Wind and Solar vs Coal, Gasoline, Nuclear

[billvon]

To a point. Maybe solar can even go as high as 40% of current electricity in sunny areas of the world with smart grid control of thermostats, ect. Not in the NE USA though. Maybe near shore wind can takes it's place in such areas.

Yes, every location will have its own ideal mix of generation.

Plus most of the additional from EV adoption with massive daytime charging infrastructure upgrades. This is a huge build out. This is nowhere near as slam dunk as the solar industry publications keep overconfidently proclaiming.

Given that pretty much every prediction made by the government, the solar industry and utilities has reliably UNDERpredicted solar buildout, I have a feeling it will happen sooner than we expect. Yes, it will take a lot of work - but we are doing that work, and it looks like it will continue.

 

[Hillhater]

From eia.gov:

Estimated LCOE (weighted average of regional values based on projected capacity
additions) for new generation resources, plants entering service in 2022 (i.e. started today)

Total system cost LCOE before tax credits ($/MWh)
Advanced nuclear 96.2
Solar PV 73.7.....

Sure, but still a LONG way from the 23-28 $MWh previously tossed around !
Also "weighted" ..includes significant cost savings from estimated high volumes of future pv construction.
And still a common 30 yr life basis..
And still an intermittennt, unreliable supply with no back up or storage.

The oldest commercial plants in the United States reached their 40th anniversary this year, and the average plant has operated for 30 years. Already, more than half of the nation's more than 100 reactors have seen their initial licenses extended for an additional two decades. Nearly all the country's plants are expected to eventually win such extensions.

....Agreed - but longer license time does not equate to being able to operate safely for that long. In many cases (as in San Onofre) there will eventually be a failure that's just too expensive/dangerous to fix.

That is the whole point of a licencing system..
Plants would not get a licence extension if there was any possibility of a safety risk.

And yet the world draws power intermittently. In fact, it often draws the most power right when solar is generating the most power. Very convenient.

No..individual users may use power intermittently, but Utility Grid systems see a "variable" draw,.. with am and pm peaks and overnight minimums, ..but it never reduces below a fairly consistent minimum "base load" ( normally approx 50% of the peak value)
Even the am/pm peaks are outside the normal solar generating periods , certainly beyond the peak of solar capacity, hence the ongoing need for "peaker" plants, interstate connections (California !) and "Demand Management". (IE, Lifestye changes!)
And you keep conveniently forgetting that Solar/wind is not just "intermittent" and "variable". ..its also very "unpredictable". and as such unreliable if there is no back up systems or storage.
So, even if you retain Nuclear, or coal, or gas for overnight "base load",...what do you do on those days when the sun doesnt shine on that 50% of solar power that industry had become weaned onto ?

 

[Punx0r]

Nuclear wasn't cost effective or commercially viable from the outset.

The world's first commercial nuclear power station was built in 1956 at Windscale in the UK. It was claimed it would produce electricity so cheaply as to not be worth bothering to meter it. In reality it was built using government finance, output a meagre 40MWe and was only really operated to produce fuel for nuclear weapons. Then it melted down.

Later reactors were better. The UK has 15 operational ones, producing around 1/6 of the country's electricity. However, they were all built using cheap government finance and when the energy industry was privatised that subsidy stopped and so did building, as the long construction times (~10 years) were deemed unattractive by private investors.

There is also a £70bhn+ liability for decommissioning of the UK's reactors.

In the near feature four new reactors might be built at Hinckley Point by EDF at a cost of £18bn. EDF is half owned (and funded) by the French taxpayer. Last year EDF's finance director quit over the issue as he feared the project would bankrupt the company. The deal hinges on the UK government guaranteeing to buy the electricity produced well into the future at a price well above market average.

So yes, nuclear is an important and significant source of baseload generation, but it was never a sure thing and still isn't necessarily from a commercial perspective.

 

[sendler2112]

Do you prefer gas and coal? Rhetorical question at this point because that is what we are using. Hopefully we don't drag our feet on building out a non-intermittent zero carbon replacement for base load before we really get in a jam with tightening carbon fuel supplies to the point where liquid fuel prices make it even more difficult and expensive to build big projects.

 

[wineboyrider]

Do you prefer gas and coal? Rhetorical question at this point because that is what we are using. Hopefully we don't drag our feet on building out a non-intermittent zero carbon replacement for base load before we really get in a jam with tightening carbon fuel supplies to the point where liquid fuel prices make it even more difficult and expensive to build big projects.

Gasoline? Or natural gas? I am a huge fan of natural gas. Uses an energy that normally would just be burned off an oil well rig and there are more and more uses for it even fuel for vehicles.

 

[sendler2112]

Or natural gas? .

90 years left. Then What? It gets mighty cold in the winter.
.
https://www.americangeosciences.org/critical-issues/faq/how-much-natural-gas-does-united-states-have-and-how-long-will-it-last
.
https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=58&t=8
.

 

[Ohbse]

Or natural gas? .

90 years left. Then What? It gets mighty cold in the winter.
.
https://www.americangeosciences.org/critical-issues/faq/how-much-natural-gas-does-united-states-have-and-how-long-will-it-last
.
https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=58&t=8
.

lol - what alarmist bullshit. You really think people will be freezing to death in their homes in 2107 because they've run out of NG?

The oldest commercial plants in the United States reached their 40th anniversary this year, and the average plant has operated for 30 years. Already, more than half of the nation's more than 100 reactors have seen their initial licenses extended for an additional two decades. Nearly all the country's plants are expected to eventually win such extensions.

....Agreed - but longer license time does not equate to being able to operate safely for that long. In many cases (as in San Onofre) there will eventually be a failure that's just too expensive/dangerous to fix.

That is the whole point of a licencing system..
Plants would not get a licence extension if there was any possibility of a safety risk.[/quote="Hillhater"]

For somebody so cynical you sure have a lot of faith in regulatory bodies. Due to the 'unique' situation in the US you actually cannot decommission one of these reactor sites. If you're paying to staff it, maintain it, secure it and insure it, you may as well be producing some power with it. You cannot compare the 'costs' associated with producing that energy with any future capacity expansion.

Here's an interesting and relevant piece on Nuclear energy, or more specifically its byproducts
[youtube]ZwY2E0hjGuU[/youtube]

In short, for more than 40 years political inaction has resulted in *no* safe storage for nuclear waste in the US, a problem that's now causing enormous health concerns. Cleanup of *one* notoriously shoddy facility consumes 10% of the DOE budget, $2.4 BILLION a year, despite the fact it hasn't produced anything in over 30 years. Running these power stations at an enormous loss is still cheaper than the realized liability of closing them down and the associated political fallout (pun very much included). When you have politicians making the calls based on their personal electoral cycle you'll definitely fail to see meaningful action. The same is true in England and elsewhere.

And you keep conveniently forgetting that Solar/wind is not just "intermittent" and "variable". ..its also very "unpredictable". and as such unreliable if there is no back up systems or storage.
So, even if you retain Nuclear, or coal, or gas for overnight "base load",...what do you do on those days when the sun doesnt shine on that 50% of solar power that industry had become weaned onto ?

Actually wind and solar is very predictable, able to be predicted days out to within a few % of real delivered energy. Shoring up the supply on a short term basis with a decent grid with some very limited storage is already done. The weather isn't crap everywhere at once

Wind blows at night. Rightly or wrongly Nuclear energy is going to persist in NA's grid for some time. NG peakers for shortfalls in the immediate term, however priced correctly this will quickly give way to additional storage as it becomes cost viable. Night time energy is not that hard.

 

[billvon]

That is the whole point of a licencing system..
Plants would not get a licence extension if there was any possibility of a safety risk.

San Onofre reactors 2 and 3 got 20 year extensions in 2009 and 2010 respectively, after a lot of upgrade work to improve safety and performance. The leak began in 2012 and shut the plant down due to safety risks.

Three Mile Island unit 2 receive its license in 1978. It suffered a meltdown in 1979.

So license extensions are certainly no guarantee of safety. You need passively safe designs to have any hope of safety - and we don't have any of them. Hopefully further research and development will provide such plants.

No..individual users may use power intermittently, but Utility Grid systems see a "variable" draw,.. with am and pm peaks and overnight minimums, ..but it never reduces below a fairly consistent minimum "base load" ( normally approx 50% of the peak value)
Even the am/pm peaks are outside the normal solar generating periods , certainly beyond the peak of solar capacity, hence the ongoing need for "peaker" plants, interstate connections (California !) and "Demand Management". (IE, Lifestye changes!)

And technology changes - thermal storage, EV storage, ESS and the like.

So, even if you retain Nuclear, or coal, or gas for overnight "base load",...what do you do on those days when the sun doesnt shine on that 50% of solar power that industry had become weaned onto ?

You think "glad we have reduced A/C loads due to the lack of sun!"

 

[billvon]

90 years left. Then What? It gets mighty cold in the winter.

Passive solar. Biomass. Sewage digesters. Thermal dissociation/Sabatier process conversion of CO2 and water to methane.

 

[Hillhater]

..... You really think people will be freezing to death in their homes in 2107 because they've run out of NG?

There are serious concerns in the US ...(who have a high proportion of NG generation , and plenty of gas),... that in some weather /storm conditions of the Alaskan cold front looping down, that the National gas demand could easily exceed supply capacity, causing power plants to run short resulting in widespread forced shutdowns...just when demand is critical.
.

.....Here's an interesting and relevant piece on Nuclear energy, or more specifically its byproducts
In short, for more than 40 years political inaction has resulted in *no* safe storage for nuclear waste in the US, a problem that's now causing enormous health concerns. Cleanup of *one* notoriously shoddy facility consumes 10% of the DOE budget, $2.4 BILLION a year, despite the fact it hasn't produced anything in over 30 years. Running these power stations at an enormous loss is still cheaper than the realized liability of closing them down and the associated political fallout (pun very much included). When you have politicians making the calls based on their personal electoral cycle you'll definitely fail to see meaningful action. The same is true in England and elsewhere.

Yes same problems worldwide,..but its a Political problem, not a technical one.
The solution is known and ready, but it will probably take a horrific disaster at one of those sites befor someone "grows a pair", and finishes the job.

And you keep conveniently forgetting that Solar/wind is not just "intermittent" and "variable". ..its also very "unpredictable". and as such unreliable if there is no back up systems or storage.
So, even if you retain Nuclear, or coal, or gas for overnight "base load",...what do you do on those days when the sun doesnt shine on that 50% of solar power that industry had become weaned onto ?

.

........Actually wind and solar is very predictable, able to be predicted days out to within a few % of real delivered energy. Shoring up the supply on a short term basis with a decent grid with some very limited storage is already done. The weather isn't crap everywhere at once.....

Solar/Wind predictions are no better than weather forcasts......and we all know how reliable they are.
But even the best weather forcasts cannot prdict the unexpected cloud bank or change in wind speed /direction.. all of which make a huge difference to grid management.
Many of those states/countries with high % of Solar and wind have had major issues with power crashes.
Germany has had to be "rescued" more than once..most recently by Poland, as a result of a still air mass not moving as predicted, and our own SA state had its famous blackouts last year due to unexpected storms.
Obviously, these problems can be avoided with a suitable grid back up , but you cannot do that if the majority of your generation is also wind or solar......because it is unreliable.
.

........Wind blows at night. ...
...Night time energy is not that hard.

[/quote]
Not every night, and sometimes not very much.!
Do you really think you could depend On wind for a large proportion of nighttime supply ?.

 

[TheBeastie]

Apparently lightening bolts contain about 10billion watts of energy. I was thinking because of all the popularity of intermediate energy that gets so much subsidised money for providing power when its not needed why not setup lightning towers and 'technically' have them in the grid.
Something that can give about 10billion watts a bit less than 3MWh but if I can have that available for a second and send everyone a bill for it like wind and solar schemes do then why not, as its not my fault you didn't have a use for it in that period of time, I generated the power its up to you to use it, now give me my money.

Most of that nuclear waste is fuel for next-gen reactors.
https://youtu.be/e7gL2iBMAeY
[youtube]e7gL2iBMAeY[/youtube]

I thought this was a good piece of fake news, its healthy that more and more of this stuff gets made because people need to learn that well presented seemingly accurate information can still be baloney. Its got over 6million views on Facebook but a tiny amount of views on Youtube. This is because Facebook creatively filters/restricts out content thats not fully embedded in its platform and ensures it doesn't become popular (more money and power for Facebook). https://www.facebook.com/thejuicemedia/videos/10156702458083452/
https://youtu.be/rNUxQ-9AZss

[youtube]rNUxQ-9AZss[/youtube]

The problem is the only reason why they want to get at the gas in the Aus bite is so they can give the voters what they want and thats renewable energy, because unlike folks in general we all know here that renewable energy is very intermittent.
So the government wants to tap the bite for gas to make achievable the renewable energy level the voting public want, but the voting public so dumb
about what it is required with intermittent renewable energy they are against it. The government will have to wait for FB/ABC to properly inform them so they can make up their mind on what they actually want, this could take a while and be messy.

One thing that I think will be really interesting over time is that as the CO2 ppm levels go to 450 to 500 over the coming decades those respected doomsday climate models will probably continue to be "recalculated" to reflect the current readings as nothing out of the long term constant changes in our environment stubbornly continue the same boring path while the CO2 charts go crazy.

SA is typically considered 50% wind and solar.

I am still banned from reneweconomy.com.au for merely posting wikipedia links etc on there, even after logging out of disqus and creating a new account with a new email address, I seem to be effectively IP based super banned.
Oh well stuff'em, the service they use Disqus got their whole userbase login/password data dumped on the internet a little while ago. https://thehackernews.com/2017/10/disqus-comment-system-hacked.html

 

[sendler2112]

90 years left. Then What? It gets mighty cold in the winter.

Passive solar. Biomass. Sewage digesters. Thermal dissociation/Sabatier process conversion of CO2 and water to methane.

Any of this might help for a world population of 2 Billion people if we abandoned every Northern megacity and started over.

 

[sendler2112]

Or natural gas? .

90 years left. Then What? It gets mighty cold in the winter.
.
https://www.americangeosciences.org/critical-issues/faq/how-much-natural-gas-does-united-states-have-and-how-long-will-it-last
.
https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=58&t=8
.

lol - what alarmist bullshit. You really think people will be freezing to death in their homes in 2107 because they've run out of NG?

I didn't say it. eia.gov said it. When do you think natural gas will tip over peak availability so as to become too expensive to heat and supply overnight electricity to megacities in North America and Russia?

 

[wineboyrider]

I have enough wood laying around the farm to heat 2 or 3 houses all winter.

 

[Cephalotus]

In Germany renewable have to bid for their projects now.

Last tender for solar was 0.054€/kWh
Last tender for wind onshore was 0.043€/kWh
Last tender for wind offshore was 0.0044€/kWh (yes, this is 3 Zeros)

Keep in mind that solar Irradiation in Germany is compareable to Alaska, our wind onshore resources are worse than in most countries and there is a complicated process for project devolpment (hundreds of pages which birds, bats, etc live near that site), wind offshore is far offshore in Germany and we have one of the highest energy needs per available area.

The 0ct/kWh offshore means that the companies plan to sell their power on the market and it is for projects that will go online in maybe 7-10 years. Price for grid connection is not included.

Significant amounts of solar plants will fall out of their 20 year feed in Tarif period year by year after 2021 and will be able to produce electricity for very cheap. Etsimation is, that those solar plants will last 30-40 years, maybe longer.

This year solar + wind will provide more than 20% of Germanys electricity consumption. CEO of 50 Hertz transmission, the grid operator with most RE share in its grid says that 70-80% share of RE are doable without the need of more storage capacity.

After 2022 there will be 0% nuclear power in Germany.

There is no estimation for electricity from new nuclear power plants in Germany. Hinkley C in UK will get feed in tarif of 11 pc/kWh + Inflation consumption for 35 years, so it is about 3-4 times more expensive than wind or solar. This is without insurance and without waste manegement.
Rebuilding nuclear power plants in Germany will cost around 50 billion Euro (estimation) plus unknown costs for waste treatment, which we will not find on your electricity bill because it will be payed with taxes.

Regards

 

[billvon]

I didn't say it. eia.gov said it. When do you think natural gas will tip over peak availability so as to become too expensive to heat and supply overnight electricity to megacities in North America and Russia?

Never. As renewables increase in capacity, natural gas use will go down. It will be relegated to peaker plant usage. As it becomes cheaper it will gradually start replacing oil as a motor fuel, for those transportation applications where battery storage is impractical.

 

[sendler2112]

I didn't say it. eia.gov said it. When do you think natural gas will tip over peak availability so as to become too expensive to heat and supply overnight electricity to megacities in North America and Russia?

Never. As renewables increase in capacity, natural gas use will go down. It will be relegated to peaker plant usage. As it becomes cheaper it will gradually start replacing oil as a motor fuel, for those transportation applications where battery storage is impractical.

Never??? How do you figure natural gas will never become scarce? There is no debating a huge dependence on gas heat and industry. Only 40% of gas is used for electricity right now. which won't go down the more peaking base load is pushed onto it. EIA states 90 years. I might guess 150 being optimistic with some conversion to other sources and some efficiency improvements.
.
https://www.eia.gov/dnav/ng/ng_cons_sum_dcu_nus_a.htm
.

 

[billvon]

Never??? How do you figure natural gas will never become scarce?

?? I didn't say it will never become scarce. I disagreed with your claim that natural gas shortages will make it impossible to heat and power cities. Because:

1) We will use less of it over time as we replace natural gas generation with renewables. This will extend its life and make it cheaper.
2) There are far more sources for methane than just oil wells. Alternatives = slower increase in cost.
3) Methane is just one of many gases we can use for this. Again, with alternatives comes fuel diversity and a slower increase in cost.

 

[liveforphysics]

If we were sharing a spaceship with just the folks on this thread in a shared atmosphere, there would be zero discussion about whether burning things in the shared air we're all breathing means mutually ensured death.

There would be no self-deception of "value" arguments for burning things, because we would all smell the fouled air together immediately in a clear and direct cause and effect relationship due to being in a confined spaceship together.

No arguments about costing or energy prices or infrastructure would sound like more than insane psychopaths grasping at straws to justify mutual self poisoning to extinction.

Now realize we are sharing a closed loop system spaceship, but it's not merely the folks on this thread, but many billions more folks.

 

[sendler2112]

How about if we were talking 30% of the population (of a planet. not a spaceship) forced to displace to keep from freezing to death from a lack of energy? Or 70% slowly starving over a couple generations from a lack of liquid fuel?

 

[billvon]

How about if we were talking 30% of the population (of a planet. not a spaceship) forced to displace to keep from freezing to death from a lack of energy?

Good solution - keep them warm in a way that does not kill anyone else.
Bad solution - just keep killing people because it's cheaper.

Or 70% slowly starving over a couple generations from a lack of liquid fuel?

Good solution - switch everyone to a vegetarian diet so no one starves.
Bad solution - let the poor starve so the rich can eat steak.

 

[Ohbse]

Never??? How do you figure natural gas will never become scarce? There is no debating a huge dependence on gas heat and industry. Only 40% of gas is used for electricity right now. which won't go down the more peaking base load is pushed onto it. EIA states 90 years. I might guess 150 being optimistic with some conversion to other sources and some efficiency improvements.

90 years at current rates of consumption. That will not remain. It might go up in the short term, however it will go down substantially as it's priced out of the market. We should hasten that process by capturing the true cost of burning it, but even if we don't - it will still decline.

If we DID start running out much sooner than expected, prices would increase. Gas suppliers aren't just going to turn off the taps one day and shrug, oops we ran out. We will never run out of gas, just like we will never run out of petroleum/oil - that last barrel will probably be very expensive indeed though.

Solving heating issues using intermittent power sources is easy. Use PV/Heatpumps to heat large quantities of water. Circulate water to regulate temperature. Done. At some point implementing such systems becomes cheaper than purchasing NG and you'll see rapid adoption.

Oil/NG etc SHOULD be much more expensive. It's still ridiculously cheap compared to its true cost. I would love to see its price double over a several year period as this would accelerate adoption of alternatives and actually make a meaningful difference to the big picture.

 

[Hillhater]

In Germany renewable have to bid for their projects now.

Last tender for solar was 0.054€/kWh
Last tender for wind onshore was 0.043€/kWh
Last tender for wind offshore was 0.0044€/kWh (yes, this is 3 Zeros)
Regards

From that, I assume you can understand that "bid" costs have absolutely no relation to the cost of production or the cost to the consumer.
Suppliers bid to get access to the market and to the rebates which hide the full cost and is what helps make Germanys electricity some of the most expensive in the world.
Germany, probably wont need batteries for storage, because like most other "zones " with high % of wind and solar, it maintains a reliable power supply by utilising supporting power inports from adjoining "zones" (countries).... Or by having large amounts of surplus thermal generators available on standby ..Its not a sustainable situation.
And just a small correction to this...

....After 2022 there will be 0% nuclear power in Germany...

"After 2022 there will be 0% nuclear power. " GENERATED". In Germany"...
Germany will still be importing nuclear power when its RE sources fail to meet demand.

 

[sendler2112]

Passive solar. Biomass. Sewage digesters. Thermal dissociation/Sabatier process conversion of CO2 and water to methane.

.

Solving heating issues using intermittent power sources is easy. Use PV/Heatpumps to heat large quantities of water. Circulate water to regulate temperature. Done. At some point implementing such systems becomes cheaper than purchasing NG and you'll see rapid adoption.
.

I was reminded this morning of a relationship to building out new technological fixes to reduced availability of energy. As we attempt to add complexity on top of complexity to come up with techno fixes to dwindling super dense fossil fuel, we need more and more energy to build out all of this stuff. Much of which requires heavy construction and transportation since nothing is built locally anymore. It is unbelievable the amount of worldwide transportation involved to get all of the separate pieces of stuff together. And heavy harvesting and refinement of more and more raw materials which also continue to get more scarce. Stacking complexity requires more energy and reduces resiliency but is what we are stuck with until we get the population back down.
.
"Because we use up the best first, all non-renewable resources (including ores and minerals) are becoming more and more energetically remote. "

 

[Hillhater]

[
Solving heating issues using intermittent power sources is easy. Use PV/Heatpumps to heat large quantities of water. Circulate water to regulate temperature. Done. At some point implementing such systems becomes cheaper than purchasing NG and you'll see rapid adoption.
.

we touched on this issue a few pages back, using the example of how to heat a city like New York with wind and solar generation and an intermittent supply.
So could you elaborate on how this hot water system would be employed in a city of that scale ?
How much water, how hot, where to store it, etc.