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Once use cases like yours become more common (e.g. 4MWh surplus), industries will adjust and buy surplus power from homeowners like you, and the nation as a who

Once use cases like yours become more common (e.g. 4MWh surplus), industries will adjust and buy surplus power from homeowners like you, and the nation as a whole will spend less time and effort on maintaining the grid and power plants that generate electricity. We will be able to run power-hungry industries (e.g. steel-aluminum/smelting) for very little cost. > And even with 5kW of solar hung for a ~100 sq ft shed, I still need propane or a generator in the winter every now and then to keep things sane in here. What about a large thermal mass wood/pellet stove? There's plenty of wood waste floating around that could heat a small house/shed in the couple of winter months when the solar panels don't do the job.

Syonyk 4y ago
Wrong way. The house has pulled an extra 4MWh from the grid during the winter months (and pushes more than that back during the rest of the year). I'm past net zero on an annual basis, but that doesn't mean that even a large array is able to cover my energy needs in the winter few months. I'm grandfathered into an arrangement where I pay my $5/mo and get unlimited net metering, but it's not remotely reasonable to pretend that I'm not heavily using the grid overnight, in the winter, etc.
eppp 4y ago
You still have to maintain the grid for others to buy it and to balance it. The maintenance costs of the grid are going no where but up. More usage, more right of way, more towers, more wire, more labor.
jonfw 4y ago
If we expect industry to take up the excess, than either 1. that industry will only operate according to the weather or 2. We'll still need some variable power generation that can be switched on when wind or solar isn't producing enough
- Symbiote 4y ago
  A few industrial users can weather changes in supply, with notice of the expected price in advance. The aluminium smelter can heat to x+250°, let things cool to x° while people cook their evening meal, then heat up again afterwards. A large supermarket chain can set their refrigerators to 5°, but by allowing the range to move between 3° and 7° can save significant power. (One of the big British supermarkets already does this.)
  - coffeebeqn 4y ago
    You don’t really get any more Solar after dinner. If everyone gets a big battery (expensive) then they could slowly offload the charge overnight but that would need to make financial sense to the house owners somehow. At a minimum you’d need to recuperate the wear on the battery as they all have a finite amount of cycles
  - makomk 4y ago
    That only works on short timescales, which isn't the main problem because there are so many ways of solving that (for example batteries or thermal storage for home heating).
    - bluGill 4y ago
      If they have notice the smelter will be happy to shutdown for maintenance for a few months. You need to plan this with them a year in advance though.
      - jonfw 4y ago
        Seasonal operation is not desirable and has lots and lots of side effects. As an example, a smelter that operates half the year takes twice as much capital to produce the same throughput as one that operates year round. That’s before we get into all of the reasons that seasonal labor is undesirable, or how much additional warehouse capacity would be required to stockpile the metal which will needed over the unoperational months, or the raw material being stockpiled while it’s unable to be processed, or the impact on just in time supply chains, etc.

Syonyk 4y ago

Wrong way. The house has pulled an extra 4MWh from the grid during the winter months (and pushes more than that back during the rest of the year). I'm past net zero on an annual basis, but that doesn't mean that even a large array is able to cover my energy needs in the winter few months. I'm grandfathered into an arrangement where I pay my $5/mo and get unlimited net metering, but it's not remotely reasonable to pretend that I'm not heavily using the grid overnight, in the winter, etc.

eppp 4y ago

You still have to maintain the grid for others to buy it and to balance it. The maintenance costs of the grid are going no where but up. More usage, more right of way, more towers, more wire, more labor.

jonfw 4y ago

If we expect industry to take up the excess, than either 1. that industry will only operate according to the weather or 2. We'll still need some variable power generation that can be switched on when wind or solar isn't producing enough

Symbiote 4y ago
A few industrial users can weather changes in supply, with notice of the expected price in advance. The aluminium smelter can heat to x+250°, let things cool to x° while people cook their evening meal, then heat up again afterwards. A large supermarket chain can set their refrigerators to 5°, but by allowing the range to move between 3° and 7° can save significant power. (One of the big British supermarkets already does this.)
- coffeebeqn 4y ago
  You don’t really get any more Solar after dinner. If everyone gets a big battery (expensive) then they could slowly offload the charge overnight but that would need to make financial sense to the house owners somehow. At a minimum you’d need to recuperate the wear on the battery as they all have a finite amount of cycles
- makomk 4y ago
  That only works on short timescales, which isn't the main problem because there are so many ways of solving that (for example batteries or thermal storage for home heating).
  - bluGill 4y ago
    If they have notice the smelter will be happy to shutdown for maintenance for a few months. You need to plan this with them a year in advance though.
    - jonfw 4y ago
      Seasonal operation is not desirable and has lots and lots of side effects. As an example, a smelter that operates half the year takes twice as much capital to produce the same throughput as one that operates year round. That’s before we get into all of the reasons that seasonal labor is undesirable, or how much additional warehouse capacity would be required to stockpile the metal which will needed over the unoperational months, or the raw material being stockpiled while it’s unable to be processed, or the impact on just in time supply chains, etc.