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Residential solar with batteries greatly aids the grid and reduces costs for the entire system. > The metals do build those batteries do not exist. Or put in a

Residential solar with batteries greatly aids the grid and reduces costs for the entire system. > The metals do build those batteries do not exist. Or put in a worse way, the mines do not exist. Lithium and sodium, the two most promising battery metals, are not usually mined, though in Australia I hear there is mining. It's more of a brine process. All across the US, frackers are finding that all that water they are pulling out is a fairly rich lithium brine. The amount of metal needed for 2 weeks of batteries is pretty trivial compared to the system we've built for extracting fossil fuels, and iron, etc. The bigger demands for electrification are acutally copper! Gotta wire everything.... Grid batteries on the GWh scale make a ton of sense financially and environmentally, and are revolutionizing the grid. Never before has the grid had a way to store electricity on a grand scale, which changes the entire nature of the beast. It's was one of the only massive systems we had where there wasn't buffering! With storage, we can alleviate congested transmission without super costly transmission upgrades. On exist lines, we can the usage massively, reducing costs, because now we can buffer across time to shave off the peak demand. Batteries are easy to build, environmentally friendly, and like a swiss army knife in their number of applications. We will be producing TWh of batteries a year in modern economies, and they last ~20 years, meaning that for the foreseeable economic growth in the coming decades, we'll easily have a peta-watthour of battery storage in use at a time.

mikaeluman 10mo ago
I don't agree. Lithium and Copper are mined and given electrification scenarios there is a projected supply deficit: https://www.iea.org/reports/global-critical-minerals-outlook-2025/executive-summary https://www.iea.org/reports/global-critical-minerals-outlook... Those prices are outdated now since practically all metals are surging. There has indeed been great growth in battery capacity but it's as I said nowhere near able to supply a country like Sweden during the winter. It is off by orders of magnitude. We need 5TWh for that. It is not going to happen any time soon. I understand California is different. Still, one would need to do these risk scenario calculations. Have they been made? I know California has rotating blackouts already as it is. I really don't have any idea how people find that acceptable. If it happened in Sweden the government would be replaced on the day. It would be a real disaster. I will be a bigger believer if a state like California can actually show its possible. For sure I hope technology improves but the current ideas of solar+battery are simply highly unlikely.
- epistasis 10mo ago
  Your link does not support the idea of a supply deficit, at least that I see. Propel panicked about lithium under supply, prices surged and didn't even affect battery prices much, and now we are in oversuppply. The worst that can happen is lag time between demand increase and supply match, and there are substitutes for all key metals for most applications, even copper. Every country will have to figure out how to supply its own power, but Sweden's seasonal variation in renewable resources is not likely to be fixed by batteries, even though batteries will be abundant and in massive supply throughout the rest of the world. If Sweden can't figure out, or merely can't, take advantage of great cheap new technology, they will be at a disadvantage compared to countries that will > I know California has rotating blackouts already as it is You don't know that because it's not true. Due to planning not taking into account climate change, there were a few days with demand above expected ability to provide capacity, but there were no blackouts because people were asked to voluntarily cut back on excessive cooling. That mere ask was more than enough to get through the few days. And it was fixed the next year, by what? By batteries! Adding nuclear wouldn't have helped, but batteries were the perfect solution. Perhaps nuclear can help Sweden, but it will be far more expensive than the solutions available to other countries. It is quite funny that what I thought was US propaganda has been spread to Sweden for repetition. Even including the IEA report that doesn't say what people claim it says!
  - mikaeluman 10mo ago
    Regarding the IEA report; I think you didn't read it carefully enough. In the near term there is no supply deficit (although current price development would seem to beg to differ) - but the point was in an electrification scenario there _would be_ in the 2030s. Given it takes many years to start up mines (as far as I know), that is the issue. For copper - the report is very clear that there already is an issue, which is understandable because copper is used everywhere. And again, looking at copper prices, you can already tell. Regarding California; you are right. I was misinformed. I would say that the grid is still very, very vulnerable due to the huge reliance on solar and overproduction during midday. That's why these examples of "I exported power to the grid" is not very interesting. Most grids aren't built that way anyway. The residential units are sinks, not sources. In Sweden we don't even have much solar power but already there have been policies aimed at reducing grid exports from residential units, because they are mostly redundant and even harmful.

mikaeluman 10mo ago

I don't agree. Lithium and Copper are mined and given electrification scenarios there is a projected supply deficit: https://www.iea.org/reports/global-critical-minerals-outlook-2025/executive-summary https://www.iea.org/reports/global-critical-minerals-outlook... Those prices are outdated now since practically all metals are surging. There has indeed been great growth in battery capacity but it's as I said nowhere near able to supply a country like Sweden during the winter. It is off by orders of magnitude. We need 5TWh for that. It is not going to happen any time soon. I understand California is different. Still, one would need to do these risk scenario calculations. Have they been made? I know California has rotating blackouts already as it is. I really don't have any idea how people find that acceptable. If it happened in Sweden the government would be replaced on the day. It would be a real disaster. I will be a bigger believer if a state like California can actually show its possible. For sure I hope technology improves but the current ideas of solar+battery are simply highly unlikely.

epistasis 10mo ago
Your link does not support the idea of a supply deficit, at least that I see. Propel panicked about lithium under supply, prices surged and didn't even affect battery prices much, and now we are in oversuppply. The worst that can happen is lag time between demand increase and supply match, and there are substitutes for all key metals for most applications, even copper. Every country will have to figure out how to supply its own power, but Sweden's seasonal variation in renewable resources is not likely to be fixed by batteries, even though batteries will be abundant and in massive supply throughout the rest of the world. If Sweden can't figure out, or merely can't, take advantage of great cheap new technology, they will be at a disadvantage compared to countries that will > I know California has rotating blackouts already as it is You don't know that because it's not true. Due to planning not taking into account climate change, there were a few days with demand above expected ability to provide capacity, but there were no blackouts because people were asked to voluntarily cut back on excessive cooling. That mere ask was more than enough to get through the few days. And it was fixed the next year, by what? By batteries! Adding nuclear wouldn't have helped, but batteries were the perfect solution. Perhaps nuclear can help Sweden, but it will be far more expensive than the solutions available to other countries. It is quite funny that what I thought was US propaganda has been spread to Sweden for repetition. Even including the IEA report that doesn't say what people claim it says!
- mikaeluman 10mo ago
  Regarding the IEA report; I think you didn't read it carefully enough. In the near term there is no supply deficit (although current price development would seem to beg to differ) - but the point was in an electrification scenario there _would be_ in the 2030s. Given it takes many years to start up mines (as far as I know), that is the issue. For copper - the report is very clear that there already is an issue, which is understandable because copper is used everywhere. And again, looking at copper prices, you can already tell. Regarding California; you are right. I was misinformed. I would say that the grid is still very, very vulnerable due to the huge reliance on solar and overproduction during midday. That's why these examples of "I exported power to the grid" is not very interesting. Most grids aren't built that way anyway. The residential units are sinks, not sources. In Sweden we don't even have much solar power but already there have been policies aimed at reducing grid exports from residential units, because they are mostly redundant and even harmful.