3 ms·

Somewhat disappointing... Would have liked for her to call out NRGV as the actual investment scam it is, rather than just pathetically inadequate. Would have

by ncmncm 4y ago

Somewhat disappointing... Would have liked for her to call out NRGV as the actual investment scam it is, rather than just pathetically inadequate. Would have preferred for mineshaft gravity storage to be mentioned, which is not a scam, in place of NRGV. Would have liked for her to cite ammonia along with hydrogen as chemical storage media. And to mention recent, radical improvements in hydrogen electrolysis efficiency. Would have liked for pumped hydro not to be described as if it were necessarily dependent on rivers. Or on hills (i.e. mention deep underground cavities as storage volumes). Would have liked for variant battery tech to have been mentioned, particularly iron, zinc-bromide, and molten-metal chemistries. But I am happy to see mention of very substantial compressed-air storage systems in production use. Would have liked for her to mention undersea buoyancy storage as the dark horse. But I understand why she would not be aware of it. Disappointed that she brought up nukes without mentioning that they are wholly unable to compete with renewables, on cost. Finally, it would have been very helpful for her to have noted that for now and well into the future, money is overwhelmingly better spent on building out renewable generating capacity than on storage.

janef0421 4y ago
How can you claim nuclear cannot compete on costs? We have no idea how much any of these things you're talking about will cost, because they either don't exist, exist only in research labs, or have never been deployed at the necessary scale.
- ncmncm 4y ago
tuatoru 4y ago
> money is overwhelmingly better spent on building out renewable generating capacity than on storage. Yes, the world uses about 18 TW (continous). If we wanted to provide all that with PV at 20% capacity factor and with a lifetime of 20 years, we need to be producing 5 TW of PV panels per year.* Currently we're making around one percent of that. * Actually we don't need all that. The 18 TW is based on "primary energy supply" which ignores the two-thirds energy losses with fossil fuel based supply. In terms of delivered, useful power, we only probably need 8-ish TW currently.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  We need to build way more PV factories. But building the wrong kind would be counterproductive. If perovskites end up way better, it would be wasteful to have built out too many new silicon cell factories. While building out storage now would be a mistake, we should be building factories for storage like crazy. Every kind. We don't know which storage methods will win, but we can't afford to wait and find out.
mort96 4y ago
> Disappointed that she brought up nukes without mentioning that they are wholly unable to compete with renewables, on cost. Is this true? I mean per average watt I imagine solar might be cheaper, but is it still cheaper when you factor in the cost of the energy storage you need to have a purely solar/wind grid? I'd love to see some numbers on this.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  Cost for storage is falling even faster than for renewable generation.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  There are different ways to cook the numbers. In particular, there are different kinds of costs. In nukes, capex (capital expenditure) absolutely dominates. That has to be amortized over all energy produced over the working life of the plant. Opex (operating expense) in nukes is also high in comparison to renewables', dominated by maintenance: overhauling steam turbines, inspections, repairs; and 24/7 staff and security. Fuel cost is low compared to coal, but far from negligible. There are hidden costs usually not counted, such as liability insurance always paid directly by taxpayers. Paying that out of revenue would price nukes' power completely out of the market, assuming any insurance company could afford to cover it at all. And there is decommissioning cost, a substantial fraction of capex. If the plant is mothballed early because it cannot produce at a competitive price, its cost for all the kWh already delivered suddenly jumps because its capex can be amortized over only those kWh. Similarly, if it is operated only at night, its per-kWh cost doubles because it costs about the same per day whatever its output. Usually existing nukes are compared to renewables with the nukes' capex, liability, and decommissioning costs artificially pinned to zero, but counting the full capex of the renewables, because those have to be built before they can produce. Renewables' opex is very close to zero. Maintaining a big steam turbine is remarkably expensive. Nuke plants are built with spares because they spend so much time down for overhauling.
- Krssst 4y ago
  I also wonder if NREs can stay cheaper once we actually try to replace the entire world electricity production considering the higher material usage than nuclear if concrete and steel production cannot keep up with demand. (well, in the end whichever we do is better than doing nothing)

by ncmncm 4y ago

janef0421 4y ago

How can you claim nuclear cannot compete on costs? We have no idea how much any of these things you're talking about will cost, because they either don't exist, exist only in research labs, or have never been deployed at the necessary scale.

ncmncm 4y ago

tuatoru 4y ago

> money is overwhelmingly better spent on building out renewable generating capacity than on storage. Yes, the world uses about 18 TW (continous). If we wanted to provide all that with PV at 20% capacity factor and with a lifetime of 20 years, we need to be producing 5 TW of PV panels per year.* Currently we're making around one percent of that. * Actually we don't need all that. The 18 TW is based on "primary energy supply" which ignores the two-thirds energy losses with fossil fuel based supply. In terms of delivered, useful power, we only probably need 8-ish TW currently.

ncmncm 4y ago
We need to build way more PV factories. But building the wrong kind would be counterproductive. If perovskites end up way better, it would be wasteful to have built out too many new silicon cell factories. While building out storage now would be a mistake, we should be building factories for storage like crazy. Every kind. We don't know which storage methods will win, but we can't afford to wait and find out.

mort96 4y ago

> Disappointed that she brought up nukes without mentioning that they are wholly unable to compete with renewables, on cost. Is this true? I mean per average watt I imagine solar might be cheaper, but is it still cheaper when you factor in the cost of the energy storage you need to have a purely solar/wind grid? I'd love to see some numbers on this.

ncmncm 4y ago
Cost for storage is falling even faster than for renewable generation.
ncmncm 4y ago
There are different ways to cook the numbers. In particular, there are different kinds of costs. In nukes, capex (capital expenditure) absolutely dominates. That has to be amortized over all energy produced over the working life of the plant. Opex (operating expense) in nukes is also high in comparison to renewables', dominated by maintenance: overhauling steam turbines, inspections, repairs; and 24/7 staff and security. Fuel cost is low compared to coal, but far from negligible. There are hidden costs usually not counted, such as liability insurance always paid directly by taxpayers. Paying that out of revenue would price nukes' power completely out of the market, assuming any insurance company could afford to cover it at all. And there is decommissioning cost, a substantial fraction of capex. If the plant is mothballed early because it cannot produce at a competitive price, its cost for all the kWh already delivered suddenly jumps because its capex can be amortized over only those kWh. Similarly, if it is operated only at night, its per-kWh cost doubles because it costs about the same per day whatever its output. Usually existing nukes are compared to renewables with the nukes' capex, liability, and decommissioning costs artificially pinned to zero, but counting the full capex of the renewables, because those have to be built before they can produce. Renewables' opex is very close to zero. Maintaining a big steam turbine is remarkably expensive. Nuke plants are built with spares because they spend so much time down for overhauling.
Krssst 4y ago
I also wonder if NREs can stay cheaper once we actually try to replace the entire world electricity production considering the higher material usage than nuclear if concrete and steel production cannot keep up with demand. (well, in the end whichever we do is better than doing nothing)