[gpm]

You can, and should, over the entirety of europe apart from the northern parts of the nordic countries electric heat pumps are now simply more efficient than gas powered furnaces. This is true even if powered by gas based electricity - but obviously makes it possible to power them via renewables as well.

People in Quebec (Canada), which is colder than just about all of Europe, have been providing heating in winter using renewables for decades (thanks to an excess of renewables).

[mono442]

most of the countries don't have enough hydro to make it feasible

[gpm]

Yeah, but now wind and solar have made it feasible just about everywhere.

[mono442]

There's little sunshine in winter. Wind is better but it's still intermittent.

[oblio]

There are a gazillion battery techs being developed right now (regular lithium ion - with variations like NMC, LFP, ...), solid state lithion ion, sodium ion.

You can over provision solar as someone said.

There's geothermal, tidal, etc.

Long distance high voltage electricity transmission at scale.

Electricity is a marvel and we're just starting to scratch the surface of what we can do with it. Betting against it is like betting against electronics, a risky proposition.

[jdlshore]

Panels are cheap enough that you can overprovision for winter sun.

[lostlogin]

And geothermal, biogas and tidal.