"Green" energy produced by wind and solar simply cannot meet the power demands of the modern world.
... The simple fact is that solar only works when the sun is shining and there is nothing obscuring the panels (approximately 18% of the time) and wind turbines only work when the wind is blowing (approximately 40% of the time).
... all renewable energy systems are necessarily backed up by either fossil fuels or nuclear power — energy sources that are reliable, consistent, and controllable.
... cold weather not only diminishes the energy output of wind turbines but often reverses it.
When the temperature drops below zero these wind turbines are shut down and actually consume electricity in order to keep their components warm to prevent damage and malfunction, turning these already lackluster energy producers into energy consumers.
... (some) claim that by storing all the excess energy produced during the peak operational periods of wind turbines or solar panels, the innate unreliability problem is “solved.
... the battery storage capacity needed simply does not exist, nor is it likely to ever exist.
As American Experiment’s Issac Orr observes, “A recent analysis by the consulting firm Wood Mackenzie estimates there will be about 741 gigawatt-hours of battery storage in 2030.
This amount equates to 741,000 megawatt-hours (MWh).
… In 2019, the state of Minnesota consumed 72 million megawatt-hours of electricity.
This means the amount of battery storage expected to be in existence for the entire world would be the equivalent of just one percent of Minnesota’s annual energy consumption.”
... there’s the high cost of battery storage.
Orr notes, “Current cost estimates for battery storage are about $250 per kilowatt-hour, which equates to a cost of $250,000 per megawatt-hour.
This means the cost of all the expected battery storage in the world (741,000 MWh by 2030) would cost $185 billion to build, and this doesn’t even begin to include the cost of building the wind turbines and solar panels needed to charge the batteries!”
And ... that would meet just 1% of Minnesota’s current annual energy consumption."