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points by dgudkov 3 days ago | 0 comments
> Solar panels still work just fine when it is cloudy, just with a lower output.

I assume you never tried measuring the output of a solar panel when it's cloudy. It's 10-15% of a sunny day. Closer to not working than working.

[–] bruce511 3 days ago
Depends on the cloud. Where I live I routinely get 50% generation on a "cloudy" day.

On a rainy day that drops closer to 20%.

As an aside - cloudy days avoid a problem I have with shade. In winter, at 3:30pm, the sun goes behind a tree and my production plummets to near zero. If there's cloud cover the sunlight is far more dispersed and there's no "shade".

[–] andsoitis 3 days ago
> On a rainy day that drops closer to 20%

And you’re still able to power your entire home? What if the rain lasts for a few days, which is pretty common in many places.

[–] bruce511 3 days ago
No, 20% is not sufficient to power the home. I'm still attached to the grid and use grid power even solar is too low.
[–] stephen_g 3 days ago
Worst I've had over a day in the last few months on my home solar is about 25% of my maximum daily generation. It was one day in a very rainy week here in Brisbane Australia.

I did have one rainy day back in the middle of Winter that was 16% but that will end up being literally the worst day of the year.

[–] tialaramex 2 days ago
To be fair Australia is very sunny. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_irradiance

It also has relatively wealthy people, living in lots of individual housing units. If you wanted to design a country that's perfect for rooftop solar your imagination might come up with Australia.

That said, Australia ought to be able to run almost everything off solar given how sunny it is, and instead solar is a distant second behind coal for electricity production. So there's plenty of work left to do.