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Can Tesla's Batteries Power Puerto Rico? (electrek.co)
An anonymous reader quotes Electrek:
Almost 1 million ratepayers of the Puerto Rican Electric Power Authority on the island of Puerto Rico were reportedly without power Wednesday during an island-wide blackout. But a few hundred locations with Tesla Energy storage systems were able to keep the lights on, according to CEO Elon Musk... Some of those locations include very critical services. For example, Tesla deployed a series of Powerpack systems on the Puerto Rican islands of Vieques and Culebra for a sanitary sewer treatment plant, the Arcadia water pumping station, the Ciudad Dorada elderly community, the Susan Centeno hospital, and the Boys and Girls Club of Vieques. Furthermore, the automaker's energy division also deployed a solar+battery system at a hospital in Puerto Rico...
It was also reported that the Puerto Rican government was considering Tesla's plan for a series of microgrids to help bring back power on a larger scale. The government has confirmed that they "presented several projects in remote areas that would allow entire communities to be more independent" and they also "presented a proposal to the Authority for Public-Private Partnerships for the deployment of a large-scale battery system designed to help stabilize the entire Puerto Rico electricity network."
The proposal, involving de-centralized local solar farms, "should prove more resilient to natural disaster," Electrek reported earlier, adding " and of course, it would be a lot cleaner than their currently mostly fossil fuel-based power generation." Already Tesla batteries are "live and delivering power" at 662 locations, Elon Musk tweeted Wednesday.
Meanwhile, CNN reports that one Puerto Rico resident spent three weeks building his own solar power system using $7,500 in parts -- which will ultimately prove cheaper than the $350 a month he was spending to run a gas generator (and waiting as long as six hours in the long gas lines).
They're not revealing his name "because he's concerned someone may try to steal his new system."
It was also reported that the Puerto Rican government was considering Tesla's plan for a series of microgrids to help bring back power on a larger scale. The government has confirmed that they "presented several projects in remote areas that would allow entire communities to be more independent" and they also "presented a proposal to the Authority for Public-Private Partnerships for the deployment of a large-scale battery system designed to help stabilize the entire Puerto Rico electricity network."
The proposal, involving de-centralized local solar farms, "should prove more resilient to natural disaster," Electrek reported earlier, adding " and of course, it would be a lot cleaner than their currently mostly fossil fuel-based power generation." Already Tesla batteries are "live and delivering power" at 662 locations, Elon Musk tweeted Wednesday.
Meanwhile, CNN reports that one Puerto Rico resident spent three weeks building his own solar power system using $7,500 in parts -- which will ultimately prove cheaper than the $350 a month he was spending to run a gas generator (and waiting as long as six hours in the long gas lines).
They're not revealing his name "because he's concerned someone may try to steal his new system."
Please tell us how you would do it for less -- paying for kit at Puerto Rican prices.
Of course they can't power Puerto Rico because they require generation in order to be charged. What they can do though is increase the resilience of the power system by making the frequent power disruptions less of a problem and reduce the cost of power by smoothing out the intermittent nature of less expensive solar and wind systems. Right now PR is heavily dependent on diesel and fuel oil power generation which is one of most expensive ways to generate electricity.
I wouldn't do it, for more, I wouldn't do it for less; I wouldn't do it PERIOD. The Puerto Ricans need to be looking after themselves. THEY need to be the ones innovating. THEY need to be designing their iwn completely novel power grid rather than getting a bailout every time something goes wrong. They must make themselves self-sufficient rather than subordinate to the mainland taxpayers. If they can't do this, what value are they to themselves?
sort of. Didn't realize that Tesla was already on the job there. I particularly like the plan to build microgrids. It would be good if some other companies got involved though.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
While Power Packs are nice. I worry about PREPAs ability to do long term maintenance on a lot of microgrids. I would also worry about their ability to pay for the replacement of Power Pack cells/ and whole Power Packs when they go bad. This utility was already struggling to replace simple stuff before the hurricane. The utility still needs to get power generation figured out, and Power Packs are another cost to add on to everything.
Admittedly a big plus to these is customers in the microgrid "won't lose power", but these just make the grid more complicated for a company that can't currently repair it's current equipment.
Your education is merely an underrepresented and overtaxed territory of your failures in life.
Now try the same statement, but substitute âoePuerto Ricansâ for âoeTexansâ, âoeFloridiansâ, or âoeianâ(TM)sâ
When the power goes out in Florida, no one expects a bailout. Volunteers, citizens, and the power company handle things nicely. You should move from Commiefornia and spend a few years in Florida. Things are closer to reality here.
This makes zero sense. The government of Puerto Rico is looking for a solution to the power problem, so they are looking after themselves.
Besides, I'm pretty sure that they have learned that they cannot expect anything good from mainland USA a long time ago.
They're not revealing his name "because he's concerned someone may try to steal his new system."
This is a common problem in the third world. Doesn't matter how much infrastructure one puts up. It's one's capacity to keep people from stealing it, that's important.
I've been off-grid for a few years now... A $5000(~1800W panels are now half the cost) system. Meets my power needs except for being in Canukistan, my heat. I have fridge/freezer/40" tv, computer/router/security system(24/7), lights,washer, microwave, electric pressure cooker, window AC unit, power tools, yada yada..
It meets the basic needs, only.. I have a really crappy battery; $1500 for a new one(only get flooded, leadacid industrial 2500+-cycle life; by far best bang for buck)... But it's been fine for years, why? because of a change in attitude about using power.
I can run my basics for 4-5 days off the battery and overcast alone(2KWh/day avg). But heres what I do.. When I want to use an electric chainsaw or other heavy tool, what do I do? I wait for the sun to come out! Nothing needs to be done immediately. For virtually everyone with their own roof/unobstructed sun, we could be off-grid now, solar now.. It's the regulations and forced 'technical workers and inspectors required in most states that drive the cost of solar through the roof.
As usual, the government makes everything worse.
That's nice Mr. Aspy-in-the-woods. Try that in suburbia. Or, perish the thought, a city.
You don't want them to come visit, do you? So you need to find a scalable solution. Yes, that's going to require cooperation but you can leave that to the extroverts.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
'The proposal, involving de-centralized local solar farms, "should prove more resilient to natural disaster," '
Not one bit!
Leftism from whom?
Yeah I can see that working out well. Oh that was decentralized solar farm ? Toss in transmission lines and it looks that much better.
Puerto Rico is a perfect argument for small nukes 50 MW on sealed reactor that only needs to be refueled every few years perfect.
Please tell us how you would do it for less -- paying for kit at Puerto Rican prices.
Rebuild the existing infrastructure and use as much buried distribution as possible/affordable. There is no perfect solution, but when you factor in cost and time to recover there is little choice.
Nice how they slipped in the "Public-Private Partnerships" bit so nobody seems to be calling attention to it. Where I come from (UK), they're used to extract/extort tax-payer money out of the public and funnel it into private pockets. Sounds like Puerto Rico is rapidly turning into Puerto Pobre and Bancos Ricos.
Debate is a form of harassment. Do not question my truth.
The actual power would have to come from somewhere else. I suggest clean and healthy coal power!
As usual, the government makes everything worse.
You should move to Russia. Weather is similar to Canukistan. It must be this Putin guy that makes everything work without government up (down?) there. Otherwise how did he get elected 5 terms in a row?
I can run my basics for 4-5 days off the battery and overcast alone(2KWh/day avg)
Come peek usage at the height of summer, I use 100kWh per day.
That's not gonna fit on my rooftop. I'll need half an acre of panels, for quite the princely sum. Then of course there is storage. I can't imagine what 300kWh+ worth of batteries would be.
InB4 some Euro-fag tries to paint me as an excessive consumer because their postage stamp apartment, without air conditioning, doesn't use a fraction of that. STFU peasants!
You may style yourself as one, but all that gear you listed, it was made by people who were part of social collectives. Your only an "individual" because you worked off the efforts of others.
Perhaps cities just need to die.
Those two guys must be laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaughing so fucking hard right about now...
You fucking kidding me? The first thing any of those red state governors do is declare state of emergency to unlock federal funds.
Dipshit.
No. This kind of retarded speculation just brings tech people across as being . . . well, retarded. Imagine if all of that money and time went into solutions that are actually viable, because as it is, Silicon Valley largely look like clowns to the more knowledgable (i.e. virtually anyone outside of the valley echo chamber).
Nuke Puerto Rico out of existence. There is nothing of value there.
The electricity consumption of the average Canadian household is 11,879 kWh/yr, or 32.5 kWh/day. You're able to live off the grid with your system because your electricity consumption is 1/16th that of the average Canadian home. Your electricity consumption is 21% the world's household average, and 40% the household average for the thriftiest OECD member nation (Mexico, which has a 46% poverty rate).
Any typical household in the developed world would have to make serious and drastic compromises to their lifestyle to live off a system such as yours.
Have you looked into flooded 2v cells?
Banks of those will last decades.
High initial cost tho. (shipping is killer)
I assume it is because he is such a nice guy. It seems like he is always, literally giving people the shirt off his back. Too bad their are no other guys in Russia to love him.
#ShirtlessPutinNeedsABear
They can't put out an RFP and let US companies submit proposals?
They claimed to be saving the battered country nearly 9 months ago by usage of their battery 'system' yet just the other day there was the massive outage. Proof is that it doesn't work. Or at least their so called promise is as believable as gas escaping from Elon Musk main speaking orifice.
Don't use shitty Tesla batteries, use cheaper, longer lasting, proven NiFe batteries. Lithium batteries are just lighter, which is useless in this context.
That depends on your nation AC. Having and paying for a grid connection is what makes a dwelling legal in some nations.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
That's nice for you, but you're probably better off concentrating on getting used to wearing your big boy pants and getting through the day without having a little accident. One step at a time, eh?
You could be right, or maybe not...
I believe most of average home power consumption is poorly designed appliances and choice... It's so easy not to think, and just plug anything in, ignore idle power consumptions...
Take fridges for one, they can be built to use 0.1KWH.day and be large enough for a family; and they wouldn't cost much more to make if they were mass-produced in quantity. Compared to most residential fridges use ~1KWh/day+.
Take my journey in computers... Desktop/monitor ~100-200W(3.6KWh/day), then went to laptop ~60Watt(1.44Kwh), then power efficient ~14" laptop ~15W(0.36KWh). Then I discovered intels power efficient chips, and run a tablet ~2-6W(0.096Kwh) connected to a 40" power efficient monitor(~18W ~16hrs/day= 0.288KWh)
So laptop(0.36KWh/day) vs tablet+40"(0.384KWh/day)
The user experience with a 40" screen, wireless kb/mouse is soo much better.
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/p...
Most of my chinese security cameras take ~7W vs Panasonic's 1.1W... This all adds up. Available products and choice... The consumers are mostly to blame, because they choose not to think about power/cost ratios.
Analog microwave 0KWh/day idle
Digital microwave: ~0.2KWh/day (73Kwh/year ; $11-22/year+- depending on location; New analog microwave ~$40)
My digital washing machine takes more power on idle than a load of laundry in a day(I unplug after every use, and I only need to do a load once a week)
People don't even need to be off-grid to make this stuff pay for itself. Run the long term numbers of devices and you can often get new power efficient devices/toys for the power savings from the grid alone. Again they choose to be wasteful/not think about it.
would you use battery technology adapted for transportation (high specific energy/power) for a stationary application? Flow batteries have been around for decades for just this sort of application. They load follow well, too. Not as sexy as Elon Musk, though, I guess. (Yuck!) He probably can deliver faster though, and might subsidize it a bit for the PR.
Those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do. (Isaac Asimov)
At the same time, a 1.8kW solar install is on the small side. I have a 7.8kW solar system (30x 260W panels) and my house footprint is 1000 sqft, so not huge. That is enough to generate 30-40kWh/day in the summer. The biggest problem in Canada is that I get zero power from my panels for a couple of months in the winter because of snow cover. Being completely off-grid is not possible in my case.
My wife and I live with a wasteful 7.2 kWh/day on average over an entire year in Oregon. I'm not sure he claimed 2 kWh/day as usage, the sentence seems to be formed to indicate that is how much he gets on overcast days and that he could last 4-5 days from the battery with that minimal overcast generation.
"All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent." [Thomas Jefferson]
I think it's great that Tesla is doing this. They have already proven this in Australia. So yes it's a great story.
If Tesla can make significant improvement on Puerto Ricos Electrical system, then it's a game changer on a much larger global scale.
Go Tesla.