2 ms·
China has announced an intention to build a cable from China to Chile to pick up Chilean solar power in the austral summer daytime. (Chile is very nearly antipo
by ncmncm 4y ago
China has announced an intention to build a cable from China to Chile to pick up Chilean solar power in the austral summer daytime. (Chile is very nearly antipodal to China.) Surprisingly, transmission loss is calculated to be only around 50%, which is completely tolerable. I doubt they will build it, in the end, but they really, usefully could.
Long distance transmission has become very practical as the top-line cost of generation has fallen far below historic lows.
You don't need a square meter in cross section. There will be a hell of a lot of long distance transmission lines. Singapore is all in on one to northern Australia. UK has signed a deal for one to Africa.
- ben_w 4y agoOoh, neat, I missed that news. 50% losses is basically what I was expecting, it’s what you get from just using state-of-the-art HVDC cables. If there’s any single entity I expect to have both the economic power and originational capacity to do that, it’s the Chinese government. The main reason is that the cables are much cheaper than the storage (so a massive incentive if you can do it), but 15000 km * 1m^2 * density of copper is 1.3e8 tons, and current global annual production is 2e7 tons, and a similar problem for aluminium. Need a lot of organisation of the wider economy to pull that off. https://www.pv-magazine.com/2021/11/15/chile-wants-to-export-solar-energy-to-asia-via-15000km-submarine-cable/ https://www.pv-magazine.com/2021/11/15/chile-wants-to-export...