California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
pv-magazine-usa.com
California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
1–10 of 61 posts
Re: California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
#2Take a shot every time the article uses "GW" and "MWh/GWh" apparently interchangeably for "energy" or "power", also seemingly at random.
Re: California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
#3Take a shot every time the article uses "GW" and "MWh/GWh" apparently interchangeably for "energy" or "power", also seemingly at random.
"My car runs 100 miles!" instead of "My car runs 100 miles per gallon!", and almost anyone would notice something is amiss. I don't get the difference to mixing "Watts" with "Watts/hour".
Re: California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
#4Energy storage projects are typically described in terms of maximum power (megawatts) and hours of supply at peak power. Multiplying hours and megawatts gives megawatt hours, a unit of energy. Gigawatts and gigawatt hours are just different magnitude units for the same power and energy values, like meters and millimeters.
Most electrical grids experience peak demand in the early evening when people come home from work, turn on lights, cook dinner, etc. This peak period is usually on the order of 4 hours. This early evening period is also when solar output drops toward zero.
Energy storage projects in CA are currently generally provisioned for 2-4 hours of storage to ensure a good match to this daily evening demand peak and dropping solar output. Storage is still expensive so it doesn't make financial sense to add capacity that isn't going to be used most days.
Some of these projects publish detailed information about power and energy. Others just publicize power, but given what is known about the California market their energy capacity can still be estimated to a reasonable degree.
Re: California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
#5Take a shot every time the article uses "GW" and "MWh/GWh" apparently interchangeably for "energy" or "power", also seemingly at random.
"My car runs 100 miles!" instead of "My car runs 100 miles per gallon!", and almost anyone would notice something is amiss. I don't get the difference to mixing "Watts" with "Watts/hour".
Energy is not Watts per hour (Watts/hour), it's Watts times hours (Watt-hours). Sorry for pedantry, but the units are the topic of discussion here.
Re: California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
#6Take a shot every time the article uses "GW" and "MWh/GWh" apparently interchangeably for "energy" or "power", also seemingly at random.
"My car runs 100 miles!" instead of "My car runs 100 miles per gallon!", and almost anyone would notice something is amiss. I don't get the difference to mixing "Watts" with "Watts/hour".
Not knowing the difference in miles and miles/gallon will get you stranded in your car pretty quickly. Now knowing the difference between watts and watts/hour will have almost no appreciable effect on your life. You flip a switch, the light turns on, and you get an invoice a month later.
Re: California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
#7Energy storage projects are typically described in terms of maximum power (megawatts) and hours of supply at peak power. Multiplying hours and megawatts gives megawatt hours, a unit of energy. Gigawatts and gigawatt hours are just different magnitude units for the same power and energy values, like meters and millimeters. Most electrical grids experience peak demand in the early evening when people come home from wor…
> Gigawatts and gigawatt hours are just different magnitude units for the same quantities, like meters and millimeters.
I liken it more to distance vs speed. Power, like speed, is a rate, in particular the instantaneous rate at which energy is transferred.
Expressed using the same scheme we use for speed (distance per time : power per time), power is watt-hours per hour (or 0.0036 megajoules per hour).
I'm guessing we express power differently because James Watt codified the standard unit for power and the standard for electrical energy came from the time-integral of his definition of power.
Re: California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
#8$FCG & $TELL - I've bought heavily levered.
Gonna be a gnarly market.
Re: California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
#9Energy storage projects are typically described in terms of maximum power (megawatts) and hours of supply at peak power. Multiplying hours and megawatts gives megawatt hours, a unit of energy. Gigawatts and gigawatt hours are just different magnitude units for the same power and energy values, like meters and millimeters. Most electrical grids experience peak demand in the early evening when people come home from wor…
> Gigawatts and gigawatt hours are just different magnitude units for the same quantities, like meters and millimeters. I liken it more to distance vs speed. Power, like speed, is a rate, in particular the instantaneous rate at which energy is transferred. Expressed using the same scheme we use for speed (distance per time : power per time), power is watt-hours per hour (or 0.0036 megajoules per hour). I'm guessing w…
I meant the "giga" units relative to their "mega" counterparts. Same physical quantities but multiplied by 1000.
Re: California breaks 1 GW energy storage milestone
#10Energy storage projects are typically described in terms of maximum power (megawatts) and hours of supply at peak power. Multiplying hours and megawatts gives megawatt hours, a unit of energy. Gigawatts and gigawatt hours are just different magnitude units for the same power and energy values, like meters and millimeters. Most electrical grids experience peak demand in the early evening when people come home from wor…
Everything about these storage projects is available as public records from the CPUC, down to the site plan drawings.