4 ms·

I agree land use is not a major consideration here. But what about base load? You cannot guarantee proper weather and we currently don't have anywhere near batt

by epups 3y ago

I agree land use is not a major consideration here. But what about base load? You cannot guarantee proper weather and we currently don't have anywhere near battery capacity to store energy from renewable sources for a meaningful amount of time. So ultimately yes, you are faced with a choice between hydro, coal/gas and nuclear for that.

pfdietz 3y ago
Take the mismatch between solar/wind and demand. Take the Fourier transform of this mismatch. It has components at various frequencies. There are various storage technologies that are best for various frequencies: batteries for high frequences (diurnal or faster); maybe thermal storage for intermediate frequencies (days to weeks); maybe hydrogen for low frequencies (months, yearly, or even longer). If you optimize the system with the right combination of solar/wind (which are typically somewhat anticorrelated, or at least somewhat independent), and various kinds of storage, you can generate an artificial steady output for not that much. See https://model.energy/ https://model.energy/ for a web site that generates cost optimal (under various cost assumptions and using historical weather data) solutions to this problem in various places.
- epups 3y ago
  None of these storage technologies are currently being used at scale. Not a single country is relying on batteries or hydrogen to solve the problem I mentioned above.
  - pfdietz 3y ago
    Ah, the good old "if it hasn't happened yet, it can't ever happen" argument. Priceless. Remember, we're talking about a claim that renewables are fundamentally blocked from providing the power for the grid in most countries. If you exclude the possibility of additional foreseeable technological development, then nuclear also fails, since existing commercial reactors very quickly exhaust the available economical uranium if they are asked to power the world.
    - epups 3y ago
      Your statement about uranium is incorrect for a couple of reasons, but that's beside the point. You're asking us to take a leap of faith and believe in experimental technologies that have not been proven to work at scale at all. I'm not denying they might work one day, and I'm all for investing in them to see if they do. But in the meantime, hundreds of thousands of people will die due to switching to coal reactors. This is a concrete fact that is happening today. We have a safe energy source in nuclear, and we should make use of it to avoid these real, measurable, tangible consequences.
      - pfdietz 3y ago
        CANDU reactors may be an exception, since they can operate with a conversion ratio of nearly 1 (about 0.9, IIRC, which will extend the uranium concentration by an order of magnitude). But breeders are not currently commercial reactors -- there have been prototypes, but they are not commercial. Nor is seawater uranium extraction commercially demonstrated (it's not even ready for that; the resins have too short a lifespan, for one thing).
    - pyuser583 3y ago
      So you’re saying we can expect batteries to scale?
      - pfdietz 3y ago
        Yes. Are you saying all the thousands of possible battery chemistries, and all the non-battery storage technologies, will fail? This is what the nuclear stans are saying. Of course speculative (or previously failed) nuclear technologies are sold as sure things.

by epups 3y ago

pfdietz 3y ago

Take the mismatch between solar/wind and demand. Take the Fourier transform of this mismatch. It has components at various frequencies. There are various storage technologies that are best for various frequencies: batteries for high frequences (diurnal or faster); maybe thermal storage for intermediate frequencies (days to weeks); maybe hydrogen for low frequencies (months, yearly, or even longer). If you optimize the system with the right combination of solar/wind (which are typically somewhat anticorrelated, or at least somewhat independent), and various kinds of storage, you can generate an artificial steady output for not that much. See https://model.energy/ https://model.energy/ for a web site that generates cost optimal (under various cost assumptions and using historical weather data) solutions to this problem in various places.

epups 3y ago
None of these storage technologies are currently being used at scale. Not a single country is relying on batteries or hydrogen to solve the problem I mentioned above.
- pfdietz 3y ago
  Ah, the good old "if it hasn't happened yet, it can't ever happen" argument. Priceless. Remember, we're talking about a claim that renewables are fundamentally blocked from providing the power for the grid in most countries. If you exclude the possibility of additional foreseeable technological development, then nuclear also fails, since existing commercial reactors very quickly exhaust the available economical uranium if they are asked to power the world.
  - epups 3y ago
    Your statement about uranium is incorrect for a couple of reasons, but that's beside the point. You're asking us to take a leap of faith and believe in experimental technologies that have not been proven to work at scale at all. I'm not denying they might work one day, and I'm all for investing in them to see if they do. But in the meantime, hundreds of thousands of people will die due to switching to coal reactors. This is a concrete fact that is happening today. We have a safe energy source in nuclear, and we should make use of it to avoid these real, measurable, tangible consequences.
    - pfdietz 3y ago
      CANDU reactors may be an exception, since they can operate with a conversion ratio of nearly 1 (about 0.9, IIRC, which will extend the uranium concentration by an order of magnitude). But breeders are not currently commercial reactors -- there have been prototypes, but they are not commercial. Nor is seawater uranium extraction commercially demonstrated (it's not even ready for that; the resins have too short a lifespan, for one thing).
  - pyuser583 3y ago
    So you’re saying we can expect batteries to scale?
    - pfdietz 3y ago
      Yes. Are you saying all the thousands of possible battery chemistries, and all the non-battery storage technologies, will fail? This is what the nuclear stans are saying. Of course speculative (or previously failed) nuclear technologies are sold as sure things.