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Power waste is not an issue even in summer. Power production is driven by demand. Turn on more lights, and electricity companies will produce more electricity,
by asteroidbelt 5y ago
Power waste is not an issue even in summer. Power production is driven by demand. Turn on more lights, and electricity companies will produce more electricity, and eventually they will make it cheap. Turn off the lights, and they'll do nothing because there's no demand.
That was my pitch for nuclear power.
- seanhunter 5y agoIt's much more complex than that because power supply is not perfectly elastic. Power companies have to commit ahead of time to a certain level of production. In that sense power production is driven by projected demand. Power waste is an issue - at times where there is oversupply, wholesale power prices can actually go negative and at that point there is an excess of power in the network which cannot be stored and if it's not consumed will lead to electrical damage. So people actually get paid to waste power. Ever seen a sports stadium with all the lights blazing late at night even though noone is there? They are one of the groups who take advantage of negative power prices. There are also places where there are literally resistors placed along the ground to sink excess electricity (as heat) into the earth during these times. When you say "eventually they will make it cheap" that seems likely to be a misconception also. Power production is not like manufacturing. Although innovation can lead to increases in efficiency and therefore reduced cost, inefficiency is not the limiting factor on power cost.
- asteroidbelt 5y agoI would reply, but since those angry warriors downvoted my very reasonable comment, I should not. Perhaps I should stop trying to talk on hacker news at all.