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You are greatly underestimating the production and distribution of power. Worldwide, solar and wind produces about 1% of energy. The majority of energy usage

by brc 11y ago

You are greatly underestimating the production and distribution of power. Worldwide, solar and wind produces about 1% of energy. The majority of energy usage is in commercial processes - factories and commercial buildings. Think about an airline. To make money it has to fly when it's customers want to take a flight - not when the spot price of jet fuel is advantageous. An airline which flew when the price of flying was cheap would attract a niche market of price sensitive travellers. Everyone else wants the flight at a set time. The same goes for industrial production. If you spend money building a large commercial business which has specific energy needs, you want that asset producing a return as close as possible to 24x7x365. There are very few types of industry that lend themselves to batch production (which implies spending capital to create overcapacity to absorb spikes). The need for baseload generation is not going anywhere. The more advanced and productive the society, the higher the need for baseload power.

olau 11y ago
> The need for baseload generation is not going anywhere. Yes, it is. Baseload is a principle you can take advantage of to introduce massive plants that need to output at 100% almost all the time, like nuclear plants. There's no intrinsic need for baseload. What matters is always matching the demand curve. You can do that with variable sources like wind and solar with a dispatchable source like hydro or gas, just as in the baseload + peak situation.
- brc 11y ago
  No, that's wrong. Look around you at the things which are consuming power 24/7. Look beyond your dwelling at the street, the neighbourhood, the city and the country. All those things require constant power 24/7, without interruption. That is what baseload is. It's not some invention of the existing generation industry, it's a function of demand. It's not some conspiracy theory dreamt up by the nuclear power industry. Cities without baseload power have long periods of blackouts and intermittent power. These are places of lower standard of living.

by brc 11y ago

olau 11y ago

> The need for baseload generation is not going anywhere. Yes, it is. Baseload is a principle you can take advantage of to introduce massive plants that need to output at 100% almost all the time, like nuclear plants. There's no intrinsic need for baseload. What matters is always matching the demand curve. You can do that with variable sources like wind and solar with a dispatchable source like hydro or gas, just as in the baseload + peak situation.

brc 11y ago
No, that's wrong. Look around you at the things which are consuming power 24/7. Look beyond your dwelling at the street, the neighbourhood, the city and the country. All those things require constant power 24/7, without interruption. That is what baseload is. It's not some invention of the existing generation industry, it's a function of demand. It's not some conspiracy theory dreamt up by the nuclear power industry. Cities without baseload power have long periods of blackouts and intermittent power. These are places of lower standard of living.