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It's the best known solution we have today. The misconception is that wind and solar are able to replace fossil fuels. They can't as of now, that's just the un
by Reedx 7y ago
It's the best known solution we have today.
The misconception is that wind and solar are able to replace fossil fuels. They can't as of now, that's just the unfortunate reality. They're a good supplement, but they don't produce 24/7, don't recycle well, take up tons of space, and batteries are orders of magnitude too expensive to be a complete solution. See the video I linked to where Gates explains this.
- pfdietz 7y agoBatteries are orders of magnitude too expensive if you expect to cover seasonal differences with batteries. But no one in their right mind would do that. You are engaging in a kind of strawman argument I call the Argument from Bad Engineering. Instead, batteries would be used for short term leveling (diurnal, perhaps a few days). Beyond that, leveling would be by demand dispatch, transmission, dispatchable demand, and long term chemical storage (for example, hydrogen or ammonia). In the shorter term, covering the last 10% with natural gas would be workable, even if the CO2 had to be captured and sequestered.
- Reedx 7y agoI didn't set up that strawman. They're too expensive for a lot more than that. Seriously, watch Bill's response to this and I'd be interested if you or anyone has a better answer: https://youtu.be/d1EB1zsxW0k?t=520 https://youtu.be/d1EB1zsxW0k?t=520
- pfdietz 7y agoA utility scale battery system might impose a cost of $200-300/MWh (source: Lazard 2018) You might say "nuclear is only $110-180/MWh!". But that's for every MWh that nuclear pumps out; batteries are only on the hook for (some of) the times wind and solar aren't covering demand. So the levelized cost of stored and direct power from renewables will be cheaper. Batteries are also declining rapidly in cost. Any nuclear plant started today will come online when storage costs could be half of what they are today, if this trend continues. I will add that DC-coupled storage in PV fields should be cheaper than this, because the batteries don't need their own inverters or grid connection.
- ZeroGravitas 7y agoGates claims Tokyo needs 23GW for 3 days a year during a monsoon. Tokyo has less cars per household than many Japanese cities but there's still about 3 million of them. If those cars each had a 50KWh battery then that would be enough power to run the city for about 1/3rd of a day. But since replacing all the ICE cars with electrics is forecast to save money and lives and help make cheap renewables even cheaper, it seems like they could work something out to tap into that when necessary and have solved a fair chunk of the problem without spending any money (in fact saving quite a lot which they can put towards this problem).
- pfdietz 7y agoGates appears to think providing that 23 GW with nuclear, at $10,000/kW, is better than providing backup combustion turbines at $400/kW.