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The cost of wind turbines has little to do with the cost of ensuring that the power plant will provide a set amount of 100% renewable energy all the time. Becau

by Udik 6y ago

The cost of wind turbines has little to do with the cost of ensuring that the power plant will provide a set amount of 100% renewable energy all the time. Because when the wind is not blowing the plant has either to provide energy from a storage system or source it somewhere else, again with 100% reliability.

pfdietz 6y ago
You didn't look at that link, did you? It has models using predicted costs for wind, solar, nuclear, batteries, and hydrogen storage, and computes the minimum cost system to produce reliable baseload power using real historical weather data (at 5 minute intervals). You can alter the assumptions and see what the costs optimize to. Nuclear is "Dispatchable 2" in the advanced settings.
- Udik 6y ago
  No, I didn't look at the link- you could have at least described what it contained. I gave it a quick look, but frankly it would take me a lot of time to check if the model and assumptions make sense (it also seems to reply "job failed" whenever it doesn't have a cached answer). But I think real costs can be estimated only from working plants. Do we have, now, renewable energy plants that are capable of delivering a constant amount of energy by storing the excess production? How many have been built around the world? Why aren't we building more if they're so cheap?
  - lostlogin 6y ago
    > Do we have, now, renewable energy plants that are capable of delivering a constant amount of energy by storing the excess production? They have plenty of drawbacks, but hydro meets this. The storage occurs pre production though.
  - pfdietz 6y ago
    > Do we have, now, renewable energy plants that are capable of delivering a constant amount of energy by storing the excess production? As long as we are burning fossil fuels (and in particular natural gas) it doesn't make much sense to build such things, even if we could. The natural gas provides pre-stored energy.

by Udik 6y ago

pfdietz 6y ago

You didn't look at that link, did you? It has models using predicted costs for wind, solar, nuclear, batteries, and hydrogen storage, and computes the minimum cost system to produce reliable baseload power using real historical weather data (at 5 minute intervals). You can alter the assumptions and see what the costs optimize to. Nuclear is "Dispatchable 2" in the advanced settings.

Udik 6y ago
No, I didn't look at the link- you could have at least described what it contained. I gave it a quick look, but frankly it would take me a lot of time to check if the model and assumptions make sense (it also seems to reply "job failed" whenever it doesn't have a cached answer). But I think real costs can be estimated only from working plants. Do we have, now, renewable energy plants that are capable of delivering a constant amount of energy by storing the excess production? How many have been built around the world? Why aren't we building more if they're so cheap?
- lostlogin 6y ago
  > Do we have, now, renewable energy plants that are capable of delivering a constant amount of energy by storing the excess production? They have plenty of drawbacks, but hydro meets this. The storage occurs pre production though.
- pfdietz 6y ago
  > Do we have, now, renewable energy plants that are capable of delivering a constant amount of energy by storing the excess production? As long as we are burning fossil fuels (and in particular natural gas) it doesn't make much sense to build such things, even if we could. The natural gas provides pre-stored energy.