That’s not what they were saying, they were saying that it’s not economical to have an abundance of electricity when people need it the least, and little or no electricity when people need it the most. It would be one thing if utilities could sell solar electricity at peak demand hours for a higher price, to make up the difference, but that’s just when solar generation is slowly down significantly or stopped entirely.
And, yes, I know that battery storage could theoretically solve this, but battery technology is not currently capable of providing electricity for the entirety of the time we need it. New technologies are being developed right now with the goal of achieving long term grid storage, but they are still in the R&D phase. I’m confident a suitable storage technology, or multiple technologies, will eventually come to market, but it’s going to take a while.
Regardless, it is likely we will always need some kind of on-demand power generation to supplement renewables and maintain grid stability, and I think nuclear is the best option.
But we shouldn’t act like the problem is that utilities are just greedy. Many utilities aren’t even for-profit companies, as many are either not-for-profit cooperatives or public entities. Sure, there are also many for-profit power utilities as well, maybe even some with connections to the fossil fuel industry, but generally power utilities are not some great villain.
I really like your response. Right behind you about energy storage.
Whoever cracks that nut is an instant billionaire in my opinion. The first cheap, effective, and practical storage technology is going to change the world. But we’re not there just yet.
I’m curious on your statement about nuclear. While I do think nuclear is a great energy source, I’m not sure I agree on the on-demand part.
Our current nuclear plants take hours or even days to start up and wouldn’t provide enough reactivity for a highly renewable grid. Are you referring to a future Small Modular Reactor technology? One with a significantly faster startup and ramp rate?
For the longest time I thought people who had solar panels had a battery on their property somewhere, they’re panels would charge battery and they would only switch to the grid if their battery ran out.
I don’t know much about it, but this seems like a pretty viable solution and I still can’t believe this isn’t how it works.
A thing you can use which gets forgotten often in the conversation is “natural” / physical batteries, or better put stores of latent energy. Essentially, “push heavy thing up hill, make it come down later”.
I know little about it, but you can release the kinetic energy stored in heavy objects at higher altitudes basically whenever, using say a dynamo on the wheels of a wagon of heavy rocks you previously pushed uphill.
There have been proposals for technology like this. Putting a motor above an abandoned mineshaft and suspending a weight. Charged by raising the weight, discharges by lowering against a load.
The issues is the capacity ends up being pretty tiny, not really at a grid level.
You’d need a TON of motors to get to something a grid could actually use to stabilize, and by then the economics don’t work out. Let alone the actual space requirements of that many motors
Additionally, a lot of the advantages of batteries come from local storage, where you don’t need to transmit the energy long distances anymore, and these “natural” batteries tend to take up a lot of space.
A better and more accessible form of “natural” energy storage are already in most homes. Heat pump water heaters in homes could do things like make the water extra hot during solar hours, when power is cheap, so they can make it until the next morning without turning back on.
Or with better building envelopes (insulation) we could run more cooling during solar, maybe even make a ton of ice. Then later in the day, when solar drops and the grid load peaks, you can still cool the building with ice.
No, peak generation in most countries is in the late afternoon when people come home from work, the ac kicks on, people start to cook + do other things around the house. You typically see a double- peak, one in the morning and one in the evening, although it varies based on the seasons. I’m an engineer who works in renewable energy and the stated problem is real- solar generation doesn’t line up very well with grid demand. You can work around this with energy storage but that is an expensive solution
Isn’t peak consumption around middle of the day for most countries?
I can’t speak to other countries, but in the US peak electricity demand generally occurs in the early evening.
Mfw electricity being cheap to generate is not economical
Cheap electricity is great for consumers, but not necessarily for producers. Some people might say, “well, screw producers,” but even if you take profit out of the equation, electric utilities need to be able to at least cover their expenses, and you can’t do that if the amount of electricity you’re generating relative to the demand is so high the price actually goes negative (meaning the utility is actually paying the consumer). Again, that’s good for consumers, but I’m sure you can see how that’s not a sustainable business model. And, like I mentioned before, it would be one thing if utilities could make up for this by selling for a higher price during peak, but by that point the sun is either setting or already set, depending on the time of year, so there’s just no solar electricity to sell, at any price.
Cheap electricity is great for consumers, but not necessarily for producers. Some people might say, “well, screw producers,” but even if you take profit out of the equation, electric utilities need to be able to at least cover their expenses, and you can’t do that if the amount of electricity you’re generating relative to the demand is so high the price actually goes negative (meaning the utility is actually paying the consumer). Again, that’s good for consumers, but I’m sure you can see how that’s not a sustainable business model.
Fully agreed: let’s eliminate business from the issue, and create national, for-service electric grids, that produce the cheapest renewables at all possible times in the most efficient way possible, disregarding hourly profit and taking into account exclusively the cost in €/kWh produced over the lifetime of each energy source.
Suddenly it’s obvious that the problem isn’t with renewables, but with organising the electric grid as a market
Public utilities still need to cover their expenses, and they’re not going to be able to do that if they’re charging negative rates in the middle of the day and have no electricity to sell once the sun goes down.
I’m not sure what you mean. Are you saying that public utilities should be funded from taxes instead of charging for service? I don’t think having tax payers pay public utilities to overproduce electricity is going to fix the problem, especially since no amount of tax dollar funding can allow utilities to produce solar electricity when the sun isn’t shining.
I mean, “economy” fundamentally is the allocation of limited resources, if something is limited at a point when it’s needed, then economical doesn’t sound like the wrong word to use?
(I’m aware economical means cheap, BTW)
That’s not what they were saying, they were saying that it’s not economical to have an abundance of electricity when people need it the least, and little or no electricity when people need it the most. It would be one thing if utilities could sell solar electricity at peak demand hours for a higher price, to make up the difference, but that’s just when solar generation is slowly down significantly or stopped entirely.
And, yes, I know that battery storage could theoretically solve this, but battery technology is not currently capable of providing electricity for the entirety of the time we need it. New technologies are being developed right now with the goal of achieving long term grid storage, but they are still in the R&D phase. I’m confident a suitable storage technology, or multiple technologies, will eventually come to market, but it’s going to take a while.
Regardless, it is likely we will always need some kind of on-demand power generation to supplement renewables and maintain grid stability, and I think nuclear is the best option.
But we shouldn’t act like the problem is that utilities are just greedy. Many utilities aren’t even for-profit companies, as many are either not-for-profit cooperatives or public entities. Sure, there are also many for-profit power utilities as well, maybe even some with connections to the fossil fuel industry, but generally power utilities are not some great villain.
I really like your response. Right behind you about energy storage.
Whoever cracks that nut is an instant billionaire in my opinion. The first cheap, effective, and practical storage technology is going to change the world. But we’re not there just yet.
I’m curious on your statement about nuclear. While I do think nuclear is a great energy source, I’m not sure I agree on the on-demand part.
Our current nuclear plants take hours or even days to start up and wouldn’t provide enough reactivity for a highly renewable grid. Are you referring to a future Small Modular Reactor technology? One with a significantly faster startup and ramp rate?
For the longest time I thought people who had solar panels had a battery on their property somewhere, they’re panels would charge battery and they would only switch to the grid if their battery ran out.
I don’t know much about it, but this seems like a pretty viable solution and I still can’t believe this isn’t how it works.
Yeah you can do that. Not everyone does
A thing you can use which gets forgotten often in the conversation is “natural” / physical batteries, or better put stores of latent energy. Essentially, “push heavy thing up hill, make it come down later”.
I know little about it, but you can release the kinetic energy stored in heavy objects at higher altitudes basically whenever, using say a dynamo on the wheels of a wagon of heavy rocks you previously pushed uphill.
There have been proposals for technology like this. Putting a motor above an abandoned mineshaft and suspending a weight. Charged by raising the weight, discharges by lowering against a load.
The issues is the capacity ends up being pretty tiny, not really at a grid level.
You’d need a TON of motors to get to something a grid could actually use to stabilize, and by then the economics don’t work out. Let alone the actual space requirements of that many motors
Additionally, a lot of the advantages of batteries come from local storage, where you don’t need to transmit the energy long distances anymore, and these “natural” batteries tend to take up a lot of space.
A better and more accessible form of “natural” energy storage are already in most homes. Heat pump water heaters in homes could do things like make the water extra hot during solar hours, when power is cheap, so they can make it until the next morning without turning back on.
Or with better building envelopes (insulation) we could run more cooling during solar, maybe even make a ton of ice. Then later in the day, when solar drops and the grid load peaks, you can still cool the building with ice.
Isn’t peak consumption around middle of the day for most countries?
Mfw electricity being cheap to generate is not economical
No, peak generation in most countries is in the late afternoon when people come home from work, the ac kicks on, people start to cook + do other things around the house. You typically see a double- peak, one in the morning and one in the evening, although it varies based on the seasons. I’m an engineer who works in renewable energy and the stated problem is real- solar generation doesn’t line up very well with grid demand. You can work around this with energy storage but that is an expensive solution
I can’t speak to other countries, but in the US peak electricity demand generally occurs in the early evening.
Cheap electricity is great for consumers, but not necessarily for producers. Some people might say, “well, screw producers,” but even if you take profit out of the equation, electric utilities need to be able to at least cover their expenses, and you can’t do that if the amount of electricity you’re generating relative to the demand is so high the price actually goes negative (meaning the utility is actually paying the consumer). Again, that’s good for consumers, but I’m sure you can see how that’s not a sustainable business model. And, like I mentioned before, it would be one thing if utilities could make up for this by selling for a higher price during peak, but by that point the sun is either setting or already set, depending on the time of year, so there’s just no solar electricity to sell, at any price.
Fully agreed: let’s eliminate business from the issue, and create national, for-service electric grids, that produce the cheapest renewables at all possible times in the most efficient way possible, disregarding hourly profit and taking into account exclusively the cost in €/kWh produced over the lifetime of each energy source.
Suddenly it’s obvious that the problem isn’t with renewables, but with organising the electric grid as a market
Public utilities still need to cover their expenses, and they’re not going to be able to do that if they’re charging negative rates in the middle of the day and have no electricity to sell once the sun goes down.
Do I really need to explain the concepts of taxes, subsidies, or fixed prices regardless of demand, to an adult?
I’m not sure what you mean. Are you saying that public utilities should be funded from taxes instead of charging for service? I don’t think having tax payers pay public utilities to overproduce electricity is going to fix the problem, especially since no amount of tax dollar funding can allow utilities to produce solar electricity when the sun isn’t shining.
I mean, “economy” fundamentally is the allocation of limited resources, if something is limited at a point when it’s needed, then economical doesn’t sound like the wrong word to use? (I’m aware economical means cheap, BTW)