Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows • Hacker News Board

Re: Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows

#141

Post by seanmcdirmid » Thu, Apr 23, 2020, 4:48 AM UTC

lightgreen wrote: post #140

205guy wrote: post #75

This is the future. Using algorithms to optimize usage of renewable energy. Not only will it be lower carbon, it will be cheaper. What's interesting is they describe it working on forecasts (for wind and sun) instead of instantaneous renewable production. I wonder what the rationale for that was? Basing the algorithm on instantaneous information should be more accurate and thus give better savings, but maybe it varie…

The future is nuclear power, and when companies buy hardware they use it at max performance around the clock because energy is cheap and does not depend on weather. There’s huge lie (by omission) about renewables: nobody explained how to convert the world to 100% renewable energy without coal backup.

Coal and nuclear are both inflexible power sources, they are either on or off, and they are hard to turn on and off. Nuclear does have the benefit of being cheap after very high initial capital costs. Natural gas is a much better backup to renewables however, since it can turned on and off at will. Dam hydroelectric also has that nice quality (send water through the generator when you need it, otherwise let it stay in the reservoir).

Given nuclear’s inflexibility, doing untimely work when less electricity is needed for more timely needs is also a win.

Re: Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows

#142

Post by lightgreen » Thu, Apr 23, 2020, 4:58 AM UTC

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #141

lightgreen wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The future is nuclear power, and when companies buy hardware they use it at max performance around the clock because energy is cheap and does not depend on weather. There’s huge lie (by omission) about renewables: nobody explained how to convert the world to 100% renewable energy without coal backup.

Coal and nuclear are both inflexible power sources, they are either on or off, and they are hard to turn on and off. Nuclear does have the benefit of being cheap after very high initial capital costs. Natural gas is a much better backup to renewables however, since it can turned on and off at will. Dam hydroelectric also has that nice quality (send water through the generator when you need it, otherwise let it stay i…

“they are either on or off”

This is not true about neither nuclear nor coal.

Nuclear reaction can be slowed down, coal furnace can be used with lower amount of coal at lower temperature.

Nuclear does not need to be turned on or off spontaneously. Nuclear power plant can increase or decrease power smoothly, and that’s practically enough because consumption patterns are easily predicted.

The inflexibility you are describing is nonissue.

High capital cost is. But the largest issue is irrational fears of voters.

Edit: nuclear or coal are not on or off

Re: Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows

#143

Post by martincollignon » Thu, Apr 23, 2020, 5:39 AM UTC

floatrock wrote: post #26

martincollignon wrote: post #5

COO from Tomorrow here (who provides the CO2 forecast data to Google). Happy to answer any questions!

Great collab with Google! They've been probably the most serious corporate wrt getting all-renewable offsets for their operations... this is helping them reach the next milestone where the renewable offsets are time-matched. Great example of being serious about this stuff rather than just greenwashing. It sounds like this project is for their own operations. Have you guys thought about how to offer this closer to a t…

Thanks a lot for the support and encouragement! More info coming soon about a turnkey solution ;-)

Re: Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows

#144

Post by berkes » Thu, Apr 23, 2020, 5:41 AM UTC

lightgreen wrote: post #142

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coal and nuclear are both inflexible power sources, they are either on or off, and they are hard to turn on and off. Nuclear does have the benefit of being cheap after very high initial capital costs. Natural gas is a much better backup to renewables however, since it can turned on and off at will. Dam hydroelectric also has that nice quality (send water through the generator when you need it, otherwise let it stay i…

“they are either on or off” This is not true about neither nuclear nor coal. Nuclear reaction can be slowed down, coal furnace can be used with lower amount of coal at lower temperature. Nuclear does not need to be turned on or off spontaneously. Nuclear power plant can increase or decrease power smoothly, and that’s practically enough because consumption patterns are easily predicted. The inflexibility you are descr…

They can be slowed down. True.

But that takes minutes or hours to do. And on anything but 100% power, the fuel innefficiency is bad. That latter is mostly a problem with coal, but even nuclear is burning fuel and costing wear.

Plants can be optimized to react really fast, or run efficient on lower capacity, or run efficient on max capacity. Choose one.

Re: Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows

#145

Post by eximius » Thu, Apr 23, 2020, 5:44 AM UTC

jdofaz wrote: post #123

eximius wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Griddy in Texas is a wholesale energy provider for consumers that passes on the fees set by the Texas grid regulatory agency every 5 minutes.

I think Griddy is a cool idea but only if you have something to automatically cut your usage when the price spikes to $9 per kWh like it did last summer.

It spiked to the regulatory max of $5, which hit me while I was at work. I still saved money compared to most other energy plans in my area.

Though yes, it would have been better if I could have adjusted.

Re: Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows

#146

Post by mint2 » Thu, Apr 23, 2020, 5:50 AM UTC

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #141

lightgreen wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The future is nuclear power, and when companies buy hardware they use it at max performance around the clock because energy is cheap and does not depend on weather. There’s huge lie (by omission) about renewables: nobody explained how to convert the world to 100% renewable energy without coal backup.

Coal and nuclear are both inflexible power sources, they are either on or off, and they are hard to turn on and off. Nuclear does have the benefit of being cheap after very high initial capital costs. Natural gas is a much better backup to renewables however, since it can turned on and off at will. Dam hydroelectric also has that nice quality (send water through the generator when you need it, otherwise let it stay i…

I don’t see nuclear making it big any time soon. There’s too much up front costs, but in theory one could make use of any excess heat during off peak hours.

For example desalination, hydrogen production, indoor growing with the light cycle at night or whenever the low demand period is, etc...

For the near future I’d only expect small modular reactors to see much use in areas with unreliable sunlight for chunks of the year. Especially since they could use the waste heat for heating/growing.

Re: Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows

#147

Post by seanmcdirmid » Thu, Apr 23, 2020, 6:08 AM UTC

mint2 wrote: post #146

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coal and nuclear are both inflexible power sources, they are either on or off, and they are hard to turn on and off. Nuclear does have the benefit of being cheap after very high initial capital costs. Natural gas is a much better backup to renewables however, since it can turned on and off at will. Dam hydroelectric also has that nice quality (send water through the generator when you need it, otherwise let it stay i…

I don’t see nuclear making it big any time soon. There’s too much up front costs, but in theory one could make use of any excess heat during off peak hours. For example desalination, hydrogen production, indoor growing with the light cycle at night or whenever the low demand period is, etc... For the near future I’d only expect small modular reactors to see much use in areas with unreliable sunlight for chunks of the…

Nuclear with hydro/pumped storage is an interesting combo: use the extra nuclear power to pump water up into a reservoir and then when extra energy is needed, move the water down through a turbine. The reservoir is basically a battery in this context.

Waste heat isn’t really recyclable, or it wouldn’t be waste heat :).

Re: Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows

#148

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Apr 23, 2020, 6:23 AM UTC

205guy wrote: post #75

This is the future. Using algorithms to optimize usage of renewable energy. Not only will it be lower carbon, it will be cheaper. What's interesting is they describe it working on forecasts (for wind and sun) instead of instantaneous renewable production. I wonder what the rationale for that was? Basing the algorithm on instantaneous information should be more accurate and thus give better savings, but maybe it varie…

[deleted]

Re: Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows

#149

Post by gregoryl » Thu, Apr 23, 2020, 6:24 AM UTC

johnb wrote: post #111

konschubert wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This will only work with fine-grained energy pricing (on the scale of minutes) and smart meters. Does this exist anywhere in the world?

It does in Australia: https://www.amberelectric.com.au/ (disclaimer: I work there)

I can see you're hiring; I'm on the market, what's your thoughts about the workplace? Super interesting industry!

Re: Our data centers now work harder when the sun shines and wind blows

#150

Post by rcMgD2BwE72F » Thu, Apr 23, 2020, 7:02 AM UTC

jdm2212 wrote: post #45

rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #40

I hope this doesn't add to much cost to their cloud customers' bills. They've worked so hard to sell their AI solutions to the fossil fuel industry, lately, so they can help them extract and burn more oil and gas[0]. [0] https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/1/3/21030688/google-amazon-a...

Why would AI solutions help the fossil fuel industry burn more oil and gas? The fossil fuel industry sells oil and gas to others to burn, it doesn't light the stuff up itself for fun.

Almost all the oil we extract must be burned. There's far too little need for oil as a non-energy source, and there's a very good reason why the price of WTI is so low these days. The industry simply cannot find enough customers to burn it.

How can Google, while helping others extract as much oil as possible, can still pretend it may not end up being burned?

It's like a a drug dealer saying "I'm definitely not helping anyone taking drugs. I'm only selling it, they stay them somewhere if they please. Don't blame me".