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Winder power is never just wind power. Looking at the power generation of example Germany we see a massive 75%+ use of wind power in good conditions, but then s

by belorn 8y ago

Winder power is never just wind power. Looking at the power generation of example Germany we see a massive 75%+ use of wind power in good conditions, but then see it all replaced with coal + oil + gas when it is not. Power generation is no longer based on demand. Weather sets the energy price, which dictate when it is economical to use fossil fuels. Wind is already at the point where the price per wat is fantastic, the environmental effect minimal, but if you include the need to infuse dirty energy when weather is not optimal the average wat start to look very different. If we have to pick between wind + coal, or only nuclear, the carbon emission will favor nuclear. An other version is wind + fewer nuclear plants and lower energy usage during low wind conditions, but there is only so much that the energy usage drop when prices goes up. There is also a bunch of wind + "battery" research, but I have not heard of any national power grid fully investing in that.

DennisP 8y ago
Solar seems like a decent pair with nuclear. Use nuclear at the level of night-time load, solar covers the extra daytime demand, and any remaining discrepancy you cover with either storage or extra nuclear, whichever is cheaper. A couple years ago MIT had a simulator online that let you try out different grid energy combinations to see their total cost, and this was the cheapest I came up with.
- froindt 8y ago
  I believe this is the simulation. https://forio.com/simulate/mit/cleanstart/simulation/index.html https://forio.com/simulate/mit/cleanstart/simulation/index.h...
  - DennisP 8y ago
    That's not it but it looks interesting! The one I mentioned let you pick different proportions of energy sources for the entire U.S. grid, and told you how much it would cost, the carbon impact, etc.
benj111 8y ago
I'm not sure why you're being downvoted. You make some reasonable points. I would say though, in the short term, we could stand to increase renewables massively with out needing to solve the storage problem, virtually every watt of installed capacity we add is directly offsetting dirty producers. Grid scale battery storage is just starting to be implemented, theres also hydro, and 'smart' grid solutions. Whether any of this turns out to be a silver bullet I don't know.
- belorn 8y ago
  Yes. Short term renewables supplement existing grid and reduce the average pollution. It is good to reduce the problem and should be used so that on good conditions it will practically take over all production. However it can not replace the polluting producers on its own, who seem to have started to switch operation to mostly when there is not enough renewables to supply the demand (marginal costs like fuel + investment vs the so-called merit order). Nuclear could operate just like the dirty producers and only operate when the combined wind and solar is too low for the demand, which would further reduce the environmental impact, but the massive investment needed in nuclear makes the economics of it a bit complex and I have not read if the marginal costs of nuclear operations make this a viable tactic. It would however reduce the nuclear pollution down to the gaps where wind and solar is not enough. That leaves future tech solutions. Smart grids sounds great, through I do not know how big part of it is a political issue or technical problem. Just getting the steel industry to focus operation on energy producing peaks seems to be a major challenge, and they already have the incentive that the energy get cheaper if they do so. Converting hydro to create burst of power rather than continuously is also something very interesting but has also both political and technical issues to solve. Then we have different from of battery ideas, all from pumping water to different heat capturing concepts, through I think that is even further away form being implemented on a large scale. The article talks about the proposed subsidy, and this is where I think we need to think about the grid as a whole. If the goal is to fill the gap when wind and solar can't supply the demand then the discussion should not be renewable vs nuclear. It is very possible that the specific subsidy is a bad tactic and they would be better served by trying to narrow the gap with even more wind and solar, but then we need data to show that existing dirty producers are preferred over nuclear in order to fill the remaining gap. That to me is a hard sell, but I am open to be convinced :).
pytester 8y ago
>Looking at the power generation of example Germany we see a massive 75%+ use of wind power in good conditions, but then see it all replaced with coal + oil + gas when it is not. The last time I looked they were importing power from abroad when it's not, which usually meant pulling in excess power from French nuclear plants.
- belorn 8y ago
  Usage vs production is one of areas where I have had a hard time to get good data. I mostly base my own understand on https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&remote=true&wind=false&countryCode=DE https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&rem... and https://www.energy-charts.de/power.htm?source=all-sources&year=2018 https://www.energy-charts.de/power.htm?source=all-sources&ye... That said, there is a lot of import/export in Europe on the energy grid.
yk 8y ago
Thing is nuclear can not be only nuclear. Or actually it can, but then you should compare it to other science fiction tech like solar in orbit, because the kind of reactors that can be steered to demand has just not been designed yet.

by belorn 8y ago

DennisP 8y ago

Solar seems like a decent pair with nuclear. Use nuclear at the level of night-time load, solar covers the extra daytime demand, and any remaining discrepancy you cover with either storage or extra nuclear, whichever is cheaper. A couple years ago MIT had a simulator online that let you try out different grid energy combinations to see their total cost, and this was the cheapest I came up with.

froindt 8y ago
I believe this is the simulation. https://forio.com/simulate/mit/cleanstart/simulation/index.html https://forio.com/simulate/mit/cleanstart/simulation/index.h...
- DennisP 8y ago
  That's not it but it looks interesting! The one I mentioned let you pick different proportions of energy sources for the entire U.S. grid, and told you how much it would cost, the carbon impact, etc.

benj111 8y ago

I'm not sure why you're being downvoted. You make some reasonable points. I would say though, in the short term, we could stand to increase renewables massively with out needing to solve the storage problem, virtually every watt of installed capacity we add is directly offsetting dirty producers. Grid scale battery storage is just starting to be implemented, theres also hydro, and 'smart' grid solutions. Whether any of this turns out to be a silver bullet I don't know.

belorn 8y ago
Yes. Short term renewables supplement existing grid and reduce the average pollution. It is good to reduce the problem and should be used so that on good conditions it will practically take over all production. However it can not replace the polluting producers on its own, who seem to have started to switch operation to mostly when there is not enough renewables to supply the demand (marginal costs like fuel + investment vs the so-called merit order). Nuclear could operate just like the dirty producers and only operate when the combined wind and solar is too low for the demand, which would further reduce the environmental impact, but the massive investment needed in nuclear makes the economics of it a bit complex and I have not read if the marginal costs of nuclear operations make this a viable tactic. It would however reduce the nuclear pollution down to the gaps where wind and solar is not enough. That leaves future tech solutions. Smart grids sounds great, through I do not know how big part of it is a political issue or technical problem. Just getting the steel industry to focus operation on energy producing peaks seems to be a major challenge, and they already have the incentive that the energy get cheaper if they do so. Converting hydro to create burst of power rather than continuously is also something very interesting but has also both political and technical issues to solve. Then we have different from of battery ideas, all from pumping water to different heat capturing concepts, through I think that is even further away form being implemented on a large scale. The article talks about the proposed subsidy, and this is where I think we need to think about the grid as a whole. If the goal is to fill the gap when wind and solar can't supply the demand then the discussion should not be renewable vs nuclear. It is very possible that the specific subsidy is a bad tactic and they would be better served by trying to narrow the gap with even more wind and solar, but then we need data to show that existing dirty producers are preferred over nuclear in order to fill the remaining gap. That to me is a hard sell, but I am open to be convinced :).

pytester 8y ago

>Looking at the power generation of example Germany we see a massive 75%+ use of wind power in good conditions, but then see it all replaced with coal + oil + gas when it is not. The last time I looked they were importing power from abroad when it's not, which usually meant pulling in excess power from French nuclear plants.

belorn 8y ago
Usage vs production is one of areas where I have had a hard time to get good data. I mostly base my own understand on https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&remote=true&wind=false&countryCode=DE https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&rem... and https://www.energy-charts.de/power.htm?source=all-sources&year=2018 https://www.energy-charts.de/power.htm?source=all-sources&ye... That said, there is a lot of import/export in Europe on the energy grid.

yk 8y ago

Thing is nuclear can not be only nuclear. Or actually it can, but then you should compare it to other science fiction tech like solar in orbit, because the kind of reactors that can be steered to demand has just not been designed yet.