Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

I'm not sure what they mean anyway. The amount of solar energy hitting earth is a lot larger than human energy utilization. Like by a factor of 10000 (tens of terawatts vs ~100 petawatts).


Well first of you'd have to reduce that by the efficiency of our panels, so we're down to 20 petawatts

And then you'd have to factor in the fact that basically none of the planet can be covered in solar panels

And then the fact that you wouldn't be able to efficiently transport the energy to where we need it

So yes in theory you put a couple hundred sqkm of solar panels in the Sahara and you're golden, in practice it's much more complex




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: