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You can build wind to compensate some of this. And of course a ton of short term storage. And then you build a bunch of cheap, inefficient gas peaker plants f
by konschubert 3y ago
You can build wind to compensate some of this.
And of course a ton of short term storage.
And then you build a bunch of cheap, inefficient gas peaker plants for the two weeks a year where neither are enough.
At the moment it looks like that will be a lot cheaper than nuclear. But if nuclear gets cheaper, that’s also a great option!
- ericd 3y agoGood points, all. But you'd still need to overbuild solar by quite a bit in order to make a reasonable amount in winter, in many areas.
- konschubert 3y agoIn Northern Europe, you definitely need Wind power and probably some natural gas dispatchable capacity. In most other places, you can overbuild the PV panels. Which isn't too bad, since you do not have to overbuild inverters or grid connections.
- ta1243 3y agoOr hydrogen. On windy days (or sunny in the southern US) you use the excess electricity to generate hydrogen, and then when there's a shortfall you convert it back to electricity.