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Wind and especially solar are also serious. But their applications are different; they can offset the load when the sun shines, or the wind blows, but can't pro
by nine_k 2y ago
Wind and especially solar are also serious. But their applications are different; they can offset the load when the sun shines, or the wind blows, but can't provide a stable source.
If you need baseload, and need it carbon-free, your only option currently is nuclear. It's terribly encumbered, but apparently it's still less of an impasse that large-scale electricity storage currently is.
- barbazoo 2y ago> If you need baseload, and need it carbon-free, your only option currently is nuclear What about geothermal, tidal, hydro, etc?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- nine_k 2y agoGood, given the right geography. - Hydrothermal: great if you're in Iceland, or near Yellowstone, or other such place blessed by heated rock being close to the surface. Not as great if you need to drill 7 km to reach it. - Hydro: great if you have a lot of mountains and rivers, like Switzerland or Norway. Harder if you don't, like in much of Texas, to say nothing of Florida. - Tidal: great if you have a sea shore, preferably with narrow bays / fjords. But if you're in a place like Turkmenistan (one of the two doubly-landlocked countries), you resort to drilling for and burning methane %)
- bobthepanda 2y agoHydro has a bunch of problems. * most of the "good sites" have already been taken * hydro will regularly silt up, requiring constant dredging * hydro does not work as well or at all in drought conditions, which are increasingly common * hydro dams require reservoirs, which in addition to the obvious disruption of the displacement of thousands or even a million plus people in the case of Three Gorges, can end up emitting large amounts of carbon as flooded vegetation decomposes. * hydro is extremely disruptive to migratory fish. the success rate of interventions like fish ladders is in the low single digit percents. so you can get a bunch of carbon free power but also destroy an ecosystem in the process, not to mention any downstream fishing. and you see similar effects with other things that downstream users might want from the river like fresh silt.
- njtransit 2y agoPumped storage hydro solves many of these issues.
- bobthepanda 2y agoIt’s not really baseload without something else, though. And pumped hydro capacity is generally meant for hours or days.
- _aavaa_ 2y ago> they can offset the load when the sun shines, or the wind blows, but can't provide a stable source. That they don't work when the sun doesn't shine or the wind doesn't blow is such a tired and trite remake. Yes, they don't provide consistent output on their own, but storage exists. If you need electricity store it in batteries or pumped hydro. If you need it for heating store it in thermal batteries.
- tonyedgecombe 2y agoGrid connected batteries are only viable for a short duration, they aren’t going to help when you don’t have any wind for two weeks.
- Teever 2y agoIs that a thing where they build wind farms? Like are there any wind farms where it is likely to occur with any regularity? In my region wind generation dipped down to only 1pc of capacity for a day or two last winter which seems to be the floor as far as I can tell. That tells me that we only need to increase capacity by 100x to get the coverage we want, and as a bonus we get all that surplus capacity most of the time to use on non-essential industry.
- ceejayoz 2y agoWhen's the last time the North Sea had no wind for two weeks?
- Ghaenergyyy 2y agoIts not that simple. First of no one is saying its just wind and solar. You say wind, solar and energy storage (batteries). And second, if more people would buy EVs, we would already have A LOT MORE storage available. My EV has 100kWh and could heat a whole modern build house for 2 full days in winter.
- kulahan 2y agoI agree with all of this. I get annoyed with the conversations surrounding wind and solar, but I don't dislike the techs themselves. They have a place and are great, and solar is mind-bogglingly affordable right now. I've seen utility companies offering them """for free""" (you lease, your electricity covers the cost of lease, no money for extra generated) because it's so cheap now. But we need, as you said, a baseload. Nobody is really discussing how to create this, they're just saying we should magically invent an incredibly dense battery (more energy-dense than hydrocarbons, ideally, or let's say within 50% as useful) using technologies nobody can even fathom. Meanwhile, we're seeing breakthroughs in fusion tech, miles ahead of the usefulness of fission, which is miles ahead of anything else we have right now. I just don't understand the aversion to a clean, renewable power source.