Can’t post the article because it is behind a paywall, but those of you who subscribe to the Washington Post will be interested in an article they just posted that we are running out of electric power and the grid can’t keep up with added renewables. If anyone can legally post the article, it would make for an interesting discussion topic on TMC.
Of course we would run out of energy if we do nothing.
That has been a fear in the past: running out of steam, whale oil, fossil oil, and now electricity.
Humans keep consuming a huge amount of energy and we should have ran out a long time ago but we never did because we keep adapting and find ways to get more energy.
Today EVs, data centers, crypto mining, A.I. computing growth.. can easily deplete our current energy supply. However, solar panels and battery storage has replaced some petroleum-based generators in some islands so it could scale up to meet the demand.
There are many other ways to get and store energy: wind, waves, tides...
The issue is utility companies try to restrict residential energy producers from sizing to various fees. So, yes, if utility companies keep penalizing residential producers, don't be surprised if there's an energy crisis.