A short review and discussion about the limiting factors, which can hold back wind and photovoltaic power plants from its presently exponential growth

Abstract

The present nearly exponential growth of the cumulative installation power of wind and photovoltaic power plants is very promising in the context of a rapid reduction of the emission of CO2, which can lead to a swift mitigation climate change if this growth behavior is maintained in the future. In this review we identify a set of ten limiting factors that can restrain, or halt back, an exponential growth of these variable renewable power plants (VREs) in the future. If the exponential growth slows down to a linear growth, such a case would extent considerably the time to reduce the CO2 emissions and the related mitigation of climate change. A scenario that would result to a much higher risk of a future continuation of the economic grow and thrive of the global economy and human society. We argue that if these limiting factors are adequately addressed to an exponential expansion VRE power plants is feasible and can result in the nearly complete avoidance of CO2 emissions as related to energy generation and consumption in 2030.