So why don't you go off an create these technologies that are there for the picking
maze,
That's why I stated it's due to mentality ! The technology is already there, dumb-crap ideologists just can't see it & don't want to curb their excesses which cause so much pollution.
Cut frivolous industries !

"And again, you're conflating retail electricity prices with generation costs."

Same old merry-go-round. I want to talk about the entirety of the national electricity system and you want to talk about the subset that best suits your fantasies. Who can be bothered arguing with such duplicity.

"Private capital, yes. But not operating in a policy vacuum."

That's quite a retreat for JD. About as much we're likely to see given he's the type that would argue that the sun rises in the west if he thought it'd support his fantasies. Of course governments were involved at the peripheries in the rail revolution but that's a million miles from government deciding, based on faulty evidence and wishful thinking, to support a particular energy source with massive subsidies, massive legislation and massive propaganda to the detriment of the people they supposedly serve.

Another interesting factoid.

During the recent winter storms in the US with massive snow storms (remember when snow was a thing of the past due to the dreaded CO2? yeah I'm sure that's been memory-holed)... during those storms renewables utterly failed.

Gas, oil, coal and nuclear provided 86% of the US electricity needs. So when people needed power to keep warm/alive, wind and solar were AWOL.

As Bjorn Lomborg said, solar is the cheapest form of power generation... when the sun shines. Otherwise its the most expensive form of power.

There's plenty to go round if they curb wasting so much for frivolous activities. Start by stopping to fund the Arts. Stop funding Sport. Stop funding hare-brained Uni schemes etc etc.

Fine, mhaze. Then let's talk about it properly.

//I want to talk about the entirety of the national electricity system…//

System costs include generation, transmission, storage, backup capacity, fuel volatility, and policy design. That's exactly why retail prices aren't a clean proxy for "renewables are expensive."

Germany's spike was heavily tied to gas price shocks after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Gas set the marginal price in their market. That's not a solar panel problem. That's fuel exposure.

If you want to debate full system cost including firming and storage, that's legitimate. But "countries with more renewables have higher prices" is not proof of causation. It's correlation layered over market design.

//government deciding… to support a particular energy source…//

Governments have always shaped energy systems.

Oil benefited from tax preferences and strategic policy for a century. Nuclear was state-backed. Coal rail networks relied on land grants and legal privileges. Energy has never evolved in a subsidy-free vacuum.

You can argue current policy is inefficient. But pretending past energy systems were pure free-market evolution is historical revisionism.

//During the winter storms… renewables utterly failed.//

During Winter Storm Elliott, wind output dropped in some regions. So did gas infrastructure - frozen wells and pipeline constraints knocked out significant capacity.

Energy system stress events expose weaknesses across technologies. Texas 2021 showed gas failures at scale. Blaming renewables alone ignores the data.

Also, renewables don't replace firm capacity one-for-one. They reduce fuel burn over time. Reliability comes from portfolio design - storage, interconnection, dispatchable backup.

//solar is cheapest… when the sun shines.//

Yes. That's why grids diversify. Just like gas is cheapest when supply isn't disrupted and coal is cheapest when transport lines aren't blocked.

No single source runs 24/7 at peak. That's why systems exist, not single plants.

Yes I agree Indyvidual- if you kill the innovation mindset how are you ever going to innovate. Innovation needs to create value for those using it, not artificial value defined separately from reality mandated by bureaucrats and academic abstractionists. Those bleating to cut CEO's wages at the same time as the same CEO's/ Startups are expected to take risks on unproven technology. There's enough energy in the world but we have a high density storage/ distribution problem- currently hydrocarbons are the best solution we have, especially for vehicles. There isn't enough Lithium in the world for the applications- let alone any growth- and it is controlled by unstable/ dangerous governments in many cases.

There are the bloodthirsty that want to feed off the churn of the energy transition until the public wake up to the reality.

Get you wood-gasifier for when the transition fails and society collapses and zombies and vampires roam the streets. Somebody said the streets are only three meals away from chaos.

But mhaze is also right when he implies (paraphrasing) "Woke/ Marxist's say that we will find the answer without knowing how".

It's difficult to reach a goal without a plan. And Woke/ Marxist's care more about talking ideological abstraction than practical planning