Slashdot Mirror

Here's what has been discovered everywhere a switch to wind and solar has been tried, they are nothing more than a proxy for natural gas. When anyone claims that they will switch from coal to wind and solar what they really mean is that they will switch to wind, solar, and natural gas.

Give it time. Battery prices keep going down. I think that flow batteries are particularly well-suited for grid storage, they just need to become price competitive with lithium ion batteries. But even lithium ion plus renewables are becoming competitive with natural gas.

A Massachusetts Institute of Technology spinoff
hopes to create battery storage technology capable of replacing fossil fuel-based power as the primary source of baseload electricity delivery across the grid. By doing this 50% of present-level carbon emissions generated by U.S. power generating utilities can disappear.
Ted Wiley, Harvard Business School, and a founding member of the company, Baseload Renewables, states, “You can currently put batteries next to solar and wind power and create an output for four hours, but we want to develop a battery to shape renewables into a 24-hour block.”

The initial goal has focused on decreasing the cost of energy storage by a factor of five. To do this the company is looking at sulfur which costs less than any other element when used to store electrons. Abundant and ten times more energy dense than lithium-ion, developing sulfur-based battery technology would be a global game changer.

What Baseload Renewables is out to invent is a flow battery using a polysulfide solution containing chains of sulfur atoms. In the MIT patent application that inspired the spinoff, the technology is described as an air-breathing aqueous sulfur rechargeable system.

When Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) built a 20 megawatt/80 megawatt-hour (MWh) energy storage system in Southern California early last year, it was a critical turning point for the industry. Not only was energy storage going to be the supplier power at peak times for the grid, replacing off-line natural gas facilities, but the project was deployed in a matter of months...
Energy storage is already starting to take some of the value formerly reserved for natural gas peaker plants, and GTM Research senior advisor Shayle Kann said recently that as energy storage systems become even more economical, he "can't see why we should build a gas peaker after 2025."

Portland General Electric (PGE) is planning to develop a first-of-its-kind renewable energy facility that would combine utility-scale wind, solar and energy storage. Once completed, PGE will be able to supply about 50% of its customers' electricity needs with emissions-free generation, the company said on Tuesday.
The project, known as Wheatridge Renewable Energy Facility, will combine 300 MW of wind generation, 50 MW of solar and 30 MW of battery storage. It will come online in stages beginning with wind generation in 2020.

Remember, you are suggesting that we use batteries to hold the grid up for HOURS or DAYS when wind and solar are not producing enough power to meet demand. Right now, the battery being used is only capable of doing this for tens of min, and only while the grid is being reconfigured to fix what ever problem happened to trigger the event.

PG&E is retiring three, count them, one, two , three, peaker plants and replacing them with batteries. They are designed to store 1.2 GWh, 300 MW for four hours. Already.

In less than a decade battery price will fall so much we can store days worth of electricity usage. My Tesla Model 3 stores 75 kWh. That is one week of usage by my home in the winter. 2 days of storage in the summer. We are there.

But, it is not an edge case or applicable only in isolated areas. PG&E is replacing three peaker power plants with battery storage. A well connected grid, and the application is not momentary load balance for frequency control. It is a well predicted clear rise in demand over four hours. Batteries are kicking the gas turbines out.

Again the story, needlessly puts Tesla front and center, no doubt for clicks, but the real hero here is the battery.

Batteries are taking huge bite out of the high premium, high profit sectors. The rest of the powerplants are going to be working on the razor thin margins of commodity base load power. The entire spot market for electricity could disappear.

Utilities themselves didn't want this rule to be made less stringent since the controls have already been put in place; the money has already been spent. The utilities are worried that they won't be able to recover those previously incurred costs if this rule is changed. This would likely only impact utilities with plants in states or municipalities where generation hasn't been deregulated.

In response, major trade groups representing electric utilities wrote to the agency, asking it to preserve the regulation. The sector has already invested more than $18 billion to comply with the rule, they wrote, and in many states regulators are still evaluating whether to allow utilities to recover the cost of pollution upgrades from customers.

"Units that retired in part due to MATS — along with other regulatory requirements, low natural gas prices, resource planning initiatives, and a variety of other factors — have been decommissioned and cannot be reinstated," utilities wrote.

Anyway, AC will always only be a small fraction of electricity consumption.

So putting up that straw man makes no sense.

What makes you say that? 18% is a pretty significant amount. And thats in power hungry America.

EIA estimates that 18% of annual household electricity use is for air conditioning.

Just have a look here to see what the experts predict.

So putting up that straw man makes no sense.

It was an example of growing wealth causing a growing use of electricity (and consumption in general)
It was also directly in resopnse to Windy's post about AC sales.
How on earth is that a strawman?

The article cites a 2016 report from Callan LLC, which is here: https://www.callan.com/ndt-stu...

In this report, Callan points out that decommissioning costs were $91B in 2016. They also state that the fund is stable at around 70% (which I assume is 70% of expected decommissioning costs).

So, even if the wind article were true, and there would be some massive apocalypse if some wind turbines stopped working, the $27B gap (gotten by subtracting $64B from $91B - I'm not sure where the other article got the $41.8B number) in nuclear decommissioning costs for 2016 would be enough to decommission 135,000 wind turbines. That's ~40% of the turbines operating worldwide (341,320 - from this page http://gwec.net/global-figures...).

"Where batteries will help is plants that cannot be competitively spun up and down fast enough for grid "fast" response-- they can use the battery to achieve a better ramp rate. Unfortunately, prices need to drop nearly an order of magnitude for the value to stack there."

I'm not so sure about that. Currently in the US, regulations aren't set up for batteries to be able to earn revenue for all of the services they are able to provide (aka energy storage revenue stacking). FERC recently issued order 841 in order to address that.

I wouldn't be surprise if once the regulations catch up to the technology (during which time battery prices will keep coming down), batteries are able to out-compete other sources. Already in Arizona a solar+storage offer won an RFP, coming in at only $0.045/kWh.

"Where batteries will help is plants that cannot be competitively spun up and down fast enough for grid "fast" response-- they can use the battery to achieve a better ramp rate. Unfortunately, prices need to drop nearly an order of magnitude for the value to stack there."

I'm not so sure about that. Currently in the US, regulations aren't set up for batteries to be able to earn revenue for all of the services they are able to provide (aka energy storage revenue stacking). FERC recently issued order 841 in order to address that.

I wouldn't be surprise if once the regulations catch up to the technology (during which time battery prices will keep coming down), batteries are able to out-compete other sources. Already in Arizona a solar+storage offer won an RFP, coming in at only $0.045/kWh.

We're still wasting a cool billion/year on rural electrification.

Actually, the requested fiscal year budget was six billion for rural electrification. And the value creation is much higher so waste is hard to argue. Do you have any specific sources for your assertions?

It hasn't wired a single new residence in 40 years.

The Rural Utilities Service doesn't wire residences, it provides funding to electrical cooperatives who provide service to residences, who have their home wired.

Did you think they were an electrician? Nope. Not a home builder either. For that, I believe you want Ben Carson and HUD. Maybe the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and the Base Housing authority.

All wasted money absorbed by rent seekers. It's never done.

Actually, that money put up over 19,000 miles of electric line, and lots of telecommunication work and more.

Really, if your intent is legitimate, there may be some grounds on which you can complain about the level of performance, you might have some useful critiques, if you ever bother to develop specifics, but your hyperbolic grandstanding ruins your case.

Lot of that going around.

Texas has a lot of renewable energy (wind), so much so that wholesale prices have been going negative at times and even some relatively new gas generators are having difficulties competing.

There is a cloud hanging over the Texas wholesale power market.

The cloud is cast by the Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing of Panda Temple Power LLC in a Delaware court.

To be clear, the Panda bankruptcy is not a cause of market conditions in the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) region — it is a symptom.

Panda Temple Power is a modern 758 MW gas-fired combined-cycle power plant in Temple, Texas, that began construction in 2012 and entered service in 2014.

The plant has been losing money since 2015, and according to a court filing now has $400 million of outstanding debt and only about $2,000 of cash...

Low gas, lots of wind

Forecasting methodology aside, the basic economics of gas fired generation in ERCOT are challenging. In March, S&P Global Ratings lowered its rating on several merchant generators in ERCOT, citing low natural gas prices and the influx of low priced wind power.

“The reality here, is there is just too much PTC subsidized wind in ERCOT,” says Jeff Schroeter, managing director at Genova Power Advisors in Plano, Texas. And, he says, there is as much as another 6,000 MW of wind power under development.

Wind plants that receive the federal production tax credit have an incentive to bid into the competitive market at zero because they can still collect the tax credit. Schroeter says a recent analysis he performed showed that in 2016 ERCOT’s Houston zone cleared below a 6,000 BTU/kWh market heat rate for about 20% of the hours because of all the negative wind bid strategies.

Well, they don't get a vote on what the generation industry does nor what government policy gets implemented. The stakeholders who do get a vote want a carbon price to be implemented.

The carbon consensus

Hours of debate found little common ground on ZECs, but there was much more consensus on what should come next. On the first day of the conference, New York ISO CEO Brad Jones said his intention was to use the ZECs as a “bridge to the future,” eventually replacing them with carbon prices in the wholesale market.

Exelon has long supported carbon pricing, even arguing for it as an implementation strategy for the Clean Power Plan. But the independent generators at the conference also endorsed the concept.

"We need to ask markets to do the right thing,” said Abraham Silverman, counsel at NRG Energy. “There’s nothing magical about the existing structure. It’s an accident of history.”

Silverman stressed that only FERC can ensure just and reasonable rates in the face of state carbon goals. One option would be to move to “security-constrained economic carbon dispatch,” with a capacity market that features competitive tranches for various resources, he said. Invenergy's Polsky, meanwhile, stressed that any award of new state subsidies should be on a competitive basis.

While the generators largely gave support for a carbon pricing proposal, the consensus stopped at Maine PUC Chairman Mark Vannoy. He said his state would support pricing other attributes (such as reliability) in the wholesale market, but not carbon, as it is too expensive.

Vannoy was challenged by Pennsylvania PUC Vice Chair Andrew Place, who pointed out that revenues from a carbon price can be returned to states and ratepayers, so “it’s not a net loss.”

But while popular, carbon pricing is unlikely to be a panacea, Silverman warned. With RPS policies and subsidies, states aim for new jobs and technological development in addition to carbon reductions, so a carbon price may not serve all their needs.

“We don’t necessarily think putting a price on carbon directly is actually the best way to incent renewables,” he said. “We think long-term [bilateral contracts] have been successful getting new renewables built — something we do all day and night.”

Consultants, academics voice support

That same qualified support for carbon pricing was apparent during FERC’s subsequent panel of power sector academics, analysts and consultants. While the group of industry veterans held diverse opinions on the correct structure of wholesale markets, all agreed that FERC and the states should find a way to integrate important attributes like carbon intensity into market prices.

Germany land area: 348,900.0 sq. miles
United States land area: 9,147,420.0 sq. miles
Over 26 times the land area. In other words, it's easier to get the power
from the source to the people in Germany, than it would be in the USA.
It's the same argument, people complain about, when talking about internet
speed. "Japan & South Korea" have x times the speed and x cheaper price
of internet, than in the USA.
Japan land area: 364,560.0 sq miles
South Korea land area: 97,480.0
It's easier in smaller countries to build out, than the USA.
Ok, so the liberal logic would say, move all the people to large urban population
centers, and make living out in the middle of the nation illegal. Yeah, that would be
the way their liberal minds would work. After all, it's "for your own good".
You want renewable power, fine, but leave coal, gas & nuclear alone.

Well thanks for showing us how your mind works. You spout a random statistic of no particular value, the size of the US versus Germany, but don't consider the population distribution, the same as with your claim about the Internet. Despite numerous and extensive discourses on both flawed argumentations of yours having been available for quite some time. The one they have in common is that you're trying ignore the distribution of population, which is not even across any of the nations, and in fact, you can see how there is plenty of concentrated population in the US with any number of maps. The next part is that you're ignoring the actual state of affairs, as the complaints about power production and internet provision actually don't just depend on the averages, but on particulars, such as North Carolina's complaints about pollution to North Carolina's actions to inhibit municipal internet.

Then, of course, you haven't actually considered that efforts to create a better interconnected grid in the US are ongoing, that alternative power production can work better with distribution.

But instead of looking at those details, let's just let you try to boil things down with an irrelevant argument that isn't particularly important. No wait, let's not.

Of course, that you ended it all with a false conclusion of what you think your strawman concept of a liberal mind would say, just puts another nail in the coffin of your argument. Why do you bother? Is it simply because you don't realize how poor a case you're making, or is that the point? Heck, maybe you're around to make conservatives look bad, that'd be offensive, but at least I wouldn't feel quite as bad.

But I mean really, Mitt Romney gabbled his nonsense over the size of the US Navy and Air Force, what else can I expect?

Lacking electric reliability is a drag on the economy. Energy prices in this part of Australia are skyrocketing. The economics on this are pretty straight-forward.

As reported in the Australian Financial Review, prices in the state have been “frequently surging above $1000 a MWh this month and at one point hitting the $14000MWh maximum price”. The Australian Financial Review reports that average monthly prices have been three to four times higher than in the eastern states during the month of July and new contract prices in South Australia are nearly double the prices in the eastern states.

Funny you should say that. Just the front 2 pages of Utility Dive has these articles:
How ConEd's mobile battery REV demo could build a new storage business model
GTM: Long-duration battery boom spurs over 300 MWh of storage additions in 2016
Commodities giant Vitol taps NEC to build 50 MW UK storage project for National Grid
ZEN Energy of Australia proposes 50 MW storage project to counter blackouts
E.ON to build nearly 20 MW of battery storage at Texas wind farms
Kentucky utilities team up with EPRI for battery storage testing
Primus Power begins production of 5-hour flow battery
Younicos to install 3 MW storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska
SDG&E, AES bring world's largest lithium ion battery storage online in California
Tesla expects to finalize plans for 2 Gigafactories in 2017

Things are just getting started. Tesla finished its Gigafactory and will be building two more. AES is building its own monster factory and Sonnenbatterie is building out more capacity.

Funny you should say that. Just the front 2 pages of Utility Dive has these articles:
How ConEd's mobile battery REV demo could build a new storage business model
GTM: Long-duration battery boom spurs over 300 MWh of storage additions in 2016
Commodities giant Vitol taps NEC to build 50 MW UK storage project for National Grid
ZEN Energy of Australia proposes 50 MW storage project to counter blackouts
E.ON to build nearly 20 MW of battery storage at Texas wind farms
Kentucky utilities team up with EPRI for battery storage testing
Primus Power begins production of 5-hour flow battery
Younicos to install 3 MW storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska
SDG&E, AES bring world's largest lithium ion battery storage online in California
Tesla expects to finalize plans for 2 Gigafactories in 2017

Things are just getting started. Tesla finished its Gigafactory and will be building two more. AES is building its own monster factory and Sonnenbatterie is building out more capacity.

Funny you should say that. Just the front 2 pages of Utility Dive has these articles:
How ConEd's mobile battery REV demo could build a new storage business model
GTM: Long-duration battery boom spurs over 300 MWh of storage additions in 2016
Commodities giant Vitol taps NEC to build 50 MW UK storage project for National Grid
ZEN Energy of Australia proposes 50 MW storage project to counter blackouts
E.ON to build nearly 20 MW of battery storage at Texas wind farms
Kentucky utilities team up with EPRI for battery storage testing
Primus Power begins production of 5-hour flow battery
Younicos to install 3 MW storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska
SDG&E, AES bring world's largest lithium ion battery storage online in California
Tesla expects to finalize plans for 2 Gigafactories in 2017

Things are just getting started. Tesla finished its Gigafactory and will be building two more. AES is building its own monster factory and Sonnenbatterie is building out more capacity.

Funny you should say that. Just the front 2 pages of Utility Dive has these articles:
How ConEd's mobile battery REV demo could build a new storage business model
GTM: Long-duration battery boom spurs over 300 MWh of storage additions in 2016
Commodities giant Vitol taps NEC to build 50 MW UK storage project for National Grid
ZEN Energy of Australia proposes 50 MW storage project to counter blackouts
E.ON to build nearly 20 MW of battery storage at Texas wind farms
Kentucky utilities team up with EPRI for battery storage testing
Primus Power begins production of 5-hour flow battery
Younicos to install 3 MW storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska
SDG&E, AES bring world's largest lithium ion battery storage online in California
Tesla expects to finalize plans for 2 Gigafactories in 2017

Things are just getting started. Tesla finished its Gigafactory and will be building two more. AES is building its own monster factory and Sonnenbatterie is building out more capacity.

Funny you should say that. Just the front 2 pages of Utility Dive has these articles:
How ConEd's mobile battery REV demo could build a new storage business model
GTM: Long-duration battery boom spurs over 300 MWh of storage additions in 2016
Commodities giant Vitol taps NEC to build 50 MW UK storage project for National Grid
ZEN Energy of Australia proposes 50 MW storage project to counter blackouts
E.ON to build nearly 20 MW of battery storage at Texas wind farms
Kentucky utilities team up with EPRI for battery storage testing
Primus Power begins production of 5-hour flow battery
Younicos to install 3 MW storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska
SDG&E, AES bring world's largest lithium ion battery storage online in California
Tesla expects to finalize plans for 2 Gigafactories in 2017

Things are just getting started. Tesla finished its Gigafactory and will be building two more. AES is building its own monster factory and Sonnenbatterie is building out more capacity.

Funny you should say that. Just the front 2 pages of Utility Dive has these articles:
How ConEd's mobile battery REV demo could build a new storage business model
GTM: Long-duration battery boom spurs over 300 MWh of storage additions in 2016
Commodities giant Vitol taps NEC to build 50 MW UK storage project for National Grid
ZEN Energy of Australia proposes 50 MW storage project to counter blackouts
E.ON to build nearly 20 MW of battery storage at Texas wind farms
Kentucky utilities team up with EPRI for battery storage testing
Primus Power begins production of 5-hour flow battery
Younicos to install 3 MW storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska
SDG&E, AES bring world's largest lithium ion battery storage online in California
Tesla expects to finalize plans for 2 Gigafactories in 2017

Things are just getting started. Tesla finished its Gigafactory and will be building two more. AES is building its own monster factory and Sonnenbatterie is building out more capacity.

Funny you should say that. Just the front 2 pages of Utility Dive has these articles:
How ConEd's mobile battery REV demo could build a new storage business model
GTM: Long-duration battery boom spurs over 300 MWh of storage additions in 2016
Commodities giant Vitol taps NEC to build 50 MW UK storage project for National Grid
ZEN Energy of Australia proposes 50 MW storage project to counter blackouts
E.ON to build nearly 20 MW of battery storage at Texas wind farms
Kentucky utilities team up with EPRI for battery storage testing
Primus Power begins production of 5-hour flow battery
Younicos to install 3 MW storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska
SDG&E, AES bring world's largest lithium ion battery storage online in California
Tesla expects to finalize plans for 2 Gigafactories in 2017

Things are just getting started. Tesla finished its Gigafactory and will be building two more. AES is building its own monster factory and Sonnenbatterie is building out more capacity.

Funny you should say that. Just the front 2 pages of Utility Dive has these articles:
How ConEd's mobile battery REV demo could build a new storage business model
GTM: Long-duration battery boom spurs over 300 MWh of storage additions in 2016
Commodities giant Vitol taps NEC to build 50 MW UK storage project for National Grid
ZEN Energy of Australia proposes 50 MW storage project to counter blackouts
E.ON to build nearly 20 MW of battery storage at Texas wind farms
Kentucky utilities team up with EPRI for battery storage testing
Primus Power begins production of 5-hour flow battery
Younicos to install 3 MW storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska
SDG&E, AES bring world's largest lithium ion battery storage online in California
Tesla expects to finalize plans for 2 Gigafactories in 2017

Things are just getting started. Tesla finished its Gigafactory and will be building two more. AES is building its own monster factory and Sonnenbatterie is building out more capacity.

Funny you should say that. Just the front 2 pages of Utility Dive has these articles:
How ConEd's mobile battery REV demo could build a new storage business model
GTM: Long-duration battery boom spurs over 300 MWh of storage additions in 2016
Commodities giant Vitol taps NEC to build 50 MW UK storage project for National Grid
ZEN Energy of Australia proposes 50 MW storage project to counter blackouts
E.ON to build nearly 20 MW of battery storage at Texas wind farms
Kentucky utilities team up with EPRI for battery storage testing
Primus Power begins production of 5-hour flow battery
Younicos to install 3 MW storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska
SDG&E, AES bring world's largest lithium ion battery storage online in California
Tesla expects to finalize plans for 2 Gigafactories in 2017

Things are just getting started. Tesla finished its Gigafactory and will be building two more. AES is building its own monster factory and Sonnenbatterie is building out more capacity.

Funny you should say that. Just the front 2 pages of Utility Dive has these articles:
How ConEd's mobile battery REV demo could build a new storage business model
GTM: Long-duration battery boom spurs over 300 MWh of storage additions in 2016
Commodities giant Vitol taps NEC to build 50 MW UK storage project for National Grid
ZEN Energy of Australia proposes 50 MW storage project to counter blackouts
E.ON to build nearly 20 MW of battery storage at Texas wind farms
Kentucky utilities team up with EPRI for battery storage testing
Primus Power begins production of 5-hour flow battery
Younicos to install 3 MW storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska
SDG&E, AES bring world's largest lithium ion battery storage online in California
Tesla expects to finalize plans for 2 Gigafactories in 2017

Things are just getting started. Tesla finished its Gigafactory and will be building two more. AES is building its own monster factory and Sonnenbatterie is building out more capacity.

I support nuclear power, but don't mistake it for being inexpensive. Some nuclear units in deregulated markets in the US for example are getting shutdown because they can't compete with combined cycle natural gas units. Some units are being saved by bailouts.

God, I hope not, that would be a terrible future. "Renewable Power" isn't reliable, so 100% renewables would lead to rolling blackouts, or wouldn't be 100% renewables.

"Renewable Power" is a broad category. You are thinking narrowly of things like solar and wind, and ignoring nascent trends toward energy storage using increasingly creative methods.

But please, by all means, go ahead and continue to be close minded. That's the sure-fire proven way toward progress. ~

You just can't do power purchase agreements under 4 cents/kwh with nuclear as you can with solar. http://www.utilitydive.com/new... Nukes are just too expensive.

Try doing that in New York, Chicago, Seattle or Boston... and then try doing that without solar panels made with a coal and diesel powered supply and manufacturing chain. You have so many externalized costs and negative effects with solar right now it isn't funny.

Nuclear builds in every cost and provides a safe, clean and reliable source of energy for decades.

With nuclear you set up a plant, dig up and refine a relatively small amount of fuel and plug it in to a grid designed for large reliable point sources of energy. And you have less waste compared with every other fuel source.

With solar you have to keep churning out solar panels and keep trucking them around and disposing of a great deal of toxic waste and then you have to plug them into a grid that can't actually handle the fluctuating power generation without billions of dollars in investment or point of use storage that raises the cost of that electricity substantially.

Solar is a way for rich people to pretend they are environmentally sensitive while they consume more and damage the planet more than the rest of us.

You just can't do power purchase agreements under 4 cents/kwh with nuclear as you can with solar. http://www.utilitydive.com/new... Nukes are just too expensive.

Never said that we are not using coal. That was you putting words in my mouth.

but ignoring your attack, here is just some of what eia is ignoring.
and here is more that eia ignored.