Innovation in 'atoms': build more solar, get cheaper energy
May 15, 2020 1:23 AM Subscribe
Solar's Future is Insanely Cheap (2020) [thread] - "This incredible pace of solar cost decline, with average prices in sunny parts of the world down to a penny or two by 2030 or 2035, is just remarkable. Building new solar would routinely be cheaper than operating already built fossil fuel plants, even in the world of ultra-cheap natural gas we live in now. This is what I've called the third phase of clean energy, where building new clean energy is cheaper than keeping fossil fuel plants running."
also btw...
also btw...
- U.S. approves massive solar power project on public land - "The Trump administration on Monday approved what it said would one day be the largest solar project in U.S. history, to be located on federal land in the Nevada desert."[1,2]
- Exclusive: Tesla's secret batteries aim to rework the math for electric cars and the grid - "The cost of CATL's cobalt-free lithium iron phosphate battery packs has fallen below $80 per kilowatt-hour, with the cost of the battery cells dropping below $60/kWh, the sources said. CATL's low-cobalt NMC battery packs are close to $100/kWh. Auto industry executives have said $100/kWh for battery packs is the level at which electric vehicles reach rough parity with internal combustion competitors."[3,4]
- Tesla has a new product: Autobidder, a step toward becoming an electric utility - "The idea is that Tesla would keep deploying more solar and energy storage systems, big and small, at the residential level and on utility-scale, and manage those distributed systems to act as a giant electric utility."[5,6,7]
- Why the falling cost of light matters - "The price of light alone tells a fascinating story: it has fallen by a factor of 500,000, far faster than official inflation statistics suggest. A thing that was once too precious to use is now too cheap to notice." (previously; also btw: 'Milestone' Evidence for Anyons, a Third Kingdom of Particles ;)
The Gemini Solar project is expected to generate enough electricity to power 260,000 homes in the Las Vegas area and will include a battery system to store energy for use after the sun goes down, the U.S. Department of Interior said in a statement... [WSJ: "enough to cover the residential population of Las Vegas"]
Approval of the massive project, which will be sited on about 7,100 acres (2,873 hectares) of U.S. Bureau of Land Management land, was delayed here earlier this year over concerns about its impact on a historic region traversed by settlers of the American West.
BLM reached an agreement with the Nevada State Historic Preservation Office, Nevada BLM Director John Rabe said on the call, but is awaiting the signature of Indian tribes before it will issue a Notice to Proceed with construction.
Conservation groups have also raised concerns about the project’s impact on the federally threatened desert tortoise. About 70 tortoises will be relocated to a conservation center during construction, officials said, and will be returned to the site once the project is built.
Nice.
I'm seeing the same in my work on offshore wind. The most recent UK auction round was won by bidders offering to supply wind at prices at or below current wholesale prices.
It's going to take me a while to read and digest all these links.
posted by atrazine at 3:38 AM on May 15, 2020 [4 favorites]
I'm seeing the same in my work on offshore wind. The most recent UK auction round was won by bidders offering to supply wind at prices at or below current wholesale prices.
It's going to take me a while to read and digest all these links.
posted by atrazine at 3:38 AM on May 15, 2020 [4 favorites]
Reading some of the comments on twitter for the main link was very frustrating.
In many parts of the world solar (and wind) is already the cheapest source of new power, and challenging installed fossil fuels generation, but many comments focus on issues in particular markets or on home scale costs.
And then the usual chorus about intermittency.
If the prices follow the track suggested, over building to handle intermittency (backed by either a small amount of cheap gas generation or storage via pumped hydro/batteries/molten salt etc) will all provide cheap and useful electricity.
It is really believable to get to 90%+ zero carbon grid in the next decade, and grow grid capacity to take over current non-electric heating and industrial fossil fuel use too.
It's almost like there are a bunch of people who just don't want to solve this problem with cheap and easy solar and wind because they decided years ago they needed nuclear or hydrogen or something instead.
posted by bystander at 3:42 AM on May 15, 2020 [30 favorites]
In many parts of the world solar (and wind) is already the cheapest source of new power, and challenging installed fossil fuels generation, but many comments focus on issues in particular markets or on home scale costs.
And then the usual chorus about intermittency.
If the prices follow the track suggested, over building to handle intermittency (backed by either a small amount of cheap gas generation or storage via pumped hydro/batteries/molten salt etc) will all provide cheap and useful electricity.
It is really believable to get to 90%+ zero carbon grid in the next decade, and grow grid capacity to take over current non-electric heating and industrial fossil fuel use too.
It's almost like there are a bunch of people who just don't want to solve this problem with cheap and easy solar and wind because they decided years ago they needed nuclear or hydrogen or something instead.
posted by bystander at 3:42 AM on May 15, 2020 [30 favorites]
To avoid old batteries ending up in landfill sites, recycling on a huge scale will be necessary
I'd hope we'd be past the stage of sticking anything in landfill by 2030, with recycling across the whole waste paradigm, never mind for items that are full of in-demand rare earth metals, toxic electrolytes or both.
Having said that, one potential innovation we might start to see more of is research outputs that try to move batteries over to using little or no rare minerals in favour of more widely available elements.
posted by biffa at 3:53 AM on May 15, 2020 [4 favorites]
I'd hope we'd be past the stage of sticking anything in landfill by 2030, with recycling across the whole waste paradigm, never mind for items that are full of in-demand rare earth metals, toxic electrolytes or both.
Having said that, one potential innovation we might start to see more of is research outputs that try to move batteries over to using little or no rare minerals in favour of more widely available elements.
posted by biffa at 3:53 AM on May 15, 2020 [4 favorites]
Previously on Metafilter: do renewable electrons lack testicles?
posted by anthill at 3:55 AM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by anthill at 3:55 AM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
11.3kW AC/10.2kW DC solar array here. I have over 3 megawatts banked with National Grid.
Best decision I ever made.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 4:14 AM on May 15, 2020 [7 favorites]
Best decision I ever made.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 4:14 AM on May 15, 2020 [7 favorites]
We're already seeing a battery re-use cascade taking form:
-Full packs being used in fixed configuration
-Then packs being disassembled. There is variation in cell aging and plenty can still be repacked for fixed configurations.
-Finally cell material recycling. There have been significant improvements in the automation of cell recycling which drives the cost down. Since every cell of a particular type is identical, you can spend a lot of capex getting really good at taking them apart and get lovely low marginal costs.
posted by atrazine at 4:17 AM on May 15, 2020 [9 favorites]
-Full packs being used in fixed configuration
-Then packs being disassembled. There is variation in cell aging and plenty can still be repacked for fixed configurations.
-Finally cell material recycling. There have been significant improvements in the automation of cell recycling which drives the cost down. Since every cell of a particular type is identical, you can spend a lot of capex getting really good at taking them apart and get lovely low marginal costs.
posted by atrazine at 4:17 AM on May 15, 2020 [9 favorites]
It's almost like there are a bunch of people who just don't want to solve this problem with cheap and easy solar and wind because they decided years ago they needed nuclear or hydrogen or something instead.
Screw nuclear but there is a debate to be had as to whether enabling solar and wind can best be done with battery or hydrogen tech (there are other DSM options that will help but at least one or the other looks essential). I think we are seeing something of a quiet war between advocates for the two sides to get themselves into a position to be seen as the most valid and to get political support on board. Its interesting since it not a battle of equals, next gen batteries are essentially disruptive while a lot of the support for hydrogen is coming from incumbents. Gas networks that want to add in some hydrogen as a gas mix initially to milk their current infrastructure then, I assume, invest in converting infrastructure to give themselves a business model not dissimilar to the current one for natural gas. The article above, 'Green Hydrogen's time has come' reflects this I think, getting both the IEA (friend of the energy establishment) and the EU on board.
The problem with this is that while hydrogen may well have some uses it may well extend the life of the NG sector and potentially slow the transition. There's a need for a lot more work on the underlying politics of what is happening on this as well as the applied technology. Its certainly not established that there shouldn't be a role for hydrogen but its role in the market could be heavily skewed by the politics.
posted by biffa at 5:00 AM on May 15, 2020
Screw nuclear but there is a debate to be had as to whether enabling solar and wind can best be done with battery or hydrogen tech (there are other DSM options that will help but at least one or the other looks essential). I think we are seeing something of a quiet war between advocates for the two sides to get themselves into a position to be seen as the most valid and to get political support on board. Its interesting since it not a battle of equals, next gen batteries are essentially disruptive while a lot of the support for hydrogen is coming from incumbents. Gas networks that want to add in some hydrogen as a gas mix initially to milk their current infrastructure then, I assume, invest in converting infrastructure to give themselves a business model not dissimilar to the current one for natural gas. The article above, 'Green Hydrogen's time has come' reflects this I think, getting both the IEA (friend of the energy establishment) and the EU on board.
The problem with this is that while hydrogen may well have some uses it may well extend the life of the NG sector and potentially slow the transition. There's a need for a lot more work on the underlying politics of what is happening on this as well as the applied technology. Its certainly not established that there shouldn't be a role for hydrogen but its role in the market could be heavily skewed by the politics.
posted by biffa at 5:00 AM on May 15, 2020
An acquaintance who works in oil and gas was actually the first to tip me off that this was quietly happening.
posted by atoxyl at 5:38 AM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by atoxyl at 5:38 AM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
for the two sides to get themselves into a position to be seen as the most valid and to get political support on board.
I know how this ends. Whichever one electrocutes an elephant wins.
posted by Literaryhero at 5:39 AM on May 15, 2020 [23 favorites]
I know how this ends. Whichever one electrocutes an elephant wins.
posted by Literaryhero at 5:39 AM on May 15, 2020 [23 favorites]
Like Your Childhood Pet Rock, I put in a solar array. It's been 10 years, and while it was a major investment (about the cost of a medium-level new car), it's long since paid for itself. With the way solar-cell prices have been dropping, I am no longer even slightly worried about the cost of replacing the system in another 10 years. I've said it before; if you own your home and have a clear view of the southern sky, you'd be smart to find the money to put in as much solar as you can. Don't be swayed by people who say "not enough sunlight" in New England or wherever*. I'm in northern MA, and there's plenty of sunlight.
* If you live in the bottom of a deep valley or in Seattle, maybe be swayed.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 5:44 AM on May 15, 2020 [6 favorites]
* If you live in the bottom of a deep valley or in Seattle, maybe be swayed.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 5:44 AM on May 15, 2020 [6 favorites]
The problem with solar is that you’re dealing with a single-supplier monopoly.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 5:56 AM on May 15, 2020 [26 favorites]
posted by ricochet biscuit at 5:56 AM on May 15, 2020 [26 favorites]
Not mentioned in the article is that the new massive solar plant in nevada is locateda few miles from a coal plant that is shuting down. Ilthe Solar will interconnect with the same substation, that served the coal plant.
That is great recycling, and of course, grid scale abtteries are going to get recycled as they contain a lot of valuable materials.
Meanwhile in California, the state is figuring out how to recover lithium from geothermal brinewhich wiuld be enough to meet all of thebstates needs
posted by CostcoCultist at 6:15 AM on May 15, 2020 [11 favorites]
That is great recycling, and of course, grid scale abtteries are going to get recycled as they contain a lot of valuable materials.
Meanwhile in California, the state is figuring out how to recover lithium from geothermal brinewhich wiuld be enough to meet all of thebstates needs
posted by CostcoCultist at 6:15 AM on May 15, 2020 [11 favorites]
If you live in the bottom of a deep valley or in Seattle, maybe be swayed.
The maps say Seattle has enough sunlight for Solar. And the climate here is changing substantially, in ways that are likely to favor solar. Not quite to the point I've installed it on my house, but there are other houses on the block with PV systems.
posted by wotsac at 6:25 AM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
The maps say Seattle has enough sunlight for Solar. And the climate here is changing substantially, in ways that are likely to favor solar. Not quite to the point I've installed it on my house, but there are other houses on the block with PV systems.
posted by wotsac at 6:25 AM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
Reading some of the comments on twitter for the main link was very frustrating.
In many parts of the world solar (and wind) is already the cheapest source of new power, and challenging installed fossil fuels generation, but many comments focus on issues in particular markets or on home scale costs.
And then the usual chorus about intermittency.
Yeah obviously don't read twitter.
I don't know why the world's dumbest people, who spend no time at all thinking about energy systems, feel they have to come in and add their point of view. (Actually that is all of twitter).
Like, "Oh, good point buddy, none of us who do this for a living had thought of that, now how do you spell Inter.mit...ok two ts tency. Thanks. I'll make a fucking note of that shall I?"
We don't need "baseload". That was a concept that existed because it matched the most efficient way of operating coal power plants which is steady-state. In other words, we created the concept because of a supply side constraint, not a demand-side one.
What we need is to match, in real-time, generation and load on the network. The best complement to variable renewables is dispatchable generation, storage, and demand side response, not baseload. Ideally that generation will be renewable as well. Hydro, pumped storage, concentrated solar power, and biogas are all possible in that space. We may use some open cycle gas turbines and reciprocating gas engines for now to balance the system while grid infrastructure is built out.
In fact, recent research has shown that for continent sized grids (and the US at least is a continent size country) you barely need any storage in a heavily electrified scenario.
That work is forecasting done at a 30 second level of granularity for 143 countries.
One of the key findings of that work is electrifying transport and heating actually makes this easier. Admittedly I was surprised that this was the case with heating (I knew it was the case with transport because of batteries) but in this case it is because the whole US is treated as a single grid and long distance transport is maximised. This makes inter-season variations smaller since warm area air conditioning loads and cold area heating loads peak in opposite seasons.
posted by atrazine at 6:30 AM on May 15, 2020 [22 favorites]
In many parts of the world solar (and wind) is already the cheapest source of new power, and challenging installed fossil fuels generation, but many comments focus on issues in particular markets or on home scale costs.
And then the usual chorus about intermittency.
Yeah obviously don't read twitter.
I don't know why the world's dumbest people, who spend no time at all thinking about energy systems, feel they have to come in and add their point of view. (Actually that is all of twitter).
Like, "Oh, good point buddy, none of us who do this for a living had thought of that, now how do you spell Inter.mit...ok two ts tency. Thanks. I'll make a fucking note of that shall I?"
We don't need "baseload". That was a concept that existed because it matched the most efficient way of operating coal power plants which is steady-state. In other words, we created the concept because of a supply side constraint, not a demand-side one.
What we need is to match, in real-time, generation and load on the network. The best complement to variable renewables is dispatchable generation, storage, and demand side response, not baseload. Ideally that generation will be renewable as well. Hydro, pumped storage, concentrated solar power, and biogas are all possible in that space. We may use some open cycle gas turbines and reciprocating gas engines for now to balance the system while grid infrastructure is built out.
In fact, recent research has shown that for continent sized grids (and the US at least is a continent size country) you barely need any storage in a heavily electrified scenario.
That work is forecasting done at a 30 second level of granularity for 143 countries.
One of the key findings of that work is electrifying transport and heating actually makes this easier. Admittedly I was surprised that this was the case with heating (I knew it was the case with transport because of batteries) but in this case it is because the whole US is treated as a single grid and long distance transport is maximised. This makes inter-season variations smaller since warm area air conditioning loads and cold area heating loads peak in opposite seasons.
posted by atrazine at 6:30 AM on May 15, 2020 [22 favorites]
The problem with solar is that you’re dealing with a single-supplier monopoly.
Mr. Burns?
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 6:39 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Mr. Burns?
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 6:39 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
I've had small, peripheral roles on a few solar development projects over the past couple of years, and in addition to the obvious slam-dunk projects like the Nevada example above (huge sites, year-round sunlight, easy interconnections to the grid) I am seeing developers putting systems in places I would have assumed didn't make sense for solar (up north, lots of snow, small sites, expensive site constraints). But between the dropping costs, improving technology, and what I assume are generous state incentives, they are creating commercially-viable projects even there. The trajectory of the renewable energy industry seems clear at this point, it's just a matter of how long it takes to supplant more and more of the current power production.
However, when I looked into it a few years ago, adding solar to our house did not appear to pencil out financially at that time (especially given low state incentives). This is a reminder that I need to check again more carefully this year; if not already, there will likely be a point fairly soon where it will clearly make economic sense and we would be leaving money on the table by not doing so.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:43 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
However, when I looked into it a few years ago, adding solar to our house did not appear to pencil out financially at that time (especially given low state incentives). This is a reminder that I need to check again more carefully this year; if not already, there will likely be a point fairly soon where it will clearly make economic sense and we would be leaving money on the table by not doing so.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:43 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
I'm only disappointed in big-solar's marketing department's failure of creativity. Have you seen the Chinese solar farm that looks like a panda? How on earth are we not selling solar farms ad space to help reduce installation cost even further? You don't think there are enough billions of dollars rolling around to have someone throw ten million at having their logo or family crest or face visible from the sky as a solar farm? come on!
posted by jermsplan at 7:35 AM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by jermsplan at 7:35 AM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
I've looked into it, we've got about 20 m2 of south facing flat roof so pretty good candidate for installation but I'm not sure that the roof is well suited for any installation that requires penetrating the membrane. Also, we don't use that much electricity. In 10 years or so it'll be due for replacement and it will definitely be replaced with roof + solar.
posted by atrazine at 7:39 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by atrazine at 7:39 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
I'm really excited about our solar future. This year, I'm looking to invest in a battery bank and a small panel array in lieu of a generator for power outages, and it's impressive how far your solar money goes these days compared to the times when you basically had to take out a second mortgage to get some roof panels.
posted by tobascodagama at 7:39 AM on May 15, 2020
posted by tobascodagama at 7:39 AM on May 15, 2020
Expanding nuclear is debatable, but it is certainly a terrible mistake to actively shut it down as Germany has been doing. If you include nuclear in the current mix, last month 74% of their electricity was generated without fossil fuels (25% wind, 20% solar, 11% biomass, 4% hydro and 13.6% nuclear). Compare that with a decade ago and it was a mere 42% non-fossil fuels but more than half of that was nuclear. In other words if Germany had not shut down any of it's nuclear capacity, they would currently be approaching a 90% non-fossil fuel mix.
It's also hard to believe if you haven't been keeping up, but the US now produces more electricity from nuclear than coal! The trendlines over the last decade are fascinating. Wind now produces more than hydro. And natural gas is the monster we'll be fighting to shut down now that coal has one foot in the grave.
Anyhoo, the solar news is fantastic. I remember reading Ramez Naam's original solar post in 2015 and thinking "Well, this seems overly optimistic, but I hope he's right!" That article is what introduced me to the concept of the technological learning curve.
I rent but I'm still able to get our electricity from local solar thanks to a community solar project. If you rent or can't afford a rooftop install, see if your town is looking into it.
posted by gwint at 7:50 AM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
It's also hard to believe if you haven't been keeping up, but the US now produces more electricity from nuclear than coal! The trendlines over the last decade are fascinating. Wind now produces more than hydro. And natural gas is the monster we'll be fighting to shut down now that coal has one foot in the grave.
Anyhoo, the solar news is fantastic. I remember reading Ramez Naam's original solar post in 2015 and thinking "Well, this seems overly optimistic, but I hope he's right!" That article is what introduced me to the concept of the technological learning curve.
I rent but I'm still able to get our electricity from local solar thanks to a community solar project. If you rent or can't afford a rooftop install, see if your town is looking into it.
posted by gwint at 7:50 AM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
The problem with solar is that you’re dealing with a single-supplier monopoly.
Its sort of a problem but if that makes your electricity more expensive (as classical economics tells us it should) then it makes solar more attractive since each kWh of solar you self generate displaces a kWh of more expensive electricity sourced from the grid. How much of your own power you can displace is a big part of the economics of a home PV system even where you can access a subsidy for your generation. If you're at home a lot in the day then you can likely use more, if you work the 9-5 then you may use less. Changing this dynamic with home energy storage is one of the reasons cheaper batteries is so important.
The real problem I think you were really talking about (if i stop being obtuse) is that the monopoly won't offer very much (or anything) for your spare power unless compelled to by a regulator of government. I'm afraid that remained true here in the UK even though we have a competitive supply market. Again, cheap batteries would help address this and also let you raise a finger to your local supplier.
posted by biffa at 8:29 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Its sort of a problem but if that makes your electricity more expensive (as classical economics tells us it should) then it makes solar more attractive since each kWh of solar you self generate displaces a kWh of more expensive electricity sourced from the grid. How much of your own power you can displace is a big part of the economics of a home PV system even where you can access a subsidy for your generation. If you're at home a lot in the day then you can likely use more, if you work the 9-5 then you may use less. Changing this dynamic with home energy storage is one of the reasons cheaper batteries is so important.
The real problem I think you were really talking about (if i stop being obtuse) is that the monopoly won't offer very much (or anything) for your spare power unless compelled to by a regulator of government. I'm afraid that remained true here in the UK even though we have a competitive supply market. Again, cheap batteries would help address this and also let you raise a finger to your local supplier.
posted by biffa at 8:29 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
I have to admit that battery costs have fallen much faster than I ever expected, which has almost entirely eliminated the case for nuclear except in isolated areas where some of those small scale "appliances" may still have a use.
It's possible some of the new small fusion designs enabled by the ever increasing magnetic flux density of REBCO might end up being more economical for the really big consumers like aluminum smelters and such. However, it's quite clear that solar+battery can cover the vast majority of residential, institutional, and light industrial energy needs in most mid-latitude locations without requiring major changes to rate structures or consumer behavior.
The change has been easily overlooked because there hasn't been much in the way of major leaps forward, just the compunding of small year-on-year improvements in capability and manufacturing cost.
posted by wierdo at 8:34 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
It's possible some of the new small fusion designs enabled by the ever increasing magnetic flux density of REBCO might end up being more economical for the really big consumers like aluminum smelters and such. However, it's quite clear that solar+battery can cover the vast majority of residential, institutional, and light industrial energy needs in most mid-latitude locations without requiring major changes to rate structures or consumer behavior.
The change has been easily overlooked because there hasn't been much in the way of major leaps forward, just the compunding of small year-on-year improvements in capability and manufacturing cost.
posted by wierdo at 8:34 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
As a 95%-former¹ wind guy, I knew this would happen. Heck, even wind was looking like a difficult sell compared to solar a few years ago. I can't favourite atrazine's We don't need "baseload" comment enough. It's not a fact or system requirement, it's just a convenience based on outdated system composition.
--
¹: I keep my hand in with a volunteer directorship of a community project, but until early 2017 I was all about prospecting, designing, operating, advocating and auditing wind projects. Nothing made me happier to hear yesterday that a wind project that I had the tiniest part in making happen that had been blocked at the 95% constructed stage by our idiot premier got clearance to restart.
posted by scruss at 8:37 AM on May 15, 2020 [5 favorites]
--
¹: I keep my hand in with a volunteer directorship of a community project, but until early 2017 I was all about prospecting, designing, operating, advocating and auditing wind projects. Nothing made me happier to hear yesterday that a wind project that I had the tiniest part in making happen that had been blocked at the 95% constructed stage by our idiot premier got clearance to restart.
posted by scruss at 8:37 AM on May 15, 2020 [5 favorites]
atrazine: In fact, recent research has shown that for continent sized grids (and the US at least is a continent size country) you barely need any storage in a heavily electrified scenario.
Can you narrow down where it says this? I'm struggling to pull it out.
They are at odds with many of the papers they cite so its hardly settled.
posted by biffa at 8:39 AM on May 15, 2020
Can you narrow down where it says this? I'm struggling to pull it out.
They are at odds with many of the papers they cite so its hardly settled.
posted by biffa at 8:39 AM on May 15, 2020
The problem with solar is that you’re dealing with a single-supplier monopoly.
I thought this was a joke, but I see some are taking it seriously, so perhaps it needs to be pointed out that the supplier provides it free of charge in a massively-distributed system that requires nothing more than simple and relatively cheap collection and transmission to make it generally accessible.
posted by No Robots at 9:04 AM on May 15, 2020 [11 favorites]
I thought this was a joke, but I see some are taking it seriously, so perhaps it needs to be pointed out that the supplier provides it free of charge in a massively-distributed system that requires nothing more than simple and relatively cheap collection and transmission to make it generally accessible.
posted by No Robots at 9:04 AM on May 15, 2020 [11 favorites]
I'm in northern MA, and there's plenty of sunlight.
Me too! Jinx!
Nuclear needed to continue its trend from 40 years ago to help and I'll never forgive the scaremongering "environmentalists" that never saw the forest through the trees. Nuclear was the lesser evil compared to coal. Today? There's no good reason to invest in it with the continually plummeting price of renewable and storage.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 9:40 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Me too! Jinx!
Nuclear needed to continue its trend from 40 years ago to help and I'll never forgive the scaremongering "environmentalists" that never saw the forest through the trees. Nuclear was the lesser evil compared to coal. Today? There's no good reason to invest in it with the continually plummeting price of renewable and storage.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 9:40 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
To avoid old batteries ending up in landfill sites, recycling on a huge scale will be necessary
Conventional Lead Acid Batteries as used in ICE cars and UPS the world over are already recycled 99.3% of the time (Battery Council International numbers but still); this is a solved structural problem that shouldn't be a problem with future batteries contianing metals way rarer than lead.
posted by Mitheral at 9:55 AM on May 15, 2020 [4 favorites]
Conventional Lead Acid Batteries as used in ICE cars and UPS the world over are already recycled 99.3% of the time (Battery Council International numbers but still); this is a solved structural problem that shouldn't be a problem with future batteries contianing metals way rarer than lead.
posted by Mitheral at 9:55 AM on May 15, 2020 [4 favorites]
I would love for solar power to get cheaper, but in Ontario, the cost for an avg solar installation of 7,500 watts is $18K to $22K. Too high for a reasonable payback.
posted by storybored at 10:27 AM on May 15, 2020
posted by storybored at 10:27 AM on May 15, 2020
We're 2.5 years into our 4.56 kw unit, and already have sent 12.4 MW into the grid. I love this time of year because with tons of sun and no A/C, we pay only $7 in electrical grid fees. Depending on what our usage is in the future (I'd love to get a plug in minivan for extra storage), we could easily add on more panels for more savings.
posted by Hermeowne Grangepurr at 10:58 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by Hermeowne Grangepurr at 10:58 AM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Solar is cheap, installation costs are not. Luckily, those costs are such that utility-scale projects have much better economics than an individual homeowner sees, even though the panels themselves aren't all that much cheaper for the utility. When you're building in a field at a large scale, you can build the supporting structure in large segments in a factory so that assembly time is minimized. That's less easily doable with residential rooftop systems.
It's funny to think how much of the solar revolution has been enabled not by research into the cells themselves, but by borrowing production techniques from the broader semiconductor manufacturing industry. Much of the cost reduction comes from technology developed to scale up the size of silicon ingots that can be grown and drive down waste in IC production. And even behind that there has been cross-pollination between optical fiber manufacturing and semiconductor manufacturing that has improved both.
Battery progress has been relatively slow because it is largely its own thing, so it can't benefit from the same kind of borrowing from other fields. Still, it's good enough now to be economical for what we need it to do.
posted by wierdo at 11:13 AM on May 15, 2020 [5 favorites]
It's funny to think how much of the solar revolution has been enabled not by research into the cells themselves, but by borrowing production techniques from the broader semiconductor manufacturing industry. Much of the cost reduction comes from technology developed to scale up the size of silicon ingots that can be grown and drive down waste in IC production. And even behind that there has been cross-pollination between optical fiber manufacturing and semiconductor manufacturing that has improved both.
Battery progress has been relatively slow because it is largely its own thing, so it can't benefit from the same kind of borrowing from other fields. Still, it's good enough now to be economical for what we need it to do.
posted by wierdo at 11:13 AM on May 15, 2020 [5 favorites]
→ in Ontario, the cost for an avg solar installation …
This happens, unfortunately, for several reasons that are real but not necessarily good:
This happens, unfortunately, for several reasons that are real but not necessarily good:
- Many installers are still riding the Micro FIT price wave that required much of the equipment to be made locally. This was from a well-intentioned attempt to keep some jobs in the province after the 2008 crash, but none of those jobs remain. Thanks, inertia!
- System requirements are way more complex than net metering requires. Thanks, IESO!
- Commodity solar is priced in USD, and CAD followed Alberta down the shitter with oil prices. Thanks, Harper!
- We're in Canada, we love paying more for things because we can. Thanks, timid and under-informed consumers!
You don't think there are enough billions of dollars rolling around to have someone throw ten million at having their logo or family crest or face visible from the sky as a solar farm?
Given the relatively tiny skyborne audience, no - I do not think it likely that someone will spend 10 million on that. Maybe Musk would.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 11:53 AM on May 15, 2020
Given the relatively tiny skyborne audience, no - I do not think it likely that someone will spend 10 million on that. Maybe Musk would.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 11:53 AM on May 15, 2020
This is such good news. I wonder what kind of jobs there are in solar...
posted by rebent at 12:18 PM on May 15, 2020
posted by rebent at 12:18 PM on May 15, 2020
Conventional Lead Acid Batteries as used in ICE cars and UPS the world over are already recycled 99.3% of the time
All states allow retailers to charge extra to consumers that don't bring a battery to swap (battery core charge) and 30 states mandate it. Waste depots won't accept them. People take their batteries to be exchanged or the AAA guy does it for them. It's an incredibly efficient closed cycle with good and reasonable incentives.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 12:33 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
All states allow retailers to charge extra to consumers that don't bring a battery to swap (battery core charge) and 30 states mandate it. Waste depots won't accept them. People take their batteries to be exchanged or the AAA guy does it for them. It's an incredibly efficient closed cycle with good and reasonable incentives.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 12:33 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Given the relatively tiny skyborne audience,
Google Maps (et al.).
posted by jaduncan at 1:32 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Google Maps (et al.).
posted by jaduncan at 1:32 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Every jurisdiction I've worked in (limited, sure, but involves parts UK, Canada, France, Ireland, USA) have prevented or greatly curtailed recognizable logos or trademarks in renewable energy projects.
posted by scruss at 1:39 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by scruss at 1:39 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
We had conscientious friends in Tacoma who leased an electric car and put Washington-made PV panels on their roof. When the roof developed leaks, removing the panels (and re-installing them after the roof repair was done) was a very expensive proposition.
I live in a state that doesn't work with the energy monopoly to actively discourage people from generating electricity — looking at you, Alabama — but if I did this, I would definitely look at roof integrity before any install.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 1:48 PM on May 15, 2020
I live in a state that doesn't work with the energy monopoly to actively discourage people from generating electricity — looking at you, Alabama — but if I did this, I would definitely look at roof integrity before any install.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 1:48 PM on May 15, 2020
Baseload does have some industrial relevance - if you buy a high capital high energy factory, you want to run it almost as much as you can - idling on calm winter nights (or whatever %) is bad for your OEE.
If we can combine that flexibility and lots of electrified thermal mass I've read that we just need to get to ~4-5 days storage to ride through most of the wind pattern variability. Inverter control of big HVDC and battery chargers are getting better at stabilizing the grid too.
The two biggest barriers seem to be national security vs. interdependence and red blinking lights on wind turbines vs. everyone.
posted by anthill at 3:08 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
If we can combine that flexibility and lots of electrified thermal mass I've read that we just need to get to ~4-5 days storage to ride through most of the wind pattern variability. Inverter control of big HVDC and battery chargers are getting better at stabilizing the grid too.
The two biggest barriers seem to be national security vs. interdependence and red blinking lights on wind turbines vs. everyone.
posted by anthill at 3:08 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
My advice to anyone considering a rooftop installation: Get a roofer to do it. Most roofers have a sideline in rooftop solar and installing roof modules is not rocket science. But roof integrity is everything and you don’t want anybody but a professional roofer messing with your roof.
posted by sjswitzer at 3:34 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by sjswitzer at 3:34 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
Rooftop solar is *huge* in Australia and systems generally cost in the order of $1 per Watt. Roof construction here is quite different to a lot of North America.
I have 23kW on the roof and the investment will break even in under three years.
posted by the duck by the oboe at 3:59 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
I have 23kW on the roof and the investment will break even in under three years.
posted by the duck by the oboe at 3:59 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
You don't think there are enough billions of dollars rolling around to have someone throw ten million at having their logo or family crest or face visible from the sky as a solar farm?
2016: 20 acre solar farm, powering the Epcot Centre. See if you can guess what shape it is before you click the link.
posted by biffa at 4:01 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
2016: 20 acre solar farm, powering the Epcot Centre. See if you can guess what shape it is before you click the link.
posted by biffa at 4:01 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
For the benefit of anyone else looking at the paper, Table 3 covers the total energy mix for 143 countries. The simulation is 2050 to 2052 and assumes almost all primary energy comes from renewables. Nuclear is not part of the simulation.
They looked at 143 countries which collectively cover almost all demand. They require total nameplate capacity of 40,000 GW of which we have currently installed 5%. Current electricity consumption is about 30,000 TWh globally which works out to average of 3,400GW. So we need a lot more electrical production.
Note that this is a satisficing and not an optimising algorithm. Once they found a solution that matched the load, they ran it 20 more times with varying parameters to tweak it but this is an existence proof and not a global optimum.
Some highlights of the solution:
We have 4.76% of the onshore wind we already need (or did as of 2018, that will be over 5% now).
We had 0.7% of the offshore wind.
We had 14% of the geothermal.
We're only in the single digits for any of the solar technologies.
The only peaking and storage selected in large quantities is solar thermal heat.
Their load matching algorithm found that you don't actually need any battery storage.
posted by atrazine at 4:14 PM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
They looked at 143 countries which collectively cover almost all demand. They require total nameplate capacity of 40,000 GW of which we have currently installed 5%. Current electricity consumption is about 30,000 TWh globally which works out to average of 3,400GW. So we need a lot more electrical production.
Note that this is a satisficing and not an optimising algorithm. Once they found a solution that matched the load, they ran it 20 more times with varying parameters to tweak it but this is an existence proof and not a global optimum.
Some highlights of the solution:
We have 4.76% of the onshore wind we already need (or did as of 2018, that will be over 5% now).
We had 0.7% of the offshore wind.
We had 14% of the geothermal.
We're only in the single digits for any of the solar technologies.
The only peaking and storage selected in large quantities is solar thermal heat.
Their load matching algorithm found that you don't actually need any battery storage.
posted by atrazine at 4:14 PM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
Half-serious question to the solar bulls in this thread: from a financial, technological, and regulatory perspective, why is it more practical to build out the enormous storage capacity (with AFAIK non-existent technology) and unified national grid we'd need for a mostly solar generation base, vs just building some modern nuclear plants instead of the awful leaky dinosaurs the US is stuck with?
(Also NGL I'd dread a big volcanic eruption somewhere in the world)
posted by xthlc at 4:15 PM on May 15, 2020
(Also NGL I'd dread a big volcanic eruption somewhere in the world)
posted by xthlc at 4:15 PM on May 15, 2020
From my point of view it's all about:
-getting emissions reductions in early. It does us more good to reduce early than late, the goal isn't getting to zero that's relatively unimportant, it's getting low-ish fast. We could add extra transmission capacity, solar, and wind (And we are) right now. If we make a definite commitment to a new fission power plant now, then the process to first neutrons if all goes well is probably a decade or more. In that time we can build an awful lot of wind and solar.
-Unit economics. Nuclear is the only technology that looks like it has a negative learning rate. I actually think that's a statistical artifact based on project phasing and improving technology but the fact remains that the cost per MWh of nuclear power has only gone up. Nukes are big and mostly built on site so we don't get any of the benefits of mass production. Maybe if we could build them in factories as small modular units, it would be different but that is a long way off.
-We need less storage than you might think. A combination of demand side management, diversity of supply types, and gas reciprocal peakers (reciprocal engines have much lower capital costs and can start faster than CCGTs) can get us into high double digit % without needing nuclear.
I'm not against nuclear but I think that it gets harder and harder to justify as out other technologies improve.
posted by atrazine at 4:25 PM on May 15, 2020 [9 favorites]
-getting emissions reductions in early. It does us more good to reduce early than late, the goal isn't getting to zero that's relatively unimportant, it's getting low-ish fast. We could add extra transmission capacity, solar, and wind (And we are) right now. If we make a definite commitment to a new fission power plant now, then the process to first neutrons if all goes well is probably a decade or more. In that time we can build an awful lot of wind and solar.
-Unit economics. Nuclear is the only technology that looks like it has a negative learning rate. I actually think that's a statistical artifact based on project phasing and improving technology but the fact remains that the cost per MWh of nuclear power has only gone up. Nukes are big and mostly built on site so we don't get any of the benefits of mass production. Maybe if we could build them in factories as small modular units, it would be different but that is a long way off.
-We need less storage than you might think. A combination of demand side management, diversity of supply types, and gas reciprocal peakers (reciprocal engines have much lower capital costs and can start faster than CCGTs) can get us into high double digit % without needing nuclear.
I'm not against nuclear but I think that it gets harder and harder to justify as out other technologies improve.
posted by atrazine at 4:25 PM on May 15, 2020 [9 favorites]
Half-serious question to the solar bulls in this thread: from a financial, technological, and regulatory perspective, why is it more practical to build out the enormous storage capacity (with AFAIK non-existent technology) and unified national grid we'd need for a mostly solar generation base, vs just building some modern nuclear plants instead of the awful leaky dinosaurs the US is stuck with?
Nuclear is a lousy fit with variable RE. You want flexibility and nuclear can't deliver it. So if you stick nuclear in with RE you need to find another way to flex so either you need to stick with gas, even more storage, more DSM (and we don't know how much of that is going to happen) or enough VRE that there is always a lot going on somewhere, which means overcapacity. Plus the price of nuclear is very high (UK costs per kWh nuclear for new generating plant are more than double PV, onshore and even offshore wind) and shows little sign of dropping in the way that both solar and wind have and look set to continue. One study even suggested nuclear may have negative learning effects, ie rising prices from one plant installation to the next. Plus if you really scale it up its possible that you end up with substantial marginal CO2 emissions from the uranium mining. Plus we have had nuclear electrical generation since 1954, that's 76 years, and this is how many long term nuclear waste repositories there are in the world: NONE.
posted by biffa at 4:44 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
Nuclear is a lousy fit with variable RE. You want flexibility and nuclear can't deliver it. So if you stick nuclear in with RE you need to find another way to flex so either you need to stick with gas, even more storage, more DSM (and we don't know how much of that is going to happen) or enough VRE that there is always a lot going on somewhere, which means overcapacity. Plus the price of nuclear is very high (UK costs per kWh nuclear for new generating plant are more than double PV, onshore and even offshore wind) and shows little sign of dropping in the way that both solar and wind have and look set to continue. One study even suggested nuclear may have negative learning effects, ie rising prices from one plant installation to the next. Plus if you really scale it up its possible that you end up with substantial marginal CO2 emissions from the uranium mining. Plus we have had nuclear electrical generation since 1954, that's 76 years, and this is how many long term nuclear waste repositories there are in the world: NONE.
posted by biffa at 4:44 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
My advice to anyone considering a rooftop installation: Get a roofer to do it. Most roofers have a sideline in rooftop solar and installing roof modules is not rocket science. But roof integrity is everything and you don’t want anybody but a professional roofer messing with your roof.
I don’t really know of any roofers here that have a sideline in solar, or vice versa. I work in the home improvement advertising field and haven’t heard of anyone around town. When our solar installation was done, they did a very thorough survey of the house, including rafter locations and this all had to be submitted to the county before installation could proceed.
posted by azpenguin at 4:52 PM on May 15, 2020
I don’t really know of any roofers here that have a sideline in solar, or vice versa. I work in the home improvement advertising field and haven’t heard of anyone around town. When our solar installation was done, they did a very thorough survey of the house, including rafter locations and this all had to be submitted to the county before installation could proceed.
posted by azpenguin at 4:52 PM on May 15, 2020
This has been a problem in some territories. Electricians aren't always used to working at height. Roofers don't have the electrical skills. Companies need to spend a bit to train to get this right.
posted by biffa at 5:04 PM on May 15, 2020
posted by biffa at 5:04 PM on May 15, 2020
Half-serious question to the solar bulls in this thread: from a financial, technological, and regulatory perspective, why is it more practical to build out the enormous storage capacity (with AFAIK non-existent technology) and unified national grid we'd need for a mostly solar generation base, vs just building some modern nuclear plants instead of the awful leaky dinosaurs the US is stuck with?
Nuclear can be done safely. The catch, though, is that to build a safe plant, it is extremely expensive and it takes a very long time to build it right. After all those years and all that money, you can start generating power. You’ll need to feed the reactor occasionally with new fuel rods, which costs money, plus you have to shut down for a little while to do that. Which is time you’re not generating, so in addition to the cost of the uranium, you’re also having a period of time you’re not making any money on that very expensive investment.
So, let’s say you have $6 billion to spend on new electricity generation. You can build a relatively small plant for that if all goes well, from my reading a little over a gigawatt. Five years after you sign the order, you’re generating power. Now you start recuperating that money.
Or you can spend $2-3 billion, get an equivalent amount of wind and solar, you can have it up and running quickly so you’re making money, and you don’t need to feed the generating units any uranium, or natural gas, or coal. It’s all upfront and you can hit the ground running. You won’t build the whole amount at once, but the first power comes online within a few months of the word “go” and more and more starts coming along after that. You start seeing ROI fast.
It’s not a tough decision anymore. Solar and wind is now so cheap that sinking money into a nuke plant is typically not a good investment.
posted by azpenguin at 5:10 PM on May 15, 2020 [6 favorites]
Nuclear can be done safely. The catch, though, is that to build a safe plant, it is extremely expensive and it takes a very long time to build it right. After all those years and all that money, you can start generating power. You’ll need to feed the reactor occasionally with new fuel rods, which costs money, plus you have to shut down for a little while to do that. Which is time you’re not generating, so in addition to the cost of the uranium, you’re also having a period of time you’re not making any money on that very expensive investment.
So, let’s say you have $6 billion to spend on new electricity generation. You can build a relatively small plant for that if all goes well, from my reading a little over a gigawatt. Five years after you sign the order, you’re generating power. Now you start recuperating that money.
Or you can spend $2-3 billion, get an equivalent amount of wind and solar, you can have it up and running quickly so you’re making money, and you don’t need to feed the generating units any uranium, or natural gas, or coal. It’s all upfront and you can hit the ground running. You won’t build the whole amount at once, but the first power comes online within a few months of the word “go” and more and more starts coming along after that. You start seeing ROI fast.
It’s not a tough decision anymore. Solar and wind is now so cheap that sinking money into a nuke plant is typically not a good investment.
posted by azpenguin at 5:10 PM on May 15, 2020 [6 favorites]
Why would you take on the danger and expense of building a nuclear plant, when solar can totally deal with it? I have I think 37 panels on my roof. They won't contaminate my property, nor my neighbors, if something goes wrong with them. Seriously?
posted by Windopaene at 5:31 PM on May 15, 2020 [5 favorites]
posted by Windopaene at 5:31 PM on May 15, 2020 [5 favorites]
The Flamanville 3 EPR plant started construction in 2007 and was supposed go online in 2012. It had an initial budget of €3.3 billion.
It’s now expected to start producing electricity in 2023, with an estimated final cost of €12.4 billion.
If you want to start abating carbon emissions in a hurry that’s... Not ideal.
posted by the duck by the oboe at 5:36 PM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
It’s now expected to start producing electricity in 2023, with an estimated final cost of €12.4 billion.
If you want to start abating carbon emissions in a hurry that’s... Not ideal.
posted by the duck by the oboe at 5:36 PM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
Similarly, the Olkiluoto 3 EPR began construction in 2005, was due on line in 2010, current estimate is 2021. Cost has trebled.
posted by biffa at 5:42 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by biffa at 5:42 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
Nuclear needed to continue its trend from 40 years ago to help and I'll never forgive the scaremongering "environmentalists" that never saw the forest through the trees.
I realize the greenhouse effect was not unknown at the time that anti-nuclear was getting big as a movement but honestly I tend to think it would have required pretty extraordinary foresight for environmentalists to get that one right at the time.
Much less sympathy for people who are trying to shut down existing, safely running plants now.
posted by atoxyl at 6:37 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
I realize the greenhouse effect was not unknown at the time that anti-nuclear was getting big as a movement but honestly I tend to think it would have required pretty extraordinary foresight for environmentalists to get that one right at the time.
Much less sympathy for people who are trying to shut down existing, safely running plants now.
posted by atoxyl at 6:37 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Well, except for the waste storage...
That's not a big deal, amirite?
posted by Windopaene at 6:54 PM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
That's not a big deal, amirite?
posted by Windopaene at 6:54 PM on May 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
The catch, though, is that to build a safe plant, it is extremely expensive and it takes a very long time to build it right
Seconded. A year ago I was reading about the new nuclear plants they are building in France (the ones that are billions of dollars and many years over their initial estimates), and one of the design improvements the new plants have over the older plants is that the new ones have a "double hull" design. There is an interior hull built primarily to keep the bad stuff in, and an exterior hull built primarily to keep bad stuff out. And the exterior hull was built to, approximately, withstand an incoming 747. At the time I read that I was like "yeah, that makes sense, if you are building a new nuclear facility you do have to plan for the fact that someone could crash a jetliner into any part of your insanely complex and dangerous facility".
Which is all just to say that nuclear plants have security concerns which, if you are taking them seriously, add a ton of extra costs that solar simply doesn't face.
posted by Balna Watya at 7:28 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
Seconded. A year ago I was reading about the new nuclear plants they are building in France (the ones that are billions of dollars and many years over their initial estimates), and one of the design improvements the new plants have over the older plants is that the new ones have a "double hull" design. There is an interior hull built primarily to keep the bad stuff in, and an exterior hull built primarily to keep bad stuff out. And the exterior hull was built to, approximately, withstand an incoming 747. At the time I read that I was like "yeah, that makes sense, if you are building a new nuclear facility you do have to plan for the fact that someone could crash a jetliner into any part of your insanely complex and dangerous facility".
Which is all just to say that nuclear plants have security concerns which, if you are taking them seriously, add a ton of extra costs that solar simply doesn't face.
posted by Balna Watya at 7:28 PM on May 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
Well, except for the waste storage...
That's not a big deal, amirite?
Well I mean if you're a coal power plant you can throw as much thorium and uranium into the air as you want and distribute it wherever.
Nuclear always looks bad until all the externalities of the the replacement fossil fuels are taken into account. God knows how many people we've killed that we didn't have to letting fly ash go unregulated for decades. But then again The China Syndrome was really compelling television.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 7:57 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
That's not a big deal, amirite?
Well I mean if you're a coal power plant you can throw as much thorium and uranium into the air as you want and distribute it wherever.
Nuclear always looks bad until all the externalities of the the replacement fossil fuels are taken into account. God knows how many people we've killed that we didn't have to letting fly ash go unregulated for decades. But then again The China Syndrome was really compelling television.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 7:57 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Oldie-but-goodie to-and-fro over nukes and solar, with this gem from saulgoodman:
posted by No Robots at 9:34 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
As it is, nuclear is and will continue to be an expensive boondoggle sustained in large part by Atom Age nostalgia and the stubborn refusal/temperamental inability of some science/technology enthusiasts to accept the reality that just because nuclear tech is, like, totally cool, real science, that doesn't mean the only opposition to its growth are anti-science simpletons or Luddites.Ok, atomic boomers.
posted by No Robots at 9:34 PM on May 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Shutting down existing nuclear does not solve the very real waste problem (which is, incidentally, primarily a US problem). Neither does it make any significant difference to the scale of the solution required. We have to either store or reuse the waste regardless, so there isn't a great argument ok that front for not running existing plants for as long as they can be run with reasonable safety.
posted by wierdo at 9:59 PM on May 15, 2020
posted by wierdo at 9:59 PM on May 15, 2020
Incidentally it is possible to run nukes in load following mode, I've seen papers from the French that model it and they actually run several of their plants this way. The issues with doing it:
-You can't do it throughout the fuel cycle, there are points in burnup where you cannot ramp back up after a fast ramp down without time in between to burn off fission poisons.
-Thermal transients reduce lifetime of the reactor.
-Since the vast majority of the cost is capital, running at less than 100% makes the LCOE much higher.
Since VREs have high capital but no marginal costs, the ideal complement would have no capital but high marginal costs. There's no such thing unfortunately but open cycle gas turbine and gas reciprocators are the closest we have. (And diesel recips but those have particulate emission problems).
posted by atrazine at 12:38 AM on May 16, 2020
-You can't do it throughout the fuel cycle, there are points in burnup where you cannot ramp back up after a fast ramp down without time in between to burn off fission poisons.
-Thermal transients reduce lifetime of the reactor.
-Since the vast majority of the cost is capital, running at less than 100% makes the LCOE much higher.
Since VREs have high capital but no marginal costs, the ideal complement would have no capital but high marginal costs. There's no such thing unfortunately but open cycle gas turbine and gas reciprocators are the closest we have. (And diesel recips but those have particulate emission problems).
posted by atrazine at 12:38 AM on May 16, 2020
Nuclear always looks bad until all the externalities of the the replacement fossil fuels are taken into account.
Nuclear still looks bad once you factor in the externalities for that too. No one is building a nuke unless the local government is willing to limit their risk in case of disaster. Plus there is usually some sweet deal limiting the decommissioning and long term storage that mitigates costs right down.
posted by biffa at 1:15 AM on May 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
Nuclear still looks bad once you factor in the externalities for that too. No one is building a nuke unless the local government is willing to limit their risk in case of disaster. Plus there is usually some sweet deal limiting the decommissioning and long term storage that mitigates costs right down.
posted by biffa at 1:15 AM on May 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
Shutting down existing nuclear does not solve the very real waste problem (which is, incidentally, primarily a US problem)
No country with nuclear energy has a reliable long term storage plan.
posted by biffa at 1:24 AM on May 16, 2020 [3 favorites]
No country with nuclear energy has a reliable long term storage plan.
posted by biffa at 1:24 AM on May 16, 2020 [3 favorites]
They have more than the anti-plan that the US has for the entire civilian sector, though.
posted by wierdo at 3:40 AM on May 16, 2020
posted by wierdo at 3:40 AM on May 16, 2020
I don't understand how renewable energy can satisfy the mostly-constant demand from industry, particularly things like smelters and industrial ovens. Really really really big batteries?
posted by Joe in Australia at 4:48 AM on May 16, 2020
posted by Joe in Australia at 4:48 AM on May 16, 2020
...there isn't a great argument on that front for not running existing plants for as long as they can be run with reasonable safety.
Some of the current operators of US nukes do not have a really great safety record. This is not OK, given the risks. The operators typically push for approval to run the plants far beyond their design life. Also, the Nuclear industry has been pushing for less oversight, and they're getting it, because Trump.This is also not OK. Having for-profit corporations run the things, in the US corporatocracy, is asking for trouble.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 4:48 AM on May 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
Some of the current operators of US nukes do not have a really great safety record. This is not OK, given the risks. The operators typically push for approval to run the plants far beyond their design life. Also, the Nuclear industry has been pushing for less oversight, and they're getting it, because Trump.This is also not OK. Having for-profit corporations run the things, in the US corporatocracy, is asking for trouble.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 4:48 AM on May 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
I don't understand how renewable energy can satisfy the mostly-constant demand from industry, particularly things like smelters and industrial ovens. Really really really big batteries?
There is a lot of information available on industrial-scale solar power management. Sage Automation is one outfit in Australia that has a good website.
posted by No Robots at 6:15 AM on May 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
There is a lot of information available on industrial-scale solar power management. Sage Automation is one outfit in Australia that has a good website.
posted by No Robots at 6:15 AM on May 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
No country with nuclear energy has a reliable long term storage plan.
No country with nuclear energy has a politically palatable reliable long term storage plan.
Reprocessing of nuclear waste is taboo among most countries because the stigma is "I'M MAKING A NUKE!". We could basically get rid of 95%+ of the waste right there. Vitrified waste sealed in stable underground geological formations is layer upon layer of black swan events for something bad happening but nobody wants to be the BY and become the NIMBY.
Nuclear just shuts off the risk circuits of humans.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 9:27 AM on May 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
No country with nuclear energy has a politically palatable reliable long term storage plan.
Reprocessing of nuclear waste is taboo among most countries because the stigma is "I'M MAKING A NUKE!". We could basically get rid of 95%+ of the waste right there. Vitrified waste sealed in stable underground geological formations is layer upon layer of black swan events for something bad happening but nobody wants to be the BY and become the NIMBY.
Nuclear just shuts off the risk circuits of humans.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 9:27 AM on May 16, 2020 [1 favorite]
Reprocessing also requires shipping the maximally hot, messy fuel from all the reactors to the reprocessing plant. Or anyway that was the original US plan, which assumed no risk in this but traffic risk, I’m told.
posted by clew at 11:06 AM on May 16, 2020 [3 favorites]
the ideal complement would have no capital but high marginal costs. There's no such thing unfortunatelyDoesn’t paying consumers to not consume qualify?
posted by clew at 11:06 AM on May 16, 2020 [3 favorites]
> Nuclear just shuts off the risk circuits of humans.
Yeah, the bad experience with the intensity of plutonium-enrichment waste from the cold war hydrogen bomb race really poisoned the well, so to speak.
posted by anthill at 11:25 AM on May 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
Yeah, the bad experience with the intensity of plutonium-enrichment waste from the cold war hydrogen bomb race really poisoned the well, so to speak.
posted by anthill at 11:25 AM on May 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
Note to self: Next time there's a post about some fantastic news in renewable energy, keep your mouth shut about nukes and just be happy.
posted by gwint at 2:02 PM on May 16, 2020 [5 favorites]
posted by gwint at 2:02 PM on May 16, 2020 [5 favorites]
I wish I knew more about non electric battery methods of green energy storage and their current costs.
I believe you can store energy as heat/cold or temp difference, potential mechanical energy like a pumped water storage or pressurized container, use energy to generate something like hydrogen that burns clean and then burn it, or a flywheel. I guess there's also creating antimatter but the tech's not there right?
posted by gryftir at 7:02 PM on May 16, 2020
I believe you can store energy as heat/cold or temp difference, potential mechanical energy like a pumped water storage or pressurized container, use energy to generate something like hydrogen that burns clean and then burn it, or a flywheel. I guess there's also creating antimatter but the tech's not there right?
posted by gryftir at 7:02 PM on May 16, 2020
As atrazine and others posted, storage isn’t as big a deal as people might assume.
Many places have historically offered discount “off-peak” electricity to use up the wasted power of running coal 24/7.
This is because load at night is much lower than during the day, so only requires a fraction of the power to sustain industry and other users.
The idea of linking a wide area in a transmission grid makes it extremely likely that at any given time there is adequate generation from sunny and windy areas to cover demand in darker or still areas.
For example, western state solar can support eastern state evening load, and eastern state wind can support western state evening load as by then the eastern demand has fallen off.
And this can be supplemented with a bit of gas turbine to cover the couple of percent of times when there is a gap.
This gets us over 95% renewables without exotic storage technologies. So what if we have to keep a bit of gas around for contingency? You don’t have to get to precisely 100% success to start making a huge difference.
And specifically users like Al smelters - these already contribute substantially to network resilience by being able to vary their load to arbitrage power prices. So they have the option of optimising their business for energy efficiency with attendant profits, or optimising their business for capacity efficiency, to maximise operating time. It is a pretty straight forward calculation to let them decide which is more profitable.
posted by bystander at 8:03 PM on May 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
Many places have historically offered discount “off-peak” electricity to use up the wasted power of running coal 24/7.
This is because load at night is much lower than during the day, so only requires a fraction of the power to sustain industry and other users.
The idea of linking a wide area in a transmission grid makes it extremely likely that at any given time there is adequate generation from sunny and windy areas to cover demand in darker or still areas.
For example, western state solar can support eastern state evening load, and eastern state wind can support western state evening load as by then the eastern demand has fallen off.
And this can be supplemented with a bit of gas turbine to cover the couple of percent of times when there is a gap.
This gets us over 95% renewables without exotic storage technologies. So what if we have to keep a bit of gas around for contingency? You don’t have to get to precisely 100% success to start making a huge difference.
And specifically users like Al smelters - these already contribute substantially to network resilience by being able to vary their load to arbitrage power prices. So they have the option of optimising their business for energy efficiency with attendant profits, or optimising their business for capacity efficiency, to maximise operating time. It is a pretty straight forward calculation to let them decide which is more profitable.
posted by bystander at 8:03 PM on May 16, 2020 [2 favorites]
→ red blinking lights on wind turbines vs. everyone
That's the FAA (or your local equivalent)'s creation. If planes had better instrumentation, wind turbines wouldn't need lights
posted by scruss at 8:18 PM on May 16, 2020
That's the FAA (or your local equivalent)'s creation. If planes had better instrumentation, wind turbines wouldn't need lights
posted by scruss at 8:18 PM on May 16, 2020
I'm sure that technology exists. The cost of installing it in every plane, from 747s down to the smallest Cessna, is probably prohibitive, and you'd need to do that to not have to put up warning lights.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 3:34 AM on May 17, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by Kirth Gerson at 3:34 AM on May 17, 2020 [1 favorite]
Not a pilot, but surely it would be fine to restrict planes without the hypothetical widget to daylight VFR.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 5:25 AM on May 17, 2020
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 5:25 AM on May 17, 2020
It's worth noting that in the study I linked, the assumption is that essentially every erg of primary energy is coming from electricity. That means all ground vehicles are electrified, so you actually are adding a lot of batteries just not at the grid level. All heating and cooling would also be electric.
These loads can be varied on timescales ranging from hours to days.
What that does, is:
1) It means that you need a lot more VRE than you would need to cover our current electricity demand.
2) ...but all the new load can do at least some time shifting. So the "must run" loads such as industrial processes (Although many of these can actually be varied quite a bit as well and already are) become a smaller percentage of the average load.
3) It creates anti-correlated heating and cooling loads which smooths primary energy consumption over the days and the year. At the moment, if you electrified only heating in the UK, your peak electrical loads would be several times what they are currently because all the heating in the UK will be on at the same time on a cold February night. If you have a "copper plate" grid then it is likely that on those same days none of the A/C loads in Southern Europe will be running.
It has long been known that adding more electric vehicles makes grids better suited for VRE but I had not thought about the effect of electric heating over large geographic time-scales.
Obviously there are limits to how realistic that copper plate approximation is and a real implementation has to balance the costs of grid infrastructure and storage.
posted by atrazine at 5:56 AM on May 17, 2020 [1 favorite]
These loads can be varied on timescales ranging from hours to days.
What that does, is:
1) It means that you need a lot more VRE than you would need to cover our current electricity demand.
2) ...but all the new load can do at least some time shifting. So the "must run" loads such as industrial processes (Although many of these can actually be varied quite a bit as well and already are) become a smaller percentage of the average load.
3) It creates anti-correlated heating and cooling loads which smooths primary energy consumption over the days and the year. At the moment, if you electrified only heating in the UK, your peak electrical loads would be several times what they are currently because all the heating in the UK will be on at the same time on a cold February night. If you have a "copper plate" grid then it is likely that on those same days none of the A/C loads in Southern Europe will be running.
It has long been known that adding more electric vehicles makes grids better suited for VRE but I had not thought about the effect of electric heating over large geographic time-scales.
Obviously there are limits to how realistic that copper plate approximation is and a real implementation has to balance the costs of grid infrastructure and storage.
posted by atrazine at 5:56 AM on May 17, 2020 [1 favorite]
Wait, are you guys talking about generating power on one side of the country and transmitting it all the way to the other side of the country? That seems like...a lot of energy to transmit, a looong ways. Maybe Canada already does this with some of their hydro stuff.
Then again, if it's cheap enough, you can just build extra capacity and only transmit some smaller fraction of the total need. I guess that's what you're probably talking about.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 8:18 AM on May 17, 2020
Then again, if it's cheap enough, you can just build extra capacity and only transmit some smaller fraction of the total need. I guess that's what you're probably talking about.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 8:18 AM on May 17, 2020
Wait, are you guys talking about generating power on one side of the country and transmitting it all the way to the other side of the country? That seems like...a lot of energy to transmit, a looong ways.
Ultra-high voltage transmission allows for the creation of a global grid, with efficient transmission over thousands of kilometers. Ref (1984).
posted by No Robots at 8:38 AM on May 17, 2020 [2 favorites]
Ultra-high voltage transmission allows for the creation of a global grid, with efficient transmission over thousands of kilometers. Ref (1984).
posted by No Robots at 8:38 AM on May 17, 2020 [2 favorites]
VFR
VFR can turn into IMC pretty fast. And instruments fail sometimes. You can't tech your way out of this one, the red lights aren't going anywhere.
posted by tobascodagama at 11:54 AM on May 17, 2020 [3 favorites]
VFR can turn into IMC pretty fast. And instruments fail sometimes. You can't tech your way out of this one, the red lights aren't going anywhere.
posted by tobascodagama at 11:54 AM on May 17, 2020 [3 favorites]
The red lights are going away. Several countries allow wind farms to use radar to detect planes and trigger automatic beaconing. Only if the beacon doesn't get a response will the farm trigger its lights. See: Vestas InteliLight®.
Man, were NavCanada pissed when Transport Canada gave this system conditional approval circa 2013 …
Also, given the last couple of months, planes can go away too. Like baseload.
posted by scruss at 4:53 PM on May 17, 2020
Man, were NavCanada pissed when Transport Canada gave this system conditional approval circa 2013 …
Also, given the last couple of months, planes can go away too. Like baseload.
posted by scruss at 4:53 PM on May 17, 2020
OK, I've held off asking, but ...red blinking lights on wind turbines vs. everyone? What does this mean? Are red lights on windmills somehow hurting people?
posted by Kirth Gerson at 5:40 PM on May 17, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by Kirth Gerson at 5:40 PM on May 17, 2020 [2 favorites]
By design they are visible from a great distance and they flash in an attention getting way. In dark rural areas they are annoying as fuck. IMO much, much more so than the turbines themselves during the day.
posted by Mitheral at 7:30 PM on May 17, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by Mitheral at 7:30 PM on May 17, 2020 [3 favorites]
I guess that they're normal to me since I've seen them on towers and mountains and towers on mountains my entire life. The red beacons have never bothered me. The high intensity white strobes, on the other hand..
There are quite legitimate complaints about the level of light those can cast on nearby property (think the appearance of lightning flashing in the window..forever), but my experience has been all of the "my mild annoyance doesn't outweigh other people's safety" variety since I haven't ever lived next door to an obstruction lit in that way.
I find the slow pulsation of the typical red tower markers above a distant ridge to be calming somehow. At nearer distances the LED variety can be mildly unpleasant sometimes because of the specific spectrum certain models of red LED emit.
All that said, there was an FAA rulemaking many years ago (I think Obama was still President at the time) that allows wind farm operators to drastically reduce the number of markers required for a contiguous group of wind turbines. They don't do it because it (quite reasonably) requires some engineering work that isn't free to ensure that the reduced level of lighting is still sufficient to warn pilots. Pilots who may well be on their way to save your life after you crash your car or whatever. Or maybe the life of someone working at a wind farm who got injured on the job.
posted by wierdo at 8:58 PM on May 17, 2020 [1 favorite]
There are quite legitimate complaints about the level of light those can cast on nearby property (think the appearance of lightning flashing in the window..forever), but my experience has been all of the "my mild annoyance doesn't outweigh other people's safety" variety since I haven't ever lived next door to an obstruction lit in that way.
I find the slow pulsation of the typical red tower markers above a distant ridge to be calming somehow. At nearer distances the LED variety can be mildly unpleasant sometimes because of the specific spectrum certain models of red LED emit.
All that said, there was an FAA rulemaking many years ago (I think Obama was still President at the time) that allows wind farm operators to drastically reduce the number of markers required for a contiguous group of wind turbines. They don't do it because it (quite reasonably) requires some engineering work that isn't free to ensure that the reduced level of lighting is still sufficient to warn pilots. Pilots who may well be on their way to save your life after you crash your car or whatever. Or maybe the life of someone working at a wind farm who got injured on the job.
posted by wierdo at 8:58 PM on May 17, 2020 [1 favorite]
Yes, as a former wind farm designer and operator, aviation lights are likely to be the biggest continuous complaint around a whole project. Designers can and do optimize lighting: maybe 1 in 3 turbines on new projects is lit, and only those on the periphery. Older wind farms will likely keep their extra lights, partly because they'll have an existing lighting agreement with air authorities, but mostly (especially in the US) that after an asset has been flipped to the tax-sheltering entity that will own it, nobody wants to spend money on anything remotely optional. Sad but true.
A lot has been done to minimize the scattered light put out by these lights, and GPS sync has really helped to cut light pollution, but they exist to be the visual equivalent of yelling Hey! every few seconds because current air safety rules require them.
The on-all-day white strobes for really tall structures are horrid. Wind turbines stayed short of the height limit for a very long time just to avoid needing them.
posted by scruss at 9:11 AM on May 18, 2020 [2 favorites]
A lot has been done to minimize the scattered light put out by these lights, and GPS sync has really helped to cut light pollution, but they exist to be the visual equivalent of yelling Hey! every few seconds because current air safety rules require them.
The on-all-day white strobes for really tall structures are horrid. Wind turbines stayed short of the height limit for a very long time just to avoid needing them.
posted by scruss at 9:11 AM on May 18, 2020 [2 favorites]
Similarly, the Olkiluoto 3 EPR began construction in 2005, was due on line in 2010, current estimate is 2021. Cost has trebled.
If only costs would have bassed instead, we might not be having this conversation.
posted by LizBoBiz at 4:06 AM on May 19, 2020 [2 favorites]
If only costs would have bassed instead, we might not be having this conversation.
posted by LizBoBiz at 4:06 AM on May 19, 2020 [2 favorites]
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