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I think you're reading the article in a quite biased manner. I didn't pick up on any of the negativity you seem to have interpreted. I don't think anyone here

by venus 14y ago

I think you're reading the article in a quite biased manner. I didn't pick up on any of the negativity you seem to have interpreted. I don't think anyone here is against renewable energy, but certainly the storage of it represents a gigantic challenge. The article just tries to table some reasonable numbers for discussion. You've said nothing that even slightly contradicts the author's findings, and your vague insinuations that the author has an anti-renewable energy agenda is not helpful at all.

jellicle 14y ago
The author's calculations are for replacing the entire energy diet of the United States. He uses gross inputs to everything, rather than outputs and usable energy. He neglects any other storage capacity present in the country - no vehicle has any battery, no electrical device has any battery - and tries to calculate how much energy we need to store IF THE ENTIRE ENERGY PRODUCTION CAPACITY OF THE UNITED STATES DISAPPEARS ENTIRELY FOR A WEEK. It's a nonsense calculation. The U.S. certainly isn't prepared today to go for a week without any electricity generation or even a single drop of fossil fuel burned, and there's no reason to demand that it be prepared to do so in the future. The "findings" are akin to someone who says "The U.S. is borrowing a dollar a year. If we extend that to infinity, we find that the U.S. debt is infinite. PANIC!". They're nonsense. Have no meaning in the real world. In the real world, one significant benefit of a widely distributed power generation infrastructure is that it won't all go down at the same time. The solar cells on your roof will keep generating electricity even if it's cloudy the next town over. And that means that the real-world requirements for a several-nines-reliability mostly-renewable energy infrastructure are several orders of magnitude less than what is being calculated here.

by venus 14y ago

jellicle 14y ago

The author's calculations are for replacing the entire energy diet of the United States. He uses gross inputs to everything, rather than outputs and usable energy. He neglects any other storage capacity present in the country - no vehicle has any battery, no electrical device has any battery - and tries to calculate how much energy we need to store IF THE ENTIRE ENERGY PRODUCTION CAPACITY OF THE UNITED STATES DISAPPEARS ENTIRELY FOR A WEEK. It's a nonsense calculation. The U.S. certainly isn't prepared today to go for a week without any electricity generation or even a single drop of fossil fuel burned, and there's no reason to demand that it be prepared to do so in the future. The "findings" are akin to someone who says "The U.S. is borrowing a dollar a year. If we extend that to infinity, we find that the U.S. debt is infinite. PANIC!". They're nonsense. Have no meaning in the real world. In the real world, one significant benefit of a widely distributed power generation infrastructure is that it won't all go down at the same time. The solar cells on your roof will keep generating electricity even if it's cloudy the next town over. And that means that the real-world requirements for a several-nines-reliability mostly-renewable energy infrastructure are several orders of magnitude less than what is being calculated here.