Sure, attaching solar panels to roofs, building windmills in backyards or deploying other small-scale energy technologies is a fine idea, Microsoft’s co-founder told a packed auditorium at the Wired Business Conference: Disruptive by Design.

Trouble is, they can’t significantly aide developing nations thirsty for cheap energy, he said.

“If you’re interested in cuteness, the stuff in the home is the place to go. If you’re interested in solving the world’s energy problems, it’s things like big [solar projects] in the desert.”

For an example of a big energy solution, read up on the world’s largest solar thermal power booster being added to an existing coal-fired power plant in Australia. This Kogan Creek project boosts the coal plant’s output with 44MW solar power from an AREVA Solar booster, and avoids 36,000 tons of carbon emissions every year.

Bill Gates is also an outspoken supporter of nuclear energy as an important energy option and, as described by Green Tech, “Gates is putting his money where his mouth is. He is an investor in his friend Nathan Myrhvold’s nuclear reactor startup Terrapower, which is designing one such next-generation nuclear reactor”

… as for cute …

Good post from blogger Matt Yglesias on the actual cost of coal:

Each stage in the life cycle of coal—extraction, transport, processing, and combustion—generates a waste stream and carries multiple hazards for health and the environment. These costs are external to the coal industry and are thus often considered “externalities.” We estimate that the life cycle effects of coal and the waste stream generated are costing the U.S. public a third to over one-half of a trillion dollars annually.

And he closes with this:

Coal-fired electricity is cheap for roughly the same reason that pulling a dine and dash at a fancy restaurant is a cheap way to get a nice dinner.

From 80 + 1′s experts’ debate on nuclear energy vs. coal energy:

Nuclear has about the same carbon footprint as wind but is astronomically more compact and efficient and operates at 90 percent capacity (coal: 53 percent capacity; wind: 34 percent). Nuclear waste is therefore tiny in volume. The world’s entire annual inventory could fit in one large townhouse. Nuclear waste recycling, done abroad, drastically reduces volume, radioactivity, and the need for long-term disposal. Civilian nuclear plants have never produced atomic bombs.