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| tom66:
You'd probably still need storage for Europe as during winter, there can be long periods of time with little wind and solar generation. Storage of ca. 1-3 months energy is possible in the form of hydrogen using the existing reservoirs used for natural gas. Most of these are underground salt caverns, some are disused fossil gas wells. Hydrogen is not reactive with the rock salt. Storage in CH4, ie methane/natural gas, is also possible but has two downsides (a) it requires a power-to-gas system with less overall efficiency and (b) it has a greater GWP so any fugitive gas escapes have a higher impact which must be otherwise mitigated. CH4 storage might make sense as an interim solution as existing power plants and home/commercial gas boilers can use it without any changes. |
| nctnico:
--- Quote from: Siwastaja on July 17, 2023, 03:23:43 pm --- --- Quote from: nctnico on July 17, 2023, 02:37:41 pm ---Additionally, the cable alone will not be enough. Storage will need to be added ass well. --- End quote --- Storage as in energy storage? The whole point is that better transmission can reduce the need for storage. There are situations in today's Europe some countries run at negative prices with excess generation while others run their fossils full blast and spot prices skyrocket, at the same minute. There are two completely orthogonal mitigations: storage or transmission. Third is, adding more production, and fourth is, accept the amount of fossils being burned. I see tomorrow's energy systems as combining all four as mentioned. Adding more PV and wind is possible and helps, but it has a limit because the price of each produced kWh starts going up when dimensioned multiple times over the peak demand. Thus, transmission helps: when it's windy and sunny in X, but cloudy and still in Y, transfer excess from X to Y, X gets money from Y and Y needs to pay less than when producing using back-up measures. Also, storage helps: store when excess is available, use when needed. Finally, even if you do all of this, there will be situations when it's super cold everywhere in Europe and wind is totally standstill for two weeks straight over the whole continent, and your new fancy HVDC link from Africa can't simply supply enough. Then you apply the Fourth principle above, and happily burn fossil fuels in your storage, because it simply does not matter in the big picture. --- End quote --- Run some numbers on it to determine price per kWh. Especially for keeping power plants ready to go once in a few years. I'm 100% sure the economics won't make sense because you'll be wasting massive amounts of money on systems that are severely under-utilised. The current way of generating power and distribution is not built because of the use of fossil fuels, it is built that way because it is most cost effective. Use that cost effectiveness as a template for a solution based on renewables. Anything else will just be more expensive due to under-utilisation. |
| tom66:
--- Quote from: nctnico on July 17, 2023, 04:26:27 pm ---Run some numbers on it. Especially for keeping power plants ready to go once in a few years. I'm 100% sure the economics won't make sense because you'll be wasting massive amounts of money on systems that are severely under-utilised. --- End quote --- In the UK, the National Grid company provides balancing services. They are known to pay up to £1,500/MWh (normal price is ~£30/MWh) to provide balancing in constrained periods. An auction system is used where customers either agree to cut off their connection or supply power. For instance the hospital near where I used to live has a 30MWe gas thermal-electricity power plant on site. In normal times it generates 10MW for the hospital (plus hot water and heating in winter) and the turbines run cooler, but if the Grid calls for it, they can push another 20MW into the grid. They don't normally do it because it's not cost effective but 20MW can be all the grid needs to maintain frequency margins. Another common one is larger datacenters will shift over to diesel generators and stop pulling from the grid. OK that's not ideal in terms of emissions but grid stability is paramount. As EVs and home energy storage becomes more common this can integrate into the auction via smart energy tariffs, low/negative price = please consume, high price = cut back and use battery. |
| AVGresponding:
--- Quote from: Siwastaja on July 17, 2023, 03:54:21 pm ---That 5 billion specifically sounds like a small sum of money, Finland can easily pay for it and much more, and we don't except anything in return. --- End quote --- That's because the maths is wrong. 5,000 x 5,000,000 is 25,000,000,000, not 5,000,000,000 |
| tszaboo:
--- Quote from: AVGresponding on July 17, 2023, 04:32:25 pm --- --- Quote from: Siwastaja on July 17, 2023, 03:54:21 pm ---That 5 billion specifically sounds like a small sum of money, Finland can easily pay for it and much more, and we don't except anything in return. --- End quote --- That's because the maths is wrong. 5,000 x 5,000,000 is 25,000,000,000, not 5,000,000,000 --- End quote --- Don't worry, because the price/kwh calculation is also wrong. |
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