The Remarkable Progress of Renewable Energy

[bilby]

a total capacity of 6.09 billion kWh, which is enough to a small country for an entire year." - that's 700 megawatts

Only if that country has an entire year without night time, or bad weather.

 

[bilby]

The maximum output is 3,500 MW, 5 times greater.

Yeah, because it's almost all generated in a 4-5 hour period of each day. For 19 hours a day there is NO ELECTRICITY.

Would you be happy if you only had electricity when the sun was shining?

 

[lpetrich]

The maximum output is 3,500 MW, 5 times greater.

Yeah, because it's almost all generated in a 4-5 hour period of each day. For 19 hours a day there is NO ELECTRICITY.

Would you be happy if you only had electricity when the sun was shining?

As happy as an advocate of nuclear electricity generation is to endure partial blackouts because nuclear reactors aren't very adjustable in their output.

Furthermore, this is not 5 hours per day, it's 12 hours but with reduced output most of that time due to the Sun being at a slant.

 

[bilby]

The maximum output is 3,500 MW, 5 times greater.

Yeah, because it's almost all generated in a 4-5 hour period of each day. For 19 hours a day there is NO ELECTRICITY.

Would you be happy if you only had electricity when the sun was shining?

As happy as an advocate of nuclear electricity generation is to endure partial blackouts because nuclear reactors aren't very adjustable in their output.

Yeah, that's not an actual thing. But then, solar power advocates really don't care much for reality.

Furthermore, this is not 5 hours per day, it's 12 hours but with reduced output most of that time due to the Sun being at a slant.

Yeah, it is more time, much of it at vastly lower output.


Here's the actual output from 10kW of solar capacity, in perfect cloudless weather at 27° Latitude. (It's on my roof).

Note that you get more than half the rated capacity for about three hours (and due to the time of year, never get above about 70% of the rated output).

Note also that the total production in 24 hours is about 20% of the installed capacity.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

The maximum output is 3,500 MW, 5 times greater.

Yeah, because it's almost all generated in a 4-5 hour period of each day. For 19 hours a day there is NO ELECTRICITY.

Would you be happy if you only had electricity when the sun was shining?

As happy as an advocate of nuclear electricity generation is to endure partial blackouts because nuclear reactors aren't very adjustable in their output.

Furthermore, this is not 5 hours per day, it's 12 hours but with reduced output most of that time due to the Sun being at a slant.

How big of a solar farm do we need in a place like Arizona/New Mexico (assuming we can bridge that to the East/West) to meet our needs with redundancy in the US?

 

[bilby]

The maximum output is 3,500 MW, 5 times greater.

Yeah, because it's almost all generated in a 4-5 hour period of each day. For 19 hours a day there is NO ELECTRICITY.

Would you be happy if you only had electricity when the sun was shining?

As happy as an advocate of nuclear electricity generation is to endure partial blackouts because nuclear reactors aren't very adjustable in their output.

Furthermore, this is not 5 hours per day, it's 12 hours but with reduced output most of that time due to the Sun being at a slant.

How big of a solar farm do we need in a place like Arizona/New Mexico (assuming we can bridge that to the East/West) to meet our needs with redundancy in the US?

Infinity.

They have night time in every state in the US.

 

[lpetrich]

The maximum output is 3,500 MW, 5 times greater.

Yeah, because it's almost all generated in a 4-5 hour period of each day. For 19 hours a day there is NO ELECTRICITY.

Would you be happy if you only had electricity when the sun was shining?

As happy as an advocate of nuclear electricity generation is to endure partial blackouts because nuclear reactors aren't very adjustable in their output.

Yeah, that's not an actual thing. But then, solar power advocates really don't care much for reality.

I'm judging nuclear energy by the standard that you judge solar energy. Nuclear reactors are usually run on constant throttle, and unless they are heavily overbuilt, they cannot meet peak demand. A way to get around that is what I mentioned: partial blackouts, with only some customers getting electricity from the reactors.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The maximum output is 3,500 MW, 5 times greater.

Yeah, because it's almost all generated in a 4-5 hour period of each day. For 19 hours a day there is NO ELECTRICITY.

Would you be happy if you only had electricity when the sun was shining?

As happy as an advocate of nuclear electricity generation is to endure partial blackouts because nuclear reactors aren't very adjustable in their output.

Yeah, that's not an actual thing. But then, solar power advocates really don't care much for reality.

I'm judging nuclear energy by the standard that you judge solar energy. Nuclear reactors are usually run on constant throttle, and unless they are heavily overbuilt, they cannot meet peak demand. A way to get around that is what I mentioned: partial blackouts, with only some customers getting electricity from the reactors.

That's why you build "customers" that don't have a problem with being blacked out. Specifically, processes where much of the cost is the energy and they convert it directly into output.

The problem exists for any system that doesn't reality throttle and the only renewables that throttle are hydro and geothermal. Thus any ecologically friendly grid must be able to cope with supply not matching demand. It's much easier to dump the extra power into things like cracking water than it is to make up the shortage of power.

 

[bilby]

I'm judging nuclear energy by the standard that you judge solar energy.

No, you are not.

 

[bilby]

Nuclear reactors are usually run on constant throttle, and unless they are heavily overbuilt, they cannot meet peak demand.

Sure. But "heavily overbuilt" for nuclear reactors to meet peak demand means maybe building capacity of three times the base load, cutting the capacity factor from ~95% to ~30%.

Capacity factors for solar START AT ~20%, before you do any "overbuilding" at all, and only get worse from there.

And you can achieve the goal of covering 100% of demand with just nuclear; You CANNOT get close to that goal with just solar, you need a shitload of (magical, handwaved) storage, to go with your shitload of "overbuilt" capacity.

A way to get around that is what I mentioned: partial blackouts, with only some customers getting electricity from the reactors.

Or just build some extra capacity, and tolerate a capacity factor that solar can't even begin to achieve. If 30% capacity factor is too wasteful of your capital, then ANY solar generation is out of consideration immediately.

You are NOT judging these technologies by the same standard AT ALL, and I am perplexed as to why - you don't appear to have this difficulty in doing simple arithmetic when the topic isn't electricity generation.

Places like France, with large nuclear capacities, do a bit of load following with nuclear, and a bit of storage with pumped hydro. That's sufficient to make it viable.

Solar plus pumped hydro would work in theory, but in practice, you would run out of suitable hydro sites LONG before you had sufficent storage to make solar viable. It simply can't be done, unless your terrain is ideal for hydro, and your population is fairly small - places like Tasmania, or Norway, for example. But then, you can just have hydro with no solar (or nuclear, or fossil fuel) at all in those places. Which they do.

 

[bilby]

The problem exists for any system that doesn't reality throttle and the only renewables that throttle are hydro and geothermal. Thus any ecologically friendly grid must be able to cope with supply not matching demand.

... OR be dominated by nuclear power.

 

[lpetrich]

Producing hydrogen fuel from solar power and agricultural waste – pv magazine USA - "Using 600% less voltage to produce hydrogen, a research team at the University of Illinois Chicago has developed a new method for splitting water."
noting
Sub-volt conversion of activated biochar and water for H2 production near equilibrium via biochar-assisted water electrolysis: Cell Reports Physical Science

Electrolysis: 2H2O + ️-> 2H2 + O2

Electrolysis represents the most expensive step in the hydrogen fuel lifecycle, representing about 80% of the cost. Recent advancements in producing hydrogen fuel have decreased the voltage required for water splitting by introducing a carbon source to the reaction. However, this process often uses coal or expensive refined chemicals and releases carbon emissions as a byproduct.

The UIC researchers modified the process to instead use biomass from common waste products as the carbon source. By mixing sulfuric acid with agricultural waste, animal waste, and sewage, they produced a slurry of biochar to be used in the reaction.

Biochar = organic material baked until it is carbonized. The team tried several input materials, like sugarcane husks, hemp waste, paper waste, and cow manure, finding that cow manure did the best.

So instead of being released, the oxygen output goes into oxidizing the carbon in the biochar.

“It’s very efficient, with almost 35% conversion of the biochar and solar energy into hydrogen” said Rohit Chauhan, the report’s co-author. Chauhan said the utilization rate of biochar represents a world record.

 

[lpetrich]

Heat wave triggers peak power demand, prompts long-term shift to renewables in India: IEEFA - BusinessToday - "The report finds gas-based power expensive in the short term. While energy storage options are expected to become commercially viable in medium term, round-the-clock renewable energy capacity is projected to increase"

Solar hits above its weight in powering US energy transition | Reuters

Renewable grid: Recovering electricity from heat storage hits 44% efficiency | University of Michigan News

n a heat battery, thermophotovoltaics would surround a block of heated material at a temperature of at least 1000°C. It might reach that temperature by passing electricity from a wind or solar farm through a resistor or by absorbing excess heat from solar thermal energy or steel, glass or concrete production.

“Essentially, using electricity to heat something up is a very simple and inexpensive method to store energy relative to lithium ion batteries. It gives you access to many different materials to use as a storage medium for thermal batteries,” Lenert said.

The heated storage material radiates thermal photons with a range of energies. At 1435°C, about 20-30% of those have enough energy to generate electricity in the team’s thermophotovoltaic cells. The key to this study was optimizing the semiconductor material, which captures the photons, to broaden its preferred photon energies while aligning with the dominant energies produced by the heat source.

So it uses photovoltaic cells that can capture low-energy photons -- near-infrared instead of visible light.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Nuclear reactors are usually run on constant throttle, and unless they are heavily overbuilt, they cannot meet peak demand.

Sure. But "heavily overbuilt" for nuclear reactors to meet peak demand means maybe building capacity of three times the base load, cutting the capacity factor from ~95% to ~30%.

The power grid as a whole inherently needs to be "overbuilt" to this degree.

Capacity factors for solar START AT ~20%, before you do any "overbuilding" at all, and only get worse from there.

And you can achieve the goal of covering 100% of demand with just nuclear; You CANNOT get close to that goal with just solar, you need a shitload of (magical, handwaved) storage, to go with your shitload of "overbuilt" capacity.

Yup, you can't guarantee any output from solar or wind. For capacity purposes they do not count at all.

They're useful for cutting fuel use. That's it. Renewables up to the point the grid can absorb is greener than the current situation but can never be remotely as green as nuclear unless someone comes up with a truly viable battery-analogue. The best we can do to date for large scale storage is cracking water then feeding the results to fuel cells. Expensive and inefficient.

Places like France, with large nuclear capacities, do a bit of load following with nuclear, and a bit of storage with pumped hydro. That's sufficient to make it viable.

I rather suspect that an optimum design runs the nuke plants at 100% instead of load following.

Solar plus pumped hydro would work in theory, but in practice, you would run out of suitable hydro sites LONG before you had sufficent storage to make solar viable. It simply can't be done, unless your terrain is ideal for hydro, and your population is fairly small - places like Tasmania, or Norway, for example. But then, you can just have hydro with no solar (or nuclear, or fossil fuel) at all in those places. Which they do.

Yup, pumped hydro is utterly non-viable at grid scale. And it's not exactly benign for the location, either--the storage area(s) will have water levels that frequently change by large amounts. Not good for anything living in the water and it makes the boundary land basically useless. And the changes play havoc with using it for recreational purposes.

 

[lpetrich]

Bladeless wind energy innovation aims to compete with rooftop solar – pv magazine USA - "A compact, “motionless” wind turbine with a magnetic generator designed for large commercial rooftops provides 5 kW of capacity per unit. Aeromine Technologies secured Series A funding for scaling its innovative design."

Aeromine said unlike conventional wind turbines that are noisy, visually intrusive and dangerous to migratory birds, the patented system is visually motionless and virtually silent. And unlike large centralized onshore and offshore wind farms, the space efficient systems are mounted on roofs, bringing power closer to where it is needed, and lessening the need for expensive long-distance transmission infrastructure.

Its generator is below the vertical cylinder, and the generator is spun with a fan. How does the air flow through this generator?
Aeromine: Home

Aeromine’s patented aerodynamic design captures and amplifies building airflow. When wind passes through the airfoils, a low pressure is generated, drawing air up through the intake and internal generator.

Aeromine units have no visible moving parts. They run quietly, require little maintenance, and have minimal impact on wildlife. The design avoids environmental unfriendly materials, such as silicon and rare earth magnets.

with a diagram of air flowing through this wind turbine.

Rooftop wind turbines? Seems like a nice addition to rooftop solar panels.

A nice thing about renewable-energy development is that some forms of it scale down very nicely, making it possible to have at least partial energy independence in one's home.

 

[lpetrich]

Nice to see something critical about electric cars.
Top 5 Lies EV Enthusiasts Tell Their Friends - CleanTechnica

ie #1: EVs Are Cheaper Than Gas Cars!

Like all good lies, this one is partially true.

Noting that electric cars often have much less continuing costs, from needing much less maintenance.

Lie #2: Charging Is Cheaper Than Gas

This one is true, but it’s not always true.

... The cost of one’s time completely aside, the cost of DC fast charging often meets or exceeds the cost of driving a comparable ICE car

Fast charging? In the middle of the day? Slow charging at night is likely much cheaper.

Lie #3: Charging On Road Trips Doesn’t Take Extra Time

In some ways, this one is true like the others.

It depends on what one is doing, like letting the car recharge for an hour while one eats.

Lie #4: You Can’t Take Road Trips Without Tesla!

This one is sort of true, but heavily exaggerated.

... The truth is that we’re going to need many charging companies to all put in as much work as they can to meet future EV charging demand, so we should support them while we demand better reliability and service.

If electric cars get more widely used, then more companies are likely to get into the electric-car-charger business. Maybe not standalone chargers, in analogy to gas stations, but chargers that are inside of other facilities, like office buildings and parking garages and eateries and hotels and the like.

Lie #5: EVs Can Go A Million Miles!

Out of the 5 lies, this one is the least true, but it still has a kernel of truth. Because an EV’s motor is so simple, and most EVs only have one gear instead of a multi-speed transmission, the drive unit has much greater longevity. In most cases, an EV drive unit will last a LOT longer than an engine and transmission. For many motors and drive units, it may indeed be possible to reach a million miles with an occasional flush/fill of the drive unit fluid!

But batteries are still a different story, at least for now.

One may have to change out a car's batteries, removing old ones and installing new ones.

 

[Elixir]

The maximum output is 3,500 MW, 5 times greater.

Yeah, because it's almost all generated in a 4-5 hour period of each day. For 19 hours a day there is NO ELECTRICITY.

Would you be happy if you only had electricity when the sun was shining?

As happy as an advocate of nuclear electricity generation is to endure partial blackouts because nuclear reactors aren't very adjustable in their output.

Furthermore, this is not 5 hours per day, it's 12 hours but with reduced output most of that time due to the Sun being at a slant.

How big of a solar farm do we need in a place like Arizona/New Mexico (assuming we can bridge that to the East/West) to meet our needs with redundancy in the US?

Infinity.

They have night time in every state in the US.

Obviously we need to use the Sahara - rent it from ... whoever. And the Gobi. That oughta about do it. Maybe we could sell the output locally or trade it for oil or something.

 

[lpetrich]

Climate and health benefits of wind and solar dwarf all subsidies | Ars Technica - "By displacing fossil fuels, wind and solar saved the US $250 billion over 4 years."

When used to generate power or move vehicles, fossil fuels kill people. Particulates and ozone resulting from fossil fuel burning cause direct health impacts, while climate change will act indirectly. Regardless of the immediacy, premature deaths and illness prior to death are felt through lost productivity and the cost of treatments.

How much fossil-fuel electricity do renewable sources displace?

One thing the regression analysis suggested is that there isn't a 1:1 ratio between the production from renewables and a drop in use of fossil fuels. Instead, one Megawatt-hour of wind power offsets 0.89 Mw-hr of fossil fuels, while a Mw-hr of solar only offsets 0.76 Mw-hr of fossil fuels. There are various reasons for this gap, ranging from long-distance transmission losses (renewable facilities are often far from urban areas) to curtailment of production to excess renewable production being absorbed by battery storage. It's likely to be a mix of the three.

How much do these exhaust-free systems help us?

The other thing is that wind and solar have distinct impacts. Wind is more commonly used in areas that otherwise get a lot of their electricity from coal, and coal is estimated to have much larger environmental costs: "the United States coal fleet released 95×, 3×, and 2× more SO2, NOx, and CO2 than natural gas plants, respectively, per MWh of electricity produced," Millstein, O'Shaughnessy, and Wiser write. Since wind is displacing more coal, its benefits are correspondingly larger.

As a result, the environmental and health benefits of wind in 2022 are estimated as being $143 for each Mw-hr, with solar providing $100/Mw-hr in benefits. Given the amount of power generated by wind and solar that year, that works out to a total of $62 billion and $12 billion, respectively. For the entire 2019–2022 period, they total up to $250 billion. Due to the uncertainties in various estimates, the researchers estimate that the real value for wind is somewhere between $91 and $183 per Mw-hr, with solar having a proportionate uncertainty.

 

[bilby]

By displacing fossil fuels, wind and solar saved the US $250 billion over 4 years."

How much did nuclear save in the same period?

How much in the last 70 years?

 

[lpetrich]

Cleantech News — #1 In EV, Solar, Wind, Tesla News - a very busy site.

Sodium-ion batteries are getting attention as an alternative to lithium-ion ones, because Na is MUCH more common than Li.

You searched for sodium-ion - CleanTechnica

US Gets First Sodium-Ion Battery Factory

In the latest sodium-ion battery news, on April 29, the US startup Natron Energy staked out its claim to the first commercial-scale production of a sodium-ion battery in the US when it hit the start button on its factory in Holland, Michigan.

Somewhat ironically, the new factory is a repurposed former lithium-ion battery plant. Natron expects the makeover to produce 600 megawatts worth of the new sodium-ion battery per year.

Is that megawatt-hours?

Natron's target market is currently data centers, for having uninterrupted 24/7 electricity. The company aims at additional markets, like telecom systems, electric-car fast charging stations, and off-road industrial vehicles.

BYD Constructing Sodium-Ion Battery Gigafactory (30 GWh) - CleanTechnica in Xuzhou, China

These batteries will reportedly be used in electric scooters and “micro vehicles,” as those are seen by BYD to be the best applications for sodium-ion batteries at the moment.