[iso1631]

> solar becoming the world's primary source of energy

Solar has always been the primary source of energy, Something like 99.95%, with geothermal taking 90% of the rest and tidal being basically zero

[leonidasrup]

You can look at coal, oil, gas as form of compressed solar energy, because all of them have biological source, stored millions of year ago. It's just burning coal, oil, gas has nasty side effects.

" Volcanic coal-burning in Siberia led to climate change 252 million years ago.

Extensive burning in Siberia was a cause of the Permo-Triassic extinction " https://www.nsf.gov/news/volcanic-coal-burning-siberia-led-c...

[iso1631]

You can.

Oil consumption is about 4,000 TWh per year, or about 10^19 Joules.

The Earth receives about 170,000 TWh per year of Solar energy.

[xbmcuser]

The Earth receives approximately 173,000 terawatts (TW) of solar power continuously, not per year.

[ilogik]

What about nuclear?

[leonidasrup]

Uranium is only naturally formed by the r-process (rapid neutron capture) in supernovae and neutron star mergers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium#Origin

[guepe]

Fuel was created by the explosion of supernovae, still solar but not our sun.

[Lambdanaut]

By that logic, all of the Earth and the moon were once parts of stars, so tidal and geothermal are also solar.

When people say "solar energy", they are usually referring to first order solar energy, directly from photons, not second or third order solar energy after it has been trapped into other sources of potential energy.

[eqvinox]

Tidal kinda isn't solar since it's from rotation's and orbits' energies though.

[philipallstar]

If it's not our sun then it isn't solar.

[triceratops]

Pedantry I can get behind. Cheers

[pfdietz]

Probably neutron star collisions, actually.

[iso1631]

tiny insignificant amounts