Slashdot Mirror
Consumers In Germany Were Paid To Use Electricity This Holiday Season (inhabitat.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Inhabitat: The cost of electricity in Germany has decreased so dramatically in the past few days that major consumers have actually been paid to use power from the grid. While "negative pricing" is not an everyday occurrence in the country, it does occur from time to time, as it did this holiday weekend. This gift to energy consumers is the result of hundreds of billions of dollars invested in renewable energy over the past two decades. This most recent period of negative pricing was a result from warm weather, strong breezes, and the low demand typical of people gathering together to celebrate. Germany's temporary energy surpluses are a result of both low demand and variably high supply. Wind power typically makes up 12 percent of Germany's power consumption on a daily basis. However, on windy days, that percentage can easily multiply several times the average. The older segment of Germany's energy portfolio, such as coal plants, are not able to lower output quickly enough. Thus, there is a glut of electricity. On Sunday, Christmas Eve, major energy consumers, such as factory owners, were being paid more than 50 euros (~$60) per megawatt-hour consumed. Further reading: The New York Times
well it is about renewables and more specifically the more unpredictable nature of generation under renewables that can lead to this scenario. They have such a huge base of renewables with massive fluxuating levels of energy generation that it can have this effect especially when they still need the gas/coal generation for reliable baseload when the renewables are below average. that isn't to say renewables are bad or good but this is most definitely a result of the increased levels of renewables.
The title is misleading and typical greenwash propaganda.
Germany has one of the highest energy price on the world and even in times when the wind blows consumers pay a premium. Prices here only have one direction - upwards and the sky is the limit.
Hey, coal is also a renewable!
... given a long-enough timeframe.
#DeleteChrome
Germans pay more for power than almost every other Western country. That fact was conveniently left out of the push piece in the submitted story.
I doubt that random negative price days offset the ~50% rise in electricity costs for German households over the past 10 years. They are paying even when it's "free" via the government funded subsidies paid out to green energy providers funded by their tax dollars.
Okay. Tell that to the eastern provinces of Germany. Or really any part of Germany, when they realize that CNG in their part of the world will come from Gazprom.
The renewables aren't just about getting off coal. They're about getting off Russian energy supplies, and away from Russian price manipulation.
Actually the conditions for coal cannot be repeated naturally. Coal formed before microbes evolved the ability to break down the hard cellulose of trees. This is long before terminates as well, which broke down trees in forests. Theoretically some coal can still form in the existing peat bogs, but new peat bogs cannot be formed either.
Which is where Tesla's coming in with their massive battery installations.. and likely other companies soon enough given Tesla's success with them (though I don't know the economics yet but that will come..) The batteries can balance out the unpredictability in near real-time, and compensate for the biggest drawback of renewables.
Of course its not all upsides. There's extra space required to house all of those batteries, you have to account for the manufacturing of the batteries when determining the relative cost of renewables vs traditional power generation, and of course they're very new so its possible that we haven't yet discovered all of the potential failure modes that could arise when we start relying on them to large extents like that.
The grid most certainly is interconnected as Germany usually gets a substantial amount of electricity from the French. But France was probably also consuming little electricity on Christmas Eve. And the grid can only transfer so much electricity anyway.
We want and need cheap and dependable power, not expensive and erratic power.
AC re Russian price manipulation?
Nations in free Europe and the Soviet Union worked on a gas network. The network was built and nations in free Europe could then buy gas if they wanted.
The Soviet Union delivered a set amount of gas for a set price. No changes to the price after the contract by the Soviet Union.
Russia now delivers a set amount of gas at a price nations in free Europe want to pay for.
The gas flows from Russia as agreed and then new contracts are agreed on.
Russia cannot do retroactive "price manipulation" as the contract is signed before the gas flows. The price is agreed and then the gas is delivered for that set price.
If the price was going to be too much for nations in free Europe they are free to not sign the next contract and consider the costs of new gas imports with ships.
Ship cost compared to established pipe line? Russian gas price is found to be very competitive and the nations of free Europe get the gas they paid for.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Surrounding nation now have their own nuclear, wind, hydro, solar power to sell.
They want to export too.
The good power deals that got done was for West Germany and communist eastern Europe.
Poor nations sold their power to West Germany at a low price while their own people did without energy.
A lot of the heavy energy use domestically has also been lost by the EU to exporting nations like China, South Korea, Japan.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
It is still a production problem... it just depends on what kind of production.
Wind, solar and hydro are all great, in theory. For all three, you can rather quickly turn down the level of generation by disabling some turbines, closing some water outlets/inlets, or pointing solar panels in other directions... but they come with their own problems: requiring the wind to be blowing, the sun to be shining and the water levels to be high enough... they are good for peak & ideal times, but less so for base loads.
Nuclear is pretty straight forward... rods go in or out and affect the amount of heat generated. Heat leads to steam, steam can either be run through turbines depending on demand or dumped into environment (sorry to the poor birds flying by).
Natural gas, you can treat similarly (but not identically) in terms of turning down production and dumping excess steam if you don't want to run too much through your turbines.
Coal is a whole other matter. Load levels for coal are projected days and weeks into the future as you don't have the ease of a few pipes feeding the whole thing. You can slow the rate at which coal is added to the system, but what is there is going to keep burning for a while... and in the case of a low demand for the thermal energy... will often get dumped.
Source: Many long conversations with an uncle who be rather senior in a multi-state power co-op. While personally & professionally in favor of nuclear, he also understood the less than well known pitfalls of the other systems.
He was also the one who confirmed my theory on the silliness of 'Earth Hour'. Where such a sudden downturn in electrical consumption sees different carbon costs to dumping the thermal energy (though he is not a believer in man made 'climate change').
Nuclear: None
Natural gas: Low (given the ease of turning down the input).
Coal: High.
Keep that in mind: Quick & unexpected downturns in power consumption to save the earth, can actually result in a net positive expenditure of carbon emissions... and in this case, it may be more desirable to have people use the energy (either leaving their lights/heat on when not at home, mining for bitcoin, or looking for aliens with Seti@home) than have the thermal energy be dumped.
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
There appears to be a fungus that also breaks down lignum developing and essentially ending the carboniferous age - or at least the coal forming part of it.
The carboniferous age lasted about 60 million years, from 360 Mya to 300 Mya, and during that time a lot of undigested wood turned into coal. Enough CO2 was sucked out of the atmosphere to trigger a major ice age.
A fungus finally figured out how to digest lignin, in a process described by biochemists as "untying a knot with a flamethrower". The same process is still used by fungi today, pretty much unaltered. By stopping the carbon-and-ice death spiral, these little fungi saved the planet. Without them, even the dinosaurs would have never existed. If you want to show your gratitude, go to a Chinese restaurant and order some "mu er" (wood ear). Some people think they are slimy and don't care for the taste, while others (including me) love'em. But while you are chewing, remember that you wouldn't even exist without the little critters.
Pumped hydro installations. They "buy" excess energy and then sell back into the grid when prices are high.
Which is where Tesla's coming in with their massive battery installations.
Batteries are very expensive for grid storage. A better option is to widen the grid, so a peak in one area can fill in a trough in other areas.
Oh, and it used to be possible (back in the old days of predictable low demand at night) to purchase an off-peak hot water system, that only heats water when electricity is cheap. I imagine adaptive systems are now available.
The renewables aren't just about getting off coal. They're about getting off Russian energy supplies, and away from Russian price manipulation.
If the price was going to be too much for nations in free Europe they are free to not sign the next contract and consider the costs of new gas imports with ships.
Firstly, you just confirmed what the said, the Russians set prices at what they want and tell people they can always freeze in the cold over the winter becaue as you know full well gas consumption would be hard to cover by sea routes. Russia uses gas as a political blackmail instrument so it's about more than just the gas prices, it's about politics and blackmail. Secondly, renewables are now getting cheaper than even natural gas, renewables are simply shaping up to be less expensive in every way so investing in them is investing in the future of energy production.
That's exactly what Europe has done, except now people are saying "hurrrr Germany needs France to keep the lights on!!1"
Yeah, they do. By design.
On a related note, the UK government's assessment of the interconnection with the EU post Brexit basically amounts to "electricity is important in modern Britain." Great insight.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
The problem in Germany here is regulation to make things very simply for consumers that also produce power with a wind-mill. They are paid standard prices, so they can't be punished for producing power when the net is overloaded, so the wind-mills owned by consumers are never put into free-wheeling mode.
If your a libertarian you'll hate this:
composition-average-german-household-power-price-2006-2017.png (PNG Image, 1132 x 800 pixels)
If you're left wing you'll hate that too.
If you're right wing you'll hate all of the renewables stuff.
German is doing a remarkable job of making renewables look bad, their public pay insane amounts whilst electricity gets offered for free or less to factories when they're all closed for Christmas.
Waterfox - a Firefox fork with legacy extension support, security updates and better privacy by default.
"requiring the wind to be blowing, the sun to be shining and the water levels to be high enough."
While nukes need high enough levels of water in the cooling water river they use, which isn't' the case sometimes in summer so they have to shut down, or the water is already hooter than the law allows for using it as cooling and so they have to shut it down, while in winter it's frozen, so they have to shut it down...not to mention all those security inspections.
Ditto for the coal ones.
And remember, Germany uses brown coal mostly and they have to raze entire villages and pay off the owners to get under the coal beneath it.
It's just now worth it anymore.
And both use tons of subsidies while lately the offshore wind turbines don't need them anymore.
They'll replace all the coal and nuke ones.
"Batteries are very expensive for grid storage. A better option is to widen the grid, so a peak in one area can fill in a trough in other areas."
They already do that, they export power to Austria and Switzerland (for free or negative prices) their nuke owners have already complained multiple times of the 'unfair competition'.
"A huge amount of subsidized renewables."
The latest batch of offshore wind turbines are not subsidized at all, the companies didn't want the money.
"Offshore Wind Farms Offer Subsidy-Free Power for First Time"
https://www.bloomberg.com/news...
Exactly. Conversely, France needs Germany to keep the lights on when their nukes cannot reliably provide (too hot, too cold, too much load - their availability is on average less than 80% and their installed capacity is just 2/3 of the peak demand). One hand washes the other.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
The rate goes negative because the energy supplier needs to pay someone to consume the surplus energy otherwise it costs the energy supplier even more money in trying to manage the surplus. Therefore, the rate goes below zero to make it attractive to someone to consume the energy, having free cost energy is not attractive enough.
While nukes need high enough levels of water in the cooling water river they use, which isn't' the case sometimes in summer so they have to shut down,
This is a very rare occasion. For example, during summer heat waves in the US Northeast, it is nuclear plants that keep the lights one while almost no wind is producing. One plant out of many reducing output is very different than the entire wind output of Germany falling because of low wind conditions.
From the article: "Do German consumers benefit from negative prices? Not directly. The wholesale costs of power make up only about a fifth of the average household electricity bill in Germany. The rest is a stew of taxes, fees to finance renewable-energy investments, and charges for use of the grid. That means their bills are lower than they otherwise would be, because power prices are sometimes negative, though household energy bills have been rising overall anyway. Basically, utilities are not depositing money in customer's bank accounts." https://www.nytimes.com/2017/1...
They could make even more money if they could do cryptocurrency mining while the car was idle.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
So if that was the case then why don't they build new pipelines to somewhere else?
Because gas in general is getting too expensive and you'd be better off spending your money on renewables, even the Wall Street banksters and the sovereign wealth funds of the Gulf States are beginning to figure that out.
Or invest in other types of energy-production? Or start building houses with better insulation to reduce the heating-requirements >90%.
I think you'll find that this is what many N-European countries are doing. Both of these trends translate into bad news for Russia though since Putin relies on oil and gas money to pay for his war machine and buy popularity with the people.
I am always amused by "environmentally aware" architects who show off the houses they built. They are usually 6000 sqft monstrosities, placed in the middle of a forest that has been cleared for the land. But they put a few rain barrels and solar panels on it, and think they are environmentalists.
A fungus finally figured out how to digest lignin, in a process described by biochemists as "untying a knot with a flamethrower". The same process is still used by fungi today, pretty much unaltered.
To add to this description, the way the knot is "tied" is that wood is a cellulose-in-lignin composite, in which the lignin is a combinatorial polymer -- the plant uses several different monomers that are sort-of randomly put together, giving you a very large number of possible products, making it impossible for any reasonably-sized set of enzymes to tackle. As Shanghai Bill described it, the eventual fungal solution was to start by pumping a blast of free radicals into the lignin, breaking it up into fragments that were more amendable to further processing.
This also points to a fundamental problem with the development of cellulosic ethanol -- we haven't managed to speed up the fermentation process much, because wood and other plant structural materials are the end result of a eons-long evolutionary stalemate between plants and microbes. There simply aren't any easy molecular biology shortcuts for digesting it; all approaches appear to have been well-balanced between biological costs incurred by the defender and the attacker.
Of course, maybe we can get around the problem by circumventing the rules of the game. For instance, bulk physical treatment process can pre-degrade plant material (physical conditions aren't accessible to microbes because of scale or biological compatibility, but engineers will still need to make the cost and energy consumption of the process economically worthwhile). Or, genetically engineering plants to produce easily degraded lignins (but this means your biomass crops have unilaterally disarmed one of their defense mechanisms).
You are kidding, right? France had historically lots of issues with plants being off line (planned and unplanned). Most famously, during the major health crisis caused by the heat wave of 2003. Most recently, this year in January and November. It deals with this problems by importing power from elsewhere (e.g. from Germany) but it is generally considered a major issue, especially because it has an aging nuclear fleet and also because heat wave are expected to become more common. If other neighboring countries would rely on nuclear in the same way as France did, there would be a major crisis every two years or so. In contrast, even without wind and sun, Germany has enough plants and does not have to import power at any time. It can produce much more power than it needs at all times. It is only France, which has a very fragile grid in terms of unplanned outages.
Nuclear is pretty straight forward... rods go in or out and affect the amount of heat generated.
Well, maybe your uncle should go back to university or get some remedial courses in nuclear engineering. Yes, nuclear reactors are controlled with control rods. And yes, if all goes according to plan, you can quickly shut the chain reaction down. But you cannot quickly vary the output of the reactor. First, because this leads to the build-up of undesirable fission products ("neutron poisons"), and secondly, because there is a large amount of residual decay heat. Nuclear powerplants typically provide base loads only, possibly changing at the several hours to days timescale. Like all thermal plants, they can in principle vent heat, but that is non-trivial on a large scale, and, of course, very inefficient.
Stephan
The latest batch of offshore wind turbines are not subsidized at all, the companies didn't want the money.
Not true. That Bloomberg article is quite poor analysis for an alleged financial services company.
The approved projects for offshore wind turbines in the North Sea will not enjoy any construction subsidies, but they will enjoy plenty of operating subsidies in the form of Germany's absurdly high energy taxes that go to operators of renewables. If they weren't going to be selling in to Germany's energy market, these projects would still not be viable.
Presumably economies of scale and efficiencies of installers will continue to drop the installation costs of large scale wind generators, but there is a floor, a minimum cost below which installers can not go without taking a loss. Raw materials will always cost something, and for the foreseeable future there will be some labor involved. I would be curious to see an analysis of what that floor might be, and how it compares to current wholesale grid prices around the world. Not curious enough to try googling myself though...