The quiet rise of solar power — and the financial problem that could arise

[SimpleDon]

The important point is that solar and wind are not even close to being base generation, the vast majority of the power that we need. They are simply just a way to generate some power without generating carbon dioxide.

There is no reasonable method for storing the large amounts of power that would be required to allow solar and wind to provide base power, not to mention that the total installed base of solar panels would have to be about three times the installed base power generation, with twice that number in storage capacity.

What is needed in the medium term 10 to 20 years is a zero carbon emitting, high density, central power generating method.

Fortunately we have such a technology available. Unfortunately for a lot of very bad reasons we are not using it. Nuclear power. It is trapped in an almost perfect storm of bad thinking from both the right and the left.

Unfortunately, it's got one big problem: Slow throttle.

If you want to run the entire country on nukes the plants have to be running at a level sufficient to cope with the peaks at all times. Any industrial firm that can make use of vast amounts of power with no say as to when it will be delivered would love it (my impression is that some electrolytic processes qualify) but it would mean the cost per kwh would go up substantially.

I am only talking about base power, for which the current, high pressure, water cooled reactors are good for. We need a fourth generation of nuclear reactors that aren't water-steam high pressure reactors but which heat a gas. They would be low pressure reactors that would throttle well and would be nuclear self-regulating, not require the stand by water cooling, a molten salt reactor for example. Gas medium allows higher temperatures and more thermodynamic efficiency than steam.

Having the fuel in the molten salt means that the reactor is much more efficient ’burning' its uranium. Current static fuel rod designs use only about 2% of the energy from the fuel before the nuclear waste accumulates and the reactor has to be shutdown and the rods redistributed and partially replaced. In a molten salt reactor the waste products can be removed from the salt and new fuel introduced while the reactor is running. You have much less waste then. A molten salt reactor could even be partially fueled with today's waste, solving another problem and retrieving most of the 98% of the energy that current reactors throw away. About twenty years down the pike from whenever we would start seriously to work on it.

We are doing it again Loren, hijacking a thread.

 

[dismal]

Except rarely is not never. Solar cuts average power use, it does almost nothing to peak power use.

On the contrary, it cuts peak power use quite sharply. It doesn't eliminate all peaks and troughs, but it does do a lot to smooth them out, reducing the amount of infrastructure the power company needs.

Perhaps you should add the qualifier "it could" cut peak power sharply because right now it does not much of anything in the grand scheme of things.

I suppose distributed solar PV could chip away at the peak load on the grid over time, but grid planners tend to put a pretty steep discount on intermittent sources when they do reserve margin planning so I'm not sure how much stand by capacity it could actually replace.

 

[lpetrich]

Energy Co-operatives Ireland – energyco-ops.ie How can renewable energy meet modern power demands? -- from this and some other sources, and my estimates, I've compiled a table of dispatch speeds.

• Milliseconds -- purely electrical
  • Capacitors
  • Fixed batteries
• Seconds -- working fluids
  • Hydroelectricity, including pumped storage
  • Flow batteries
  • Fuel cells
• Seconds to minutes -- ?
  • Natural-gas turbines
• Hours -- boilers' thermal inertia
  • Natural-gas combined cycle
  • Oil
  • Coal
  • Biomass
  • Nuclear

Geothermal I'm not sure about.

So nuclear energy is not very good for filling in the gaps of intermittent sources like wind and solar.

 

[bilby]

Energy Co-operatives Ireland – energyco-ops.ie How can renewable energy meet modern power demands? -- from this and some other sources, and my estimates, I've compiled a table of dispatch speeds.

• Milliseconds -- purely electrical
  • Capacitors
  • Fixed batteries
• Seconds -- working fluids
  • Hydroelectricity, including pumped storage
  • Flow batteries
  • Fuel cells
• Seconds to minutes -- ?
  • Natural-gas turbines
• Hours -- boilers' thermal inertia
  • Natural-gas combined cycle
  • Oil
  • Coal
  • Biomass
  • Nuclear

Geothermal I'm not sure about.

So nuclear energy is not very good for filling in the gaps of intermittent sources like wind and solar.

Nobody is suggesting that it is; It does a much better job of reducing CO₂ emissions than intermittent sources like wind and solar, though, because it replaces coal-fired base load, which wind and solar cannot, due to their intermittency.

The objective is reducing total CO₂ emissions, while still generating the electricity people want and need, at a price they can afford.

Using wind and solar is not the objective, it is one of the means of reaching that objective. Another (potentially much more effective) means is using nuclear power for base load generation.

Wind and solar have very different output profiles from coal plants, and so replacing coal with these requires additional technologies or methodologies that are not part of the status quo.

Nuclear can be changed out one-for-one with coal, and the output is almost indistinguishable from the status quo.

The largest source of CO₂ emissions currently is coal fired power stations; the only currently available and almost carbon neutral replacement for such stations, that requires no other infrastructural or methodological changes, is nuclear power.

 

[Bomb#20]

That is what we need, innovative thinking! A way to sell the obvious, best solution to the problem of carbon free electrical generation, the other "N" word, to the technology skeptics. But I don't think that using the word "uranium" is going to do it, try to use the term "dense mineral" or even just "heavy rocks."

Warm rock power.

Imaging power. It worked for NMR!

 

[Togo]

And so far we haven't even mentioned the increased electrical transmission and distribution capacity that these things would require to transmit the power around the country,

Are they different from any other type of power plant? Unless you build plants in urban areas.

from where the sun is shining in the west to the peak loads in the east for example.

Peak load is daytime. That's why electricity is cheaper at night, and why there is so much emphasis on running high-energy tasks at night, to take advantage of idle capacity.

It does a much better job of reducing CO₂ emissions than intermittent sources like wind and solar, though, because it replaces coal-fired base load, which wind and solar cannot, due to their intermittency.

eh? Why not?

Let's say we have a collection of solar panels that produce 100 units of power when sunny, and 40 when cloudy. That means they can replace 40 units of base power generation during the day (which is when it is needed), and save fuel on 60 units of intermittent power. They don't work at night, but then we have base power idle at night anyway.

Similarly with wind, say the turbines produce 100 units most of the time, and 20 units in the rare periods of counter-cyclical wind conditions. That could replace 100 units of base power and increase intermittent demand by 80 a small percentage of the time.

Compare that to a nuclear power source that creates 100 units most of the time, but 0 when it shuts down for maintenance, repair, or inspection. That's 100 units of base power and increasing intermittent demand of 100.

Obviously you can improve efficiency by shutting down reactors at different times, or combining different areas of wind or sun, but the basic principle remains the same.


Part of the confusion maybe the somewhat woolly definition of base power. If you're talking power that runs all day, but shuts down at night, that's one figure. If you're talking all day and all night, that's a much lower figure. Nuclear is good at replacing the latter, but far less efficient at replacing the former. So nuclear power can be used to replace coal on a one-for-one basis only for definitions of base power that put it at a low percentage of power generation.

 

[RavenSky]

The problem with solar is that the largely fixed cost of constructing and maintaining grid is currently amortized across units of power sold. People who maintain a grid connection but don't consume power are exploiting the model. They are free riding.

THEY are "free riding"

I certainly can't speak for the entire world, but in Florida homeowners are REQUIRED to maintain a grid connection whether they want to or not; and municipalities will actually take action against another who fails to maintain the connection.

 

[dismal]

Are they different from any other type of power plant? Unless you build plants in urban areas.

from where the sun is shining in the west to the peak loads in the east for example.

Peak load is daytime. That's why electricity is cheaper at night, and why there is so much emphasis on running high-energy tasks at night, to take advantage of idle capacity.

It does a much better job of reducing CO₂ emissions than intermittent sources like wind and solar, though, because it replaces coal-fired base load, which wind and solar cannot, due to their intermittency.

eh? Why not?

Let's say we have a collection of solar panels that produce 100 units of power when sunny, and 40 when cloudy. That means they can replace 40 units of base power generation during the day (which is when it is needed), and save fuel on 60 units of intermittent power. They don't work at night, but then we have base power idle at night anyway.

Similarly with wind, say the turbines produce 100 units most of the time, and 20 units in the rare periods of counter-cyclical wind conditions. That could replace 100 units of base power and increase intermittent demand by 80 a small percentage of the time.

Compare that to a nuclear power source that creates 100 units most of the time, but 0 when it shuts down for maintenance, repair, or inspection. That's 100 units of base power and increasing intermittent demand of 100.

Obviously you can improve efficiency by shutting down reactors at different times, or combining different areas of wind or sun, but the basic principle remains the same.


Part of the confusion maybe the somewhat woolly definition of base power. If you're talking power that runs all day, but shuts down at night, that's one figure. If you're talking all day and all night, that's a much lower figure. Nuclear is good at replacing the latter, but far less efficient at replacing the former. So nuclear power can be used to replace coal on a one-for-one basis only for definitions of base power that put it at a low percentage of power generation.

It's not as simple as night and day. The summer load at 4PM is dramatically higher than it is at 10AM. There is a constant dispatching/switching off of units that goes on throughout the day. Intermittent sources compound the problem. You now have fluctuations in both supply and demand that must be managed real time. And it's not just that the power output varies significantly like when a 500 MW plant trips off, it's that intermittent sources are highly correlated with each other. When the wind isn't blowing it isn't blowing most everywhere. The average wind capacity factor is like 16%. But in reality you're probably getting 80% some of the time and next to nothing a lot of the time. Whatever wind capacity you build you almost need to duplicate again with other capacity that is available on demand. Not that you can't do it, it just costs a lot of money.

 

[Sarpedon]

Geothermal I'm not sure about.

Geothermal you can't really turn off, unless you release the steam from the system. Then it would be just like any other thermal system.

 

[Underseer]

The state regulates the utility industry. What it can charge, whom it must serve.

The problem with solar is that the largely fixed cost of constructing and maintaining grid is currently amortized across units of power sold. People who maintain a grid connection but don't consume power are exploiting the model. They are free riding.

The common-sensical non-ideological solution to this would be to have a fixed grid charge and a variable power charge that is more in line with the marginal cost of power. If someone want to completely disconnect from the grid they can avoid the grid charge.

I can't think of any valid reason why anyone of any ideology would find this objectionable.

I can't imagine why anyone would want to cling to outdated system that does not serve its purpose in the modern world.

Ignorance and bias, I suppose.

So if your argument is really what you believe, then why aren't you complaining about the much larger taxpayer handouts given to oil companies?

Why are handouts and tax breaks good when they go to oil companies, but bad when they go to solar?

 

[Togo]

It's not as simple as night and day. The summer load at 4PM is dramatically higher than it is at 10AM. There is a constant dispatching/switching off of units that goes on throughout the day.

That's not an argument for more base power that can't be easily switched on and off. Quite the reverse.

Intermittent sources compound the problem. You now have fluctuations in both supply and demand that must be managed real time.

Still less complicated than, say, running a nuclear power plant.

The average wind capacity factor is like 16%. But in reality you're probably getting 80% some of the time and next to nothing a lot of the time. Whatever wind capacity you build you almost need to duplicate again with other capacity that is available on demand.

I'm seeing a lot of phrases like 'like 16%', 'probably getting 80%', 'next to nothing' and 'almost need to duplicate'. Presumably you don't have actual figures to hand - they certainly don't much resemble the ones I've seen for existing wind power. And I'm not sure why you'd 'almost need to duplicate' wind generation with something else.' Can you give some kind of argument or reason or evidence that this is the case?

 

[Uwe]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludington_Pumped_Storage_Power_Plant

"The Ludington Pumped Storage Plant is a hydroelectric plant and reservoir in Ludington, Michigan. It was built between 1969 and 1973 at a cost of $315 million and is owned jointly by Consumers Energy and Detroit Edison and operated by Consumers Energy. At the time of its construction, it was the largest pumped storage hydroelectric facility in the world."

Late to the party, I know. Just chiming in with a 40-year old, non-mountain solution.