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Elon Musk's SolarCity Offering To Build Cities, Businesses Their Own Grids
Lucas123 writes Rooftop solar distributor SolarCity announced a new service where it will build a centrally-controllable power grid for cities, business campuses and even islands. Marketing its GridLogic service by calling attention to the recent uptick in natural disasters and the extended power outages that resulted from them, SolarCity said its "microgrids" are fully independent power infrastructures fed by solar panels with lithium-ion backup batteries (courtesy of Tesla). SolarCity claims its GridLogic program can provide electricity to communities and businesses for less than they pay for utility power and the facilities can still be connected to their area's utility power grid as an added backup.
There is more than just a "green" reason to build local microgrids.
Energy Security and Grid Reliability are two.
The American electrical grid, built decades ago and in need of major upgrades, is acknowledged to be a problem moving forward with renewable energy. Utilities complain that they can't handle the load. As utilities whine about what solar and wind will do to their grids(while simultaneously poopooing renewables and how much power they can generate) SolarCity will build microgrids that will allow localized power generation and distribution, so the tender and fragile utilities-of-old won't have to be bothered by pesky solar derived electricity.
The American megagrids serve a purpose, and they should be upgraded, however we should be simultaneously building infrastructure than is localized and more robust.
Someone should not lost power because a tree fell on a line hundreds of miles away.
We play the game with the bravery of being out of range
Eliminate the batteries, system is simpler, and benefits more.
Are you sure? A bank of batteries may very well be simpler than upgrading the entire grid to handle distributed generation.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Partly because a solar-powered city is gauranteed to still need power at night, and local storage eliminates loss inherent to transmission and distribution. But mainly because trying to tie into the grid means the big investor-owned utilities will screw you.
Lithium is actually about the least toxic battery technology, compared to older tech like lead acid, nimh and nicad it's practically green. True it causes pollution to produce but after that disposal is much less of a concern.
Why are they using lithium batteries?
Because EVs use them, but when the EVs are done with the packs, the packs are still good for something.
The plan for Leaf packs was to use them for this purpose from day one. Why not Tesla? Hell, they might be able to get their hands on the Leaf packs cheap.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Has he ever given any reason to doubt him?
Says he can build an electric car, ends up producing the safest, best engineered, and fantastic car ever made, for under $100k. And now they're working on making it drive itself.
Says he can build rockets for a fraction of the cost everyone else is charging. Ends up producing the most successful and economical lift vehicles in existence. Also working on a way for it to land itself on a platform in the ocean.
I'd say he has a history of under-promising and over-delivering.
Yeah this guy is always promising us the moon. How the hell is he gonna get there? With his own personal rocket factory?! Why doesn't he start with something more down to earth...like a car or something. If his companies can somehow gain a lot of experience with these solar panels and batteries he plans to use then maybe we don't need to brush off this natural innovation as complete hype. Then maybe, just maybe I can stop typing exclusively in sarcasm. Only time will tell.
And no-one should be disposing of them anyway, they can be recycled. In fact, nothing should be going into landfill these days.
Waterfox - a Firefox fork with legacy extension support, security updates and better privacy by default.
Will you please stop with these mundane, low-hanging fruit goals and try something lofty and ambitious for once? It's always the same-old, same-old, doing-what-everyone-else is doing with you, isn't it?
"TAMS shouldn't be destroyed. They should just tag us before releasing us into the wild." -- Maeglin
Well, lithium-6 deuteride tends to make much boom in thermonuclear weapons. So that is a concern.
Gosh darn it, you're right! I'm afraid, uncertain, and doubtful about lithium and its uses now. Maybe we should ban that "hydrogen" stuff they use in the bombs too?
</sarcasm>
I really can't believe I'm having to deal with comments like these on Slashdot, AC or otherwise. Just because something can be used in bombs does not mean that it is of any particular concern (did you know that they use steel too?!). But if you really feel like wasting your life by worrying about lithium, then maybe you should do everything in your power to prop up the lithium battery industry (e.g. buy more batteries), since you can think of each of those batteries as a little, tiny sequestration of lithium that won't make it back into bomb production as long as it's in your possession.
Do your part for the anti-nuke effort: buy more lithium (batteries).
They're going to be constantly replacing LiOn packs on any appreciable sized system. Why not go with a NiFe battery system that will last for fifty years? The price won't be much different, especially over the life of the system, or is the system life that short? Its not like you need to keep weight and size down in a building. Also who wants the fire risk that LiOn's pose in their business or home?
1973 called, they want their solar power cost benefit analysis back.
Obviously there are still situations where solar is not ideal but there is a reason its one of the fastest growing energy sources. Things everyone should know:
-Solar panels collect back the power used to manufacture them in 1-4 years.
-Their useful lifespan is over 30 (approaching 50).
-If your roof gets sun more than half the days of the year, a solar array will pay itself back in under 15 years WITHOUT SUBSIDIES (I'm looking at about 12 for my array not including subsidies).
-Storage is indeed an issue, but that is the very issue that this plan is addressing!
In reality, that also helps. He cannot promise a battery with infinite capacity. Cars running on gas need refueling too and sometimes, when I'm running low, I wouldn't mind knowing where the closest gas station is. Not saying Tesla and Elon Musk will solve the world's problems, but they are trying to solve one or two while still making some profit. What do companies Exxonmobil or Chevron do for us? Really? Endless wars for oil, oil spills and other environmental impacts, price fluctuations and possibly many other negative factors.
I tried to get a quote on a solar system from SolarCity for our home. They were rude, pushy, and kept insisting that I "think of SolarCity as a utility company, not an installer."
I contacted them because of Musk's association with the company. I have since decided to go DIY, and now I don't really see why "solar companies" are even necessary. Any electrician worth his salt should be able to wire and setup a solar system. The panel, inverter, and battery manufacturers are what matter.
I've got Solar City...
You do not pay to install anything.
You do not pay to keep them clear of branches.
You *do* buy electricity from the solar cells, but at a much *lower* rate than municipal power. You do buy the rest of your power from your normal provider at the normal price.
Yes, 100% of the tax credits and rebates go to Solar City.
In other words, you pay nothing and get cheaper electricity. All you have to do is let them put solar cells on your roof, which they then maintain. It's a pretty nice win-win situation as far as I am concerned. I have a much lower electric bill, and I know that I'm helping the environment, and I had no out-of-pocket expense at all.