4 ms·

For the ongoing maintenance costs I have assumed that the costs per GW are given with respect to faceplate capacity. You have assumed (or know) that they relate

by amoss 4y ago

For the ongoing maintenance costs I have assumed that the costs per GW are given with respect to faceplate capacity. You have assumed (or know) that they relate to the useful output. I went back to check in the source document (and in reference 41 where they originate from) but could not see a definite statement either way. Did you find something that clarified this?

robomartin 4y ago
That's part of the problem with some of these things, isn't it? The deeper you dig you end up with either word-spaghetti explanation or averages of averages of averages. Take this for example, from reference 41: "For wind and solar PV, in particular, the cost favorability of the lowest-cost regions compound the underlying variability in regional cost and create a significant differential between the unadjusted costs and the capacity-weighted average national costs as observed from recent market experience. To reflect this difference, we report a weighted average cost for both wind and solar PV, based on the regional cost factors assumed for these technologies in AEO2022 and the actual regional distribution of the builds that occurred in 2020 (Table 1)." I am not sure I have a clue what that means. And here we are, two reasonably intelligent people, trying to make some sense out of what's being presented. I don't even want to imagine how politicians or people without technical/scientific training and little interest driving them think about this stuff. My guess: It's indistinguishable from magic. And, of course, because Elon says it, it must be correct. I don't have a problem with him. He is a smart guy, very focused and dedicated (I worked for him for a couple of years). That said, he is selling solar panels and batteries. So, yeah, I would want to really look closely and demand justification for the claims. One can easily lie (strong word, not accusing Tesla of this) by omission, which can happen without intention. What I mean by this is that, as an example, nowhere in that document do I see a study, a comparison, of only using solar for grid-scale power vs. only using wind at grid scale. In other words, limit solar to residential/commercial buildings. I am arguing that wind at grid scale might have massive advantages when compared to solar. Tesla omitted this comparison, likely because it didn't occur to them to ask the question. At the extreme you have the "well, we sell solar panels and batteries" realization. I don't know. The other problem I have with a lot of these papers and articles is that they use averages. The average (mean) is a fine central tendency indicator. And it is absolutely horrible for anything else. A more accurate approach divides the data into bands and studies those bands to reach a set of conclusions rather than applying a single average to the entire population.

by amoss 4y ago

robomartin 4y ago

That's part of the problem with some of these things, isn't it? The deeper you dig you end up with either word-spaghetti explanation or averages of averages of averages. Take this for example, from reference 41: "For wind and solar PV, in particular, the cost favorability of the lowest-cost regions compound the underlying variability in regional cost and create a significant differential between the unadjusted costs and the capacity-weighted average national costs as observed from recent market experience. To reflect this difference, we report a weighted average cost for both wind and solar PV, based on the regional cost factors assumed for these technologies in AEO2022 and the actual regional distribution of the builds that occurred in 2020 (Table 1)." I am not sure I have a clue what that means. And here we are, two reasonably intelligent people, trying to make some sense out of what's being presented. I don't even want to imagine how politicians or people without technical/scientific training and little interest driving them think about this stuff. My guess: It's indistinguishable from magic. And, of course, because Elon says it, it must be correct. I don't have a problem with him. He is a smart guy, very focused and dedicated (I worked for him for a couple of years). That said, he is selling solar panels and batteries. So, yeah, I would want to really look closely and demand justification for the claims. One can easily lie (strong word, not accusing Tesla of this) by omission, which can happen without intention. What I mean by this is that, as an example, nowhere in that document do I see a study, a comparison, of only using solar for grid-scale power vs. only using wind at grid scale. In other words, limit solar to residential/commercial buildings. I am arguing that wind at grid scale might have massive advantages when compared to solar. Tesla omitted this comparison, likely because it didn't occur to them to ask the question. At the extreme you have the "well, we sell solar panels and batteries" realization. I don't know. The other problem I have with a lot of these papers and articles is that they use averages. The average (mean) is a fine central tendency indicator. And it is absolutely horrible for anything else. A more accurate approach divides the data into bands and studies those bands to reach a set of conclusions rather than applying a single average to the entire population.