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That’s not the most realistic alternative to fossil energy. The most realistic option would be the cheapest, renewables and storage.
by aplummer 7y ago
That’s not the most realistic alternative to fossil energy. The most realistic option would be the cheapest, renewables and storage.
- bamboozled 7y agoCould we say both are realistic alternatives? We've ran out of time and really need to move away from coal, like yesterday, who cares which method we use, let's just stop burning fossil fuels.
- arnoooooo 7y agoI care. Safe nuclear power plants require high quality maintenance and stringent regulations. I'm not too optimistic about social stability (the part of climate change we won't be able to avoid will not help), so I don't want nuclear power plants all around.
- willis936 7y agoShould a nonexistent energy storage mechanism be considered realistic?
- zajio1am 7y agoStorage for renewables is realistic for hour-to-hour and max day-to-day fluctuations. But in central europe (like where the power plant from the article is located) solar power production during winter is about 15 % of summer values. You cannot reasonably store electricity for whole season.
- akvadrako 7y agoStorage isn't yet realistic for whole-day fluctuations. Current capital costs are about $200/kWh. Daily global energy use is about 400 TWh. That would be an 80000 trillion dollar battery. That number is so outrageous it's basically infinite. Even if the whole world focused on building a battery to supply a single country for a single day we'd run out of materials and land (batteries aren't small). The only hope for energy storage is 100000x cost reductions.