361–370 of 397 posts
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It IS unfashionable, dams are actively being removed across the US in order to restore the ecosystems they shattered. Migratory fish and all predators higher up the trophic chain are devastated by any type of dam.
I'm wondering if we should even accept the framing of that as "fashion" and not "large-scale action spurred by a rational shared reevaluation of impact"
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Pumped Hydro doesn't have to be built on a river - you just need a pair of reservoirs that you can fill and transfer water between. This obviously destroys the ecosystem of the valley you use, but at least you're not impacting river water temperatures/sedimentation/fish spawning/etc.
It does not, in fact, need to destroy any ecosystem.
Obviously hydroelectricity is massively damaging to ecosystems. My day job includes designing hydroelectric control systems and even I can admit that. That's a big part of the reason that hydro is a non-starter in much of the western world, which is probably a reasonably good thing (although there are certainly some exceptions where hydro development seems like a no-brainer to me but I digress) What's not so clear to…
I think the main reason is that not everybody has the geography conducive for pumped Hydro. Here in Kansas we have a ton of wind energy production and we’re lucky enough to have a nuclear reactor as well. It’d really be nice to store that, but we have no mountains. We have a rolling plain in the middle of the state but even the highest/lowest delta is like 200-300 ft (I made that number up).
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The world produces and uses 700 cubic kilometers (at STP) of hydrogen annually. Hydrogen has been used on a mass scale industrially since the 1800s. The US has over 1000 miles of hydrogen pipelines. There are obviously off the shelf components for dealing with hydrogen. This is not some hand wringing unsolved problem.
It can be used there are just better, cheaper options. Same for compressed air, molten salt, tidal power or a litany of other working tech that doesnt hit the right price/performance point.
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The scenario you've described still begs the question though. It seems the only difference between traditional hydroelectricity and pumped storage is how much you disrupt the natural flow from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario. The hard limit is when the Niagara Falls run dry. Anything more than that is basically spending electricity to create a treadmill for fish, which may be the environmentally responsible thing but we sh…
We let stuff migrate upriver years ago when they added a lock system back in 1829. At this point any environmental harm from connecting these lakes has already happened generations ago well before we where born. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welland_Canal Anyway, the amount of water flowing over Niagara Falls is currently regulated hourly by treaty with excess flows above that level used to generate hydroelectricity.…
I wasn't aware of the treaty, that makes sense.
The link about turning off the American side of the falls doesn't really support the implication that there is enough hydroelectric capacity to use up the entire flow of the river. The simplest explanation is that the flow was diverted over to the Canadian falls.
Obviously hydroelectricity is massively damaging to ecosystems. My day job includes designing hydroelectric control systems and even I can admit that. That's a big part of the reason that hydro is a non-starter in much of the western world, which is probably a reasonably good thing (although there are certainly some exceptions where hydro development seems like a no-brainer to me but I digress) What's not so clear to…
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Can you create an underground reservoir, say from an expired oil field, that is of sufficient capacity to create a pumped hydro system in concert with a ground-level reservoir?
In theory, yes. But I do not believe an oil field would be suitable. Hydro relies on a pressure difference. This means you want the turbine located at the lower reservoir, which is going to be tricky with an oil well. Oil fields are not a hole filled with oil but instead are just porous rock, which greatly limits the flow rate you can achieve from a single well. Oil fields are already pressurized, so you'd actually n…
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One destroys an ecosystem and fishery. The other moves water between ponds.
Never understood that to be honest.. we can today build quite excellent tunnels that are crossable for fishes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_B5bZvCdJY Just make it go to almost the same depth and you dont even loose water..
Grand Coulee Dam should be demolished, but won't be.
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Such hydrogen storage facilities already exist, actually. But the hydrogen the store is produced via steam reformation which emits carbon. The big issue with hydrogen storage cheaply producing hydrogen without producing CO2.
There is in fact no such issue because literally no one is even considering producing hydrogen for energy storage in that way.
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It does not, in fact, need to destroy any ecosystem.
No matter where you put the few cubic kilometers of water that pumped hydro requires, you need to put it somewhere . The ecosystem of that place will then be displaced or destroyed.
A reservoir can increase scarce habitat for migratory birds, which is commonly much more valuable than your typical bald hilltop.