[reitzensteinm]

You know, you're right. I had previously thought that was infeasible due to transmission losses, but I ran the numbers (which I should have done before posting the above), and it would only require a worst case of 50% losses, and ~4000 of today's HVDC cables going around the world. And probably quite a bit better, since that assumes that half the world is getting its power from the other half all the time.

I still think everyone owning an electric car for storage is probably a more realistic plan, but it's definitely not impossible to create a world energy grid and run the world even just from solar.

Your comment is exactly right; a blend is what's needed. Though in the case of solar, a blend still requires very long, very high capacity HDVC cables.