Wind and Solar vs Coal, Gasoline, Nuclear

If demand is staying flat or increasing then why do you say fossil fuel stocks are not a good proposition in a 20 year outlook?

I suppose along with reduced demand there are the increased financial liabilities of carbon taxing and reparations for past climate damage.

Hillhater said:

No..
Even you know that will not work.
We have been over this many times previously..there is not enough funding

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The US has a GDP of 19 trillion dollars a year. To build out enough batteries to store a day's worth of energy demand from wind and solar (which would give us 2-3 days of storage, since wind and solar are available for more than half the day on average) would cost five trillion dollars, using a $500/kwhr storage number.

So dedicating 20% of our GDP to battery purchase, we could build out enough battery capacity to power the entire US in two years.

So the "funding" argument doesn't work. You could claim you don't WANT to spend that much money on storage, but the argument that we can't do it because there's not enough money doesn't work. You could also claim that that's not the best way to do it, and that's very true.

useful space for wind turbines, and certainly not enough battery manufacturing capacity,....to make that realistic.

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Again, wrong. The US has a capacity for about 31 petawatt-hours of wind power using the 100 meter/40% constraints (i.e. turbines at 100 meters, capacity factor of 40%.) We use about 3.8 petawatt-hours a year.

...you must be contemplating some magical future advancements in battery tech.?

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Nope. The above uses standard, off the shelf battery designs. Of course, at that scale, companies will use things like compressed air storage, pumped hydro and potential energy solutions that are cheaper at large scales.

billvon said:

...... You again know there is nowhere near enough hydro...and little prospect of suitable sites for future major installations.
What type of storage is going to supply the base load when the wind isnt blowing ?? (Please dont say batteries)

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We certainly COULD do it with batteries (see above.)

What it will LIKELY be is a combination of compressed air storage, potential storage, pumped hydro and leased-battery (EV) storage.

So what is this magical "dispatchable load" that you propose to substitute for fossil fuels when the weather is not cooperating ??

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Onsite thermal storage. EV charging. Throttleable industrial processes.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/201794/us-electricity-consumption-since-1975/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_generation_potential_in_the_United_States
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=36432

Projections are guesstimates of course. The second chart is way short on total energy demand compared to other studies I have seen as what will be required to maintain our current exponential growth in world GDP. But it gives a general idea of what I expect. Total world coal consumption to continue to rise slightly for the next 100 years until it too is limited by availability due to diminishing ER/EI. Or a world economic crash probably much sooner.
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World oil projected consumption.
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https://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/fossil-fuels/gas-and-oil/u-s-oil-production-keeping-world-oil-price-increases-check/
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World coal projected consumption,
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http://www.ichorcoal.com/our-business/market-research
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billvon said:

So dedicating 20% of our GDP to battery purchase, we could build out enough battery capacity to power the entire US in two years.....

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Ohhh jeez bill !.... So do you in your wildest dreams think that could ever happen
..and you cannot purchace batteries unless you have the manufacturing facilities, materials, resources, etc to produce them.

Even if the USA could chop it's primary energy use in half with the efficiency gains from full electrification of everything while increasing our rebuildable generating capacity 30X beyond what we have now. we would still be at 1.5 TW.
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24 hours of battery storage would need 35 TWh. 1,000 times the eventual full capacity of the GigaFactory. So 20 GigaFactories would still take 50 years. Just for grid storage. Not to mention electrifying 300 Million cars, trucks, tractors, earth movers. Just for the USA. We have 20-30 years of affordable (sub $200/ barrel) oil left.

Probably best get cracking then rather than standing around complaining loudly it "can't" be done...

Punx0r said:

Probably best get cracking then rather than standing around complaining loudly it "can't" be done...

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Only fools waste time , money, resources, and effort, on something that "can't be done". !
Especially when it doesnt need to be done.

Something definitely needs to be done. Many things. Everything. Will need to change before oil price goes out of reach in 30 years. Our current economic and social systems were built last century on $20 oil. So dense, transportable, and incredibly cheap. They will not function on $200 oil as it finally begins to slip away. There is no plug and play replacement to for it. Entirely new social systems must evolve where people can be happy sharing fairly from a much smaller pie.
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Let's get busy.

Hillhater said:

Ohhh jeez bill !.... So do you in your wildest dreams think that could ever happen

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It COULD happen. Would it be a good idea to go that route? No; a much better approach would be to make battery storage just one part of a coordinated system.

..and you cannot purchace batteries unless you have the manufacturing facilities, materials, resources, etc to produce them.

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Exactly right. You'd need mines, drilling rigs, processing plants - hundreds of very large ones. The industry would be as big as, say, the petroleum industry.

And unless you are going to claim that the petroleum industry doesn't exist - then we could certainly do that.

Hillhater said:

Only fools waste time , money, resources, and effort, on something that "can't be done". !

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Like airplanes? Grid tied solar? Airliners? Spaceflight? Nuclear power? Reusable orbital boosters? Jet engines? Ram air parachutes? Trains that go faster than 30mph? All those things "couldn't be done" - until someone did them.

I am glad we had "fools" like the Wright Brothers, Albert Einstein, Enrico Fermi, Elon Musk, Werner von Braun, Robert Goddard, Thomas Edison, Domina Jalbert, Arthur Raymond and George Westinghouse to do the things that everyone said couldn't be done.

sendler2112 said:

24 hours of battery storage would need 35 TWh. 1,000 times the eventual full capacity of the GigaFactory. So 20 GigaFactories would still take 50 years. Just for grid storage.

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Yep. You'd need over 100 gigafactories to get it done in less than 10 years.

We have 135 refineries in the US now, each considerably larger than a gigafactory. Somehow we did that.

sendler2112 said:

Something definitely needs to be done. Many things. Everything. Will need to change before oil price goes out of reach in 30 years. Our current economic and social systems were built last century on $20 oil. So dense, transportable, and incredibly cheap. They will not function on $200 oil as it finally begins to slip away. There is no plug and play replacement to for it. Entirely new social systems must evolve where people can be happy sharing fairly from a much smaller pie.
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Let's get busy.

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In a world of 7 billion or more humans, I am not confident your vision is achievable. Human traits such as greed, jealousy , revenge, corruption, bias , etc are just to strong to overcome. It may be possible, if some type of divine or alien intervention { if that even exists in the universe} could manifest itself in a format that is visible and permanently and positively influential to every single human on earth. To expect 7 billion humans to somehow embrace a existence that is fair, equal and non impactive in negative ways upon others, is a pipedream. Lets also remember, that the negative influences of TV, social media, radio , fashion, new trends and the sociopath nature of our leaders and the idols we embrace only makes it even more impossible to have a world you hope arrives.

The whole human race, would need a mass awakening and change in character traits, genetics, etc to make such a positive worldwide change. All of us would have to also find a 100% verifiable way to identify any and all lies we are told thru venues of communication and influence. Do not under estimate the power of the endless lies we are fed by TPTB, and how those lies cause confusion, divide, hatred in society while those same lies allow TPTB to be in charge and remain in charge.

Unfortunately this is the darker (and much more probable) eventuality I try to stay away from as access to energy gets scarce for 9 Billion people. As liquid fuel and food get increasingly more expensive, economic growth ends forcing one country after another to default on the huge national and personal debts into worthless currency. Endless world wars, walled nations and then cities of privilege with starvation on the outside fighting to get in.
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I would much rather try to educate people to the forthcoming Great Simplification. And encourage wise grassroots discourse on finding a whole new way.

sendler2112 said:

Unfortunately this is the darker (and much more probable) eventuality I try to stay away from as access to energy gets scarce for 9 Billion people. As liquid fuel and food get increasingly more expensive, economic growth ends forcing one country after another to default on the huge national and personal debts into worthless currency. Endless world wars, walled nations and then cities of privilege with starvation on the outside fighting to get in.
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I would much rather try to educate people to the forthcoming Great Simplification. And encourage wise grassroots discourse on finding a whole new way.

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I love the optimistic alternatives, but I do not see them as reality taking place. How do you convince billions of people in modern society, with iphones, big screen tvs, cars and every other luxury, to somehow proactively revert back to a era 100 years ago , where our impact on environment and the planet was much less destructive and much more patterned to a life of self sufficiency ?


Like I said, divine or advanced alien intervention would be needed OR, it could be forced upon the human race via a very destructive natural catastrophe like a asteroid impact , which would not only force humans back to a simpler time, but also take care of the population explosion, for many generations.

Your average person in modern US society, probably cant even grow a successful garden . Compare that to around 70 years ago , where almost all American families were doing it . Most of our society has replaced skills of homesteading, self sufficiency with mass consumerism, credit card debt, iphones, laptops and the ability to upload endless photos of ourselves on facebook and social media. Does anyone think this is gonna end well ?

We have to try. Now that a few of us know. The world is not yet fully broken. Learn. Think. Talk. Steer the conversation for good. We still have 20 years of cheap fuel left and can focus this to get ready.

sendler2112 said:

We have to try. Now that a few of us know. The world is not yet fully broken. Learn. Think. Talk. Steer the conversation for good. We still have 20 years of cheap fuel left and can focus this to get ready.

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Well, I already grow a garden, raise rabbits, chickens and do most of my local travelling via my ebike. I live a life of moderation and well below my means. No credit card debt, or debt at all { never even owned a credit card} . I consider myself to be resourceful and logical but in this current era, I do not find many people in my surroundings, with traits like this and you surely cant force people to be a certain way or think a certain way.

I believe the root of so many problems, is humans inability to accurately spot all the lies they are fed by TPTB and thru TV, newspapers, radio, etc. One of our biggest faults, is our willingness to embrace a pleasing lie, over a unpleasant truth. I dont see that changing anytime soon. Furthermore, it is engrained in our existence that we dislike admitting when we have been wrong about something.

billvon said:

Yep. You'd need over 100 gigafactories to get it done in less than 10 years.
We have 135 refineries in the US now, each considerably larger than a gigafactory. Somehow we did that.

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....progressively, over a timescale of 100+ years.
After almost 5 years, the GigaFactory is still only 1/3 complete,.
....and there are still doubts over its ability to source ongoing supplies of raw materials to meet production targets.

Hillhater said:

....progressively, over a timescale of 100+ years.
After almost 5 years, the GigaFactory is still only 1/3 complete,.
....and there are still doubts over its ability to source ongoing supplies of raw materials to meet production targets.

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Yep.

There were doubts about whether Musk could ever land a first stage.
There were doubts about whether any surgeon could ever open the chest or abdomen and have the patient survive.
There were doubts as to whether anyone would ever want to own a computer.
There were doubts as to whether any heavier-than-air vehicle could ever fly.

Everything seems impossible - until you do it.

Some applicable quotes from years past:

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"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." --Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943

"I have traveled the length and breadth of this country and talked with the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad that won't last out the year." --The editor in charge of business books for Prentice Hall, 1957

"But what ... is it good for?" --Engineer at the Advanced Computing Systems Division of IBM, 1968, commenting on the microchip.

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." --Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977

"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." --Western Union internal memo, 1876.

"The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?" --David Sarnoff's associates in response to his urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920s.

"The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn better than a 'C,' the idea must be feasible." --A Yale University management professor in response to Fred Smith's paper proposing reliable overnight delivery service. (Smith went on to found Federal Express Corp.)

"Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" --H.M. Warner, Warner Brothers, 1927.

"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." --Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1895.

"So we went to Atari and said, 'Hey, we've got this amazing thing, even built with some of your parts, and what do you think about funding us? Or we'll give it to you. We just want to do it. Pay our salary, we'll come work for you.' And they said, 'No.' So then we went to Hewlett-Packard, and they said, 'Hey, we don't need you. You haven't got through college yet.'" --Apple Computer Inc. founder Steve Jobs on attempts to get Atari and H-P interested in his and Steve Wozniak's personal computer.

"Professor Goddard does not know the relation between action and reaction and the need to have something better than a vacuum against which to react. He seems to lack the basic knowledge ladled out daily in high schools." --1921 New York Times editorial about Robert Goddard rocket.

"Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? You're crazy." --Drillers who Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist to his project to drill for oil in 1859.

"Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau." --Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929.

"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value." --Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre.

"Everything that can be invented has been invented." --Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899.

"Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction". --Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872

"The abdomen, the chest, and the brain will forever be shut from the intrusion of the wise and humane surgeon". --Sir John Eric Ericksen, British surgeon, appointed Surgeon- Extraordinary to Queen Victoria 1873.
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Here is a good review and synopsis of "The Long Emergency" to save those that don't have time to start reading on these subjects. He is just one of many wise writers who's work has been summarily dismissed as so dissonant that it couldn't possibly have merit.
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https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-03-09/a-review-of-james-kunstler-s-the-long-emergency-10-years-later/
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China continues to ignor the "Paris" agreement it seems....
These plants had previously been reported as having been "cancelled" by China's Energy authorities, but it is now clear that construction is continuing
It begs the question of "why coal?" in a country that produces the majority of solar panels ?
The Chinese have proven they are no fools in the energy sector.
https://endcoal.org/2018/09/tsunami-warning/

.......259 Gigawatts (GW) of new (coal generation) capacity are under development in China, comparable to the entire U.S. coal fleet (266 GW). This represents a 25% increase in China’s coal power fleet. (Note: A typical coal-fired generating unit is 300–1,000 Megawatts, or 0.3–1.0 GW, in size, with most power stations having two or more such units.)
The new capacity is the result of a permitting surge from late 2014 to early 2016, after a regulatory devolution from central to provincial authorities.
In 2016 and 2017, central authorities sought to rein in the surge through a series of suspension orders.
Contrary to previous reporting and analysis, many of the restrictions only delayed new projects rather than stopping them.
China’s developmental pipeline places it on a trajectory to exceed its own announced 1100 GW coal power cap through 2020, with coal power capacity already at 993 GW in 2018.
Adding 259 GW of new coal power in China is wildly out of line with the Paris climate agreement. According to the IEA, a 50% chance of limiting future temperature increases to 1.75°C requires China phase out its traditional coal plants by 2045.
The surge in new projects will overwhelm China’s own 1100 GW coal cap in the country’s current Five-Year Plan.
Given that China’s coal fleet operates less than half the time, 259 GW additional coal power capacity is unneeded and represents US$210 billion in capital expenditures that could instead fund nearly 300 GW of solar PV or 175 GW of onshore wind power.......

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I believe there's a similar situation in India with unneeded coal plants still being built because their construction was started and locked in years ago. It's a gigantic waste of money and many of the finished plants will probably sit idle or under-used, but it's not uncommon in infrastructure projects.

"Currently there is a deficit in the energy availability and 35% of India’s commercial energy needs are still imported. Figure 1. Shows the anticipated growth in energy use in India by fuel source."
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"Due to its low cost and domestic availability, coal is the dominant fuel source for electricity generation in India, and its use is forecast to grow between now and 2030. India is investing in a number of coal-fired power plants efficiency measures, specifically cogeneration."
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http://www.localpower.org/cchp-decentralized-and-renewable-energy-potential-solution-for-india-energy.html
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I would like to see all those abandoned oil wells in the future recycled and converted into geothermal power sources.

Resilience.org examines a plan to reduce world energy consumption.
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"So how do the authors of the “low energy demand” paper propose to achieve in the future what has proved so elusive up until now? Partly through a shift to a sharing society, in which we give up personal ownership of cars, tools, and appliances in favor of payment for energy services such as rides, tool use, etc. Sharing will be enabled and promoted by digitalization and the Internet of Things."
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https://www.resilience.org/stories/2018-09-19/what-will-it-take-to-avert-collapse/
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Punx0r said:

I believe there's a similar situation in India with unneeded coal plants still being built because their construction was started and locked in years ago. It's a gigantic waste of money and many of the finished plants will probably sit idle or under-used, but it's not uncommon in infrastructure projects.

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China's wont stay unused.
They are despeate to get power to many of the remote population that had their open coal/ wood fired stoves and house fires, conficated by force a few years ago in order to meet some random emission target.
The millions of homes were promissed electric cookers and heaters as replacements.....bu unfortunately the planned power plants to supply those heaters were stopped by Central Authorities.
However, they have since realised that children, and whole families are dieing from the freezing winter weather with no means of heating or cooking,
..Hence why they are now resuming the original power build programm
Remember , China is a huge country with many remote communities and does not have a complex distribution system, so power has to be generated relatively local to where it is needed.
It would be no surprise that a similar Situation exists in India with power being urgently needed in remote areas.