Yesterday, I was driving a friend’s family back to their home in my new Volvo
after they helped with the cleanup following a party at our place. While
driving, I explained to their daughter, how the car works. She was curious
about the battery indicator below the speed reading on the display in the
center. I told her "we were driving on solar energy—the sunshine drives us
home and will take me back up the hills“.
When she asked how it works, I explained that the panels on the roof
capture sunlight, generate electricity, and store it in a battery. This electricity
powers our house and charges the car. Occasionally, we feed excess
electricity back into the grid. It feels quite funny passing petrol stations now
because I never stop there for gasoline. She also asked about gears, and I
explained that electric cars don’t have gears. They can go from 0 to 100 km/
h in just a few seconds without shifting gears—just press the pedal, which
isn’t a „gas pedal" anymore.
This conversation got me thinking about our journey to make our home and
life more CO2 efficient and energy-independent and how renewable energy
can be both intermittent and permanently adaptive.
