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Our electrical grid has losses of 30 percent, even after being designed to minimize those losses. Superconductivity wouldn't simply remove those losses; it wou
by kbelder 3y ago
Our electrical grid has losses of 30 percent, even after being designed to minimize those losses. Superconductivity wouldn't simply remove those losses; it would remove that design constraint, enabling (for example) solar panels in the Sahara to power households in Siberia. It would mostly fix the power storage problem for renewables.
The point is that at a certain level, a quantifiable increase in efficiency causes a qualitative change in capabilities.
- tuatoru 3y agoYeah, see, it wouldn't. Transmission lines are priced per kilometre. Superconducting transmission will almost certainly cost more than vanilla SCAW (steel cored aluminum wire), and you still have to pay for pylons, bridges, and/or directional drilling over land, or for laying if on the sea bed. Return on capital employed drives investment decisions. With the cost of PV, wind, and storage falling rapidly, and the efficiency of PV rising, the numbers are starting to fall out in favour of overbuilding supply near demand (in Siberia, to take your example), not building long transmission lines. No one lives in Siberia anyway, to a first approximation. No market, no investment.