month, how much efficiency is lost?