4 ms·
It's been suggested. The problem is that having to run only during the day, and perhaps only in certain seasons, is a huge impediment to most of the application
by conjecTech 9y ago
It's been suggested. The problem is that having to run only during the day, and perhaps only in certain seasons, is a huge impediment to most of the applications you could think of because most energy intensive processes tend to be capital intensive as well.
For instance, I did some cursory analysis on building a chemical plant to do ammonia production in order to take advantage of the negative energy costs that were available in some parts of CA for hours a day thanks to a combination of the duck curve and the overcapacity at Oroville. When you're only running things 2-8 hours a day, you are amortizing the fixed costs over a much smaller output than something running constantly. Even getting paid several cents per kwh to take energy off the grid, it seemed hard to turn a profit.
- kaycebasques 9y agoBased on your username, I’m imagining Billy Quizboy reading out your post.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- flukus 9y agoWhat if you factor in storage? If your paid to take energy off grid you can store it and still potentially run 24/7.
- conjecTech 9y agoIt doesn't help. You'd account for the storage at opportunity cost (you could sell it back to the grid at night rather than using it). So you'd get the same economics as just pulling power off the grid 24/7. At least for this application, the output was worth less than the marginal cost of the electricity during the more normal periods. If you kept it running like that, you'd be showing a loss even before amortizing the CapEx, so running it constantly would produce worse results.