Those reports are rarely telling the whole story. While it's technically true that solar power plants can beat traditional power sources in cost/kWh, that doesn't factor in energy storage. The...
I keep seeing reports about how the cost of solar and other renewable sources of energy are starting to dip below the price of coal, so what's driving this continued investment in the latter? Of course, renewables aren't as stable as fossil fuels, but surely that can't be the only factor at play here. I can't imagine the difference between peak and off-peak is big enough that any country is going to need to rely on coal to such an extent in the coming years.
Those reports are rarely telling the whole story. While it's technically true that solar power plants can beat traditional power sources in cost/kWh, that doesn't factor in energy storage. The amount of investment needed to make them behave as though they were traditional base load power plants is significantly more than the cost of the solar plant itself. At present, it's so much more that it's very rarely done: the more popular technique is to use solar or wind while you can, and have a fossil fuel plant waiting in the wings to pick up the slack.
Those reports are rarely telling the whole story. While it's technically true that solar power plants can beat traditional power sources in cost/kWh, that doesn't factor in energy storage. The amount of investment needed to make them behave as though they were traditional base load power plants is significantly more than the cost of the solar plant itself. At present, it's so much more that it's very rarely done: the more popular technique is to use solar or wind while you can, and have a fossil fuel plant waiting in the wings to pick up the slack.