Elon Musk Tells Governors About Solar Power plus US Gigafactories

So Elon Musk was speaking to the National Governors Association. It’s summer conference in Rhode Island last week. Elon Musk gave the Governor’s aka state solons their money’s worth. He told them that it would be possible to supply every electron needed to keep America humming. That’s by covering just 100 square miles with solar panels.

“If you wanted to power the entire U.S. with solar panels, it would take a fairly small corner of Nevada or Texas or Utah. You only need about 100 miles by 100 miles of solar panels to power the entire United States.”

Of course, some grid storage capability would need to be included. Musk has an answer for that, too. “The batteries you need to store the energy. All to make sure you have 24/7 power, is 1 mile by 1 mile. One square mile. That’s it.”

Now Seth says:

I learned this when I worked for NYSERDA. One of the things that made me work harder. 1% of  sub Saharan Africa can power the world. 9% of the Mohave desert can power the USA. You need to use energy storage. Combined its the one two combo. Add wind and tidal. It’s really over.

For the entire story from CleanTechnica on July 19th, 2017 by Steve Hanley