Mobile MW-scale solar microgrids
Los Angeles and Reno-Tahoe
Joined November 2019
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Corey Johnson retweeted
it is pretty incredible how solar generation keeps growing at a breakneck pace despite the best efforts of the current administration to force everyone to use fossil fuels
Corey Johnson retweeted
This 100MW data center in UAE is the largest solar powered datacenter in the world. There are currently 1,300 data centers in the world that are bigger than this one, but this one is the largest solar powered one.
That’s 10 square kilometres of solar panels you can see.
The datacenter itself is 0.02 square kilometres, so a solar powered datacenter is ~500x larger than a data center using any other form of power.
A five hundred times larger site.
UAE has some of the highest solar irradiance anywhere on Earth, it is an inhospitable desert. Averaging 9.7 hours of sunlight per day with average irradiance above 2,200 kWh/m^2.
If you build this somewhere else, you need more solar panels because your irradiance will almost certainly be lower.
Even if the world had an infinite supply of free solar panels, solar power will not be free.
Anyone who has ever done major capital projects, who looks at where data centers need to be in the next 5 years and the next 10 years… we know it aint solar. Sorry.
You struggle to even build a train track that’s 100 miles long and 10ft wide anywhere in the West, there is zero chance of build 100 square mile solar farms for GW compute.
This is why people are talking about space compute. Deploying into space is one strategy to solve the constraints.
But there are faster and more scalable strategies, that get you to mass deployment of multi GW data centers.
There are strategies that also allow you to power the 10 billion robots and their newtonian actuators, that immediately follow the inference demand cycle.
Step back and look at the full cycle of this industrial revolution… There will be billions of chips, but there will be trillions of actuators.
This biggest part of this revolution is the embodiment cycle, and it’s big by a factor of 20 or 50x over the stuff that comes before it.
There is no analogy in human history for the scale of this economy, of the demand it will place on energy and commodities.
The humans own the Earth, and if you exist inside their legal system, they won’t let you turn the surface of their planet into glass.
But they do want your chips and your actuators to serve their needs and desires. There is a way to do all of this, and so it will happen.
Readers added context they thought people might want to know
The circled area is not the data center, it is the power substation. The system also supplies Dubai and wider area with an aim to provide 75% of all its power so is not just supplying the data center. x.com/philroberts/st…
Corey Johnson retweeted
John Gerrard's "Western Flag" is probably the most relevant work of art right now.
Corey Johnson retweeted
The Sun is the limit.
Even if there were another source that could compare in abundance, we still couldn't use more energy than we get from the Sun.
The limit is not how much energy we can get, but how much energy Earth can get rid of (via radiation).
We can use other energy sources, but every joule of heat we generate has to be balanced by a joule of sunlight we reject.
We can either harness the power of the Sun, or reject it.
lets go
2026 is going to be a life changing year. I don't know if I'm alone here, but I just feel it in my bones that the optimists will win. Slop algos, time is running out doom, you can feel the collective exhaustion. People yearn for the real, and there's no greater opportunity to embody it
Build something with a pure message, be so refreshingly human, simply impossible to not stand out. Those who dare to distribute the white pill, internet culture is yours to shape. Purpose is back. Passion is in. Inspire more of the world to live again by simply living ourselves. Exciting times ahead, be there no matter what
Corey Johnson retweeted
since a fuck ton of people dm on why lowercase writing & now some complaints on copying… lemme explain the my thesis on lowercase:
i have a deep disdain for capital letters because uniform text is cleaner, more elegant.. there is no arbitrary hierarchy, no forced structure disrupting the flow.
lowercase removes friction, lets ideas stand on their own. everything exists on the same plane, creating balance, visual harmony, & a kind of effortless cohesion. it also lets your brain process information faster ironically.
i’ve been writing this way since middle school, even in professional emails. when i worked in corporate i would send vp’s emails in all lowercase. people lose their minds over it, mistaking it for laziness when it’s actually a deliberate considered choice. ppl’s frustration only proves the point… which is how fragile their attachment to meaningless formality really is. also sama didn’t invent lowercase writing just like he didn’t invent the transformer.
lowercase is better.
had to be done
Introducing the first utility-scale clean energy power plant at @burningman - SOLAR STATION ☀️
💚 Intended as the clean energy counterpart to Hell Station, SOLAR STATION is an offering from @SOLARPUNKSCLUB in partnership with @MayanWarrior_ that generates 2MWh+ of solar energy a day - pro bono.
🌞 Over eight days, this solar microgrid generates enough clean energy to fully charge (from 0 to 100%): 30,000+ e-bikes OR 130+ large art cars OR 2,600+ small mutant vehicles OR 1,000,000+ phones.
⚡ The solar energy will be made free for Black Rock City citizens to power mutant vehicles, e-bikes, phones, art and more - 24/7. The other portion of renewable energy is intended to power all of @MayanWarrior_ and SOLARPUNKS camp infrastructure (including RVs) fully from the power of the sun.
⛽ Decentralized clean energy means communities can capture economic value instead of shipping profits to fossil fuel shareholders. This demonstration is also a field test for displacing large diesel generators with clean electrons across disaster relief, festivals, construction sites, film productions — anywhere portable power currently means portable pollution.
🔋 For a spark of climate optimism, come visit SOLAR STATION on 2+K. SOLARPUNKS attendants will be available to lend chargers and answer questions
🔌 Charging outlets are available around the clock and we recommend that you Bring Your Own Charger (BYOC) to ensure compatibility. Reach out if you want to power your electric art car with clean electrons!
🌎 The climate math is unforgiving, but if we retire fossil fuel infrastructure in time, we can make it — the technology exists and the economics are inevitable. Climate doomerism is not a strategy.
—————
☀️ Let's design our fossil fuel-free future together now. Come charge up on 2+K and let’s link up ways to advance this impact off playa! ☀️
#BurningMan #blackrockcity #solarpunks #tomorrowtoday
Corey Johnson retweeted
The Cortège
A Gathering at the Twilight
of the World we once knew.
tickets on sale now
World Premiere
September 11 2025
at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center
thecortege.co
future
New video of @Tesla’s brand new off-grid Supercharger in Lost Hills, California.
• 12 pull-through stalls for ppl towing
• 168 stall Supercharger (84 stalls open now, rest later this year)
• 11 MW of ground mount solar & canopies, on 30 acres of land
• 10 Tesla Megapacks with 39 MWh of storage
• Only 1.5 MW grid service, ahead of a future expansion
Thanks for taking this video @romestrach
Corey Johnson retweeted
Hi @Energy, welcome to 2025👍
Corey Johnson retweeted
I have good news, and I have bad news.
The good news is: the cavalry is coming. We are saved. The crisis will be resolved. The problem will be solved.
The bad news is: if you are reading this, you’re the cavalry.
we literally trust and rely on science in EVERY single aspect of our lives and society. the idea of selectively and preferentially disregarding it when it comes to climate is absolutely reckless and beyond my ability to comprehend.
