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Question is always: what's externalized and what isn't? Grid storage, required if you want to ensure your energy source is renewable, is usually not taken into

by brnt 3y ago

Question is always: what's externalized and what isn't? Grid storage, required if you want to ensure your energy source is renewable, is usually not taken into account. Sure, diesel and commercial hydrogen isn't either, and an energy reduction even if not renewable is still great, but I'd be keen on knowing the number when taking it into account. That's the end goal after all.

beej71 3y ago
I think in this particular case the question might be "what is cheaper to operate?"
bee_rider 3y ago
Who pays for grid storage? Is it really externalized or does it just become part of the cost of doing business for the power company?
- marcosdumay 3y ago
  The answer for "who pays for X" is always similar. If no government intervenes, people that use electricity when its most expensive pay for it; or if the power company keeps the price constant, it gets included on the average price.
  - bee_rider 3y ago
    But, governments tend to intervene in utility prices somewhat often, and power companies have varying policies WRT constant pricing, so we have at least three (fairly dissimilar) possible answers here.
    - marcosdumay 3y ago
      > so we have at least three possible answers here For a question of who pays for a service, in an undefined market, at an undefined place, not specifying what participant it's about, and not determining at what history period exactly it's about (yeah, near future, but how near?). Do you think that's too many?
pjc50 3y ago
You can significantly reduce grid storage requirements for high-renewables scenarios if you can include demand-response in a big fleet of EV chargers to say "if your charge is not urgent, please delay it a bit".
gruez 3y ago
> Question is always: what's externalized and what isn't? In many (most?) electricity markets this is a non-issue because on the producer side, the price they get is determined by a spot market. Rather than every producer getting paid $0.05/kWh (or whatever) all the time, the price is calculated every hour/minute according to supply and demand. That means producers that generate electricity when there's an abundance (eg. renewables on a windy/sunny day) are penalized accordingly, and producers that generate electricity when there's a shortage (eg. peaking fossil fuel plants) are awarded accordingly.
Qwertious 3y ago
Grid storage isn't needed before the grid is at least 50% renewable (and I don't mean "once in a blue moon more than 50% of demand is satisfied by renewable electricity, I mean baseline"); in fact it's hard to justify building a lot of storage out before renewables give them lots of stuff to balance. Grid storage is eventually needed, but the discussion around batteries is kind of like demanding your website be "web scale" when you've had less than 100 visitors a day for the past year. Like, I'm all for planning ahead but is this really our priority? Meanwhile, if we reduce our emissions by 10% today, then we have 10%(ish) more time to get rid of the remaining 90%. Our deadline isn't time, it's CO2e emitted. In other words: Grid storage should not be taken into account, because the only way it becomes important soon is if we buy ourselves a lot of time to deal with it by majorly cutting emissions. People focus too much on "100% renewables by 20XX" and not enough on "50% renewables by ASAP". I'm sure there's a better way of phrasing that, because "[thing] should be taken into account" is basically an applause light and I'm contradicting it, but you get the idea.

by brnt 3y ago

beej71 3y ago

I think in this particular case the question might be "what is cheaper to operate?"

bee_rider 3y ago

Who pays for grid storage? Is it really externalized or does it just become part of the cost of doing business for the power company?

marcosdumay 3y ago
The answer for "who pays for X" is always similar. If no government intervenes, people that use electricity when its most expensive pay for it; or if the power company keeps the price constant, it gets included on the average price.
- bee_rider 3y ago
  But, governments tend to intervene in utility prices somewhat often, and power companies have varying policies WRT constant pricing, so we have at least three (fairly dissimilar) possible answers here.
  - marcosdumay 3y ago
    > so we have at least three possible answers here For a question of who pays for a service, in an undefined market, at an undefined place, not specifying what participant it's about, and not determining at what history period exactly it's about (yeah, near future, but how near?). Do you think that's too many?

pjc50 3y ago

You can significantly reduce grid storage requirements for high-renewables scenarios if you can include demand-response in a big fleet of EV chargers to say "if your charge is not urgent, please delay it a bit".

gruez 3y ago

> Question is always: what's externalized and what isn't? In many (most?) electricity markets this is a non-issue because on the producer side, the price they get is determined by a spot market. Rather than every producer getting paid $0.05/kWh (or whatever) all the time, the price is calculated every hour/minute according to supply and demand. That means producers that generate electricity when there's an abundance (eg. renewables on a windy/sunny day) are penalized accordingly, and producers that generate electricity when there's a shortage (eg. peaking fossil fuel plants) are awarded accordingly.

Qwertious 3y ago

Grid storage isn't needed before the grid is at least 50% renewable (and I don't mean "once in a blue moon more than 50% of demand is satisfied by renewable electricity, I mean baseline"); in fact it's hard to justify building a lot of storage out before renewables give them lots of stuff to balance. Grid storage is eventually needed, but the discussion around batteries is kind of like demanding your website be "web scale" when you've had less than 100 visitors a day for the past year. Like, I'm all for planning ahead but is this really our priority? Meanwhile, if we reduce our emissions by 10% today, then we have 10%(ish) more time to get rid of the remaining 90%. Our deadline isn't time, it's CO2e emitted. In other words: Grid storage should not be taken into account, because the only way it becomes important soon is if we buy ourselves a lot of time to deal with it by majorly cutting emissions. People focus too much on "100% renewables by 20XX" and not enough on "50% renewables by ASAP". I'm sure there's a better way of phrasing that, because "[thing] should be taken into account" is basically an applause light and I'm contradicting it, but you get the idea.