6 ms·

Hydro is mostly built out. Scalable storage isn't proven. How does renewable replace base load?

jacobush 7y ago
This seems an unpopular opinion, but maybe we don't need more base load. Maybe we need more on availability load. With all the magic of connected devices, they could cope with varying electricity?
- cheerlessbog 7y ago
  Hearing, maybe refrigeration, in future electric car charging. Beyond that doesn't most load require consistent power?
  - jacobush 7y ago
    Heating + cooling must be the largest consumers. And these are great candidates for "layered" service.
  - Mvandenbergh 7y ago
    Of US Commercial electricity use about 40% is refrigeration, cooling, heating, and ventilation which can all time shifted at least intra-day with good building practices. 10% is lighting which realistically can't - you need lights when it's dark. 15% is computers which can sort of load shift because most office computers are now laptops - with good communications systems you can tell laptops how aggressively to charge / whether to run off battery. The rest is "other" quite a lot of which is small electronic devices like tablets and phones charging and then a grab-bag of misc. stuff. Half of residential electricity is some kind of temperature shifting (heating, cooling, refrigeration, freezers, ventilation). Essentially with good insulation you can get to a point where you can load shift 50%+ of your electricity consumption on an intra-day basis. Electric car charging of course is a perfect load to match to renewables as well. That doesn't solve the issue of inter-day fluctuations - what happens when you have a cloudy, high pressure system sitting over a substantial part of your generation for a week - but it does mean that we can go pretty far. We may have to keep more open-cycle gas around for those times which will have to be funded on a capacity basis.
    - ThrowawayR2 7y ago
      > ...most office computers are now laptops... Maybe in SV but not elsewhere. Plus servers that run 24x7 are probably the bulk of that 15%.
    - wolfram74 7y ago
      "with good building practices", "get to a point" this is planning an ideal future despite having a system where the legacy infrastructure very much still needs to be accommodated for. We can't disregard what already exists, and that involves a considerable amount of base load.
      - Mvandenbergh 7y ago
        1) We don't yet have enough renewables for this to be an issue. Even with the most optimistic possible build-out timelines for additional renewable generation, we will not do so for another decade or two. That's why it's important to change building practices for new-build and refurbs now since the incremental cost for additional insulation is much less than the cost of retro-fitting. 2) "base load" isn't the best term here. Base load refers to the load that makes up the bottom of the load curve, basically a straight horizontal line right under the trough in demand. Some of base load actually is flexible load - for instance refrigeration equipment that runs overnight can be timeshifted by an hour easily (although in that case it is rarely done because power prices are cheap at that time). The problem for renewables is not base load but non-flexible / non-dispatchable load that must go on when requested such as lights or televisions.
      - jacobush 7y ago
        Or you can view vanishing base load as an "incentive" and view solutions pop up. I'm more in the "bring more popcorn" camp.
strainer 7y ago
Renewables meet the traditional concept of base load while generation is sufficient. This can be the situation often, or just occasionally depending on how many wind and solar facilities are present. Renewable oversupply can already be economically stored for daily cycle purposes with 4 to 8 hour battery banks. If longer term storage is not developed, biomatter and synthetic fuels can run thermo-electric generators on the occasions that renewable supply falls short of demand.
ZeroGravitas 7y ago
"baseload" is another shibboleth that suggests you're coming from some other information bubble, where that phrase has much more meaning. I have no problem imagining renewable and storage taking care of baseload. Seasonal storage and winter peaks in cold climates and long distance flight are interesting problems. But meeting the baseload more economically than coal, gas or nuclear? Just roll out more of the tech we already have and which is already saving us money as we roll it out at smaller scales. Every small battery that replaces a horrendously expensive gas peaker plant is one step closer to the goal and generates savings we can spend on the next step.

This seems an unpopular opinion, but maybe we don't need more base load. Maybe we need more on availability load. With all the magic of connected devices, they could cope with varying electricity?

cheerlessbog 7y ago
Hearing, maybe refrigeration, in future electric car charging. Beyond that doesn't most load require consistent power?
- jacobush 7y ago
  Heating + cooling must be the largest consumers. And these are great candidates for "layered" service.
- Mvandenbergh 7y ago
  Of US Commercial electricity use about 40% is refrigeration, cooling, heating, and ventilation which can all time shifted at least intra-day with good building practices. 10% is lighting which realistically can't - you need lights when it's dark. 15% is computers which can sort of load shift because most office computers are now laptops - with good communications systems you can tell laptops how aggressively to charge / whether to run off battery. The rest is "other" quite a lot of which is small electronic devices like tablets and phones charging and then a grab-bag of misc. stuff. Half of residential electricity is some kind of temperature shifting (heating, cooling, refrigeration, freezers, ventilation). Essentially with good insulation you can get to a point where you can load shift 50%+ of your electricity consumption on an intra-day basis. Electric car charging of course is a perfect load to match to renewables as well. That doesn't solve the issue of inter-day fluctuations - what happens when you have a cloudy, high pressure system sitting over a substantial part of your generation for a week - but it does mean that we can go pretty far. We may have to keep more open-cycle gas around for those times which will have to be funded on a capacity basis.
  - ThrowawayR2 7y ago
    > ...most office computers are now laptops... Maybe in SV but not elsewhere. Plus servers that run 24x7 are probably the bulk of that 15%.
  - wolfram74 7y ago
    "with good building practices", "get to a point" this is planning an ideal future despite having a system where the legacy infrastructure very much still needs to be accommodated for. We can't disregard what already exists, and that involves a considerable amount of base load.
    - Mvandenbergh 7y ago
      1) We don't yet have enough renewables for this to be an issue. Even with the most optimistic possible build-out timelines for additional renewable generation, we will not do so for another decade or two. That's why it's important to change building practices for new-build and refurbs now since the incremental cost for additional insulation is much less than the cost of retro-fitting. 2) "base load" isn't the best term here. Base load refers to the load that makes up the bottom of the load curve, basically a straight horizontal line right under the trough in demand. Some of base load actually is flexible load - for instance refrigeration equipment that runs overnight can be timeshifted by an hour easily (although in that case it is rarely done because power prices are cheap at that time). The problem for renewables is not base load but non-flexible / non-dispatchable load that must go on when requested such as lights or televisions.
    - jacobush 7y ago
      Or you can view vanishing base load as an "incentive" and view solutions pop up. I'm more in the "bring more popcorn" camp.

strainer 7y ago

Renewables meet the traditional concept of base load while generation is sufficient. This can be the situation often, or just occasionally depending on how many wind and solar facilities are present. Renewable oversupply can already be economically stored for daily cycle purposes with 4 to 8 hour battery banks. If longer term storage is not developed, biomatter and synthetic fuels can run thermo-electric generators on the occasions that renewable supply falls short of demand.

ZeroGravitas 7y ago

"baseload" is another shibboleth that suggests you're coming from some other information bubble, where that phrase has much more meaning. I have no problem imagining renewable and storage taking care of baseload. Seasonal storage and winter peaks in cold climates and long distance flight are interesting problems. But meeting the baseload more economically than coal, gas or nuclear? Just roll out more of the tech we already have and which is already saving us money as we roll it out at smaller scales. Every small battery that replaces a horrendously expensive gas peaker plant is one step closer to the goal and generates savings we can spend on the next step.