Hours of the Top 50 CAISO Electricity Loads in California, July 2019.

[Igel]

9. Which is why

we had such outrage when subsidies for solar power were reduced.

Not ended. Reduced.

Because solar power was so profitable.

That happened when the Obama-era home solar energy rebate ended. It happened when there were reductions in support for commercial solar power.

Note that costs have come way down, and it's still not profitable. If it was that profitable, there'd be no need for legislation to drive a shift to solar power. The greedy capitalists (so to speak) would be rushing towards it.

Which, oddly, is largely what's happened in Texas with wind energy. I often think that part of the love of solar apart from the fact that Helios has more adherents than Boreas is the fact that Texas dominates wind, while for years there was pushback against wind in the Finger Lakes region, off the coast of Long Island, and numerous other places noted for their aggressively RW politics. (Not!)

One wonders where nuclear power would be if it got the kind of government research investments that solar got.