- cross-posted to:
- usnews@beehaw.org
- technology@slrpnk.net
- cross-posted to:
- usnews@beehaw.org
- technology@slrpnk.net
Yeah, I think massive chemical batteries for storing excess electricity to facilitate a contrived green energy market is a bad idea.
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Find an engineer or an engineering channel to better understand the grid. Energy generation - clean or otherwise - has to be adjusted in realtime… further: the above statement doesn’t clearly understand or solve for over generation vs under generation. There’s a fix: a reservoir. In other words: storage. This (storage) is present everywhere from the grid to almost literally every circuit board.
You’re picking a fight with batteries/energy storage - then making an argument about something unrelated. “Storing cooked beef sure is hard” is not properly solved with “the store stocking more beef.” They are tangentially related… but not the same thing.
edit: clarity / punctuation
further: the above statement doesn’t clearly understand or solve for over generation vs under generation.
Filling a reservoir during the day to run a steel mill overnight is a complete waste of a reservoir: move the steel mill to daytime hours and you don’t need the reservoir.
And yet, we are doing this now: We are driving consumption to overnight hours that can’t possibly be met by solar. We are offering cheap “off peak” power, and incentivizing overnight consumption.
We do have good reason for it: we need that excess overnight demand to improve the efficiency of our base load generation. But, those same incentives are killing solar/wind efficiency and artificially increasing the need for storage.
Yes, we need storage to match the imbalance between generation and demand. But it is far more important that we minimize that imbalance first.
Shifting demand to time of production (demand shaping) is much more efficient than shifting production to time of demand (storage).
OP’s position is rather ludicrous for a number of reasons, but they are not wrong on this particular point.
This is just factually ridiculous.
Filling a reservoir during the day to run a steel mill overnight is a complete waste of a reservoir: move the steel mill to daytime hours and you don’t need the reservoir.
This isn’t a logical comparison. Here’s an apples to apples: It’s the rainy season - my plants have water … I take excess water and keep it in a rain barrel. An unexpected dry spell occurs: My plants have water.
We’ll return to this in a moment.
And yet, we are doing this now: We are driving consumption to overnight hours that can’t possibly be met by solar.
Being night I’d imagine that’s a tough fight for solar… I’ll give you that. 🙄
…But, those same incentives are killing solar/wind efficiency and artificially increasing the need for storage.
No.
Storage - or a buffer if you will - is simply a requirement of many systems. Electricity is no different. Renewables benefit substantially by having it and would be horribly inefficient without it.
…Shifting demand to time of production (demand shaping) is much more efficient than shifting production to time of demand (storage).
Demand shaping when we’re taking about the grid is largely the result of seasons, the availability of light, and our day to day actions. We turn lights on at night, the heat on when we are cold, and the air on when we are hot. We cook meals before and after work. Demand shaping on the scale that is being suggested requires a positively insane amount of change and has an infinitesimally small chance of occuring.
Now: we have solar during the day and turbines for when it’s windy. This is your production. You cannot shift it. It is raining - my plants are getting water. How then, do you water your plants when it is dry? This answers itself.
OP’s position is rather ludicrous for a number of reasons, but they are not wrong on this particular point.
Op believes that energy storage shouldn’t be necessary. At all. They have clearly stated elsewhere that their opinion is not based on research and it shows. A grid requires a buffer - or a series of fast acting production which effectively simulates one. Solar / wind without that buffer would be nearly unusuable.
Op is misguided at best and while technically not completely wrong: for them to be right we’d need to live in some utopia with vastly different technologies that we have presently. I like sci-fi too… but I’m not going to lobby congress to get rid of planes in favor of teleporters.
Op believes that energy storage shouldn’t be necessary. At all.
Yes, that is one of the ludicrous arguments that I acknowledged OP is making.
Storage - or a buffer if you will - is simply a requirement of many systems.
Agreed. As I said: “Yes, we need storage to match the imbalance between generation and demand. But it is far more important that we minimize that imbalance first.”
Demand shaping when we’re taking about the grid is largely the result of seasons,
No. You are describing one type of demand shaping, but it is not the only one, and it is not the type I am referring to. “Time of use” plans are another type that consumers are more aware of. I’m referring to the industrial version of TOU rate plans.
I am saying that these varieties of demand shaping are currently setup to support traditional nuclear/coal baseload generation, rather than solar/wind. They are currently designed to increase the minimum, overnight load on the grid. They are currently used lower peak demand, and raise the trough.
Those TOU plans need to shift to driving consumption to daylight hours: To maximize the amount of power consumed as it is generated, and thus minimizing the need for storage.
for them to be right we’d need to live in some utopia with vastly different technologies that we have presently.
Only if we are trying to get every consumer to participate. We don’t actually need to do that.
This is just factually ridiculous.
Filling a reservoir during the day to run a steel mill overnight is a complete waste of a reservoir: move the steel mill to daytime hours and you don’t need the reservoir.
This isn’t a logical comparison.
Dude. We are already doing exactly that. We have grid storage facilities being charged by solar power during the day and discharging overnight. We also have steel mills and aluminum smelters paying lower rates to operate overnight rather than during the day, to meet the needs of baseload generators.
But ultimately, the solar, nuclear/coal, storage, and steel plants are all on the same grid. So we are, effectively, doing exactly what I said: running the steel mills with stored solar power. Yes, there are legitimate reasons for doing it this way, but those reasons are ultimately based on legacy issues.
To continue the shift from traditional coal/nuclear baseload generation to solar/wind, we either need enough storage to run the steel mills overnight, or we need to shift the mills to daytime operation.
Again: Storage is important, yes. But, demand shifting is far more important.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7G4ipM2qjfw
OP is… trying his best, I guess. For now lipo is the best solution. Actually multiple things are the solution. Pumped water has a delay that needs to be covered by something else. Flywheels have mechanical chalenges. Molten salt also has problems. Etc. They all compliment each other. IMO best single solution would be nuclear. Salt will be better then lithium, but in some years.
When batteries (ahcually accumulators, but whatever) are done properly, the fires should not go beyond one cell, if at all.
PS Gravity, except pumped water, is hilariously bad.
OP is… trying his best, I guess.
I commend your faith in … ehm… the human spirit we’ll say.
PS Gravity, except pumped water, is hilariously bad.
Keenly aware. I got a good laugh out of it when I saw it mentioned.
Practical Engineering is great. He does a fantastic job of explaining things simply and frequently provides models to demonstrate things.
100% on the combination of things statement. Many different storage mediums have different advantages and disadvantages. The right tool for the right job. Flawed though it is I always loved reading about molten salt… It just seemed like such a metal way to store energy. 😂
Realistically - I don’t mind people being incorrect or even just leaning into their particular beliefs or preferences… but OP emphatically stating incorrect information and then arguing as people corrected him was irritating.
