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> Solar and wind are winning Genuine question. What kind of solar/wind installation could generate 2GW of power on demand (including when no wind or sun) and h

> Solar and wind are winning Genuine question. What kind of solar/wind installation could generate 2GW of power on demand (including when no wind or sun) and how much would that cost? is it even feasible with actual technology?

epistasis 3y ago
Is that really a genuine question? 2GW of batteries attached to solar installations, spread over multiple sites, is quite common in 2023. What do you mean by "what kind"? Its just the normal kind.
- yodsanklai 3y ago
  If there's no sun, how long can the battery deliver? And if there's too much sun, where's the extra power dissipated? I'm wondering if it's possible to provide a service equivalent to a nuclear powerplant today, and if so, how much it costs.
  - _ph_ 3y ago
    The thing is, the question doesn't really make sense. Yes you could design a closed system of solar production and battery storage, which delivers power 24/7. But that is not reasonable. Solar is only one part of the electricity supply to the grid. Wind is another. Add to that water, biomass, etc. and you have multiple sources which complement each other. You would need battery storage only for those remaining amounts of electricity which cannot be served by the combination above. And this amount is easily an order of magnitude (or more) lower than a solar+storage system alone. This also heavily depends on your local climate. The closer to the equator you get, the more a solar storage only needs to supply energy over the night. There a solar+storage only grid would be the no brainer.
    - yodsanklai 3y ago
      The question makes sense. When people claim that wind + solar wins over nuclear. They compare apple and orange. Nobody is able to explain what wind/solar (+ other renewable) installation is doable right night in Sweden (not near the equator), that would provide the same guarantee as a nuclear powerplant: 2GW of power, all year long. Or at least any time when the people need that power and there hasn't been sun/wind for a while.
      - epistasis 3y ago
        This is not specifically for Sweden, but if for some reason you want to imaging a single unit that produces continual output (which is not a desirable operation mode for any grid asset in the modern world), then imagine a solar installs distributed over a geographic areas with 18+ hours of storage at the desired power output. That's the overall design. People don't build that way but they could if they wanted. Right now, batteries deployed on the grid cost $300-$500/kWh, and typically LFP batteries are designed to last for 5000-7000 cycles, and will have warranties for 15+ years. This places the cost of storing a MWh at between $42/MWh and $100/MWh. Solar costs vary based on location, but range from $20/MWh to $80/MWh. For places with high seasonal variation, sizing the install for daily storage, using the seasonal minimum of input, in some areas might double or triple the cost for a particular season. Nuclear costs vary widely by construction competence, but in the largely incompetent west costs are going to be far north of $150/MWh. So for most areas, most of the time, solar+storage is going to be far cheaper than nuclear. But low insolation or high latitudes might make solar+storage more expensive than nuclear. In the future, nuclear's prices will continue to rise very slowly, and solar and storage prices will continue to plummet at ridiculously fast paces. This is why solar and storage are winning. For industrial processes that need heat, the storage options become even cheaper. And if the industrial site can be put somewhere with half-decent solar insolation, then the solar power can be directly connected without going through the grid, which means looping off that $60-100/MWh that utilities charge for the very very expensive grid transmission. We are just at the start of industry realizing what is possible with distributed renewables and thermal storage, and there is potential for drastically cheaper energy for energy intensive industry that be built at new sites. This is why solar and storage are "winning" even if nuclear might be better for Sweden. And with the ever increasing deployment of EVs, people are going to be parking multiple days worth of their home's energy needs in their garage. People will soon realize just how cheap storage is, and how perhaps even their vehicles will act as grid storage, even if it's only though charging at selective times when energy is cheaper.
  - philipkglass 3y ago
    And if there's too much sun, where's the extra power dissipated? You can just open the circuit to disconnect a solar panel from the external load. The panel will get slightly warmer in full sunlight when it's not connected to a load, but there's no harm to it. Since there is no rotating mass or hot steam with accumulated energy in a solar farm, you can shut it down completely in seconds if necessary. Solar PV can safely go from 100% output to 0% faster than any other electricity source.
matthewdgreen 3y ago
Here's a list of sites planned for 2024 in the US [1]. The CD Solar Project has a 2GW capacity and a 1GW storage array. [1] https://www.renewableenergyworld.com/solar/10-large-solar-projects-in-development-for-2024/ https://www.renewableenergyworld.com/solar/10-large-solar-pr...
- yodsanklai 3y ago
  So that answers my question. This doesn't exist yet. 1GW storage isn't 2. Also how long would this last if there's no sun? (Sweden isn't Nevada).
  - mharig 3y ago
    No one needs 2 GW 24/365.25. Medium values are not very useful, most of the times.
    - yodsanklai 3y ago
      They want their trains to run or electricity in their hospitals, even though they's no sun/wind for a several days. Unless your renewable installation can provide that, it's not comparable to a nuclear plant and solar/wind doesn't win. The best example of this is Germany who is one of the worst CO2 emitter in Europe despite their huge investment in renewable.
      - mharig 3y ago
        Nuclear electricity is rather expensive. Are you sure the demand forecast someone calculated cannot be meet by ramping up hydro? Or importing electricity? In Germany, the right parties did block any project that had the smell of environment protection. And the pseudo-green clowns are no game changer.
      - matthewdgreen 3y ago
        Right now solar and storage are eating into the most economically-profitable generation. That means we’re seeing deployments of storage that shift supply a few hours into the high-demand evening period. This will work well in places that get a lot of sunlight or that have lots of sunny days or highly-connected grids (Europe is in the process of building HVDC links to North Africa for this reason.) What’s going to happen is that this low-hanging profitable fruit will be plucked first, and then as storage costs decrease (happening quickly as we speak) we’ll see a second layer of multi-day and seasonal storage get deployed. The problem for nuclear is that (1) this construction will eat a lot of the most profitable generation opportunities, and (2) nuclear takes so long to build (and has such a long payback period) that any new plant will arrive just as storage gets cheap enough to make it unprofitable.

epistasis 3y ago

Is that really a genuine question? 2GW of batteries attached to solar installations, spread over multiple sites, is quite common in 2023. What do you mean by "what kind"? Its just the normal kind.

yodsanklai 3y ago
If there's no sun, how long can the battery deliver? And if there's too much sun, where's the extra power dissipated? I'm wondering if it's possible to provide a service equivalent to a nuclear powerplant today, and if so, how much it costs.
- _ph_ 3y ago
  The thing is, the question doesn't really make sense. Yes you could design a closed system of solar production and battery storage, which delivers power 24/7. But that is not reasonable. Solar is only one part of the electricity supply to the grid. Wind is another. Add to that water, biomass, etc. and you have multiple sources which complement each other. You would need battery storage only for those remaining amounts of electricity which cannot be served by the combination above. And this amount is easily an order of magnitude (or more) lower than a solar+storage system alone. This also heavily depends on your local climate. The closer to the equator you get, the more a solar storage only needs to supply energy over the night. There a solar+storage only grid would be the no brainer.
  - yodsanklai 3y ago
    The question makes sense. When people claim that wind + solar wins over nuclear. They compare apple and orange. Nobody is able to explain what wind/solar (+ other renewable) installation is doable right night in Sweden (not near the equator), that would provide the same guarantee as a nuclear powerplant: 2GW of power, all year long. Or at least any time when the people need that power and there hasn't been sun/wind for a while.
    - epistasis 3y ago
      This is not specifically for Sweden, but if for some reason you want to imaging a single unit that produces continual output (which is not a desirable operation mode for any grid asset in the modern world), then imagine a solar installs distributed over a geographic areas with 18+ hours of storage at the desired power output. That's the overall design. People don't build that way but they could if they wanted. Right now, batteries deployed on the grid cost $300-$500/kWh, and typically LFP batteries are designed to last for 5000-7000 cycles, and will have warranties for 15+ years. This places the cost of storing a MWh at between $42/MWh and $100/MWh. Solar costs vary based on location, but range from $20/MWh to $80/MWh. For places with high seasonal variation, sizing the install for daily storage, using the seasonal minimum of input, in some areas might double or triple the cost for a particular season. Nuclear costs vary widely by construction competence, but in the largely incompetent west costs are going to be far north of $150/MWh. So for most areas, most of the time, solar+storage is going to be far cheaper than nuclear. But low insolation or high latitudes might make solar+storage more expensive than nuclear. In the future, nuclear's prices will continue to rise very slowly, and solar and storage prices will continue to plummet at ridiculously fast paces. This is why solar and storage are winning. For industrial processes that need heat, the storage options become even cheaper. And if the industrial site can be put somewhere with half-decent solar insolation, then the solar power can be directly connected without going through the grid, which means looping off that $60-100/MWh that utilities charge for the very very expensive grid transmission. We are just at the start of industry realizing what is possible with distributed renewables and thermal storage, and there is potential for drastically cheaper energy for energy intensive industry that be built at new sites. This is why solar and storage are "winning" even if nuclear might be better for Sweden. And with the ever increasing deployment of EVs, people are going to be parking multiple days worth of their home's energy needs in their garage. People will soon realize just how cheap storage is, and how perhaps even their vehicles will act as grid storage, even if it's only though charging at selective times when energy is cheaper.
- philipkglass 3y ago
  And if there's too much sun, where's the extra power dissipated? You can just open the circuit to disconnect a solar panel from the external load. The panel will get slightly warmer in full sunlight when it's not connected to a load, but there's no harm to it. Since there is no rotating mass or hot steam with accumulated energy in a solar farm, you can shut it down completely in seconds if necessary. Solar PV can safely go from 100% output to 0% faster than any other electricity source.

matthewdgreen 3y ago

Here's a list of sites planned for 2024 in the US [1]. The CD Solar Project has a 2GW capacity and a 1GW storage array. [1] https://www.renewableenergyworld.com/solar/10-large-solar-projects-in-development-for-2024/ https://www.renewableenergyworld.com/solar/10-large-solar-pr...

yodsanklai 3y ago
So that answers my question. This doesn't exist yet. 1GW storage isn't 2. Also how long would this last if there's no sun? (Sweden isn't Nevada).
- mharig 3y ago
  No one needs 2 GW 24/365.25. Medium values are not very useful, most of the times.
  - yodsanklai 3y ago
    They want their trains to run or electricity in their hospitals, even though they's no sun/wind for a several days. Unless your renewable installation can provide that, it's not comparable to a nuclear plant and solar/wind doesn't win. The best example of this is Germany who is one of the worst CO2 emitter in Europe despite their huge investment in renewable.
    - mharig 3y ago
      Nuclear electricity is rather expensive. Are you sure the demand forecast someone calculated cannot be meet by ramping up hydro? Or importing electricity? In Germany, the right parties did block any project that had the smell of environment protection. And the pseudo-green clowns are no game changer.
    - matthewdgreen 3y ago
      Right now solar and storage are eating into the most economically-profitable generation. That means we’re seeing deployments of storage that shift supply a few hours into the high-demand evening period. This will work well in places that get a lot of sunlight or that have lots of sunny days or highly-connected grids (Europe is in the process of building HVDC links to North Africa for this reason.) What’s going to happen is that this low-hanging profitable fruit will be plucked first, and then as storage costs decrease (happening quickly as we speak) we’ll see a second layer of multi-day and seasonal storage get deployed. The problem for nuclear is that (1) this construction will eat a lot of the most profitable generation opportunities, and (2) nuclear takes so long to build (and has such a long payback period) that any new plant will arrive just as storage gets cheap enough to make it unprofitable.