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The nice thing about solar is it's very cheap, and as a grid provider you can just charge more for energy at night to disincentivize use when the sun is not shi

The nice thing about solar is it's very cheap, and as a grid provider you can just charge more for energy at night to disincentivize use when the sun is not shining. We do not actually need constant energy supply at all hours of the day and night and solar can cover a great deal of energy needs for very cheap. You can also deploy solar even on a large scale in very short time scales. Want to build nuclear? You start applying for permits today and by the time the earth has surpassed 2.0 degrees C of warming maybe you start generating electricity. Even though I don't like natural gas for energy generation, let's say an area is currently being served by a natural gas plant. But now everyone wants electric cars and more power is needed. You can deploy a whole boatload of solar and use rate structuring to incentivize consumption in the day time (you charge your car at work). Now the gas plant spins up at night but it is only running half the time, and all day long people are using emission-free solar energy. And they aren't burning gasoline for their cars anymore. Plus if there is a power outage they can use their car as a home battery backup. So yeah, I don't think it really makes any sense to say "we have 78 seconds of battery backup so solar is pointless". You can make a HUGE dent in people's energy-related carbon emissions if you install solar tomorrow. Or you can pay much more and install nuclear in 15 years. Maybe we should start building out nuclear now but it would absolutely not be to the exclusion of solar! Even if we built 1000 new nuclear power plants in the US we would still need lots of solar and wind energy.

internetter 3y ago
I don't think they were saying solar is useless, but you underestimate how difficult it is to change peak load. Well a good start is actually smart systems within homes, for instance to avoid heating said home when nobody is present, or timing loads like car charging and dishwashers to be on that beat. That's great, but it's been proven these smart systems are very hard to roll out, no matter how much you try to say it's cheaper in the end. Well you can ignore all this and roll out significant pricing changes to coincide with peek production anyway, and quickly be met with two problems. The first are the people who say "fossils were better my energy was cheaper", good luck there. And you will also hear a large number of people say "well this is just a further tax against the poor who can't afford these systems, nice work, joe.", and honestly, they'd be right. A big thing we need if we want this energy transition to go well is a more local view, but also we could have solutions that don't depend on daylight to ease that transition. Anyway, don't know where I was going with this but those are my two cents.
- silverlyra 3y ago
  now I am wondering about the net social benefit of solar power disincentivizing third-shift (overnight) production. cheaper electricity during the day makes it relatively more expensive to operate heavy industry plants 24/7. the heavy investment that goes into those plants incentives operators to drive (and staff) them 24/7, but there are hidden social costs (negative externalities) of having so many people out of diurnal rhythm. maybe massive solar power buildout, with sharply cheaper daytime electricity, would relieve people from working “graveyard shifts” – and maybe that’d be a good thing
  - zdragnar 3y ago
    I worked a graveyard shift at a factory in college one summer because it was the only job that I could really find after weeks of looking. I definitely feel for the people who did it for a living. That said, the companies aren't going to just stop, they'll just charge higher prices. To stop producing in the third shift, they'll need to: - add more daytime production lines, which means buying more floor space, possibly in a different location with new logistics to work out - new capex for the new lines - higher overhead because your newly expanded production lines are idle 30% of the time - higher overhead from daily startup and shutdown times This is all for companies where it is feasible to do so. Some plants measure startup and shutdown in hours, if not days. Doing a full cycle every day would mean redesigning their entire operation, if it is even possible to do so at all. Even places like hospitals don't exactly get to choose to just turn off all the life support and lights at night.
  - ETH_start 3y ago
    24/7 might make transportation infrastructure utilization more efficient. Less congestion during rush hour for example.
- pydry 3y ago
  >That's great, but it's been proven these smart systems are very hard to roll out, no matter how much you try to say it's cheaper I thought the opposite was proven. E.g. When Germany produced a lot of variable output electricity they varied aluminum smelting rates accordingly. That was highly effective and not generally expected. There's tons of low hanging fruit like that but if you listen to carbon or nuclear lobby propaganda theyre insistent that the only thing that can solve the problem is more lithium than exists in the entire world.
nradov 3y ago
We actually need constant energy supply at all hours of the day and night if we want to have a modern industrialized economy with factories and refineries operating around the clock. It's generally not practical to shut down those facilities just because electricity prices are temporarily high. So, in practice all of those industries will migrate to areas with cheap, reliable power (even if it's not "green"). This has obvious national security concerns in that it makes us dependent on unreliable imports for critical materials.
- TaylorAlexander 3y ago
  > We actually need constant energy supply at all hours of the day and night if we want to have a modern industrialized economy with factories and refineries operating around the clock. We always need electricity available, but the demand is not constant and there are quite a few discretionary loads which can be run preferentially in the day time. We can expand our electrical capacity with clean solar energy in the day time, reducing the total need for existing polluting sources. Even if industrial factories run off of natural gas at night, a large installed base of solar will allow discretionary loads (home appliances, EV charging, etc) to run off of zero emissions solar when available. And even the industrial plants can utilize solar during the daytime, cutting their CO2 emissions related to energy use in half.
  - katbyte 3y ago
    Still burning O&G - the goal is to not which means you need that base load which means nuclear where hydro/pumped storage is not an option.
    - Retric 3y ago
      Only in the short term. It’s taking 10-15+ years to get nuclear online. Looking at the ramping up of battery production by you can build solar today, add batteries in 10 years and be much better off financially and environmentally. Even China regularly spends 7+ years to build nuclear from the point where construction actually starts and even longer when you include planning.
kjkjadksj 3y ago
I have so many products now that are either built from the start or have gotten a software update to do the bulk of their routine power draw overnight. I scarcely need to use AC at all where I live and my heat is from gas. I expect peak usage hours have already shifted from daytime to nighttime in my own case, probably for at least a few others in the area as well.
- Retric 3y ago
  Which is dependent on cheaper nighttime rates, if daytime rates where lower than all that demand would happen in the day.
mlsu 3y ago
Yes, certainly I agree. Solar is the best option, for the first 60-70% penetration. I am, like most in this thread, very optimistic about solar. We are nowhere near that level of penetration in most regions. But after that 60-70%, adding more capacity just doesn't move the needle. Once you hit 100% for the day in solar, a spare panel doesn't help your nighttime situation. So then what. You could overbuild solar, build distribution, build battery banks. I'm not wild about that. Mining for batteries is nasty business and we need all of the Lion we can get for electric mobility. Distribution? It's alright, but you run into problems -- like, what do you do when the sun goes down on the west coast? What do you do when a line goes down? Your system is larger, more centralized, more vulnerable. Nuclear under the current regulatory regime is clearly a nonstarter. But the capex of nuclear is almost entirely artificial. Something much closer to "too cheap to meter" could be a reality. All it takes is a cultural willingness. By the way, nuclear having an extraordinary capex makes it even tougher to compete with solar in the mix. Because your capacity factor goes way down if you are only generating at night. This is why we build oil and gas plants -- they're cheap. What we need is for nuclear to favorably compete with oil and gas. It does not need to compete with solar.

internetter 3y ago

I don't think they were saying solar is useless, but you underestimate how difficult it is to change peak load. Well a good start is actually smart systems within homes, for instance to avoid heating said home when nobody is present, or timing loads like car charging and dishwashers to be on that beat. That's great, but it's been proven these smart systems are very hard to roll out, no matter how much you try to say it's cheaper in the end. Well you can ignore all this and roll out significant pricing changes to coincide with peek production anyway, and quickly be met with two problems. The first are the people who say "fossils were better my energy was cheaper", good luck there. And you will also hear a large number of people say "well this is just a further tax against the poor who can't afford these systems, nice work, joe.", and honestly, they'd be right. A big thing we need if we want this energy transition to go well is a more local view, but also we could have solutions that don't depend on daylight to ease that transition. Anyway, don't know where I was going with this but those are my two cents.

silverlyra 3y ago
now I am wondering about the net social benefit of solar power disincentivizing third-shift (overnight) production. cheaper electricity during the day makes it relatively more expensive to operate heavy industry plants 24/7. the heavy investment that goes into those plants incentives operators to drive (and staff) them 24/7, but there are hidden social costs (negative externalities) of having so many people out of diurnal rhythm. maybe massive solar power buildout, with sharply cheaper daytime electricity, would relieve people from working “graveyard shifts” – and maybe that’d be a good thing
- zdragnar 3y ago
  I worked a graveyard shift at a factory in college one summer because it was the only job that I could really find after weeks of looking. I definitely feel for the people who did it for a living. That said, the companies aren't going to just stop, they'll just charge higher prices. To stop producing in the third shift, they'll need to: - add more daytime production lines, which means buying more floor space, possibly in a different location with new logistics to work out - new capex for the new lines - higher overhead because your newly expanded production lines are idle 30% of the time - higher overhead from daily startup and shutdown times This is all for companies where it is feasible to do so. Some plants measure startup and shutdown in hours, if not days. Doing a full cycle every day would mean redesigning their entire operation, if it is even possible to do so at all. Even places like hospitals don't exactly get to choose to just turn off all the life support and lights at night.
- ETH_start 3y ago
  24/7 might make transportation infrastructure utilization more efficient. Less congestion during rush hour for example.
pydry 3y ago
>That's great, but it's been proven these smart systems are very hard to roll out, no matter how much you try to say it's cheaper I thought the opposite was proven. E.g. When Germany produced a lot of variable output electricity they varied aluminum smelting rates accordingly. That was highly effective and not generally expected. There's tons of low hanging fruit like that but if you listen to carbon or nuclear lobby propaganda theyre insistent that the only thing that can solve the problem is more lithium than exists in the entire world.

nradov 3y ago

We actually need constant energy supply at all hours of the day and night if we want to have a modern industrialized economy with factories and refineries operating around the clock. It's generally not practical to shut down those facilities just because electricity prices are temporarily high. So, in practice all of those industries will migrate to areas with cheap, reliable power (even if it's not "green"). This has obvious national security concerns in that it makes us dependent on unreliable imports for critical materials.

TaylorAlexander 3y ago
> We actually need constant energy supply at all hours of the day and night if we want to have a modern industrialized economy with factories and refineries operating around the clock. We always need electricity available, but the demand is not constant and there are quite a few discretionary loads which can be run preferentially in the day time. We can expand our electrical capacity with clean solar energy in the day time, reducing the total need for existing polluting sources. Even if industrial factories run off of natural gas at night, a large installed base of solar will allow discretionary loads (home appliances, EV charging, etc) to run off of zero emissions solar when available. And even the industrial plants can utilize solar during the daytime, cutting their CO2 emissions related to energy use in half.
- katbyte 3y ago
  Still burning O&G - the goal is to not which means you need that base load which means nuclear where hydro/pumped storage is not an option.
  - Retric 3y ago
    Only in the short term. It’s taking 10-15+ years to get nuclear online. Looking at the ramping up of battery production by you can build solar today, add batteries in 10 years and be much better off financially and environmentally. Even China regularly spends 7+ years to build nuclear from the point where construction actually starts and even longer when you include planning.

kjkjadksj 3y ago

I have so many products now that are either built from the start or have gotten a software update to do the bulk of their routine power draw overnight. I scarcely need to use AC at all where I live and my heat is from gas. I expect peak usage hours have already shifted from daytime to nighttime in my own case, probably for at least a few others in the area as well.

Retric 3y ago
Which is dependent on cheaper nighttime rates, if daytime rates where lower than all that demand would happen in the day.

mlsu 3y ago

Yes, certainly I agree. Solar is the best option, for the first 60-70% penetration. I am, like most in this thread, very optimistic about solar. We are nowhere near that level of penetration in most regions. But after that 60-70%, adding more capacity just doesn't move the needle. Once you hit 100% for the day in solar, a spare panel doesn't help your nighttime situation. So then what. You could overbuild solar, build distribution, build battery banks. I'm not wild about that. Mining for batteries is nasty business and we need all of the Lion we can get for electric mobility. Distribution? It's alright, but you run into problems -- like, what do you do when the sun goes down on the west coast? What do you do when a line goes down? Your system is larger, more centralized, more vulnerable. Nuclear under the current regulatory regime is clearly a nonstarter. But the capex of nuclear is almost entirely artificial. Something much closer to "too cheap to meter" could be a reality. All it takes is a cultural willingness. By the way, nuclear having an extraordinary capex makes it even tougher to compete with solar in the mix. Because your capacity factor goes way down if you are only generating at night. This is why we build oil and gas plants -- they're cheap. What we need is for nuclear to favorably compete with oil and gas. It does not need to compete with solar.