
Photovoltaic growth: reality versus projections of the IEA - ericdanielski
https://steinbuch.wordpress.com/2017/06/12/photovoltaic-growth-reality-versus-projections-of-the-international-energy-agency/
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ggm
I think the quality which needs reflecting on is not that in any given year
they're always wrong, but that for all years they have been specifically wrong
on the lowside.

This can't be an averaging error where they refactor the model from past
experience alone because it would either be asymptomatic or variant about the
true rate. (I.e. both higher and lower, not just always lower. For the
variance to always be lower it's either got to approach the value and so
reflect feedback into the model, or its just.. wrong)

Unless they're getting less wrong each year, this is basically doubling down
on a faulty methodology. No other discipline would accept this multi year,
would they?

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sharemywin
They're using linear extrapolation. and it's clearly an exponential curve
after the fact. the problem is when does it hit saturation and flatten out
like an s curve.

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ggm
It's not like we've never seen a logistic supply issue before. If they just
said linear as a lowside and did a high side based on saturation at some
chosen level we'd have a bracketing. But instead they tick a pessimal box, and
then pundits use it and planners use it as gospel for setting finance and risk
rates. It's insane planning..

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michaelbuckbee
I'm not familiar enough with the machinations of these groups, but could this
be explained by loss aversion?

Like I've always heard that meteorologists predict rain more often than their
models would actually imply -> because people get mad if they make plans and
they get rained out.

Is anyone "mad" if PV beats estimates or conversely is someone at the IEA
going to lose their job if they say: "this is the year that solar is blowing
up" and someone invests and it's finally the year it takes a break?

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rcMgD2BwE72F
> "this is the year that solar is blowing up" and someone invests and it's
> finally the year it takes a break?

Do you think analysts take more risk hyping solar (b/c investors in renewable
energy could lose some $ if solar stalls) or by playing down solar (b/c
investors in fossil fuels could lose $$$ if solar keeps growing)?

I guess fear originates from the side where most capital is at risk. Hint: not
solar.

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mtgx
IEA's EV growth projections are just as bad. I believe a couple of years ago
they predicted something like 3% of the car market will be EVs - in _2040_.

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TaylorAlexander
Reminds me of the old IBM quote about the market for computers.

It just sounds like a combination of old and entrenched thinking. For the
longest time nothing could shake fossil fuels and anyone who believed
otherwise was proven wrong. People in the fossil fuel community could succeed
while dismissing renewables. But the facts no longer support those old
positions, and entrenched organizations will be slow to pick up on it.

I’ve never heard of this organization but I hope they’re not driving policy
changes anywhere, though they sound like the kind of org that would...

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BLKNSLVR
It just sounds like a combination of old and entrenched thinking.

My experience of economics modelling (admittedly very limited) is that it
can't help but be skewed towards the status quo. The only solid figures they
can use are historical, which will only act as an anchor to the predictions of
the potential future.

Additionally, economic modelling is often used as a risk analysis tool, and
'knowns' (with solid historical numbers and patterns) are always less risky
than 'unknowns' with limited information.

'New' always faces an uphill battle on many fronts.

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addicted
Are there models which factor in an analysis of their past successes/failures
and adjust for them?

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b0rsuk
If it wasn't for pollution, it would be an exciting time to live in. Expect a
new influx of Science Fiction books. The genre was born in XIX, the age of
crazy progress. I think our time is a similar breakthrough, thanks to personal
computers and the Internet.

~~~
zaarn
Science Fiction is older than the 1900s. Just check on Jules Verne. The name
"science fiction" is from the 1850's, arguably before "XIX". First almost SF
books appeared in 1810 (Julius von Voß)

~~~
b0rsuk
I'm going through a 4-book science fiction anthology which starts with
Gilgamesh, Utopia, City of the Sun and so on. You really don't need to tell me
that. My point was that SF surges in times when science achieves major wins.
One surge was in XIX, another in 50's because of first men in space and on the
Moon, as well as nuclear holocaust scare.

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danmaz74
In other news, predicting the future of technology is incredibly difficult.

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sddfd
It is. But I think humans are generally incapable of comprehending exponential
growth.

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svantana
...which makes sense because true exponentials cannot exist in physical
reality; what looks exponential is the beginning of a sigmoid or bell curve.
So the question becomes what the limiting factors are and when they will kick
in, thus ending the exponential growth.

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danmaz74
Right. With the problem that it's usually impossible to know when those
factors will kick in.

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modeless
Are the IEA's terrible predictions used when modeling future CO2 emissions for
climate studies? Will the growth of solar put a dent in all those really
pessimistic climate models out there?

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danielharan
I don't think theirs specifically, but that type of problem is core to all
these models. David Roberts has been complaining about this:

[https://www.vox.com/2015/10/23/9604120/climate-models-
uncert...](https://www.vox.com/2015/10/23/9604120/climate-models-uncertainty)

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static_noise
I haven't seen many market studies but those that I saw were... not very
predictive beyond rolling dice and generic drawing exponential curves.

I think we might have reached the point where push comes to shove and solar is
making its breaktrough. You can't really predict when that will happen. The
best we can do is "when problem X is solved" or "price point Y is reached"
then it will go off and "once it does it will reach XX% market share in a
short time." Afterwards it is easy to pinpoint the exact time where it went
off. But beforehand. Hard. Probably impossible. Many technologies die without
gaining wide adoption.

The question I'm asking is not how fast solar will reach some percentage but
where will it level off? 20%, 50%, 80% of total electricity generation? Will
it replace fossil fuel or will it add to that? The total primary energy market
is huge compared to just electricity. Will solar replace much of the primary
energy consumption, too?

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afarrell
> where will it level off?

That is going to depend on what energy-storage technology its paired with to
handle when demand outstrips supply. Currently, that role is played by natural
gas turbines, which are quick to turn on.

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hwillis
No, storage is near irrelevant already. Math for one square meter of solar
paneling: that's 186 W of solar cells[1], about $192 installed[2], including
land cost, taxes, etc etc etc. A residential system will cost about 3x as
much. Over most of the US, that panel will generate an average of 1 kWh per
day (5.5 kWh insolation times 18.6% efficiency). To a rough approximation
you'll need to store about 30% of that power overnight- 300 Wh. Lets call that
$120/kWh for the batteries- that's a reasonable large-scale current cost. Say
it lasts 5000 cycles, same as the Tesla powerwall- 13.7 years. In reality that
could last way, way longer at a slightly higher capacity, but say you just
replace it until the panels run out. That's $192 for the panels and $108 for
the batteries, warrantied for at least 41 years. That gives you a cost of 2.0
cents per kWh. Even if you quadruple the cost of batteries, solar is still
stupid cheap.

It just needs financing.

[1]: [http://sinovoltaics.com/learning-center/quality/standard-
tes...](http://sinovoltaics.com/learning-center/quality/standard-test-
conditions-stc-definition-and-problems/)

[2]:
[https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy17osti/68925.pdf](https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy17osti/68925.pdf)

~~~
candiodari
> solar is still stupid cheap.

Addendum: and getting cheaper.

> It just needs financing.

I would just like to make the point that this is actually the greatest pain
point now. Solar is not getting financed exactly because it is stupid cheap
and getting cheaper.

Think about it: will you be investing in something that's already stupid cheap
(with bad margins, and heavy international government competition making it
cheaper), and getting cheaper ?

That would be a VERY bad investment decision.

So what's happening is "the datacenter investment". Solar power plants are
mainly being built and financed by the customers of their electricity, who use
it to disconnect from the grid (to some extent). Nobody's investing in it,
because it's not necessary.

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michaelbuckbee
See, this is where I get tripped up. Because I'd think that it would
definitely be the time to invest. That you'd want to cut a deal to deliver X
amount of solar capacity / year for the next 20 years at what strikes today's
buyer as a cheap price. Then you've locked in the payback for the next two
decades as the cost to product plummets and your margins expand every year.

There was some talk about how this was the thinking behind the recent "below
cost" bids happening in the middle east.

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candiodari
This is exactly "the datacenter investment". But the only people who can make
it are established companies with predictable long-term power needs. You
cannot really invest in it.

Investing in solar companies however (e.g. SUNE, SCTY, ...) went badly (of
course SCTY "turned out well" thanks to Elon Musk putting up 2 billion of not-
quite-his-own money to saving it, presumably mostly to protect his reputation.
This is ironically another reason not to invest, as the difference between a
large loss and a large gain was created only by a large external force (sort-
of government even, if you consider just how much government money TSLA gets))

So an investment in SCTY was pretty much a simple bet: "do you believe the
government will bail out SCTY ?". The answer was yes, in a roundabout way. In
the case of SUNE, the answer was no.

