Recent comments in /f/IAmA

GREENbear-king t1_j7w7zng wrote

Reply to I’m Sammy Roth, an L.A. Times reporter trying to figure out where to put all the solar and wind farms we'll need to fight climate change. Is farmland the answer? AMA! by losangelestimes

Does America offer solar panel rebates to home owners? They did it aus tralia and lots of houses connect to solar. A lot even produce extra and sell it to the grid. 32 percent of Aussie homes have a solar system and the number goes up and up.

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Sammy_Roth t1_j7w4yg0 wrote

Reply to comment by diver12345 in I’m Sammy Roth, an L.A. Times reporter trying to figure out where to put all the solar and wind farms we'll need to fight climate change. Is farmland the answer? AMA! by losangelestimes

Really good question! This is a topic I really need to learn more about, but the short answer is not super well, at least not in a lot of places. I got into the grid challenges just a bit, and cited some valuable recent research, in this piece: https://www.latimes.com/environment/newsletter/2021-11-04/future-of-rooftop-solar-up-for-grabs-in-california-boiling-point.

Big picture, building all the renewable generating capacity we'll need -- from big solar farms to lots more rooftop panels -- and also electrifying transportation and heating will require huge investments in the electric grid to make it bigger, more resilient, more flexible and more able to accommodate flows in both directions. That means from big power plants to consumers, but also from consumers back to the grid -- from rooftop solar panels, dedicated energy storage systems and also electric vehicle batteries.

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Sammy_Roth t1_j7w21oo wrote

Reply to comment by inkslingerben in I’m Sammy Roth, an L.A. Times reporter trying to figure out where to put all the solar and wind farms we'll need to fight climate change. Is farmland the answer? AMA! by losangelestimes

Hey there, great question -- I've heard about this but not sure it's been done here. Definitely huge potential for solar on land around highways. Good story about that from Canary Media: https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/solar/gigawatts-of-solar-could-be-built-in-the-open-land-around-u-s-interstate-highways.

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Sammy_Roth t1_j7w1i16 wrote

Reply to comment by truthinlies in I’m Sammy Roth, an L.A. Times reporter trying to figure out where to put all the solar and wind farms we'll need to fight climate change. Is farmland the answer? AMA! by losangelestimes

Hey there, thank you for the good questions! I'd definitely say that the lowest-conflict places for solar are within the built environment -- on warehouse and residential rooftops, over school parking lots, etc. Just a couple weeks ago I visited one of the largest rooftop solar installations in the country, at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas. More to come on that in Part 3 of Repowering the West: https://www.latimes.com/projects/repowering-the-west/.

I don't know as much about the repair/replacement issues, unfortunately. That's a topic I should probably learn more about!

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