[DennisP]

Power plants right now have to optimize for working around varying wind/solar supply, but if we tried to run civilization on wind/solar alone, we'd rediscover the need for good baseload supply when the wind stops blowing at night.

[Tade0]

Actually no, because this function is already being taken over by gas peaker plants. It's less expensive to have such a plant and fire it once in a while than to keep a large nuclear/coal plant churning.

[DennisP]

Both of us were talking about the long run, and what I said was "wind/solar alone." Of course we can run on wind/solar/gas but that doesn't decarbonize the grid.