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This is completely wrong, wind and solar variability is a HUGE problem that we do not currently have the storage technology to mitigate. The assumption that we

This is completely wrong, wind and solar variability is a HUGE problem that we do not currently have the storage technology to mitigate. The assumption that we do is starting to feel like a religion.

ben_w 4y ago
Technology != Infrastructure We have the tech (you're almost certainly already using it), we have not deployed it at sufficient scale yet. But we are building the factories to make the batteries, and the mines to feed the factories, as fast as we can raise money to do so. I'm not sure what's happening with hydrogen (apparently it's much cheaper than batteries?); but regardless, that technology predates all forms of generating electricity more complex than the etymological origin of the word (ἤλεκτρον, amber) — "rubbing things together" was the only option when Deimand and van Troostwijk charged their Leyden jar back in 1789 and demonstrated electrolysis.
- pencilguin 4y ago
  Right: storage is mostly 19th-century tech, battery chemistries and catalysts excepted, that only needs building out. But we need not feed the trolls.
  - Dylan16807 4y ago
    Focusing on the mere existence of technology is basically "let them eat cake". It's fine to say "the factories need to be built", as long as they can be built at a manageable price. But price is a huge factor that cannot be ignored, and it's high enough in this situation to make the word "trivial" incorrect.
    - ben_w 4y ago
      I am sympathetic to both of you regarding the word "trivial". No new problems need to be solved, so in that sense it is trivial. It costs a lot of money in absolute terms, so in that sense it is not trivial. The cost (for global battery based storage, the most expensive serious storage option) is in the order of 6 months global supply of crude oil to turn rocks into batteries (i.e. the dumbest possible limit on the cost of recycling), those batteries last at least three years even using the worst cycle-count estimates I've seen and throwing the batteries away at 70% of initial peak capacity, that's trivial. Opening new mines and factories, even if the new mines provide new work for workers currently in fossil fuels, may be a significant geopolitical and economic shift, so in that sense it isn't trivial. And so on. For hydrogen, it's "build a tank that only leaks a little bit". (We'd probably be better off adding some carbon to that hydrogen, but I have no idea if anyone is working on that at sufficient scale even though the tech is over a century old).
    - pencilguin 4y ago
      The fact is that we exist today in exactly the state that is being promoted as beyond solution. Our present renewable generation and present ready storage are exceeded, and we rely on a 3rd-line backup, fossil fuels. Each increment of renewable generation and storage added reduces the amount of fossil fuels that must be used. Factories for any form of storage are not different in any material way from a thousand other factories we know work. We have been making factories for going on three centuries, and know we can. Making and operating factories is expensive capex, but exploring, extracting, transporting, and refining fossil fuels is an even more expensive opex. If we could afford fossil opex, renewable capex of similar order is strictly better.

This is completely wrong, wind and solar variability is a HUGE problem that we do not currently have the storage technology to mitigate. The assumption that we do is starting to feel like a religion.

ben_w 4y ago

Technology != Infrastructure We have the tech (you're almost certainly already using it), we have not deployed it at sufficient scale yet. But we are building the factories to make the batteries, and the mines to feed the factories, as fast as we can raise money to do so. I'm not sure what's happening with hydrogen (apparently it's much cheaper than batteries?); but regardless, that technology predates all forms of generating electricity more complex than the etymological origin of the word (ἤλεκτρον, amber) — "rubbing things together" was the only option when Deimand and van Troostwijk charged their Leyden jar back in 1789 and demonstrated electrolysis.

pencilguin 4y ago
Right: storage is mostly 19th-century tech, battery chemistries and catalysts excepted, that only needs building out. But we need not feed the trolls.
- Dylan16807 4y ago
  Focusing on the mere existence of technology is basically "let them eat cake". It's fine to say "the factories need to be built", as long as they can be built at a manageable price. But price is a huge factor that cannot be ignored, and it's high enough in this situation to make the word "trivial" incorrect.
  - ben_w 4y ago
    I am sympathetic to both of you regarding the word "trivial". No new problems need to be solved, so in that sense it is trivial. It costs a lot of money in absolute terms, so in that sense it is not trivial. The cost (for global battery based storage, the most expensive serious storage option) is in the order of 6 months global supply of crude oil to turn rocks into batteries (i.e. the dumbest possible limit on the cost of recycling), those batteries last at least three years even using the worst cycle-count estimates I've seen and throwing the batteries away at 70% of initial peak capacity, that's trivial. Opening new mines and factories, even if the new mines provide new work for workers currently in fossil fuels, may be a significant geopolitical and economic shift, so in that sense it isn't trivial. And so on. For hydrogen, it's "build a tank that only leaks a little bit". (We'd probably be better off adding some carbon to that hydrogen, but I have no idea if anyone is working on that at sufficient scale even though the tech is over a century old).
  - pencilguin 4y ago
    The fact is that we exist today in exactly the state that is being promoted as beyond solution. Our present renewable generation and present ready storage are exceeded, and we rely on a 3rd-line backup, fossil fuels. Each increment of renewable generation and storage added reduces the amount of fossil fuels that must be used. Factories for any form of storage are not different in any material way from a thousand other factories we know work. We have been making factories for going on three centuries, and know we can. Making and operating factories is expensive capex, but exploring, extracting, transporting, and refining fossil fuels is an even more expensive opex. If we could afford fossil opex, renewable capex of similar order is strictly better.