blake1

14 ms·

91.
by blake1 6y ago
That volatility can be dealt with by distributing the renewables geographically. It’ll be sunny or windy somewhere. This requires overbuilding, which is currently cheaper that storage, and the average generation is highly predictable for da
92.
by blake1 6y ago
McConnel had serious doubts that Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, would _fail_ to get a majority in the senate, so he forbade the nomination to come to a vote. So it’s a little different than you pose: you a pretending that Obama’s nominat
93.
by blake1 6y ago
https://www.republicanleader.senate.gov/newsroom/press-relea... He’s basically that the partisan makeup of the Senate as of the most recent election should be the controlling factor. It has the veneer of a neutral rule
94.
by blake1 6y ago
It was a new rule, concocted at a moments notice, and discarded the moment it outlived its usefulness. That latter moment was today. It was the definition of abuse.
95.
by blake1 6y ago
Even the rational numbers have that property (the Archimedean property): for any distinct rationals s2 and s3, there exists a rational x such that s2 < x < s3. Proof: x = (s2 + s3) / 2. This is easily extended to show that there
96.
by blake1 6y ago
I'm always fascinated by the way these techno-anarchists are so drawn to symbols of the State, and State power. Cold War, nuclear artifacts seem a perennial favorite. And it's funny how every little collective seems to end up bein
97.
by blake1 6y ago
Unfortunately, you seem to be right. The Governor of Minnesota admitted precisely that, stating simply that he didn’t want to believe that his own people could act that way. Scapegoating allows politicians to avoid angering their own consti
98.
by blake1 6y ago
Don’t let them participate in scrums.
99.
by blake1 6y ago
As mentioned in the article, solar power is insanely cheap. So while you are right that a kWh of solar is not, on average, as valuable as a kWh of semidispatchable coal, the insane cheapness means that at some point, it is economical to mas
100.
by blake1 7y ago
As one of the other sibling comments noted, a turbine can extract maybe 33% of the thermal energy if it’s operating at the theoretical maximum Carnot efficiency. The other 66% must be dumped somewhere to avoid accidents.
101.
by blake1 7y ago
Increasing temperatures increase steam pressure until a rupture occurs, and the water boils away. The steel reactor vessel and structural elements will then inevitably melt, and the reaction will continue until the molten fuel can spread ou
102.
by blake1 7y ago
Partly true. The washing process removes the natural coating, but this is replaced by a synthetic coating. GP is correct.
103.
by blake1 7y ago
Also, nuclear power plants are very slow to start up/shut down (ramp rate), and need to be periodically offline for refueling, many technical issues require the reactor to shut down, and they need a huge staff a highly trained technic
104.
by blake1 7y ago
Nuclear power is pretty Stone Age. Hold a bunch of special rocks close together. They get hot and make water hot. And turns into hot, wet air, which turns a big fan. Hook a magnet to that fan, and spin it in some hoops and you get electrici
105.
by blake1 7y ago
Surely you’re trolling. This is not the place for it because, by any objective measure, despotic regimes are worse places to live.
106.
by blake1 7y ago
The solar ramp-down is faster than the AC ramp-down. If you have a dumb thermostat, it runs the AC a fraction of the time which is a function of the outside temperature. However, the temperature stays elevated some hours after sunset, but t
107.
by blake1 7y ago
Very short term interest rates in the US are set by the Fed, pretty much at will. Under normal conditions, they have an extremely strong influence on medium term interest rates as well by convincing the market that they will keep short rate
108.
by blake1 7y ago
Later in the article they clarify that the batteries cost $0.187/kWh. However, the owner of said battery will be able to sell energy storage to the grid operator. I also assume that there is a synergy, in that the solar side of the ins
109.
by blake1 7y ago
Fukushima successfully SCRAMed their reactor. Previously produced fission byproducts continued to decay after criticality was lost. While the thermal power of this decay process was an order of magnitude below peak, it greatly exceeded pass
110.
by blake1 7y ago
The animals’ populations have rebounded, especially those, like wolves and foxes, who’s habitats are least compatible with humans. Still, mean lifetimes, fertility rates and mean body mass are down, while illness are up. This also applies t
111.
by blake1 7y ago
This isn’t going to let us electrify the transportation decrypt. Here’s some back of the envelope numbers. An ICE is about 33% efficient at converting chemical energy to kinetic. I don’t know how efficient this process is, but to be generou
112.
by blake1 7y ago
You are right. Tethers are not liquid in any real sense, and should actually pay a pretty hefty interest.
113.
by blake1 7y ago
But tether isn’t claiming to be a bank account. A bank account is an unsecured loan, tether claimed to be taking secured loans. With a bank, you are lending cash to them when you make a deposit. You are taking a risk that the bank’s credit
114.
by blake1 7y ago
This seemed inevitable for a long time. Tether is very important for maintaining the price of bitcoin, and yet the stablecoin’s financial condition has been an unanswered question. The company has raised every red flag and in a rational mar
115.
by blake1 8y ago
His sentence seems fair according to the standards of the US justice system, at least from my non-lawyer’s perspective. He profited enormously from drug trafficking, and received a sentence in line with other convicted cartel leaders. Is th
116.
by blake1 8y ago
Different rover. Spirit and opportunity aren’t RTG powered; curiosity is.
117.
by blake1 8y ago
Correct that his is thermal efficiency, and I apologize for not breaking into out earlier. An ICE is ~20% efficient. A combined cycle gas turbine is ~60% efficient, transmission systems ~98%, LiIon ~99%, motors around 85-90%. The first is t
118.
by blake1 8y ago
Transmission loses 1-2%, batteries lose maybe 5%. Compare that to 30% losses for an ICE, above generator losses.
119.
by blake1 8y ago
Wow. The first two comments on HN are anti-vax propaganda, obfuscation, and racism. It’s not a logical stretch to say that lower vaccination rates leads to higher infection rates. And it’s pretty well documented that herd immunity drops off
120.
by blake1 8y ago
Good point, but one small nitpick. Combined-cycle plants are optimized for efficiency, at the expense of ramp speed, so they are not really used as peakers. Gas turbine plants are what you are thinking of; basically, a jet engine with a gen

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