“Electricity produced from solar is too expensive”
Let’s start with the most common argument: it’s too expensive. It used to be true, but it isn’t. According to an IRENA report, the cost of photovoltaic electricity has fallen by 82% since 2010, and this trend will intensify in the future. Last year, a record was set by the French company Akuo Energy (several technologies of which are labeled by the Solar Impulse Foundation) during a call for tenders from the Portuguese government. A 150 MW power plant will provide solar electricity at a record price of 1.5 cents / kWh. In many parts of the world, solar has become the most competitive source of energy, ahead of polluting fossil fuels, and often ahead of nuclear.
“Renewable energies are unreliable”
It is true that they are intermittent. The sun does not shine on us at night, and not every day. But faced with this subject, which is also fundamental in the ecological transition, many technologies are becoming available to store the energy produced. Hydrogen is in one, just like lithium batteries, in particular those of electric vehicles when they are not running, compressed air or pumped energy transfer stations (STEP). Other innovative means exist, such as recycled ceramic bricks which store heat at temperatures between 500 and 1000 ° C, or even Energy Vault, which has developed a crane 120 meters high, which hoists blocks of concrete when there is too much electricity and let them go down by generating electricity when it is needed.
It is clear that the cost of storage must be integrated into the final price of solar electricity, but even so, photovoltaics remains competitive, as these technologies have evolved.
“It is a threat to the traditional industrial and financial world”
This is only true if the dinosaurs lean on the past. This is why we must encourage the oil companies to take the ecological turn now and to rename themselves energy companies. The diversification of the majors in the production and distribution of renewable energies can only be beneficial to them. Not to mention consumer service, which is becoming an important source of income as Engie demonstrates every day. This summer, despite the publication of one of its worst quarterly results, the BP stock closed up 6.5% after the announcement of their environmental strategy, which announced a tenfold increase in its investments in renewables and carbon neutrality in 2050! Why ? Because pension funds and life insurance companies know full well that investments in fossil fuels are becoming rotten assets, like subprime loans in 2008 …
“Climate change is a very long term problem”
I sometimes hear some say that solar energy is first and foremost a way to fight climate change, which is a long-term problem – when they don’t simply deny that this crisis exists – and that we have to other immediate priorities. This is doubly incorrect. Firstly, because the consequences of climate change are already being felt all over the world. But also, and above all, because solar energy makes it possible to fight another catastrophic and very topical problem: air pollution. According to the World Health Organization, this scourge affects 9 out of 10 people in the world and kills approximately 8 million people each year due to the diseases it causes.
“There is not enough sun everywhere”
But where there is no sun, there can be wind, streams, waves, geothermal energy … Solar is not a panacea and must be combined with other complementary sources. . There is no single solution to address this problem, but a combination of clean technologies.
“It will not be enough to guarantee the electricity needs of the whole world”
At the current rate of waste around the world, it’s true: around 75% of the energy produced is wasted due to the archaic technologies that are still in use. This is why I have been fighting for many years to make energy efficiency a priority on the environmental agenda. We need to put in place much stricter standards and regulations in this area so that our electrical appliances, buildings, transport and factories are more energy efficient.
“Solar panels require too much energy for their manufacture”
I recently saw an “expert” announce to a parliamentary committee that a solar panel takes 30 years to reimburse its embodied energy, that is to say the energy necessary for its manufacture, transport, recycling, etc. . However, this figure is totally false. In half the world, including much of France, this figure is between 6 months and a year. That is, in less than 12 months, a solar panel has reimbursed the electricity it required for its manufacture.
During the next 30 years of its operation, it produced low-carbon and inexhaustible electricity.
“It is an energy for rich countries”
Totally wrong. As it is the best way to produce electricity on the market, solar energy, since it is decentralized, allows access to the most isolated and disadvantaged populations. So many poor countries are getting poorer every year spending their currencies to buy gas or oil, without having the means to pull power lines, that solar energy becomes the only way to ensure economic development local and social stability.
“Solar requires public subsidies”
If its development actually started with a guarantee to buy back solar electricity at often high prices, the reverse is happening today almost everywhere: fossil fuels are subsidized to the tune of billions of dollars in the world and in no way cover their externalities, that is to say the health and environmental damage they cause.
” This is not beautiful “
Say rather: it was not beautiful. Today, solar tiles, like those in the French pavilion at the Dubai World Expo, can be adapted to all contexts.
You will understand, I am a fervent defender of solar energy. Not because it allowed me to fly day and night on Solar Impulse, or even because it helps fight climate change. But because it is a logical alternative, even before being ecological, which creates sustainable jobs and produces electricity that is cheaper than fossil fuels. The demi-experts will not be able to prevent it from becoming a major source of energy in the world, provided that one protects oneself from their untruths.
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