The Myth of Going Off the Power Grid

Lasrick writes: Dawn Stover uses Elon Musk's announcement that Tesla will soon be unveiling plans for a battery that could power your home as a starting point to explore the idea that "going off the grid" is going to solve climate change. "The kind of in-house energy storage he is proposing could help make renewables a bigger part of the global supply. But headlines announcing that a Tesla battery 'could take your home off the grid' spread misconceptions about what it takes to be self-sufficient — and stop global warming." Stover worries that shifting responsibility for solutions to climate change from governments to individuals creates an 'every-man-for-himself' culture that actually works against energy solutions and does little to reduce overall greenhouse gas emissions. Instead, "smart grid" technology would be much more efficient: "With a smarter grid, excess electricity generated by solar panels and wind turbines could be distributed to a network of on-the-grid home and car batteries. Some utilities have also experimented with using home water heaters as an economical substitute for batteries."

Comments

But....Profits!

[zarthrag]

Doesn't matter. As long as monopolistic energy companies spend their time legislating new fees to prevent the average person from being able to afford rooftop solar panels and wind turbines under the banner of "not choosing winners" ...a net-zero utility bill simply isn't possible in today's (political) climate - not in the US.

This isn't likely to change, either. So, that leaves one option: Every man for himself. A house, and maybe even an entire neighborhood could be built around the idea of having some ability to cut utility costs by utilizing smart appliances, solar power, and electric cars with big honking batteries. But if you generate more power than you need, you better store it - where I live, you'll get an extra fee every month for generating your own power AND the power company only takes your excess in exchange for WHOLESALE rates.

Net-zero would be my only incentive, and it's looking less likely without being investigated by the IAEA

Re:But....Profits!

[inqrorken]

Why should the utility be forced to pay you at the same rate you buy?

Regular electricity is generated. It's then sold wholesale, where the local utilities then buy it and sell it at a regulated (5-10%) profit. In between the wholesale price, the 5-10% profit, and what you pay, is the cost of maintaining the distribution and transmission networks. These costs are nonzero. As the distribution utilities are traditionally regulated ("nonregulation" is really a misnomer, regulation still exists in those markets), those costs will still be borne by the ratepayers.

If users of rooftop solar get net zero pricing, then they shift all of the upkeep costs to those without rooftop solar - as PV prices go down, these costs will be borne more and more by the poor and/or those who rent (in many cases, one and the same.)

If you want to not pay for system upkeep, disconnect yourself. Spend the money on a vast solar array and a basement full of batteries (what, you though 24h of storage was enough? Not all the time, it's not.) Then realize the traditional model costs less to you.

Re:But....Profits!

[Anonymous Coward]

But...you want it both ways! You want the reliability of the power company, and to spend less. You want to use your own power when its convenient for you, but have them on standby for when you need them but apparently don't want to pay. You want to force feed power back to them, but they don't want it, they want to sell power not store it for you so you can save money.

Re:But....Profits!

[AmiMoJo]

Do what they do in Germany. Buy the local grid infrastructure and make it work for you. The animals buy the farm, and work it for themselves instead if being the product.

Public ownership it very strong regulation is the only long term future for the grid. Utilities will go into a death spiral.

Watt is this article about?

[Paleolibertarian]

This seems to be an article more about condemning Tesla's batteries that about energy. In fact the word "watt" appears nowhere. Before you can have a discussion about energy you need to be armed with some facts about actual energy needs and potentials. This is just more anti-Tesla propaganda.

Re:Energy storage in the grid is 100% efficient!

[TWX]

Those calculations do not factor-in utility companies that will screw you over if you're attempting to do home-solar or other local power generation.

If you manage to keep the utilities from imposing excessive fees then I agree. The only way to do that though is to divorce the service connection from the usage cost, and they don't want to do that.

Going off the grid completeletly is stupid

[MpVpRb]

Why not use the grid as a reservoir..like a battery or capacitor?

When your local production exceeds your demand..push the rest into the reservoir

When you have a deficit..draw from it

Many people who advocate being off the grid are extreme isolationists..who value isolation over practicality

Sometimes, being a bit dependent, and interconnected, is good

Very first world/American view.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

The article is written looking at the situation from the POV of an average American. The "grid" is practically non existent in large parts of Africa and South America and lots Asian countries. Even where it exists it is quite unreliable. But in almost all these countries the grid is often a state owned inefficient monopoly. The demand for electricity is high and there are lots of people willing to pay way over what the American utilities charge for power. There was an journalist who recounted rich folks in Karachi, Pakistan, driving around in their air conditioned luxury cars when the grid goes blackout. The counties might be poor, but these rich folks collectively far outnumber the middle class in America. They will provide the market, and the invisible hand will find providers. These folks will underwrite the R&D costs of moving off grid.

Think about it: Half of India does not know when their next meal is going to be. Which means the other half has food security. Still they live in a hand to mouth existence. Half the rest are better off than hand to mouth. Half of the better than hand-to-mouth have decent disposable income. This 1/8 of the population of India is 125 million strong, as big an economy as Japan and bigger than many European countries. Living in a sea of dirt cheap labor, none of the labor saving devices would sell there. But anything not doable by throwing more people in, electric power or cell phone etc will have big markets there. Add Africa and South America, you can bet they will leap frog over the developed countries in off grid power, like India did with cell phones a decade ago.