Khan: Over 100 startups attempted alternative solar cells before silicon won
Shayle Kann · The better mousetrap fallacy · Sep 12, 2024 · at 9:37
Shail Khan (host of Catalyst) and Andy Lubershane discuss the historical shakeout in solar photovoltaics and why incremental startup alternatives failed against scaling crystalline silicon.
0:00 / 0:18exact quote · 18.8s
720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“Cause back before it was obvious that crystal and silicon was going to be The dominant winner. There were a hundred technology startups. I mean, literally a hundred technology startups doing different kinds of solar cells, lots of different thin film stuff, SIGs, cadmium telluride, amorphous silicon, you know, people who've been around this industry will remember all this stuff.”
quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →
More from Shayle Kann
Kann: Electric vehicles will never discharge to the grid at scale
“I do not think we'll ever see vehicles discharging into the grid at scale.”
Kann: Sulfur injection could cool Earth 0.5°C for $2 billion
“Specifically, you might be able to get about a half a degree Celsius of global cooling out of stratospheric sulfur injection for a couple of billion dollars, which is nothing, basically, comparatively.”
Kann: Software engineering is the only job category truly displaced by AI to date
“And in fact, the only jobs that have been lost really because of AI to date are like software engineers.”
Kann: V2G economics do not pencil for EV drivers with $7,000 hardware
“GM, for example, their bi-directional charging bundle runs about 7000 dollars before installation. And grid programs so far have paid drivers a lot less than that. It just doesn't pencil.”
Kann: Power is the rate limiter to AI growth
“And understanding the multiple factors that drive failure of new transmission, I think, is key to understanding why power is, in my opinion, The rate limiter to AI growth, and why upward pressure on electricity prices will probably sustain for a while.”
Kann: Almost none of the 50 GW data center pipeline is off-grid
“There's like, 50 gigawatts of behind-the-meter generation and development at data centers, right? And they, and some people have interpreted that to be, oh, 50 gigawatts of off-grid data centers getting built. It's actually close to zero of those that are true…”