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Is there enough potential capacity of solar + wind + hydro to meet total future demand though?

Yes. And very easily too. ANU did a study in Australia and found pump hydro could cover 100% of the supply needs while only using a small fraction of available sites. Australia is a very flat country so I'd imagine it is even easier in most countries.

See http://www.anu.edu.au/news/all-news/anu-finds-22000-potentia...



Australia is also very large and very low population. Less than 2/3rds the population of California but about 18 times the area.


That shouldn't really matter. It was something like 1% (?) of the available sites to make Australia 100% renewable. So in the US it might be 15% - except that the US has a lot more mountains and a lot more water near population centers.




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