3 ms·

> 5,700tWH/yr IOW 650 GW average. Which would be 743 Sanborns. China could churn that out in a couple of years. Your math is out by a factor of 365*24.

> 5,700tWH/yr IOW 650 GW average. Which would be 743 Sanborns. China could churn that out in a couple of years. Your math is out by a factor of 365*24. > And given that Coal is US$1-1.50/kg, heavy industry will continue to use that because it is cheap and available. I think your numbers must be off, because that's crazy expensive. It takes over a pound of coal to generate a kWh of electricity, so that's over 50 cents per kWh, 100X as expensive as solar.

alephnerd 2y ago
The $1-1.50/kg includes the capex for infra and land (eg. a coal plant, or a solar array). Alternative energy sources are not cost effective until they hit the $1.50/kg limit. Solar has hit that in the mid-2010s, but land acquisition remains a major blocker in both China and India. > China could churn that out in a couple of years. "Could" is carrying a lot of the weight in this sentence. China hasn't fully built and commissioned a Sanborn sized battery grid project yet (but will in the next 1-2 years). It will still take at least a decade to roll out countrywide, and within a decade, China's secondary industry will have grown beyond the size that it is today. Just having capacity alone doesn't equal a battery grid overnight. A significant portion of that battery capacity is devoted to the automotive industry as well as exports, plus financing remains a potential blocker, as battery grid projects tend to be public-private projects initiated by provinces within China. Furthermore, if financing and batteries are already allocated, it still takes time to build out and commission a battery grid. Plus this ignores India, Vietnam, Indonesia, and plenty of other countries rapidly building out heavy industry capacity.
- bryanlarsen 2y ago
  > "Could" is carrying a lot of the weight in this sentence. No it's not. China will have the capacity to produce > 2500 Sanborns worth of batteries in 2025 alone.

alephnerd 2y ago

The $1-1.50/kg includes the capex for infra and land (eg. a coal plant, or a solar array). Alternative energy sources are not cost effective until they hit the $1.50/kg limit. Solar has hit that in the mid-2010s, but land acquisition remains a major blocker in both China and India. > China could churn that out in a couple of years. "Could" is carrying a lot of the weight in this sentence. China hasn't fully built and commissioned a Sanborn sized battery grid project yet (but will in the next 1-2 years). It will still take at least a decade to roll out countrywide, and within a decade, China's secondary industry will have grown beyond the size that it is today. Just having capacity alone doesn't equal a battery grid overnight. A significant portion of that battery capacity is devoted to the automotive industry as well as exports, plus financing remains a potential blocker, as battery grid projects tend to be public-private projects initiated by provinces within China. Furthermore, if financing and batteries are already allocated, it still takes time to build out and commission a battery grid. Plus this ignores India, Vietnam, Indonesia, and plenty of other countries rapidly building out heavy industry capacity.

bryanlarsen 2y ago
> "Could" is carrying a lot of the weight in this sentence. No it's not. China will have the capacity to produce > 2500 Sanborns worth of batteries in 2025 alone.