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No 13 TWh is just our current _electricity_ consumption for 5 hours. We are talking about replacing all energy consumption like heating with electric heat pumps

No 13 TWh is just our current _electricity_ consumption for 5 hours. We are talking about replacing all energy consumption like heating with electric heat pumps etc. This would be closer to 100TWh. And google says our current production is around 600GWh of batteries per year. 91.89 TWh / 600 GWh/year = 153 years. Yes there is pumped storage, but I wonder how much more of that there really is to develop? Plus damns are environmental disasters of their own. The other storage methods are speculative at best. I just wanted to push back a bit on the idea that "just" need solar + storage as many people seem to believe. It is a big ask, and I think we will need more. If we don't want gas plants, then nuclear could be a good option.

mikeyouse 4y ago
Nah, that's ignoring that this hypothetical is in a world with mostly renewable power generation. E.g. most of the energy in that mix you're referring to is oil/natural gas/coal -- and over half of that is lost before it reaches the first power pole or the drive wheels. Vastly more efficient electric devices will greatly reduce the amount of energy needed. E.g. a heat pump with COP of 4 needs 1/4th the energy as burning natural gas in a high-efficiency furnace. Yes it shifts that energy demand from natural gas to electricity, but total energy consumption still drops. Similarly, a gas Corolla getting 40mpg equals about 1.2 miles/kwh, whereas a Tesla Model Y is more like 3.5 miles/kwh, so again, even though there's an increase in electricity consumption, total energy consumption decreases by ~2/3. My other point stands though -- even if you grant a much larger electricity demand, you can't just look at today's battery production capacity. There are pipeline projects that will 10x that by 2030 (which is what happened in the past 10 years). Even with pessimistic assumptions, you get to pretty reasonable time frames pretty quickly.
- seiferteric 4y ago
  Yes efficiency improves with electrification (I said so above) but step back for a second. The premise of this was that 5 hours storage would be "good enough" but my original point is that with change in electricity usage brought on by bevs, heat pumps etc, that this may not be the case forever. What if it is 10 hours? Or 20? Also, you have to keep in mind developing countries rapidly growing energy demands. And yes, battery production will increase, probably exponentially.. until it doesn't, everything is an S-Curve in reality, so it all depends on what we can realistically produce.
  - Dylan16807 4y ago
    > everything is an S-Curve in reality The only thing that limits battery production is demand. There will be plenty of materials available and plenty of machine-makers exist. That S will go as big as we need.
    - akiselev 4y ago
      That's the kind of logic that got us here.
      - Dylan16807 4y ago
        The "there will be plenty of oil" logic got us here because it was right, so I'm not sure what you're implying. It doesn't reflect negatively on batteries unless ability to scale up is inherently bad, and I don't think it is.
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mikeyouse 4y ago

Nah, that's ignoring that this hypothetical is in a world with mostly renewable power generation. E.g. most of the energy in that mix you're referring to is oil/natural gas/coal -- and over half of that is lost before it reaches the first power pole or the drive wheels. Vastly more efficient electric devices will greatly reduce the amount of energy needed. E.g. a heat pump with COP of 4 needs 1/4th the energy as burning natural gas in a high-efficiency furnace. Yes it shifts that energy demand from natural gas to electricity, but total energy consumption still drops. Similarly, a gas Corolla getting 40mpg equals about 1.2 miles/kwh, whereas a Tesla Model Y is more like 3.5 miles/kwh, so again, even though there's an increase in electricity consumption, total energy consumption decreases by ~2/3. My other point stands though -- even if you grant a much larger electricity demand, you can't just look at today's battery production capacity. There are pipeline projects that will 10x that by 2030 (which is what happened in the past 10 years). Even with pessimistic assumptions, you get to pretty reasonable time frames pretty quickly.

seiferteric 4y ago
Yes efficiency improves with electrification (I said so above) but step back for a second. The premise of this was that 5 hours storage would be "good enough" but my original point is that with change in electricity usage brought on by bevs, heat pumps etc, that this may not be the case forever. What if it is 10 hours? Or 20? Also, you have to keep in mind developing countries rapidly growing energy demands. And yes, battery production will increase, probably exponentially.. until it doesn't, everything is an S-Curve in reality, so it all depends on what we can realistically produce.
- Dylan16807 4y ago
  > everything is an S-Curve in reality The only thing that limits battery production is demand. There will be plenty of materials available and plenty of machine-makers exist. That S will go as big as we need.
  - akiselev 4y ago
    That's the kind of logic that got us here.
    - Dylan16807 4y ago
      The "there will be plenty of oil" logic got us here because it was right, so I'm not sure what you're implying. It doesn't reflect negatively on batteries unless ability to scale up is inherently bad, and I don't think it is.

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