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Most of those technologies also need uninterrupted power supplies. Something wind, solar and batteries for the next 50 years aren't.

by noosphr 8mo ago

toomuchtodo 8mo ago
Ember Energy: Solar electricity every hour of every day is here and it changes everything - https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-every-hour-of-every-day-is-here-and-it-changes-everything/ https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-e... - June 21st, 2025 > Batteries are now cheap enough to unleash solar’s full potential, getting as close as 97% of the way to delivering constant electricity supply 24 hours across 365 days cost-effectively in the sunniest places. What does this mean? It means we are most of the way there with solar and batteries alone, even if we need a bit of carbon based generation to bridge the gap while solar and battery deployments scale globally. Solar and batteries will only continue to get less expensive and better. Our World In Data: Installed solar energy capacity - https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-capacity https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-capaci... Solar PV go brrr.
alexfoo 8mo ago
Pumped hydro is one solution. You bank the excess wind/solar using gravitational potential energy and then draw on that whenever you need to. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinorwig_Power_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinorwig_Power_Station
- noosphr 8mo ago
  Yes, we just need to build the mountains first.
  - Leno1225 8mo ago
    Yeah, or water towers. No need to play god here.
    - supertrope 8mo ago
      Pumped hydro energy storage relies on the cheapness of water and existing geology. If you have to build the chambers instead of damming a river it's too expensive. Most of the good spots to have a reservoir are already used. If you have to manufacture the bulk media instead of just using water it's too expensive.
      - ben_w 8mo ago
        Pumped hydro doesn't need a river, "just"* rock which isn't water porous and some nearby body of water (lake, sea, whatever). The economics works out even if you were lifting concrete blocks rather than water, hence why you get pictures like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Energy_Vault_Test_Tower_2021.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Energy_Vault_Test_Tower_2... The argument against lifting concrete is that you can dig a hole in the ground an pump water in/out of it for more reliability and lower cost than having a crane lift and lower concrete, and it's easy to make it much bigger both horizontally and vertically, so why bother. But it does appear to be economical even with that, and water is cheaper. We make lots of holes in the ground on a regular basis, including for extracting fossil fuels. Here's two, note scale bar, though I have no idea what the rock around it is like regarding water losses: https://www.google.com/maps/@50.9063171,6.4418046,17655m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDMwMi4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D https://www.google.com/maps/@50.9063171,6.4418046,17655m/dat... * it's never "just" with things on this scale
    - nomel 8mo ago
      There are exactly zero economically viable pumped water storage systems where water towers are involved. If you do the math for the amount of a mass of water, you'll see why! It's not feasible.
      - alexfoo 8mo ago
        Indeed, you can get a sense of the scale on the Dinorwig wikipedia page and the pages it links to. It has a storage capacity of about 9.1GWh. The upper reservoir (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marchlyn_Mawr https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marchlyn_Mawr) holds 9.2 million cubic meters of water. So 1 million cubic meters of water provides ~1GWh. We can see how that compares in terms of raw GPE (Gravitational Potential Energy): 1 million cubic meters of water = 1E6 * 1E3 kg = 1E9 kg There's roughly a 500m vertical drop between the upper and lower takes at Dinorwig so: 1E9 kg * 500 m * 9.8 m/(s^2) = 4.9E12 J =~ 1.36GWh As for water towers, if you look at something like the Roihuvuori tower in Helsinki (from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_tower https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_tower) which is one of the largest: Height: 52m, Capacity: 12000 cubic meters If we are generous and say that all of the water is stored at the maximum height then: 12000 * 1E3 kg * 52m * 9.8 m/(s^2) =~ 1.7MWh You'd need over 5000 of them to match what Dinorwig can provide.
eru 8mo ago
Have you heard of batteries?
ben_w 8mo ago
> Something wind, solar and batteries for the next 50 years aren't. False. If you'd stopped before the "and" you would have been correct, though. Batteries are really cheap now, and supply of batteries is growing basically as fast as people can get the investments and permissions for the inputs and the factories.

Most of those technologies also need uninterrupted power supplies. Something wind, solar and batteries for the next 50 years aren't.

by noosphr 8mo ago

Most of those technologies also need uninterrupted power supplies. Something wind, solar and batteries for the next 50 years aren't.

toomuchtodo 8mo ago

Ember Energy: Solar electricity every hour of every day is here and it changes everything - https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-every-hour-of-every-day-is-here-and-it-changes-everything/ https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-e... - June 21st, 2025 > Batteries are now cheap enough to unleash solar’s full potential, getting as close as 97% of the way to delivering constant electricity supply 24 hours across 365 days cost-effectively in the sunniest places. What does this mean? It means we are most of the way there with solar and batteries alone, even if we need a bit of carbon based generation to bridge the gap while solar and battery deployments scale globally. Solar and batteries will only continue to get less expensive and better. Our World In Data: Installed solar energy capacity - https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-capacity https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-capaci... Solar PV go brrr.

alexfoo 8mo ago

Pumped hydro is one solution. You bank the excess wind/solar using gravitational potential energy and then draw on that whenever you need to. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinorwig_Power_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinorwig_Power_Station

noosphr 8mo ago
Yes, we just need to build the mountains first.
- Leno1225 8mo ago
  Yeah, or water towers. No need to play god here.
  - supertrope 8mo ago
    Pumped hydro energy storage relies on the cheapness of water and existing geology. If you have to build the chambers instead of damming a river it's too expensive. Most of the good spots to have a reservoir are already used. If you have to manufacture the bulk media instead of just using water it's too expensive.
    - ben_w 8mo ago
      Pumped hydro doesn't need a river, "just"* rock which isn't water porous and some nearby body of water (lake, sea, whatever). The economics works out even if you were lifting concrete blocks rather than water, hence why you get pictures like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Energy_Vault_Test_Tower_2021.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Energy_Vault_Test_Tower_2... The argument against lifting concrete is that you can dig a hole in the ground an pump water in/out of it for more reliability and lower cost than having a crane lift and lower concrete, and it's easy to make it much bigger both horizontally and vertically, so why bother. But it does appear to be economical even with that, and water is cheaper. We make lots of holes in the ground on a regular basis, including for extracting fossil fuels. Here's two, note scale bar, though I have no idea what the rock around it is like regarding water losses: https://www.google.com/maps/@50.9063171,6.4418046,17655m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDMwMi4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D https://www.google.com/maps/@50.9063171,6.4418046,17655m/dat... * it's never "just" with things on this scale
  - nomel 8mo ago
    There are exactly zero economically viable pumped water storage systems where water towers are involved. If you do the math for the amount of a mass of water, you'll see why! It's not feasible.
    - alexfoo 8mo ago
      Indeed, you can get a sense of the scale on the Dinorwig wikipedia page and the pages it links to. It has a storage capacity of about 9.1GWh. The upper reservoir (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marchlyn_Mawr https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marchlyn_Mawr) holds 9.2 million cubic meters of water. So 1 million cubic meters of water provides ~1GWh. We can see how that compares in terms of raw GPE (Gravitational Potential Energy): 1 million cubic meters of water = 1E6 * 1E3 kg = 1E9 kg There's roughly a 500m vertical drop between the upper and lower takes at Dinorwig so: 1E9 kg * 500 m * 9.8 m/(s^2) = 4.9E12 J =~ 1.36GWh As for water towers, if you look at something like the Roihuvuori tower in Helsinki (from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_tower https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_tower) which is one of the largest: Height: 52m, Capacity: 12000 cubic meters If we are generous and say that all of the water is stored at the maximum height then: 12000 * 1E3 kg * 52m * 9.8 m/(s^2) =~ 1.7MWh You'd need over 5000 of them to match what Dinorwig can provide.

eru 8mo ago

Have you heard of batteries?

ben_w 8mo ago

> Something wind, solar and batteries for the next 50 years aren't. False. If you'd stopped before the "and" you would have been correct, though. Batteries are really cheap now, and supply of batteries is growing basically as fast as people can get the investments and permissions for the inputs and the factories.