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> 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 w
by _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?
- nazgul17 2y agoNot everyone can use energy from the North Sea.
- ceejayoz 2y agoThankfully, it’s not the only reliably windy spot on the planet. Especially on continent-sized electrical grid scales. We put the farms in windy spots, and we pick a variety of spots.
- ImJamal 2y agoCan the North Sea wind provide enough for 100 million people?
- ceejayoz 2y agoAlmost certainly yes. The Dogger Bank farm alone powers six million, and we’ve hardly filled the entire sea with turbines.
- tonyedgecombe 2y agohttps://www.wind-watch.org/news/2021/09/14/energy-prices-in-europe-hit-records-after-wind-stops-blowing/ https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2021/09/14/energy-prices-in-...
- ceejayoz 2y agoIf you dig a little deeper than an industry front quoting the WSJ, "stop" there means "10-20% less than usual" https://climate.copernicus.eu/esotc/2021/low-winds https://climate.copernicus.eu/esotc/2021/low-winds
- tonyedgecombe 2y agoYou still need to cover that 10-20% less. Try doing the figures, we can't scale batteries to cover these drops.
- Rebelgecko 2y ago>Yes, they don't provide consistent output on their own, but storage exists I think this varies depending on where you live. In California, Cal-iso has a really cool dashboard that seems to show that they have enough battery storage to hold about 90 minutes of daytime solar generation. Definitely not something that can handle a fully cloudy day yet (presumably it's cheaper to keep some natty gas plants ready to spin up or import than to store more excess solar?)
- _aavaa_ 2y agoThey do. The good news is that the limit factor on that growth appears to be getting through the grid interconnect queue rather than a lack of people willing to pay to build them: https://emp.lbl.gov/news/grid-connection-backlog-grows-30-2023-dominated-requests-solar-wind-and-energy-storage https://emp.lbl.gov/news/grid-connection-backlog-grows-30-20...
- nine_k 2y agoStorage exists, but it's insufficient and expensive. We need 30x, or maybe 100x more storage. After that, we could live on renewables only, and keep gas-fired plants only as a disaster-recovery tool, like diesels in datacenters. Until then, we need stable generation which does not spew CO2, which is, well, nuclear. It's hard to tell if ubiquitous cheap utility-scale batteries emerge in 5 years or 50 years.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago> Storage exists, but it's insufficient and expensive It’s just insufficient. Solar + storage is cost competitive with nuclear. The problem is we have a bajillion needs for batteries, a Balkanised global market and wholly insufficient production forecasts over the next decade without gas or nuclear support. Voters seem to like gas. Private participants are choosing nuclear where they can. Good to be a gas exporter for the next half century or so.
- caseyy 2y agoThere are pumped storage hydro-electric plants with abundant and cheap capacities. They also work and are in use, mostly in China and Japan. China is building a lot more, too. It will probably have 80% of the world’s energy storage capacity in a decade. We just don’t talk about them in the West for some reason. I guess battery tech is more appealing somehow but it’s not cheaper nor more environmentally friendly, all in all. I hope that now once there are some serious users of power, they might build some of these plants, and then governments in the West will wake up to how good the plants are.