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According to a recent report, there was only 13.4 GWh of grid storage in the US 2022. Even with projected growth, each addition 12 GWh is not trivial. https:/

According to a recent report, there was only 13.4 GWh of grid storage in the US 2022. Even with projected growth, each addition 12 GWh is not trivial. https://www.smart-energy.com/regional-news/north-america/us-grid-scale-storage-capacity-breaks-market-record-at-4-7gwh/?amp=1 https://www.smart-energy.com/regional-news/north-america/us-...

epistasis 3y ago
12 GWh is a fraction of a single factory's output from a single year. We are producing >50GWh total for storage per year, and the only reason more of it isn't going to the grid is that grid storage is a much less lucrative use of our storage capacity compare to cars, which have higher margins. The entire industry is growing at 10x capacity every five years! Don't forget that this single 1GW of nuclear took more than a decade. We simply can not scale nuclear to meet our needs, it is not a technology that scales well at all. For example, we have roughly 100GW of reactors in the US rapidly reaching their end of life. Even if the industry put all its effort in rebuilding fast enough to replace existing reactors, it would require a scale up that we can't possibly imagine right now. Meanwhile, we are already scaling storage, by building factory after factory.
- ftth_finland 3y ago
  > The entire industry is growing at 10x capacity every five years! Grid storage is projected only to grow 10-17 GWh per year according to the aforementioned article. Is that anywhere enough, if the aim is to decarbonise?
  - ben_w 3y ago
    Kinda; cars need to decarbonise as well as the grid, so the batteries are still really important even if none end up on the grid for whatever reason.
  - epistasis 3y ago
    And there's zero new expected nuclear after vogtle 4... If we add 10-17GWh in 2023, it would be foolish to think we will add the same amount in 2024. The amount added per year will grow too. We are at the beginning of the logistic curve, where growth is exponential. A few years ago, there wasn't even a single GWh on the grid. For more than a century we have balanced the grid by keeping energy stored in fuel; as we switch to cheap renewables, that's the only time that grid storage becomes necessary, and you have to get to pretty high levels of renewables before it makes economic sense to add storage. So the market is small now, and will grow. Until then, those lithium ion batteries are being shoved into cars, because car makers can not acquire them fast enough to meet demand. There are several other very promising and quickly advancing battery technologies as well, based on iron or sodium instead of lithium. We will see which get cheap, but until there's high amounts of renewables.
    - ftth_finland 3y ago
      > If we add 10-17GWh in 2023, it would be foolish to think we will add the same amount in 2024. The amount added per year will grow too. According to the Woodmac report I referenced, the amount of grid storage added yearly is going down. 12 GWh in 2023 10 GWh in 2024 Based on what do you think the report is wrong and where is the exponential growth in grid storage going to come from?
      - pfdietz 3y ago
        Now be honest and tell us what Woodmac is projecting for storage by 2030. I'll wait.
        ftth_finland 3y ago
        Why are you asking me? I am not Woodmac. Furthermore, their projections only go to 2027. I’m sure they will commission a custom report for you if you compensate them enough. Either way, 2030 grid storage projections are highly speculative. Projections for the next five years are based on announced and planned projects. Nobody is announcing or even planning 2030 deployments yet. Besides that, what’s your point? Are you trying to say that the previously touted exponential growth is only going to start after 2027? In 2030 perhaps? As an aside I find it amusing that you or somebody else downvoted me for quoting a report and asking where the exponential growth that contradicts the report findings are going to come from.
evilos 3y ago
Casually suggesting we add the equivalent of our nation's supply of grid battery storage to get the equivalent of a single nuclear plants worth of energy is a new one.
- ben_w 3y ago
  Is it? Given how fast reactors are getting built in the US, I'd say the batteries look like they're already doing much better than the reactors. Of course, both can change as the number are, while interesting, small.
  - evilos 3y ago
    Even if we really could ramp up those factories and the corresponding mines for all the battery materials, those batteries will last maybe 10 ish years. Then they need to be recycled and we have basically no capacity for that today. A nuclear plant can easily go for 60 to 80 years with good maintenance.
    - epistasis 3y ago
      What do you mean "even if"? Can you name a single battery factory that has seen delays of cost overruns like nuclear regularly has? Can you point to a single investor that's willing to back new nuclear in the US like they are backing new battery factories all over? Your usage of numbers is off and extremely biased. Warranties for grid storage batteries are already longer than 10 years, and they don't suddenly stop working, they just experience finished capacity over time. Whereas 80 years for nuclear has no basis in reality, and most are getting shut down at forty due to excessive costs to continue operation. This sort of rose-colored view of nuclear, cherry picking the very best case from one's imagination, and then taking the very worst possible estimate of the comparator, is the type of self-deception that results in nuclear losing again and again. Without a clear view of why these projects fail, and what they actually can deliver, the entire industry has lost any credibility.
      - evilos 3y ago

epistasis 3y ago

12 GWh is a fraction of a single factory's output from a single year. We are producing >50GWh total for storage per year, and the only reason more of it isn't going to the grid is that grid storage is a much less lucrative use of our storage capacity compare to cars, which have higher margins. The entire industry is growing at 10x capacity every five years! Don't forget that this single 1GW of nuclear took more than a decade. We simply can not scale nuclear to meet our needs, it is not a technology that scales well at all. For example, we have roughly 100GW of reactors in the US rapidly reaching their end of life. Even if the industry put all its effort in rebuilding fast enough to replace existing reactors, it would require a scale up that we can't possibly imagine right now. Meanwhile, we are already scaling storage, by building factory after factory.

ftth_finland 3y ago
> The entire industry is growing at 10x capacity every five years! Grid storage is projected only to grow 10-17 GWh per year according to the aforementioned article. Is that anywhere enough, if the aim is to decarbonise?
- ben_w 3y ago
  Kinda; cars need to decarbonise as well as the grid, so the batteries are still really important even if none end up on the grid for whatever reason.
- epistasis 3y ago
  And there's zero new expected nuclear after vogtle 4... If we add 10-17GWh in 2023, it would be foolish to think we will add the same amount in 2024. The amount added per year will grow too. We are at the beginning of the logistic curve, where growth is exponential. A few years ago, there wasn't even a single GWh on the grid. For more than a century we have balanced the grid by keeping energy stored in fuel; as we switch to cheap renewables, that's the only time that grid storage becomes necessary, and you have to get to pretty high levels of renewables before it makes economic sense to add storage. So the market is small now, and will grow. Until then, those lithium ion batteries are being shoved into cars, because car makers can not acquire them fast enough to meet demand. There are several other very promising and quickly advancing battery technologies as well, based on iron or sodium instead of lithium. We will see which get cheap, but until there's high amounts of renewables.
  - ftth_finland 3y ago
    > If we add 10-17GWh in 2023, it would be foolish to think we will add the same amount in 2024. The amount added per year will grow too. According to the Woodmac report I referenced, the amount of grid storage added yearly is going down. 12 GWh in 2023 10 GWh in 2024 Based on what do you think the report is wrong and where is the exponential growth in grid storage going to come from?
    - pfdietz 3y ago
      Now be honest and tell us what Woodmac is projecting for storage by 2030. I'll wait.
      - ftth_finland 3y ago
        Why are you asking me? I am not Woodmac. Furthermore, their projections only go to 2027. I’m sure they will commission a custom report for you if you compensate them enough. Either way, 2030 grid storage projections are highly speculative. Projections for the next five years are based on announced and planned projects. Nobody is announcing or even planning 2030 deployments yet. Besides that, what’s your point? Are you trying to say that the previously touted exponential growth is only going to start after 2027? In 2030 perhaps? As an aside I find it amusing that you or somebody else downvoted me for quoting a report and asking where the exponential growth that contradicts the report findings are going to come from.

evilos 3y ago

Casually suggesting we add the equivalent of our nation's supply of grid battery storage to get the equivalent of a single nuclear plants worth of energy is a new one.

ben_w 3y ago
Is it? Given how fast reactors are getting built in the US, I'd say the batteries look like they're already doing much better than the reactors. Of course, both can change as the number are, while interesting, small.
- evilos 3y ago
  Even if we really could ramp up those factories and the corresponding mines for all the battery materials, those batteries will last maybe 10 ish years. Then they need to be recycled and we have basically no capacity for that today. A nuclear plant can easily go for 60 to 80 years with good maintenance.
  - epistasis 3y ago
    What do you mean "even if"? Can you name a single battery factory that has seen delays of cost overruns like nuclear regularly has? Can you point to a single investor that's willing to back new nuclear in the US like they are backing new battery factories all over? Your usage of numbers is off and extremely biased. Warranties for grid storage batteries are already longer than 10 years, and they don't suddenly stop working, they just experience finished capacity over time. Whereas 80 years for nuclear has no basis in reality, and most are getting shut down at forty due to excessive costs to continue operation. This sort of rose-colored view of nuclear, cherry picking the very best case from one's imagination, and then taking the very worst possible estimate of the comparator, is the type of self-deception that results in nuclear losing again and again. Without a clear view of why these projects fail, and what they actually can deliver, the entire industry has lost any credibility.
    - evilos 3y ago