Because of the large number of inverters in a utility-scale solar plant, it can provide reactive power, even when not feeding the grid, ie, when the sun isn't shining.
Most inverters are capable of VAR management, but solar farm developers in most places generally don't want to pay for the extra SCADA to manage it, nor do they want to oversize their inverters.
It won't happen overnight but if there's money to be made, some will start doing it and more will follow. Unless the cost is *extremely* prohibitive, the appeal of making money when the sun is NOT shining will garner at least a few early adopters.
There isn't much money to be made in the US, but their are some general requirements put in place by NERC that can force it to happen. Traditionally, large plants provide plenty of ride-thru support in the US, so its not a big enough problem to warrant high payments for ancillary services, and those services are used relatively little.
There are few if any places on the US grid where they have the stability problems that the Australian battery is being used to manage.
It it will stay like that because coal is king and green energy will never work* in the USA.
*Due to absolutely zero technical reasons.
No, actually gas is the tool of choice for handling grid stresses, as it is much faster response than coal. All sources have different characteristics and costs. Nobody says green energy can't work, but there are costs that come with any given approach and energy mix.
Not sure what you are talking about, gas turbines are cheap power in the US where gas is super cheap. Both coal and gas load follow, but gas is pretty fast response so it matches well with solar and wind, as well as matching any rapidly changing demand.
With batteries you pay for power twice. Once for generating, then again for storing. They are very fast acting so can be useful in certain places where the grid cannot adequately handle stresses, mostly frequency response and voltage support. The US grid doesn't not have many places where those issues are big enough to warrant spending on batteries. South Australia had a particularly bad situation with inadequate transmission lines supplying remote generation.
. We are talking about a periodic compensation that happens 50 times per second in a 50Hz net.
This article is about power reserve, which is about compensating fluctuations in the power demand on the net. We are talking about time frames anywhere from milliseconds to hours here
The cost savings referred to in the title are entirely due to ancillary services, where grid disturbances can impact reliability due to inadequate incoming transmission lines. This has nothing to do with solar output fluctuations, however at times of low solar output that portion of the Australian grid is even more exposed to transient causing events.
This is the primary purpose of the batteries, not for smoothing the solar generation intermittency. In fact, the batteries cannot be fully utilized for that purpose because they must contain reserve for transient response.
Curtailment of wind and solar increases the cost of wind and solar. It becomes more common/necessary as the percentage of solar/wind to total annual generation increases. In Germany, at 15% Wind, 5% solar, they are just starting to see some need for curtailment.
That is different than VAR management, which solar/wind inverters can perform if they have that capability and it is being used. I believe that is what the 2012 requirement addressed instead of, or along with curtailment capability. .
An ongoing issue with operating and maintaining an electrical grid is how to balance electrical generation with electrical consumption. The two vary throughout the day; for example, solar energy adds a surge of power to the grid during sunlight hours, while peak consumer demand for electricity happens around 7-8pm. If you have five minutes, I suggest you watch this video, produced by Vox, discussing it further.
How do electrical companies then compensate for the differences? Or for contingencies, like when an electrical generator needs to be brought offline for emergencies or maintenance? This is where "ancillary services" plays a vital importance. Utilities are desperate to find an efficient way to store surplus power generated when supply is higher than demand, so that it can then be released when demand is higher than supply. Currently, when supply is too high, it is reduced (ex: solar panels and wind turbines turned off), wasting energy. When supply is too low, expensive generators are brought online to meet demand. But if we can make battery technology cost-efficient to store surplus electricity for peak-demand use, it would save vast sums of money, as this article highlights.
My only real concern is how much battery waste this will lead to. Cells need to be replaced every 3-5 years. Until superconductors or high-energy-plasma devices become reality, the only somewhat-environmentally-safe way to store energy long-term is thermal. Hopefully molten-salt storage technology succeeds in this regard.
Ancillary services are generally not load peaking support but rather VAR and frequency control in relatively rare/extreme conditions, for short durations.
Because of the large number of inverters in a utility-scale solar plant, it can provide reactive power, even when not feeding the grid, ie, when the sun isn't shining.
Most inverters are capable of VAR management, but solar farm developers in most places generally don't want to pay for the extra SCADA to manage it, nor do they want to oversize their inverters.
What happens when there are two of them? Will the grid overload or go into instability?
They just use them as needed. No problems would be created. But if the first battery handles 90% of the needs, they have no need for another one, or at least another of that size.
ITs becoming more common. The last company I worked for and the company I work for now are both moving in this direction. However, you can get 'approved' usb devices if you can show the need and establish required controls.
Don't know how you derived all that from my very straightforward comment, guess it was just on your mind and you didn't have a related post to respond to.
15,000 of the 80,000 new home construction sites each year already include solar as part of the build.
So almost 20% of new home construction already includes this. Not a drastic change from the status quo, but it will be interesting to see how fast other states follow California's lead, as they do with vehicle emissions, etc.
This pushes the cost of the electrical needs of the house in to the mortgage, but at the same time reduces air pollution and reduces daytime load on the grid. Should be interesting to see how this impacts the "duck curve" that solar is causing on the California power grid.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_curvehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_curve>
Its is included where buyers want it and can afford it or are at least willing to pay for it. That represents 20% of the market.
It would make more sense to me to require wiring be put in place to support solar, but leave the panels as optional. Not every home is a high dollar city or coastal region home.
It adds about $10,000 to the cost of a new home, which is about 1-2% of the cost of new home construction in the bay area. It's tiny.
And cost will come down. As will the cost of installation.
Anybody who read the NHTSA report should clearly understand that the Autopilot safety data comparison was not done to demonstrate the safety of Autopilot, but rather to decide if there was indication that AP caused an increase. Also, 2/3 of the cars in the study didn't have any pre-AP data at all. It was entirely useless for the purpose of making any kind of safety claim. The NHTSA should not have had to clarify, but too many idiots made stupid claims based on that information. The media in general can be really stupid with statistics.
One thing though,
I thought those number were about Tesla autopilot on *almost ideal condition* VS people on *all condition* no?
Anybody who read the NHTSA report should clearly understand that the Autopilot safety data comparison was not done to demonstrate the safety of Autopilot, but rather to decide if there was indication that AP caused an increase. Also, 2/3 of the cars in the study didn't have any pre-AP data at all. It was entirely useless for the purpose of making any kind of safety claim. The NHTSA should not have had to clarify, but too many idiots made stupid claims based on that information. The media in general can be really stupid with statistics.
Slashdot Mirror
Because of the large number of inverters in a utility-scale solar plant, it can provide reactive power, even when not feeding the grid, ie, when the sun isn't shining.
Most inverters are capable of VAR management, but solar farm developers in most places generally don't want to pay for the extra SCADA to manage it, nor do they want to oversize their inverters.
It won't happen overnight but if there's money to be made, some will start doing it and more will follow. Unless the cost is *extremely* prohibitive, the appeal of making money when the sun is NOT shining will garner at least a few early adopters.
There isn't much money to be made in the US, but their are some general requirements put in place by NERC that can force it to happen. Traditionally, large plants provide plenty of ride-thru support in the US, so its not a big enough problem to warrant high payments for ancillary services, and those services are used relatively little.
There are few if any places on the US grid where they have the stability problems that the Australian battery is being used to manage.
It it will stay like that because coal is king and green energy will never work* in the USA.
*Due to absolutely zero technical reasons.
No, actually gas is the tool of choice for handling grid stresses, as it is much faster response than coal. All sources have different characteristics and costs. Nobody says green energy can't work, but there are costs that come with any given approach and energy mix.
Not sure what you are talking about, gas turbines are cheap power in the US where gas is super cheap. Both coal and gas load follow, but gas is pretty fast response so it matches well with solar and wind, as well as matching any rapidly changing demand.
With batteries you pay for power twice. Once for generating, then again for storing. They are very fast acting so can be useful in certain places where the grid cannot adequately handle stresses, mostly frequency response and voltage support. The US grid doesn't not have many places where those issues are big enough to warrant spending on batteries. South Australia had a particularly bad situation with inadequate transmission lines supplying remote generation.
. We are talking about a periodic compensation that happens 50 times per second in a 50Hz net.
This article is about power reserve, which is about compensating fluctuations in the power demand on the net. We are talking about time frames anywhere from milliseconds to hours here
The cost savings referred to in the title are entirely due to ancillary services, where grid disturbances can impact reliability due to inadequate incoming transmission lines. This has nothing to do with solar output fluctuations, however at times of low solar output that portion of the Australian grid is even more exposed to transient causing events.
This is the primary purpose of the batteries, not for smoothing the solar generation intermittency. In fact, the batteries cannot be fully utilized for that purpose because they must contain reserve for transient response.
Curtailment of wind and solar increases the cost of wind and solar. It becomes more common/necessary as the percentage of solar/wind to total annual generation increases. In Germany, at 15% Wind, 5% solar, they are just starting to see some need for curtailment.
That is different than VAR management, which solar/wind inverters can perform if they have that capability and it is being used. I believe that is what the 2012 requirement addressed instead of, or along with curtailment capability. .
Well it was built to stabilise a nearby wind farm, but yeah I don't think it cares where the power comes from to charge it.
Would make sense to charge when power is cheap or negative ( get paid to absorb power) and fees back when need stability or prices go up.
No, it did not stabilize a wind farm. It stabilizes grid transients due to limitations of the transmission system serving the region.
Is in what is called "ancillary services".
An ongoing issue with operating and maintaining an electrical grid is how to balance electrical generation with electrical consumption. The two vary throughout the day; for example, solar energy adds a surge of power to the grid during sunlight hours, while peak consumer demand for electricity happens around 7-8pm. If you have five minutes, I suggest you watch this video, produced by Vox, discussing it further.
How do electrical companies then compensate for the differences? Or for contingencies, like when an electrical generator needs to be brought offline for emergencies or maintenance? This is where "ancillary services" plays a vital importance. Utilities are desperate to find an efficient way to store surplus power generated when supply is higher than demand, so that it can then be released when demand is higher than supply. Currently, when supply is too high, it is reduced (ex: solar panels and wind turbines turned off), wasting energy. When supply is too low, expensive generators are brought online to meet demand. But if we can make battery technology cost-efficient to store surplus electricity for peak-demand use, it would save vast sums of money, as this article highlights.
My only real concern is how much battery waste this will lead to. Cells need to be replaced every 3-5 years. Until superconductors or high-energy-plasma devices become reality, the only somewhat-environmentally-safe way to store energy long-term is thermal. Hopefully molten-salt storage technology succeeds in this regard.
Ancillary services are generally not load peaking support but rather VAR and frequency control in relatively rare/extreme conditions, for short durations.
Imagine five or ten of these in America.
It'd be a real infrastructure project that would benefit people.
Oh wait, not under this Congress.
There are few if any places on the US grid where they have the stability problems that the Australian battery is being used to manage.
Because of the large number of inverters in a utility-scale solar plant, it can provide reactive power, even when not feeding the grid, ie, when the sun isn't shining.
Most inverters are capable of VAR management, but solar farm developers in most places generally don't want to pay for the extra SCADA to manage it, nor do they want to oversize their inverters.
What happens when there are two of them? Will the grid overload or go into instability?
They just use them as needed. No problems would be created. But if the first battery handles 90% of the needs, they have no need for another one, or at least another of that size.
ITs becoming more common. The last company I worked for and the company I work for now are both moving in this direction. However, you can get 'approved' usb devices if you can show the need and establish required controls.
Wiring it 80% the cost of install, you might as well just pay the extra $1500 for the panels and get the full benefit.
False. You are thinking about wiring and inverter for an existing home. Adding just wiring during construction is low cost.
Don't know how you derived all that from my very straightforward comment, guess it was just on your mind and you didn't have a related post to respond to.
15,000 of the 80,000 new home construction sites each year already include solar as part of the build. So almost 20% of new home construction already includes this. Not a drastic change from the status quo, but it will be interesting to see how fast other states follow California's lead, as they do with vehicle emissions, etc. This pushes the cost of the electrical needs of the house in to the mortgage, but at the same time reduces air pollution and reduces daytime load on the grid. Should be interesting to see how this impacts the "duck curve" that solar is causing on the California power grid. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_curvehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_curve>
Its is included where buyers want it and can afford it or are at least willing to pay for it. That represents 20% of the market. It would make more sense to me to require wiring be put in place to support solar, but leave the panels as optional. Not every home is a high dollar city or coastal region home.
It adds about $10,000 to the cost of a new home, which is about 1-2% of the cost of new home construction in the bay area. It's tiny. And cost will come down. As will the cost of installation.
Yeah, screw the rest of California.
Anybody who read the NHTSA report should clearly understand that the Autopilot safety data comparison was not done to demonstrate the safety of Autopilot, but rather to decide if there was indication that AP caused an increase. Also, 2/3 of the cars in the study didn't have any pre-AP data at all. It was entirely useless for the purpose of making any kind of safety claim. The NHTSA should not have had to clarify, but too many idiots made stupid claims based on that information. The media in general can be really stupid with statistics.
One thing though,
I thought those number were about Tesla autopilot on *almost ideal condition* VS people on *all condition* no?
https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/i...
Anybody who read the NHTSA report should clearly understand that the Autopilot safety data comparison was not done to demonstrate the safety of Autopilot, but rather to decide if there was indication that AP caused an increase. Also, 2/3 of the cars in the study didn't have any pre-AP data at all. It was entirely useless for the purpose of making any kind of safety claim. The NHTSA should not have had to clarify, but too many idiots made stupid claims based on that information. The media in general can be really stupid with statistics.
Reliability will become ever more important as full AD becomes standard and humans' driving skills deteriorate (or never develop)
Well, I was just kidding, as blockchain is the preferred go to media solution. However, to your point, aren't there ways to employ it anonomously?
Maybe the old pacemaker microwave scare thingy can be relevant again.
Stop with numbers and reason. This is a CRISIS!
2.8 m gallons is a very tiny amount relative to the source. Extremely tiny.
Blockchain to the rescue!
tower sharing and leasing space on them is not news, not new, and has been done since the dawn of radio broadcasting.
Crap, and I thought I had a brilliant idea.... sharing FM towers! Back to the ole drawing board.
It just like airplane autopilot, except airplane autopilot development bosses didn't all quit.