We're still going to have rolling blackouts because PGE turns the power off.
Okay but literally there haven't been in years
California invests in battery energy storage, leaving rolling blackouts behind
121–130 of 363 posts
Re: California invests in battery energy storage, leaving rolling blackouts behind
#122This is the way. It's become standard practice in China, which now leads to the world with half of all battery installations.
Much as i dislike China i feel they are pragmatic. I don't know if it's justified but i always give them the benefit of the doubt that they don't do stupid things for no good reason. Unlike Western nations who have to please voters and look good, China has no such constraints and are far more transactional. They don't care about climate emissions. At all. If they think something will be good for them and their econom…
What does rolling blackouts in California have to do with renewables? Opposite, really.
Re: California invests in battery energy storage, leaving rolling blackouts behind
#123When they say their battery storage capacity is 15,000 MW, do they mean MWh? Because watts are time-independent, or rather, they're like speed to Joule's (watt-hour's) distance.
CAISO's own documents quote battery capacity in MW. So I don't think you can just blame journalists.
"Battery storage capacity grew from about 500 MW in 2020 to 13,000 MW in December 2024"
https://www.caiso.com/documents/2024-special-report-on-batte...
As another commenter notes, utilities are interested in "capacity on call" i.e. instant power generation.
Re: California invests in battery energy storage, leaving rolling blackouts behind
#124One of my biggest pet peeves is when outlets talk about energy storage exclusively in terms of output and neglect to mention capacity. Does 15.7 gigawatts of storage mean 15.7 GWh? Capacity is as important, if not more important, than output.
Re: California invests in battery energy storage, leaving rolling blackouts behind
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
While Sodium Ion may be the future of grid batteries, it's not the present. As long as LFP is cheaper, there is no reason to go with Sodium. This calculus will probably change in 3-5 years, but today Sodium is more expensive and therefore has little demand without some form of discount or subsidy. The switch will be rapid once the economics make sense, but they don't yet.
CATL is claiming mass production of their sodium-ion batteries starts in December, with a target price of $10/kWh. If that ends up even partway true it'll completely change the economics of power storage.
CATL is just dumping
Re: California invests in battery energy storage, leaving rolling blackouts behind
#126[deleted]
Re: California invests in battery energy storage, leaving rolling blackouts behind
#127Earlier quoted context omitted.
PG&E's corruption is laid bare by Silicon Valley Power, which serves the town of Santa Clara, charging less than half what PG&E does for the house a few blocks over [1]. [1] https://www.siliconvalleypower.com/residents/rates-and-fees
I will only put this down once because I repeat it in many threads and I'm sure people are tired of hearing it, but the reason that isolated municipal utilities are offering great prices locally is that they are free-riding on things that PG&E ratepayers bought.
> they are free-riding on things that PG&E ratepayers bought
Genuinely curious, how is that the case for Silicon Valley Power?
Re: California invests in battery energy storage, leaving rolling blackouts behind
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
CATL is claiming mass production of their sodium-ion batteries starts in December, with a target price of $10/kWh. If that ends up even partway true it'll completely change the economics of power storage.
CATL is just dumping
What makes you say that? I don’t know this space very well
Re: California invests in battery energy storage, leaving rolling blackouts behind
#129Re: California invests in battery energy storage, leaving rolling blackouts behind
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
Much as i dislike China i feel they are pragmatic. I don't know if it's justified but i always give them the benefit of the doubt that they don't do stupid things for no good reason. Unlike Western nations who have to please voters and look good, China has no such constraints and are far more transactional. They don't care about climate emissions. At all. If they think something will be good for them and their econom…
What does rolling blackouts in California have to do with renewables? Opposite, really.
Renewables are intermittent and therefore unreliable. Also unless california has gone for lots of redundancy the would also be displacing fossil fuel power plants. Again i'm not trashing renewables, because what's wrong with free energy. What i am doing automatically is wondering why batteries are a better option then traditional power stations.
California does have much more expensive electricity then anywhere else, so it is reasonable for me to scrutinise their energy plans more closely and question whether their current strategy is really the best one.