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A common issue with all predictions from a few years ago is that they failed to predict the 90% fall in cost of solar panels. We see a similar thing today when

A common issue with all predictions from a few years ago is that they failed to predict the 90% fall in cost of solar panels. We see a similar thing today when battery storage is dismissed as being too expensive. Unfortunately, current policies are often based on predictions from a few years ago.

nradov 3y ago
Battery storage has excellent long term potential but costs are falling much more slowly than with solar panels. There are some significant constraints on raw materials supplies. Those can eventually be worked through but it will take longer.
- Kon5ole 3y ago
  You may be right of course, but I believe the reason for the slow drop is mostly because most of the battery factories currently under production are not online yet and EV makers are still grabbing all the batteries they can get. VW just started building one of their planned 6 last year. Once the transition to EV's is mostly done and car sales fall to normal levels there will be an immense surplus of battery production capacity. My understanding is also that LFP batteries have basically eliminated the raw materials bottleneck, which was another development that few analysts (or anyone else) were able to predict just a few years ago.
  - tooltalk 3y ago
    >> My understanding is also that LFP batteries have basically eliminated the raw materials bottleneck, << the casuality between the raw material supply bottleneck and LFP would be difficult to demonstrate. LFP has lower energy density and would have required more lithium to get equivalent KWh than what is normally required by high-energy, high-nickel batteries (eg, NCM/A); therefore higher lithium demand, but ... The price of lithium, and other battery raw materials, however, plunged by 75% since last Novemember peak (still falling) -- it's widely understood that the drop is largely caused by slower than expected EV demand (and oversupply). >> but I believe the reason for the slow drop is mostly because most of the battery factories currently under production are not online yet... << GM forecasted earlier this year that their (Ultium) cell cost would drop to $87/KWh by 2025; just last week, GM reported a 40% drop in their cell cost YoY. Sure, there is 400+GWh new US battery production coming up in 2025-2026 and the commodification/mass-production of made batteries would accelerate further price drop.
- tooltalk 3y ago
  >> There are some significant constraints on raw materials supplies. << which was true for all kinds of stuff from construction materials to EVs last year -- the prices of battery raw materials, eg, lithium, nickel and cobalt, plunged by as much as 75% since last November peak.
Gibbon1 3y ago
Battery economics have really changed in the last 5 years without a lot of notice. California has installed 5GW worth in the last 4 years. Max demand in California is about 50GW. What's driving batteries is the spread between price per MHW at 12am and 6PM.
hn_throwaway_99 3y ago
When it comes to storage there are also a lot of other technologies that may be viable if solar/wind are built out to the point where they are particularly over-subscribed (meaning that on a particularly windy/sunny day they provide much, much more than 100% of demand). For example, using things like clean hydrogen or Power-to-methane processes that can create gas to be used in existing peaker plants.
- tomatocracy 3y ago
  Curtailment already happens routinely today for solar PV in some countries (eg Spain) - though it's due to running out of grid capacity in the right places, not oversupply on the grid as a whole. Economically for PV farms which are being curtailed building colocated hydrogen storage makes some sense. If there's no curtailment (and if you have sites available in the country) then pumped storage makes a lot more sense. But either way, building sufficient storage to do anything other than peak-shave is very, very, very expensive, so we'd be better off with nuclear even at a 2-3x cost overrun.
  - pydry 3y ago
    Pumped storage and hydrogen are, paired with wind or solar, much, much cheaper than nuclear power. We'd even be better off if all solar and wind power were converted into hydrogen first and only then turned into electricity. Not because thats cheap but because nuclear power is that expensive. Nuclear power only becomes cost competitive when you use it to share costs with the nuclear-military industrial complex - which is why it is built.
    - tomatocracy 3y ago
      For intraday variation, yes I agree - intermittent renewables+storage works well. But for longer term variability (eg wind droughts) or even worse, if you wanted to cover seasonal variation in production (solar PV can have enormous seasonal variability in northerly latitudes), the amount of storage you need in MWh is absolutely enormous. This is why nuclear still winds up being much more sensible.
cbmuser 3y ago
A much more common issue is that many people forget that neither wind nor solar provide baseload and even with the cheapest batteries on the planet, we won’t even close to buffering a national grid’s demand for days. Having said that, any future electricity mix must include nuclear power. France proves that only nuclear allows for deep decarbonization unless you have lots of hydropower and a small population like Norway. For people who still think that wind and solar alone can do it, I just recommend looking at Germany which had to resort to restart even communist East Germany era coal plants to stabilize the grid after the nuclear phase out.
- WatchDog 3y ago
  What about gas peaker plants? I think people are letting perfect be the enemy of good, sure they output carbon, but they seem like a much more affordable option for buffering dips in renewables output, compared to batteries or nuclear.
  - pfdietz 3y ago
    CO2 fees will be raised until that's no longer the case. Unless by "gas" you meant green hydrogen.
regularfry 3y ago
That's a good problem to have, though. Inefficiencies from following "the wrong path" just mean the end solution isn't quite as good as it might have been, but if it was good enough to solve the problem in the first place then anything you can recover by switching tack is almost pure upside.

nradov 3y ago

Battery storage has excellent long term potential but costs are falling much more slowly than with solar panels. There are some significant constraints on raw materials supplies. Those can eventually be worked through but it will take longer.

Kon5ole 3y ago
You may be right of course, but I believe the reason for the slow drop is mostly because most of the battery factories currently under production are not online yet and EV makers are still grabbing all the batteries they can get. VW just started building one of their planned 6 last year. Once the transition to EV's is mostly done and car sales fall to normal levels there will be an immense surplus of battery production capacity. My understanding is also that LFP batteries have basically eliminated the raw materials bottleneck, which was another development that few analysts (or anyone else) were able to predict just a few years ago.
- tooltalk 3y ago
  >> My understanding is also that LFP batteries have basically eliminated the raw materials bottleneck, << the casuality between the raw material supply bottleneck and LFP would be difficult to demonstrate. LFP has lower energy density and would have required more lithium to get equivalent KWh than what is normally required by high-energy, high-nickel batteries (eg, NCM/A); therefore higher lithium demand, but ... The price of lithium, and other battery raw materials, however, plunged by 75% since last Novemember peak (still falling) -- it's widely understood that the drop is largely caused by slower than expected EV demand (and oversupply). >> but I believe the reason for the slow drop is mostly because most of the battery factories currently under production are not online yet... << GM forecasted earlier this year that their (Ultium) cell cost would drop to $87/KWh by 2025; just last week, GM reported a 40% drop in their cell cost YoY. Sure, there is 400+GWh new US battery production coming up in 2025-2026 and the commodification/mass-production of made batteries would accelerate further price drop.
tooltalk 3y ago
>> There are some significant constraints on raw materials supplies. << which was true for all kinds of stuff from construction materials to EVs last year -- the prices of battery raw materials, eg, lithium, nickel and cobalt, plunged by as much as 75% since last November peak.

Gibbon1 3y ago

Battery economics have really changed in the last 5 years without a lot of notice. California has installed 5GW worth in the last 4 years. Max demand in California is about 50GW. What's driving batteries is the spread between price per MHW at 12am and 6PM.

hn_throwaway_99 3y ago

When it comes to storage there are also a lot of other technologies that may be viable if solar/wind are built out to the point where they are particularly over-subscribed (meaning that on a particularly windy/sunny day they provide much, much more than 100% of demand). For example, using things like clean hydrogen or Power-to-methane processes that can create gas to be used in existing peaker plants.

tomatocracy 3y ago
Curtailment already happens routinely today for solar PV in some countries (eg Spain) - though it's due to running out of grid capacity in the right places, not oversupply on the grid as a whole. Economically for PV farms which are being curtailed building colocated hydrogen storage makes some sense. If there's no curtailment (and if you have sites available in the country) then pumped storage makes a lot more sense. But either way, building sufficient storage to do anything other than peak-shave is very, very, very expensive, so we'd be better off with nuclear even at a 2-3x cost overrun.
- pydry 3y ago
  Pumped storage and hydrogen are, paired with wind or solar, much, much cheaper than nuclear power. We'd even be better off if all solar and wind power were converted into hydrogen first and only then turned into electricity. Not because thats cheap but because nuclear power is that expensive. Nuclear power only becomes cost competitive when you use it to share costs with the nuclear-military industrial complex - which is why it is built.
  - tomatocracy 3y ago
    For intraday variation, yes I agree - intermittent renewables+storage works well. But for longer term variability (eg wind droughts) or even worse, if you wanted to cover seasonal variation in production (solar PV can have enormous seasonal variability in northerly latitudes), the amount of storage you need in MWh is absolutely enormous. This is why nuclear still winds up being much more sensible.

cbmuser 3y ago

A much more common issue is that many people forget that neither wind nor solar provide baseload and even with the cheapest batteries on the planet, we won’t even close to buffering a national grid’s demand for days. Having said that, any future electricity mix must include nuclear power. France proves that only nuclear allows for deep decarbonization unless you have lots of hydropower and a small population like Norway. For people who still think that wind and solar alone can do it, I just recommend looking at Germany which had to resort to restart even communist East Germany era coal plants to stabilize the grid after the nuclear phase out.

WatchDog 3y ago
What about gas peaker plants? I think people are letting perfect be the enemy of good, sure they output carbon, but they seem like a much more affordable option for buffering dips in renewables output, compared to batteries or nuclear.
- pfdietz 3y ago
  CO2 fees will be raised until that's no longer the case. Unless by "gas" you meant green hydrogen.

regularfry 3y ago

That's a good problem to have, though. Inefficiencies from following "the wrong path" just mean the end solution isn't quite as good as it might have been, but if it was good enough to solve the problem in the first place then anything you can recover by switching tack is almost pure upside.