5 ms·
This is not correct. They constructed that with small batteries - not nearly large enough to smooth out to 99.9% uptime levels.
by koheripbal 5y ago
This is not correct. They constructed that with small batteries - not nearly large enough to smooth out to 99.9% uptime levels.
- bryanlarsen 5y agoNothing has 99.9% uptime, not even nuclear. That's a grid level property, not plant level.
- koheripbal 5y agoI don't think it's useful to disagree about the number of 9s. The point is that nuclear is far more reliable than any other power source. https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/nuclear-power-most-reliable-energy-source-and-its-not-even-close https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/nuclear-power-most-reliab... https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=23112 https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=23112
- bryanlarsen 5y agoThe relevant metric is not reliability, it's reliability per dollar spent. And in that metric a grid built for 95% mix of renewable 5% natgas peaker with geographic diversity will trounce a nuclear. Building nuclear in 2021 is like buying UltraSPARC in 2021. Sure, it's more reliable than a single PC, but a cluster of PC's is way cheaper and more reliable in aggregate.
- koheripbal 5y agoYour expectation that renewables will be able to handle 95% of the load without MASSIVE batteries and hence massive costs, is exactly the problem. As an example, the large solar facility in Arizona produces 15% of the power in January, as it does in June. The batteries or overbuild needed to compensate for this tremendous imbalance in power production can only be offset with absolutely staggering scaled batteries. ...something that never seems to be modeled in the articles pushing renewables.