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Tesla’s big battery in South Australia may prove the viability of renewables

theguardian.com

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Re: Tesla’s big battery in South Australia may prove the viability of renewables

#61

Post by sanxiyn »

resu_nimda wrote: post #56
sanxiyn wrote: post #21

Why is Snowy Hydro 2.0 "ridiculous" and "silly"? What exactly is advantage of battery over pumped storage? Big problem with pumped storage is that it needs specific location, but it seems they already have it. As I understand, pumped storage is cheaper, more energy efficient, more mature technology. I understand battery swithes faster. What else?

Battery technology will continue to mature and at a certain point it will undoubtedly be the better option in most cases. Instead of a giant one-off civil engineering project every time (with all the ways that could go poorly), it would presumably be a relatively straightforward and repeatable install. Unless there is a dire need to bring a ton of storage online right now, it seems that investing in batteries is the…

I agree battery will be better in the future. But it doesn't follow that battery is better investment today.

On civil engineering project going poorly, I think that's the problem of poor project management, but I guess sometimes technical solution to management problem makes sense. I note pumped storage gets built routinely within time and budget without any fuss all over the world.

Re: Tesla’s big battery in South Australia may prove the viability of renewables

#62

Post by ericd »

coolguy4 wrote: post #58
rodgerd wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have the moral high ground forcing others to absorb the cost of your dirty coal. Poisoning people is, in general, a great deal less moral than charging them more money.

The problem is your statement is that CO2 is not poisonous. It is a natural gas that is produced by human breath. It is also not dirty. We're not talking about particles of carbon in the air, we're talking about CO2, an odorless, invisible gas.

Coal puts out a lot other pollutants that are poisonous. Coal kills far more people than nuclear.

Re: Tesla’s big battery in South Australia may prove the viability of renewables

#63

Post by jussij »

sanxiyn wrote: post #21

Why is Snowy Hydro 2.0 "ridiculous" and "silly"? What exactly is advantage of battery over pumped storage? Big problem with pumped storage is that it needs specific location, but it seems they already have it. As I understand, pumped storage is cheaper, more energy efficient, more mature technology. I understand battery swithes faster. What else?

> but it seems they already have it.

The Snowy Mountains (the location of the hydro) is a very long way away from South Australia and not even in the same state.

So for SA location is a problem.

But I think the bigger problem with Snowy Hydro 2.0 is time and the cost.

The Snowy Hydro 2.0 feasibility study has only just begun and will be finished in December of this year.

If that study finds the project is feasible, it will be many years before the project even starts.

Compare that with the SA battery project which will be finished even before Snowy Hydro 2.0 finishes it's feasibility study.

Re: Tesla’s big battery in South Australia may prove the viability of renewables

#64

Post by LoSboccacc »

jdietrich wrote: post #33
shoo wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

that's true. but to dig a bit deeper, who pays each cost and who benefits from the value? who directly benefits from the value of energy: - australian energy consumers - australian energy producers who pays the costs for energy prices: - australian energy consumers who pays the costs for australian emissions *: - people living in australia -- 0.3% of emissions - people living in world excluding australia -- 99.7% of…

Failure to act on climate change has a game-theoretic cost. Taking unilateral action massively improves your negotiating position and reduces the cost for other countries to reduce their emissions via economies of scale. One country taking decisive action could trigger a chain reaction of political pressure. Australia has a horrendous wildfire problem. The frequency and severity of wildfires has drastically increased…

Works the other way too.

First country footing the massive startup bill will have an economy slowdown compared to other that can be dirty a decade or more while the tech and the solution become commodity.

Besides countries won't really change until it's in their economic interest. Taking from your example until the cost of fighting bush fires (and other climate change related stuff) is greater than the cost of implementing a national plan on the whole economy, things won't change. That's why the hop production crisis is a better predictor on government action than bushfires or heat strokes deaths.

Re: Tesla’s big battery in South Australia may prove the viability of renewables

#65

Post by petecox »

nindalf wrote: post #51
coolguy4 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let people who care about the environment pay extra for their electricity. You do not have the moral high ground if you force people to pay extra for electricity through coercion.

You missed his point. If a person is getting something for cheap (coal fired electricity) while allowing the rest of society to pick up the tab (dealing with climate change), perhaps they shouldn't be allowed to. Putting a dollar value on the damage being done through burning coal and adding that to the bill of the people who prefer to burn coal is the best way for them to take responsibility for their actions. Your…

To level the playing field, let's start by removing the reported $AU4Billion/annum subsidies in Australia to fossil fuels. That amounts to over $AU400 per household per year of taxpayer funds...

Re: Tesla’s big battery in South Australia may prove the viability of renewables

#67

Post by jimjimjim »

coolguy4 wrote: post #58
rodgerd wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have the moral high ground forcing others to absorb the cost of your dirty coal. Poisoning people is, in general, a great deal less moral than charging them more money.

The problem is your statement is that CO2 is not poisonous. It is a natural gas that is produced by human breath. It is also not dirty. We're not talking about particles of carbon in the air, we're talking about CO2, an odorless, invisible gas.

The dose makes the poison.

If you are thirsty and you become trapped underwater, you don't just get extremely refreshed!

Re: Tesla’s big battery in South Australia may prove the viability of renewables

#68

Post by jazoom »

imron wrote: post #23
Animats wrote: post #6

Can Tesla deliver the batteries in the next 100 days? Tesla had a battery shortage last quarter when production couldn't keep up, and had to delay some car deliveries.[1] With Model 3 deliveries starting, is Tesla's battery production sufficient? [1] http://money.cnn.com/2017/07/03/technology/tesla-battery-car...

When this first hit the news a few months back, Musk said they'd do it on 90 days or it'd be free. That's a pretty big incentive to get it done quickly.

Now it's 100 days or free.

Re: Tesla’s big battery in South Australia may prove the viability of renewables

#69

Post by petra »

cinquemb wrote: post #57
petra wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much is the price for kwh stored/dispatched , over the long term ? that's the missing data here. And btw: i don't know the economics of this project, but in general, if this was cost effective, Musk would have tons of customers(including power companies), to supply power during peak hours and save them a lot of money.

> Musk would have tons of customers(including power companies), to supply power during peak hours and save them a lot of money. Assuming such customers don't already have existing contractual obligations with existing providers nor assets whose valuation depends on no significant changes to current operations.

It isn't the case. There are many businesses(both utilities and others) who could use a peak shaving solution, especially one as scaleable as batteries.

EDIT: what's unique about the australian installation(in 100 days), is that it is politically driven, or risk management driven(to reduce the risk of outages). see[2].

And so, using a healthy dose of skepticism, All i'm saying: If there's a real economical solution for the big problem of energy storage, real deployments are the test, not politically/risk driven deployments, or psychological/marketing[1] driven deployments(like we see with the power wall).

And this is a repeating pattern with musk(a marketing genius, definetly, and very smart overall), succeeding quite well on the higher end of the market, but when it comes to the more commodity end, his companies are less stellar: see First Solar, or the fact the Renault-Nissan sells more electric cars than Tesla.

[1]https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/how-to-sell-ene...

[2]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14715679

Re: Tesla’s big battery in South Australia may prove the viability of renewables

#70

Post by sanxiyn »

jussij wrote: post #63
sanxiyn wrote: post #21

Why is Snowy Hydro 2.0 "ridiculous" and "silly"? What exactly is advantage of battery over pumped storage? Big problem with pumped storage is that it needs specific location, but it seems they already have it. As I understand, pumped storage is cheaper, more energy efficient, more mature technology. I understand battery swithes faster. What else?

> but it seems they already have it. The Snowy Mountains (the location of the hydro) is a very long way away from South Australia and not even in the same state. So for SA location is a problem. But I think the bigger problem with Snowy Hydro 2.0 is time and the cost. The Snowy Hydro 2.0 feasibility study has only just begun and will be finished in December of this year. If that study finds the project is feasible, i…

Why is it important that something is done quickly? As I understand from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_South_Australian_blackout it was caused by once-in-50-year event. I understand political urgency, but technically there doesn't seem to be anything urgent.
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