Fraunhofer shows a clear increase in year over year energy spot prices in Germany for each month so far this year compared to 2016. The only anomalies are overproduction negative price scrambles.
Germany is not nearly finished with its transition. It is expected to be nuclear free by around 2023. This news is just showing that they are well on their way to that goal, with another 5 years to go before we can really judge the outcome.
Actually, Germany is significantly slowing down expansion of solar and wind. At this point there are sill days when solar and wind struggle to provide 5% of demand. So they have a long way to go. The costs of adding new capacity are going up because of the major transmission infrastructure adjustments that will be required to achieve a higher capacity penetration from intermittent renewables. Prices will continue to rise. With nuclear shutdowns, CO2 emissions will rise as well for quite some time. Its a big challenge. Germany has invested huge amounts but their overall CO2 output hasn't really improved much.
^This is part of the reason why wind and solar can achieve high percentages on a Sontag is spring and we get headlines like this submission. But industry is where electricity prices really hit home and are why almost every country subsidizes electricity of every form. Unfortunately, there are still weekdays when the plants are humming and Germany's huge investment in wind and solar are still providing less than 5% of demand.
As we can see there are still many days in Germany where wind and solar struggle to provide even 10% of demand, and at times during those days actual contribution is less. I hope these numbers don't surprise anybody. They are exactly what we should expect.
Energy systems are only as good as their performance in high demand situations. They must be designed to handle the demand profile and therefore looking at the 'easy' times doesn't reflect the entire picture. Let looks at some other numbers besides that typical "we hit a hit percentage on a spring Sunday when little power was being used" scenario;
Spot production; (other sources or imports not listed);
May 8 at 23:30 Solar 0%, Wind 2.1%, Conventional 92%
May 10 at 1500 Solar 0%, Wind 0.04% Conventional 92%
These are not outlier moments, these are typical daily occurrences.
Total Electrical Production January 2017;
Solar 2%, Wind 7.95%, Conventional 80%
That is a glimpse of what 300 billion Euro in wind and solar achieves from a system capability standpoint.
Seems really wasteful to cover the non-productive side of the roof with solar tiles. They could presumably produce similar looking non-solar tiles at a much lower cost so that you could have the uniform look without paying extra for solar tiles that won't be doing anything for you.
That begs the question, do subsidies help pay for the non-solar shingles? I bet their math assumes so.
The site quoted me 33K for the roof and 7K for the battery, with 18K worth of electricity generated over 30 years and a 9K tax credit for a net cost of about 13K over thirty years.
I'm actually in the market for a roof replacement in the next two years, and I'm interested in solar. I have a small house. An asphalt roof replacement is less than four grand.
This offer is a complete non-starter for me.
This is where I have a problem. Uber expensive solar roofs should not qualify for tax credits. At least not beyond the amount that would be given for traditional PV panels of the same capacity. Its bad enough that most of these credits are simply helping pay power bills for the wealthy, but now we pay for their roofs as well? Meanwhile low income people have no access to these gifts.
We should take all the PV tax credits and provide public schools with PV panels. That way we add PV capacity and help lower school energy bills, good for people of all income levels.
That's exactly the point, though. The insoluble problem with Nuclear Power isn't outdated reactor designs - it's the tons of highly radioactive waste products that need to be stored for decades in systems that are themselves complex and subject to failure.
And those improved reactors we've yet to see in practice will still keep churning out the stuff.
More ignorance. The waste issues at Hanford are all the nasty stuff that was never properly handled to begin with. Liquids and chemical used for defense research and production. Spent fuel is nowhere near the problem, it is actually quite easy to manage. Unfortunately, most people can't differentiate between the two. That, coupled with ignorance about radiation risk, leads us to failure when it comes to real carbon reduction. No power source has come close to nuclear in reducing carbon contributions. But alas, ignorance and fear rule. We must do away with our most effective clean air power source.
The problem here is he's not looking at the bigger picture. In a congested big city you would be simply moving the traffic jam to the next traffic light. In bigger cities the lights all have to be coordinated so that you don't end up with a backlog of red light traffic that extends all the way back to the previous traffic light. And then having idiots that get stuck in the intersection blocking cross traffic.
Maybe it works in Greenville, population 100,000 but not in a city of 2-3 million or more.
There is a point where the road can't handle the traffic no matter how efficient the traffic controls are, but fully autonomous controls could greatly improve traffic even in those congested cities. At worst, they would minimize the windows of greatest congestion buy keeping traffic flowing as long as possible. There would need to be some algorithms that adjust for multiple intersections. In some cases, the answer might be stop and go.
Too many human drivers can't even efficiently navigate a traffic circle. I can't imagine this could be done until all vehicles are autonomous with the proper control system. That's not going to happen in the foreseeable future.
If we can get to the point where all vehicles have that capabilities, this type of intersections becomes rather easy to do, and is just one of the many obvious improvements in traffic control we can achieve.
This is not a nuclear power plant. It is a wast dump from cold war activities. How stupid to say it is another Chernobyl waiting to happen. That screams ignorance.
I just said current was a primary factor. That is not an attack. I guess you took it as one, that is your problem not mine. Maybe you should take a break.
No pretending required. The posts are right here. I never claimed wind wasn't a factor, you responded as if you needed to defend it was. I even repeatedly told you so and you stuck with your posture. You simply can't seem to read properly and/or admit you were being ridiculous. No worries for me, any other reader can see it plain as day... so go on and act crazy.
Your response to my initial point was ridiculous, as were your following responses. I even reminded you multiple times I never said wind was not a factor, but yet you kept responding as if I had. Now you are just throwing senseless darts in the dark. Pathetic.
Slashdot Mirror
And the overall trend is clearly still upward;
https://www.cleanenergywire.or...
Fraunhofer shows a clear increase in year over year energy spot prices in Germany for each month so far this year compared to 2016. The only anomalies are overproduction negative price scrambles.
Germany is to big, to have 'no wind'.
Its not to big to have 'essentially no wind'. For all Germany;
Jan 8, 2017 8:00 AM Wind Generation = 0.6% of demand
Jan 22, 2017 8:00 AM Wind Generatin = 0.8% of demand
There are many similar times. This is with wind being approximately 25% of total installed nameplate capacity.
Also, on some occasions an anticyclone can cover a good portion of France, Germany, and nearby countries.
Germany is not nearly finished with its transition. It is expected to be nuclear free by around 2023. This news is just showing that they are well on their way to that goal, with another 5 years to go before we can really judge the outcome.
Actually, Germany is significantly slowing down expansion of solar and wind. At this point there are sill days when solar and wind struggle to provide 5% of demand. So they have a long way to go. The costs of adding new capacity are going up because of the major transmission infrastructure adjustments that will be required to achieve a higher capacity penetration from intermittent renewables. Prices will continue to rise. With nuclear shutdowns, CO2 emissions will rise as well for quite some time. Its a big challenge. Germany has invested huge amounts but their overall CO2 output hasn't really improved much.
My two posts above provide actual numbers that back your point;
https://hardware.slashdot.org/...
^This is part of the reason why wind and solar can achieve high percentages on a Sontag is spring and we get headlines like this submission. But industry is where electricity prices really hit home and are why almost every country subsidizes electricity of every form. Unfortunately, there are still weekdays when the plants are humming and Germany's huge investment in wind and solar are still providing less than 5% of demand.
Lets looks at some full day productions percentages (Twh) for Germany;
Jan 6 2017: Solar=2.2% Wind=7.0% Conv =75.2% T=1.61 Twh
Jan 8 2017: Solar=0.3% Wind=3.2% Conv=79.0% T=1.46 Twh
Feb 5 2017: Solar=3.5% Wind=8.9% Conv=71.8% T=1.41 Twh
Mar 7 2017: Solar=2.8% Wind=6.7% Conv=75.4% T=1.60 Twh
Apr 4 2017: Solar=8.7% Wind=2.9% Conv=71.3% T=1.51 Twh
As we can see there are still many days in Germany where wind and solar struggle to provide even 10% of demand, and at times during those days actual contribution is less. I hope these numbers don't surprise anybody. They are exactly what we should expect.
Energy systems are only as good as their performance in high demand situations. They must be designed to handle the demand profile and therefore looking at the 'easy' times doesn't reflect the entire picture. Let looks at some other numbers besides that typical "we hit a hit percentage on a spring Sunday when little power was being used" scenario;
Spot production; (other sources or imports not listed);
May 8 at 23:30 Solar 0%, Wind 2.1%, Conventional 92%
May 10 at 1500 Solar 0%, Wind 0.04% Conventional 92%
These are not outlier moments, these are typical daily occurrences.
Total Electrical Production January 2017;
Solar 2%, Wind 7.95%, Conventional 80%
That is a glimpse of what 300 billion Euro in wind and solar achieves from a system capability standpoint.
I guess those Night Train Express Dash buttons finally found a home.
It may be a way of keeping a stock of human test subjects on hand. You never know when you'll need that.
The problem with this flaw is that it is a known flaw. If we keep all flaws unknown the Chinese won't use them.
Didn't almost every new technology start out as a novelty item for rich people?
No.
Seems really wasteful to cover the non-productive side of the roof with solar tiles. They could presumably produce similar looking non-solar tiles at a much lower cost so that you could have the uniform look without paying extra for solar tiles that won't be doing anything for you.
That begs the question, do subsidies help pay for the non-solar shingles? I bet their math assumes so.
The site quoted me 33K for the roof and 7K for the battery, with 18K worth of electricity generated over 30 years and a 9K tax credit for a net cost of about 13K over thirty years.
I'm actually in the market for a roof replacement in the next two years, and I'm interested in solar. I have a small house. An asphalt roof replacement is less than four grand.
This offer is a complete non-starter for me.
This is where I have a problem. Uber expensive solar roofs should not qualify for tax credits. At least not beyond the amount that would be given for traditional PV panels of the same capacity. Its bad enough that most of these credits are simply helping pay power bills for the wealthy, but now we pay for their roofs as well? Meanwhile low income people have no access to these gifts.
We should take all the PV tax credits and provide public schools with PV panels. That way we add PV capacity and help lower school energy bills, good for people of all income levels.
That's exactly the point, though. The insoluble problem with Nuclear Power isn't outdated reactor designs - it's the tons of highly radioactive waste products that need to be stored for decades in systems that are themselves complex and subject to failure.
And those improved reactors we've yet to see in practice will still keep churning out the stuff.
More ignorance. The waste issues at Hanford are all the nasty stuff that was never properly handled to begin with. Liquids and chemical used for defense research and production. Spent fuel is nowhere near the problem, it is actually quite easy to manage. Unfortunately, most people can't differentiate between the two. That, coupled with ignorance about radiation risk, leads us to failure when it comes to real carbon reduction. No power source has come close to nuclear in reducing carbon contributions. But alas, ignorance and fear rule. We must do away with our most effective clean air power source.
The problem here is he's not looking at the bigger picture. In a congested big city you would be simply moving the traffic jam to the next traffic light. In bigger cities the lights all have to be coordinated so that you don't end up with a backlog of red light traffic that extends all the way back to the previous traffic light. And then having idiots that get stuck in the intersection blocking cross traffic. Maybe it works in Greenville, population 100,000 but not in a city of 2-3 million or more.
There is a point where the road can't handle the traffic no matter how efficient the traffic controls are, but fully autonomous controls could greatly improve traffic even in those congested cities. At worst, they would minimize the windows of greatest congestion buy keeping traffic flowing as long as possible. There would need to be some algorithms that adjust for multiple intersections. In some cases, the answer might be stop and go.
Too many human drivers can't even efficiently navigate a traffic circle. I can't imagine this could be done until all vehicles are autonomous with the proper control system. That's not going to happen in the foreseeable future.
If we can get to the point where all vehicles have that capabilities, this type of intersections becomes rather easy to do, and is just one of the many obvious improvements in traffic control we can achieve.
'I attempted to place in your mouth". That's a funny one. Either I did or I didn't, and I didn't.
This is not a nuclear power plant. It is a wast dump from cold war activities. How stupid to say it is another Chernobyl waiting to happen. That screams ignorance.
I called you a fool after you made a fool out of yourself.
I just said current was a primary factor. That is not an attack. I guess you took it as one, that is your problem not mine. Maybe you should take a break.
No pretending required. The posts are right here. I never claimed wind wasn't a factor, you responded as if you needed to defend it was. I even repeatedly told you so and you stuck with your posture. You simply can't seem to read properly and/or admit you were being ridiculous. No worries for me, any other reader can see it plain as day... so go on and act crazy.
Your response to my initial point was ridiculous, as were your following responses. I even reminded you multiple times I never said wind was not a factor, but yet you kept responding as if I had. Now you are just throwing senseless darts in the dark. Pathetic.
Have you seen the V8 atom?
I checked it out. I almost can understand....but Hillary? There's got to be better way.
I also did not write that currents can be ignored
I never said you did. I did say your point didn't negate mine, to which you replied "It kind of does....". You are just being obstinate.