The Remarkable Progress of Renewable Energy

[lpetrich]

Global Solar Atlas - has how much sunlight each bit of land gets.

As I've posted earlier here, I'm seeing a buzz about hydrogen, the sort of buzz that I saw about storage a few years back, and about photovoltaic cells a few years before storage. I remember when I first got interested in renewable energy, over 10 years ago. It seemed to me that wind energy was the best-developed renewable resource.

LA could soon be home to the nation’s largest green hydrogen infrastructure system – pv magazine USA - "Southern California Gas Company is submitting an application to build a 10 to 20GW electrolyzer and 25 to 35GW of new and curtailed wind and solar, along with 2GW of energy storage, to deliver green hydrogen to the Los Angeles Basin."

It will use a reversible fuel cell to do electrolysis, and much of the hydrogen that it will produce will be stored in underground tanks. Thus using hydrogen as a form of energy storage.

At the moment, the largest hydrogen electrolyzer in the world is Baofeng Energy’s 150 MW facility in China. But larger facilities are already under construction, and there has been a bevy of newly announced hydrogen electrolyzers recently, especially from Australia.

‘Green hydrogen is now competitive with fossil fuels’ | ArcelorMittal among offtakers at massive 7.4GW project in Spain | Recharge - "HyDeal España, the first part of the 67GW HyDeal Ambition plan, will produce renewable H2 from 9.5GW of solar power and create an industrial hub to decarbonise steel, fertiliser and other products"


After vetoing US subsidies for clean hydrogen, Manchin seeks billions of federal dollars for fossil-fuel H2 in home state | Recharge - "The key Democrat swing voter in the Senate, along with Republicans colleagues, wants to build a 'clean hydrogen' hub in West Virginia based on coal and natural gas"

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Global Solar Atlas - has how much sunlight each bit of land gets.

As I've posted earlier here, I'm seeing a buzz about hydrogen, the sort of buzz that I saw about storage a few years back, and about photovoltaic cells a few years before storage. I remember when I first got interested in renewable energy, over 10 years ago. It seemed to me that wind energy was the best-developed renewable resource.

LA could soon be home to the nation’s largest green hydrogen infrastructure system – pv magazine USA - "Southern California Gas Company is submitting an application to build a 10 to 20GW electrolyzer and 25 to 35GW of new and curtailed wind and solar, along with 2GW of energy storage, to deliver green hydrogen to the Los Angeles Basin."

The company seeks to make use of 25-35GW of curtailed and new wind and solar power, plus two gigawatts of energy storage. The electrolyzer facility will range from 10 to 20GW of capacity and will require 200 to 750 miles of hydrogen infrastructure.

200 to 750 miles of infrastructure. Because it needs to go from point A to B to be usable.

So solar -> electrolysis -> storage -> distribution. I can see why gas companies would like this idea as it can be compatible with their existing plants. But, this is what I don't understand. Solar energy is being used to make with electrolysis and storage... this means there is waste. Why wouldn't you just pump the energy from the solar into the electric grid? It looks like more storage "solutions" that are ignoring the waste. The storage helps deal with "sun sets" issue with solar and providing possible power during night, but are they generating enough H₂ to make that work?

It will use a reversible fuel cell to do electrolysis, and much of the hydrogen that it will produce will be stored in underground tanks. Thus using hydrogen as a form of energy storage.

At the moment, the largest hydrogen electrolyzer in the world is Baofeng Energy’s 150 MW facility in China. But larger facilities are already under construction, and there has been a bevy of newly announced hydrogen electrolyzers recently, especially from Australia.

‘Green hydrogen is now competitive with fossil fuels’ | ArcelorMittal among offtakers at massive 7.4GW project in Spain | Recharge - "HyDeal España, the first part of the 67GW HyDeal Ambition plan, will produce renewable H2 from 9.5GW of solar power and create an industrial hub to decarbonise steel, fertiliser and other products"

Is burning H₂ actually "renewable"?

 

[ZiprHead]

Concentrated Solar Power and Storage


Concentrated solar energy is used to heat a nitric salt solution, which then turns water into steam to drive the turbines which drive the generators. The excess hot salt solution is stored to make steam when the sun isn't shining.

 

[James Brown]

 Ocean_thermal_energy_conversion

Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) uses the ocean thermal gradient between cooler deep and warmer shallow or surface seawaters to run a heat engine and produce useful work, usually in the form of electricity. OTEC can operate with a very high capacity factor and so can operate in base load mode...

Among ocean energy sources, OTEC is one of the continuously available renewable energy resources that could contribute to base-load power supply.[1] The resource potential for OTEC is considered to be much larger than for other ocean energy forms.[2] Up to 88,000 TWh/yr of power could be generated from OTEC without affecting the ocean's thermal structure.[3]

Beneficial factors that should be taken into account include OTEC's lack of waste products and fuel consumption

 

[bilby]

At bioenergy crossroads, should corn ethanol be left in the rearview mirror?

Transportation is responsible for a larger share of greenhouse gas emissions than any other sector of the U.S. economy, making biofuels a promising strategy to mitigate human-driven climate change. The U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard, created by 2007 legislation, mandates that such fuels partially replace petroleum-based ones. So far, however, the mandate has been nearly entirely fulfilled by corn ethanol, a fuel that may be worse for the climate than the gasoline it replaces.

Fifteen years on, research led by the University of Wisconsin–Madison assessed the environmental impacts of corn ethanol and the policy that governs it, using a combination of econometric analyses, land use data and biophysical modeling.

Noting
Environmental outcomes of the US Renewable Fuel Standard | PNAS

Even without considering likely international land use effects, we find that the production of corn-based ethanol in the United States has failed to meet the policy’s own greenhouse gas emissions targets and negatively affected water quality, the area of land used for conservation, and other ecosystem processes.

So this fuel is a failure.

But US Presidential candidates profess their undying love for the fuel when they visit Iowa, the state with the first Presidential primaries.

Sugar beets are better at producing ethanol but beet growers don't have the lobbying organizations corn growers do.

Ethanol for fuel here is entirely derived from sugar cane. I don't know what overall impact it has on the environment, but I would be surprised if it was anywhere close to the impact of fossil petroleum.

 

[skepticalbip]

At bioenergy crossroads, should corn ethanol be left in the rearview mirror?

Transportation is responsible for a larger share of greenhouse gas emissions than any other sector of the U.S. economy, making biofuels a promising strategy to mitigate human-driven climate change. The U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard, created by 2007 legislation, mandates that such fuels partially replace petroleum-based ones. So far, however, the mandate has been nearly entirely fulfilled by corn ethanol, a fuel that may be worse for the climate than the gasoline it replaces.

Fifteen years on, research led by the University of Wisconsin–Madison assessed the environmental impacts of corn ethanol and the policy that governs it, using a combination of econometric analyses, land use data and biophysical modeling.

Noting
Environmental outcomes of the US Renewable Fuel Standard | PNAS

Even without considering likely international land use effects, we find that the production of corn-based ethanol in the United States has failed to meet the policy’s own greenhouse gas emissions targets and negatively affected water quality, the area of land used for conservation, and other ecosystem processes.

So this fuel is a failure.

But US Presidential candidates profess their undying love for the fuel when they visit Iowa, the state with the first Presidential primaries.

Sugar beets are better at producing ethanol but beet growers don't have the lobbying organizations corn growers do.

Ethanol for fuel here is entirely derived from sugar cane. I don't know what overall impact it has on the environment, but I would be surprised if it was anywhere close to the impact of fossil petroleum.

That is a long running debate.

"Scientists and policy wonks have been telling each other they are dead wrong about ethanol for more than a decade. Kammen started out on the pro-ethanol side: His lab published a paper in 2006 suggesting corn ethanol was better than fossil fuels. But then, in 2008, a pair of papers pointed out that any analysis of ethanol had to consider indirect land-use change. If growing corn for ethanol in Iowa meant that farmers had to convert more land into fields, that would completely wipe out the benefit of ethanol. In 2010, a group of researchers, including Kammen, did another accounting — this time including the effect of land use change — and they concluded that ethanol’s carbon footprint is the same as gasoline, or larger."

Is ethanol really worse than gasoline? The debate, revisited.

Vox is a general interest news site for the 21st century. Its mission: to help everyone understand our complicated world, so that we can all help shape it. In text, video and audio, our reporters explain politics, policy, world affairs, technology, culture, science, the climate crisis, money...

www.vox.com

I dunno.

 

[bilby]

At bioenergy crossroads, should corn ethanol be left in the rearview mirror?

Transportation is responsible for a larger share of greenhouse gas emissions than any other sector of the U.S. economy, making biofuels a promising strategy to mitigate human-driven climate change. The U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard, created by 2007 legislation, mandates that such fuels partially replace petroleum-based ones. So far, however, the mandate has been nearly entirely fulfilled by corn ethanol, a fuel that may be worse for the climate than the gasoline it replaces.

Fifteen years on, research led by the University of Wisconsin–Madison assessed the environmental impacts of corn ethanol and the policy that governs it, using a combination of econometric analyses, land use data and biophysical modeling.

Noting
Environmental outcomes of the US Renewable Fuel Standard | PNAS

Even without considering likely international land use effects, we find that the production of corn-based ethanol in the United States has failed to meet the policy’s own greenhouse gas emissions targets and negatively affected water quality, the area of land used for conservation, and other ecosystem processes.

So this fuel is a failure.

But US Presidential candidates profess their undying love for the fuel when they visit Iowa, the state with the first Presidential primaries.

Sugar beets are better at producing ethanol but beet growers don't have the lobbying organizations corn growers do.

Ethanol for fuel here is entirely derived from sugar cane. I don't know what overall impact it has on the environment, but I would be surprised if it was anywhere close to the impact of fossil petroleum.

That is a long running debate.

"Scientists and policy wonks have been telling each other they are dead wrong about ethanol for more than a decade. Kammen started out on the pro-ethanol side: His lab published a paper in 2006 suggesting corn ethanol was better than fossil fuels. But then, in 2008, a pair of papers pointed out that any analysis of ethanol had to consider indirect land-use change. If growing corn for ethanol in Iowa meant that farmers had to convert more land into fields, that would completely wipe out the benefit of ethanol. In 2010, a group of researchers, including Kammen, did another accounting — this time including the effect of land use change — and they concluded that ethanol’s carbon footprint is the same as gasoline, or larger."

Is ethanol really worse than gasoline? The debate, revisited.

Vox is a general interest news site for the 21st century. Its mission: to help everyone understand our complicated world, so that we can all help shape it. In text, video and audio, our reporters explain politics, policy, world affairs, technology, culture, science, the climate crisis, money...

www.vox.com

I dunno.

But is sugar cane less of a problem than corn? I suspect that it is.

 

[Hermit]

While I disagree with much of what you wrote a few days ago in this post, I just about agree with everything you wrote in the one directly above. Origin Energy is lying through omission. Right now all but 240 of its 6300 nominal (Nameplate) Megawatt capacity is done via some form of fossil fuel. Most, if not all of the capacity lost when it closes its 2880 MW Eraring Power Station coal-fired power plant will be replaced by gas turbines. There will be a reduction in CO2 emissions, but it won't be anywhere near near 20 million tonnes per annum. Origin Energy is bullshitting us by what it does not say, and bullshitting us some more with its greenwashing PR machine. Still, while the plant's shutdown is too little too late, it is a welcome change.

Nuclear power is vastly preferable from both the safety and environmental protection angles, but it too is a case of too little too late, to put it mildly. Nuclear power plants take almost ten years from construction's commencement to completion. You can add a few years to make them politically doable, overcome the NIMBY factor, preliminary, site specific design, testing and debugging before they will operate at the capacity they are designed for.

Where we disagree is that you regard wind and solar sourced electricity generation projects as a misdirection of resources, I do not.

 

[bilby]

While I disagree with much of what you wrote a few days ago in this post, I just about agree with everything you wrote in the one directly above. Origin Energy is lying through omission. Right now all but 240 of its 6300 nominal (Nameplate) Megawatt capacity is done via some form of fossil fuel. Most, if not all of the capacity lost when it closes its 2880 MW Eraring Power Station coal-fired power plant will be replaced by gas turbines. There will be a reduction in CO2 emissions, but it won't be anywhere near near 20 million tonnes per annum. Origin Energy is bullshitting us by what it does not say, and bullshitting us some more with its greenwashing PR machine. Still, while the plant's shutdown is too little too late, it is a welcome change.

Nuclear power is vastly preferable from both the safety and environmental protection angles, but it too is a case of too little too late, to put it mildly. Nuclear power plants take almost ten years from construction's commencement to completion. You can add a few years to make them politically doable, overcome the NIMBY factor, preliminary, site specific design, testing and debugging before they will operate at the capacity they are designed for.

Where we disagree is that you regard wind and solar sourced electricity generation projects as a misdirection of resources, I do not.

If it's too late for nuclear, it's too late for anything.



The claim that nuclear plants require a decade to construct is nonsense.

Japan’s Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant Unit 6 took 39 months to build. That's almost exactly a third as long as you suggest it must take; And there's no engineering constraint to stop us from building plants much faster than that. Smaller plants can be built considerably faster, with many SMR designs explicitly being configured for mass production.

 

[bilby]

Where we disagree is that you regard wind and solar sourced electricity generation projects as a misdirection of resources, I do not.

Sure; But you are mistaken.

On a still night, you need a way to make enough electricity to run everything, without burning fossil fuels.

If you don't build any wind or solar, you therefore must still have enough electricity generating capacity to run everything.

So wind and solar are completely unnecessary. They are always a duplication of capacity, and as such are a waste of resources.

This isn't complicated.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

While I disagree with much of what you wrote a few days ago in this post, I just about agree with everything you wrote in the one directly above. Origin Energy is lying through omission. Right now all but 240 of its 6300 nominal (Nameplate) Megawatt capacity is done via some form of fossil fuel. Most, if not all of the capacity lost when it closes its 2880 MW Eraring Power Station coal-fired power plant will be replaced by gas turbines. There will be a reduction in CO2 emissions, but it won't be anywhere near near 20 million tonnes per annum. Origin Energy is bullshitting us by what it does not say, and bullshitting us some more with its greenwashing PR machine. Still, while the plant's shutdown is too little too late, it is a welcome change.

Nuclear power is vastly preferable from both the safety and environmental protection angles, but it too is a case of too little too late, to put it mildly. Nuclear power plants take almost ten years from construction's commencement to completion. You can add a few years to make them politically doable, overcome the NIMBY factor, preliminary, site specific design, testing and debugging before they will operate at the capacity they are designed for.

Where we disagree is that you regard wind and solar sourced electricity generation projects as a misdirection of resources, I do not.

If it's too late for nuclear, it's too late for anything.

View attachment 37295

The claim that nuclear plants require a decade to construct is nonsense.

Japan’s Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant Unit 6 took 39 months to build. That's almost exactly a third as long as you suggest it must take; And there's no engineering constraint to stop us from building plants much faster than that. Smaller plants can be built considerably faster, with many SMR designs explicitly being configured for mass production.

I'm so glad the US is now part of Japan and regulatory issues regarding the construction of Nuclear Plants in the US now are liek they are in Japan.

 

[Hermit]

Sweden is doing extremely well, isn't it? It's energy generation also has one of the lowest climate impacts at 20 g CO2-eq/kWh. This compares particularly well with China (800), USA (500) and Germany (450). The global average is 500 g CO2-eq/kWh.

What the same site, analys.se, that generated the chart you linked to also mentions is that while Sweden gets 34% of its electricity from nuclear power plants, the bulk of it, 64%, comes from renewables. Sweden obviously values energy production from renewable resources more than you do, and the figures show that its mix of sources makes for a great result from an environmental point of view.

 

[bilby]

Sweden is doing extremely well, isn't it? It's energy generation also has one of the lowest climate impacts at 20 g CO2-eq/kWh. This compares particularly well with China (800), USA (500) and Germany (450). The global average is 500 g CO2-eq/kWh.

What the same site, analys.se, that generated the chart you linked to also mentions is that while Sweden gets 34% of its electricity from nuclear power plants, the bulk of it, 64%, comes from renewables mostly hydroelectricity. Sweden obviously values energy production from renewable resources more than you do, and the figures show that its mix of sources makes for a great result from an environmental point of view.

FTFY.

The frequent quoting by wind and solar advocates of "renewables" data in support of wind and solar, when it is in fact hydroelectric that makes up the vast majority of "renewable" electricity is verging on fraudulent.

"Renewable" isn't a particularly sensible category; But it is a great way of lumping the pathetic wind and solar contribution into a category that isn't performing so woefully.

Renewable and reliable power sources - such as hydroelectric and geothermal - are very good to have, if your geographical environment supports them.

Renewable but unreliable sources are a massive waste, and a crime against the environment.

 

[Hermit]

The frequent quoting by wind and solar advocates of "renewables" data in support of wind and solar, when it is in fact hydroelectric that makes up the vast majority of "renewable" electricity is verging on fraudulent.

I'd agree with you, were it not for the fact that about 65% of South Australia's electricity demand is met by wind and solar generators.

"Renewable" isn't a particularly sensible category; But it is a great way of lumping the pathetic wind and solar contribution into a category that isn't performing so woefully.

Wind and solar contributions are doing very well where I live, thank you. South Australia's is producing 415 mW using gas and 1154 mW with wind turbines and 0 mW from solar (which is unsurprising, the sun having set a couuple of hours ago) as I type. It is slightly more than required, so the difference goes interstate.

Renewable and reliable power sources - such as hydroelectric and geothermal - are very good to have, if your geographical environment supports them.

So are wind and solar.

Renewable but unreliable sources are a massive waste, and a crime against the environment.

Hyperbole noted. Thanks for the rant.

 

[bilby]

I'd agree with you, were it not for the fact that about 65% of South Australia's electricity demand is met by wind and solar generators

Except that it isn't.

Electricity generated in SA but not used that instant in SA isn't contributing at all to supplying electricity to SA (other than the minuscule amount used to charge the tiny amount of battery storage everyone seems so impressed by).

Electricity isn't a commodity. It's a service.

The wind and solar lobby are very keen on "facts" that turn out to be frauds, and "% of demand" figures are particularly weasely.

If a region generates 1,000MWh of wind power on Monday, and zero wind power on Tuesday; And it consumes 500MWh per day, then the amount of demand met by wind power in that region is 50%, not 100%; And on Monday, half their generation was sold at close to $0, while on Tuesday they had to buy dirty and expensive electricity from somewhere else.

This remains true even if simpletons like to pretend that it's not.

No electricity grid anywhere generates anywhere close to 65% of its power from wind and solar, over periods of many consecutive days. You are being comprehensively lied to by people you want to believe. It's a common problem; Around here it's usually referred to as a 'religion'.

 

[Tigers!]

Origin Energy announced today that it will be closing Australia's largest power plant (which is also Australia's largest coal-fired power plant) in mid-2025 instead of 2032. The power plant has a nameplate capacity of 2880 megawatts and produces nearly 20 million tonnes of greenhouse pollution into the atmosphere every year.

From the Australian Financial Review:

Chief executive Frank Calabria said Origin’s proposed complete exit from coal-fired power generation “reflects the continuing, rapid transition of the NEM as we move to cleaner sources of energy”.

“Australia’s energy market today is very different to the one when Eraring was brought online in the early 1980s, and the reality is the economics of coal-fired power stations are being put under increasing, unsustainable pressure by cleaner and lower cost generation, including solar, wind and batteries,” Mr Calabria said.
[...]
The news on Eraring comes after the Australian Energy Market Operator has warned of the likely accelerated closure of baseload coal power plants, which are becoming increasingly uneconomic with the rise of cheap renewable power.

Origin’s rival AGL Energy last week also brought forward the dates for its two largest coal plants to close, although it still is assuming its Loy Yang A plant in Victoria will run until 2045.

The decision is clearly based on cold-nosed economic considerations. Despite massive fossil fuel subsidies, underpinned by our current Prime Minister's fervent and decades long support, coal-fired power plants keep losing commercial viability.

"...the economics of coal-fired power stations are being put under increasing, unsustainable pressure by cleaner and lower cost generation, including solar, wind and batteries,” Mr Calabria said.

But mostly including cheap gas from fracking, he very carefully, and extremely dishonestly, didn't say.

As I said, people love wind and solar and even batteries (despite their being three orders of magnitude too small to do any good; Hugely expensive; And rather dangerous and polluting).

Whenever anyone wants to greenwash their transition from coal to gas, from mining to fracking, and from cheap to expensive electricity, they trot out vague claims that the new system will "include" wind and solar.

It's hype. Marketing. A scam. A big lie, concealed in weasel words like "including".

The only important measure is carbon dioxide (and equivalent greenhouse gas) emissions from the entire system.

We need to dramatically lower that. But people don't even talk about it.

Taking away 20 million tonnes per year of carbon dioxide emissions is great - but nobody's owning up to the emissions they are replacing them with.

It's all hype and spin. It's great for giving the appearance of action. But it achieves very little - and nowhere near what could be achieved with a much smaller investment in nuclear power plants. Ask the French.

Everyone needs to be much more France, and much less Germany.

We've certainly locked ourselves into reliance on gas generation.

This is what the energy mix looks like for a week during summer in South Australia, Australia's trailblazer on renewable energy:

View attachment 37275

This is at the time of year when we get almost maximum sunlight. The purple imports are all coal and gas from Victoria. While we have moments where the supply is 100% renewable, this only happens when we get the ideal combination of daytime sun and high winds.

We can't possibly solve this problem with more solar and wind. We are stuck with gas until a replacement technology is invented that fills the same role as despatchable supply.

The big picture at the national level looks more promising. Coal is in decline and gas isn't growing:

View attachment 37276

Renewables includes hydroelectric, which is confined to a small number of generators where the geography actually makes it viable. Most of the growth in renewables is in solar and wind.

There are two problems here: Firstly, the rate is decline of fossil fuels is way too fucking slow. Secondly, the growth of renewables will inevitably slow down once we build enough solar to supply 100% of the energy every summer afternoon, and enough wind to supply 100% of energy every third day when it's actually windy.

Shit, my solar feed-in tariff was recently cut by almost 60% because daytime solar generation is so abundant. It's now about 10% of the feed-in tariff that was being paid ten years ago. That's not a lot of incentive for homeowners to keep buying panels.

I would have thought the incentive to buy panels was the prospect of saving the planet, not the ability to make money?

 

[bilby]

Origin Energy announced today that it will be closing Australia's largest power plant (which is also Australia's largest coal-fired power plant) in mid-2025 instead of 2032. The power plant has a nameplate capacity of 2880 megawatts and produces nearly 20 million tonnes of greenhouse pollution into the atmosphere every year.

From the Australian Financial Review:

Chief executive Frank Calabria said Origin’s proposed complete exit from coal-fired power generation “reflects the continuing, rapid transition of the NEM as we move to cleaner sources of energy”.

“Australia’s energy market today is very different to the one when Eraring was brought online in the early 1980s, and the reality is the economics of coal-fired power stations are being put under increasing, unsustainable pressure by cleaner and lower cost generation, including solar, wind and batteries,” Mr Calabria said.
[...]
The news on Eraring comes after the Australian Energy Market Operator has warned of the likely accelerated closure of baseload coal power plants, which are becoming increasingly uneconomic with the rise of cheap renewable power.

Origin’s rival AGL Energy last week also brought forward the dates for its two largest coal plants to close, although it still is assuming its Loy Yang A plant in Victoria will run until 2045.

The decision is clearly based on cold-nosed economic considerations. Despite massive fossil fuel subsidies, underpinned by our current Prime Minister's fervent and decades long support, coal-fired power plants keep losing commercial viability.

"...the economics of coal-fired power stations are being put under increasing, unsustainable pressure by cleaner and lower cost generation, including solar, wind and batteries,” Mr Calabria said.

But mostly including cheap gas from fracking, he very carefully, and extremely dishonestly, didn't say.

As I said, people love wind and solar and even batteries (despite their being three orders of magnitude too small to do any good; Hugely expensive; And rather dangerous and polluting).

Whenever anyone wants to greenwash their transition from coal to gas, from mining to fracking, and from cheap to expensive electricity, they trot out vague claims that the new system will "include" wind and solar.

It's hype. Marketing. A scam. A big lie, concealed in weasel words like "including".

The only important measure is carbon dioxide (and equivalent greenhouse gas) emissions from the entire system.

We need to dramatically lower that. But people don't even talk about it.

Taking away 20 million tonnes per year of carbon dioxide emissions is great - but nobody's owning up to the emissions they are replacing them with.

It's all hype and spin. It's great for giving the appearance of action. But it achieves very little - and nowhere near what could be achieved with a much smaller investment in nuclear power plants. Ask the French.

Everyone needs to be much more France, and much less Germany.

We've certainly locked ourselves into reliance on gas generation.

This is what the energy mix looks like for a week during summer in South Australia, Australia's trailblazer on renewable energy:

View attachment 37275

This is at the time of year when we get almost maximum sunlight. The purple imports are all coal and gas from Victoria. While we have moments where the supply is 100% renewable, this only happens when we get the ideal combination of daytime sun and high winds.

We can't possibly solve this problem with more solar and wind. We are stuck with gas until a replacement technology is invented that fills the same role as despatchable supply.

The big picture at the national level looks more promising. Coal is in decline and gas isn't growing:

View attachment 37276

Renewables includes hydroelectric, which is confined to a small number of generators where the geography actually makes it viable. Most of the growth in renewables is in solar and wind.

There are two problems here: Firstly, the rate is decline of fossil fuels is way too fucking slow. Secondly, the growth of renewables will inevitably slow down once we build enough solar to supply 100% of the energy every summer afternoon, and enough wind to supply 100% of energy every third day when it's actually windy.

Shit, my solar feed-in tariff was recently cut by almost 60% because daytime solar generation is so abundant. It's now about 10% of the feed-in tariff that was being paid ten years ago. That's not a lot of incentive for homeowners to keep buying panels.

I would have thought the incentive to buy panels was the prospect of saving the planet, not the ability to make money?

It achieves neither goal. Solar panels are an environmental nightmare, on a number of levels.

 

[Hermit]

I'd agree with you, were it not for the fact that about 65% of South Australia's electricity demand is met by wind and solar generators

Except that it isn't.

Electricity generated in SA but not used that instant in SA isn't contributing at all to supplying electricity to SA (other than the minuscule amount used to charge the tiny amount of battery storage everyone seems so impressed by).

Electricity isn't a commodity. It's a service.

Electricity is a commodity. It takes material resources to produce, distribute and sell. With the exception of Western Australia the entire country is connected. Some of the commodity is imported and exported to and from states as needed.

The wind and solar lobby are very keen on "facts" that turn out to be frauds, and "% of demand" figures are particularly weasely.

If the claim that 60 or 65% of South Australia's electricity comes from renewables is fraudulent someone would have provided evidence of it by now. You most certainly have yet to do so.

If a region generates 1,000MWh of wind power on Monday, and zero wind power on Tuesday; And it consumes 500MWh per day, then the amount of demand met by wind power in that region is 50%, not 100%; And on Monday, half their generation was sold at close to $0, while on Tuesday they had to buy dirty and expensive electricity from somewhere else.

This remains true even if simpletons like to pretend that it's not.

This is true. There is even a word for that: 'average'. On average 60 or 65% of South Australia's electricity comes from renewables.

No electricity grid anywhere generates anywhere close to 65% of its power from wind and solar, over periods of many consecutive days. You are being comprehensively lied to by people you want to believe. It's a common problem; Around here it's usually referred to as a 'religion'.

Nobody claims that South Australia generates anywhere close to 65% of its power from wind and solar, over periods of many consecutive days. On some days power generated from wind and solar is way above average. On others it is way below. Often it is somewhere in between. Averaged out over the past year power from wind and solar met 60 or 65% of South Australia's demand. Your rants don't change a thing. If you have evidence that the stated figures are fraudulent, let's have them already.

 

[Tigers!]

This is true. There is even a word for that: 'average'. On average 60 or 65% of South Australia's electricity comes from renewables.

All that has to be done is how is that gap of 35-40% to be closed reliably?
And that is what Bilby is saying is the problem, for Sth Aust. and anywhere else.

 

[bilby]

I'd agree with you, were it not for the fact that about 65% of South Australia's electricity demand is met by wind and solar generators

Except that it isn't.

Electricity generated in SA but not used that instant in SA isn't contributing at all to supplying electricity to SA (other than the minuscule amount used to charge the tiny amount of battery storage everyone seems so impressed by).

Electricity isn't a commodity. It's a service.

Electricity is a commodity. It takes material resources to produce, distribute and sell. With the exception of Western Australia the entire country is connected. Some of the commodity is imported and exported to and from states as needed.

The difference between a commodity and a service is that a commodity can be stockpiled.

Electricity is a service.

The wind and solar lobby are very keen on "facts" that turn out to be frauds, and "% of demand" figures are particularly weasely.

If the claim that 60 or 65% of South Australia's electricity comes from renewables is fraudulent someone would have provided evidence of it by now. You most certainly have yet to do so.

When did it become my responsibility to provide evidence that the figure (which you have provided exactly zero evidence for) is nonsensical?

And what part of "electricity is not a commodity" fails to achieve that proof (which I have given anyway out of the goodness of my heart)?

That you can't grasp the proof doesn't imply that it doesn't exist.

If a region generates 1,000MWh of wind power on Monday, and zero wind power on Tuesday; And it consumes 500MWh per day, then the amount of demand met by wind power in that region is 50%, not 100%; And on Monday, half their generation was sold at close to $0, while on Tuesday they had to buy dirty and expensive electricity from somewhere else.

This remains true even if simpletons like to pretend that it's not.

This is true. There is even a word for that: 'average'. On average 60 or 65% of South Australia's electricity comes from renewables.

No electricity grid anywhere generates anywhere close to 65% of its power from wind and solar, over periods of many consecutive days. You are being comprehensively lied to by people you want to believe. It's a common problem; Around here it's usually referred to as a 'religion'.

Nobody claims that South Australia generates anywhere close to 65% of its power from wind and solar, over periods of many consecutive days. On some days power generated from wind and solar is way above average. On others it is way below. Often it is somewhere in between. Averaged out over the past year power from wind and solar met 60 or 65% of South Australia's demand. Your rants don't change a thing. If you have evidence that the stated figures are fraudulent, let's have them already.

Averages are meaningless for services. Your failure to understand isn't evidence that it's not true.