6 ms·

> Base-load power is the power that continues to be generated even when there is low demand for it. That is wrong. Base load is the minimum demand of electrici

> Base-load power is the power that continues to be generated even when there is low demand for it. That is wrong. Base load is the minimum demand of electricity at any given moment over a time span. The base load that a wind turbine without buffer storage can supply is zero. The same goes for solar, obviously. The vast majority of renewable energy in Germany happens to be wind, its storage and transport remains the biggest (and unsolved) challenge.

lispm 8y ago
> its storage and transport remains the biggest (and unsolved) challenge. It's not 'unsolved' - it's just that it was economically not useful nor necessary nor wanted to store wind electricity in larger scales and this might be the case for another decade. Then we will see more storage coming online. I live in Northern Germany with some possibility for higher wind electricity production. To store that one way is to build HVDC lines to Norway to store the excess electricity there as hydro power. One line is currently under construction and another one has been planned. The Netherlands is operating such a line to Norway since 2008. Additionally inside Germany there is more delivery of wind-generated electricity to the south of Germany planned. It's not 'unsolved' in the sense that we don't know what to do. It's just that storage needs are just starting to increase. Similar to PV solar technology - without a market no investment. Without investment, no market. Germany jump-started the PV solar market with its investments due to Renewable Energy Law. We will see similar effects in the coming decades for storage.
- zeroname 8y ago
  > It's not 'unsolved' - it's just that it was economically not useful nor necessary nor wanted to store wind electricity in larger scales and this might be the case for another decade. Then we will see more storage coming online. The whole thing wasn't economically useful or necessary from the very beginning, otherwise it wouldn't have needed massive subsidies that made Germany have the most expensive electricity in Europe. > It's not 'unsolved' in the sense that we don't know what to do. It's just that storage needs are just starting to increase. You don't know what to do. The storage requirements are massive: https://www.oulu.fi/blogs/how-much-storage-does-the-energiewende-need https://www.oulu.fi/blogs/how-much-storage-does-the-energiew... Think about it, if you did know what to do, why aren't all the politicians pointing to some clear-cut roadmap on how to achieve the goal, using all the great engineering prowess that Germany is famous for?
  - lispm 8y ago
    > The whole thing wasn't economically useful or necessary from the very beginning That's your claim. Enough people here have been thinking the opposite. > otherwise it wouldn't have needed massive subsidies that made Germany have the most expensive electricity in Europe. Actually Germany a) does not have generally the most expensive electricity in Europe - check out industry prices for electricity in Europe. If you followed recent protests in France, then you have seen that is also about higher energy prices for the public - which has been kept artificially low so far. https://www.euractiv.com/section/electricity/news/yellow-vests-killed-eu-bid-to-phase-out-regulated-electricity-prices/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/electricity/news/yellow-ves... b) its also useful to make energy expensive - it helps to keep energy consumption low and the money gets invested back into modern infrastructure, research&development, build-up of new industries, ... > The storage requirements are massive That's a very shallow study about a non-goal (100%). A more detailed study from 2013: https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2013/speicher-in-der-energiewende/Agora_Speicherstudie_Web.pdf https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2013/s... a shorter english version https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2013/speicher-in-der-energiewende/Agora_Speicherstudie_EN_web.pdf https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2013/s... The current big picture of the Energiewende for 2030... https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2017/Big_Picture/134_Big-Picture_EN_WEB.pdf https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2017/B...
    - woodpanel 8y ago
      Again, your „data“ consists solely of political aligned think-tanks. Agora Energiewende is by no means a neutral organisation, with even proponents of green energy repeatedly criticizing agora for deliberately “making false assumptions out of unambiguous datasets”. [1] [1] “Aus zum Teil eindeutigem Datenmaterial werden falsche und zudem nicht im Einklang mit bisherigen politischen Aussagen und Zusicherungen stehende Schlüsse gezogen.” https://senertec-center-nrw-sued.de/File/MR%207b_Stellungnahme%20des%20B%20KWK%20zur%20Studie%20der%20Agora%20Energiewende%20DIE%20ROLLE%20DER.pdf https://senertec-center-nrw-sued.de/File/MR%207b_Stellungnah...
      - 8y ago
oska 8y ago
Germany does not have a single wind turbine in a single location. It has vast numbers of them across many locations, many of which are situated in areas with near near constant wind. Across the whole portfolio of this production resource there is a certain minimum level of production which is consistently maintained. And, unlike a coal plant, there is almost zero risk of the whole system failing. In my country (Australia) we frequently see coal power plants 'trip' (breakdown), particularly in hot weather. [1] And on the question of the definition of base-load, it was originally defined in terms of supply (production). Yes, the meaning has spread to demand but the idea that base-load demand must be supplied by 'base-load' power plants such as coal or nuclear is a piece of sophistry that quickly dissolves when it is examined closely. Just one reason being that their supply is not guaranteed (as I have described above). [1] https://medium.com/@TheAustraliaInstitute/gas-coal-power-has-broken-down-114-times-so-far-this-year-fair-dinkum-1c87043a9251 https://medium.com/@TheAustraliaInstitute/gas-coal-power-has...
- zeroname 8y ago
  > Germany does not have a single wind turbine in a single location. It has vast numbers of them across many locations, many of which are situated in areas with near near constant wind. Across the whole portfolio of this production resource there is a certain minimum level of production which is consistently maintained. Yes, but it's a fraction of total output and it's nowhere near enough to supply the actual base load. > Yes, the meaning has spread to demand but the idea that base-load demand must be supplied by 'base-load' power plants such as coal or nuclear is a piece of sophistry that quickly dissolves when it is examined closely. Just one reason being that their supply is not guaranteed (as I have described above). What quickly dissolves into sophistry is the idea that wind energy is remotely comparable to coal or nuclear in terms of supplying base load. Yes, an individual coal plant doesn't have 100% reliability, but it's still massively less volatile than wind. > [1] https://medium.com/@TheAustraliaInstitute/gas-coal-power-has.. https://medium.com/@TheAustraliaInstitute/gas-coal-power-has.... Okay, let's look at Australia: https://reneweconomy.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Disappearing-role-of-baseload-power-in-south-australia-copy.jpg https://reneweconomy.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Disap... What's that big grey part that is "dispatchable"? It's mostly natural gas, which Australia has plenty of (7% of exports), but Germany would need to import. Australians can pat themselves on the back for not using any more coal in the grid, but they still ship it off (16% of exports) for someone else to burn it.

lispm 8y ago

> its storage and transport remains the biggest (and unsolved) challenge. It's not 'unsolved' - it's just that it was economically not useful nor necessary nor wanted to store wind electricity in larger scales and this might be the case for another decade. Then we will see more storage coming online. I live in Northern Germany with some possibility for higher wind electricity production. To store that one way is to build HVDC lines to Norway to store the excess electricity there as hydro power. One line is currently under construction and another one has been planned. The Netherlands is operating such a line to Norway since 2008. Additionally inside Germany there is more delivery of wind-generated electricity to the south of Germany planned. It's not 'unsolved' in the sense that we don't know what to do. It's just that storage needs are just starting to increase. Similar to PV solar technology - without a market no investment. Without investment, no market. Germany jump-started the PV solar market with its investments due to Renewable Energy Law. We will see similar effects in the coming decades for storage.

zeroname 8y ago
> It's not 'unsolved' - it's just that it was economically not useful nor necessary nor wanted to store wind electricity in larger scales and this might be the case for another decade. Then we will see more storage coming online. The whole thing wasn't economically useful or necessary from the very beginning, otherwise it wouldn't have needed massive subsidies that made Germany have the most expensive electricity in Europe. > It's not 'unsolved' in the sense that we don't know what to do. It's just that storage needs are just starting to increase. You don't know what to do. The storage requirements are massive: https://www.oulu.fi/blogs/how-much-storage-does-the-energiewende-need https://www.oulu.fi/blogs/how-much-storage-does-the-energiew... Think about it, if you did know what to do, why aren't all the politicians pointing to some clear-cut roadmap on how to achieve the goal, using all the great engineering prowess that Germany is famous for?
- lispm 8y ago
  > The whole thing wasn't economically useful or necessary from the very beginning That's your claim. Enough people here have been thinking the opposite. > otherwise it wouldn't have needed massive subsidies that made Germany have the most expensive electricity in Europe. Actually Germany a) does not have generally the most expensive electricity in Europe - check out industry prices for electricity in Europe. If you followed recent protests in France, then you have seen that is also about higher energy prices for the public - which has been kept artificially low so far. https://www.euractiv.com/section/electricity/news/yellow-vests-killed-eu-bid-to-phase-out-regulated-electricity-prices/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/electricity/news/yellow-ves... b) its also useful to make energy expensive - it helps to keep energy consumption low and the money gets invested back into modern infrastructure, research&development, build-up of new industries, ... > The storage requirements are massive That's a very shallow study about a non-goal (100%). A more detailed study from 2013: https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2013/speicher-in-der-energiewende/Agora_Speicherstudie_Web.pdf https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2013/s... a shorter english version https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2013/speicher-in-der-energiewende/Agora_Speicherstudie_EN_web.pdf https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2013/s... The current big picture of the Energiewende for 2030... https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2017/Big_Picture/134_Big-Picture_EN_WEB.pdf https://www.agora-energiewende.de/fileadmin2/Projekte/2017/B...
  - woodpanel 8y ago
    Again, your „data“ consists solely of political aligned think-tanks. Agora Energiewende is by no means a neutral organisation, with even proponents of green energy repeatedly criticizing agora for deliberately “making false assumptions out of unambiguous datasets”. [1] [1] “Aus zum Teil eindeutigem Datenmaterial werden falsche und zudem nicht im Einklang mit bisherigen politischen Aussagen und Zusicherungen stehende Schlüsse gezogen.” https://senertec-center-nrw-sued.de/File/MR%207b_Stellungnahme%20des%20B%20KWK%20zur%20Studie%20der%20Agora%20Energiewende%20DIE%20ROLLE%20DER.pdf https://senertec-center-nrw-sued.de/File/MR%207b_Stellungnah...
    - 8y ago

oska 8y ago

Germany does not have a single wind turbine in a single location. It has vast numbers of them across many locations, many of which are situated in areas with near near constant wind. Across the whole portfolio of this production resource there is a certain minimum level of production which is consistently maintained. And, unlike a coal plant, there is almost zero risk of the whole system failing. In my country (Australia) we frequently see coal power plants 'trip' (breakdown), particularly in hot weather. [1] And on the question of the definition of base-load, it was originally defined in terms of supply (production). Yes, the meaning has spread to demand but the idea that base-load demand must be supplied by 'base-load' power plants such as coal or nuclear is a piece of sophistry that quickly dissolves when it is examined closely. Just one reason being that their supply is not guaranteed (as I have described above). [1] https://medium.com/@TheAustraliaInstitute/gas-coal-power-has-broken-down-114-times-so-far-this-year-fair-dinkum-1c87043a9251 https://medium.com/@TheAustraliaInstitute/gas-coal-power-has...

zeroname 8y ago
> Germany does not have a single wind turbine in a single location. It has vast numbers of them across many locations, many of which are situated in areas with near near constant wind. Across the whole portfolio of this production resource there is a certain minimum level of production which is consistently maintained. Yes, but it's a fraction of total output and it's nowhere near enough to supply the actual base load. > Yes, the meaning has spread to demand but the idea that base-load demand must be supplied by 'base-load' power plants such as coal or nuclear is a piece of sophistry that quickly dissolves when it is examined closely. Just one reason being that their supply is not guaranteed (as I have described above). What quickly dissolves into sophistry is the idea that wind energy is remotely comparable to coal or nuclear in terms of supplying base load. Yes, an individual coal plant doesn't have 100% reliability, but it's still massively less volatile than wind. > [1] https://medium.com/@TheAustraliaInstitute/gas-coal-power-has.. https://medium.com/@TheAustraliaInstitute/gas-coal-power-has.... Okay, let's look at Australia: https://reneweconomy.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Disappearing-role-of-baseload-power-in-south-australia-copy.jpg https://reneweconomy.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Disap... What's that big grey part that is "dispatchable"? It's mostly natural gas, which Australia has plenty of (7% of exports), but Germany would need to import. Australians can pat themselves on the back for not using any more coal in the grid, but they still ship it off (16% of exports) for someone else to burn it.