3 ms·
Negative power prices are only possible because there are other resources to provide the production baseline. As there exists no system to store power at scale,
by wazoox 6y ago
Negative power prices are only possible because there are other resources to provide the production baseline. As there exists no system to store power at scale, production must match exactly consumption at any time; so when the wind blows or the sun shines and there is no demand, the generated power is basically worthless.
But this is only possible because renewables represent only a small fraction of all power in most places. They can at peak generate a significant amount of power, but overall most produced TWh come from other sources.
- pydry 6y agoI foresee -ve prices becoming more common. Overproduction is a cheap way of dealing with the variability of a source that is 2-3x cheaper than others even if it ends up not being used or if some is wasted (e.g. wind turbines that are left turned off when it's very windy and grid demand is low). If that overproduction can be channeled into e.g. hydrogen production which can be used for airline fuel or heating homes or for topping up the grid when it's not windy or sunny all the better.