Renewable energies are dependent on the weather and the sunshine, which makes them inherently unreliable. From Daniel Lacalle at dlacalle.com:
On April 23rd, I participated in a conference at the European Parliament on the future of nuclear energy with experts from all over Europe, where I warned that, with the current energy policies, blackouts will be the norm, not a coincidence.
The shortsighted and sectarian policy of the activists who populate the government has led us to the worst blackout in the history of Spain. We have been without communication or electricity for nearly eleven hours.
This blackout, with the immediate collapse of fifteen gigawatts of power in the system, is the consequence of a policy that penalizes base energy, key to providing stability to the system, and plunders the energy sector.
Governments have been dedicated to closing nuclear power plants, making them unviable with abusive and confiscatory taxation; penalizing investment in distribution with absurd regulations; imposing a volatile and intermittent energy mix; and burdening energy with elevated taxes and administrative delays. What could go wrong? Everything.
And it happened.
Renewable energies, while essential in a balanced energy mix, cannot provide safety and stability due to their volatility and intermittent nature. That’s why it is essential to have a balanced system with base-load energy that operates all the time, such as hydropower, nuclear, and natural gas as backup.