How Windmills as Wide as Jumbo Jets Are Making Clean Energy Mainstream

Post by toomuchtodo » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 4:27 PM UTC

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #49

shaqbert wrote: post #2

As the production costs with windpower decrease due to the technological progress, the question of grid storage and grid interconnection becomes more pressing. E.g. in Germany, they frequently have days of negative energy prices, where producers need to pay to feed energy into the greed because of overproduction of energy on windy/sunny days [0](in German). Without storage and grid interconnection, there is only so m…

Can you explain why you think these negative prices are a bad thing? I think they're an efficient use of market based tools to ensure that the group who can reduce the input to the grid does so, and to incentivize electricity production that can meet the flexible demands of the grid (e.g. slow ramping coal would be penalised over fast ramping gas without any regulation needing to specifically target the coal and the…

Post by loco5niner » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 4:28 PM UTC

dmd wrote: post #110

everyone wrote: post #66

I like this article. I like that is has nice big pictures and videos, but they dont do that stupid big 'screenspace' image thing that seems to be popular in these sorts of articles now. Also their control centre looks horrible. Wheres all the crap on their desks? I hope they only just had to tidy it away for the sake of a press photo.

The guy on the left appears hard at work looking at an empty Windows desktop.

Post by coryfklein » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 4:29 PM UTC

ams6110 wrote: post #143

fulafel wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When power gets more expensive in the evenings, a lot of heating/cooling/charging loads may shift in time. Also, hvdc grids let you transmit over a couple of timezones. (And wind does not have the problem the first place, obviously)

If possible, but it may only get worse. If EVs become more prevalent, it will only increase the evening demand as most people will charge when they get home from work. Sure, maybe with timers you can shift that to midnight or something, but it's still happening at a time when Solar adds nothing. You can't just toss out something like HVDC grids as a quick solution. That kind of infrastructure takes decades to build o…

Post by coryfklein » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 4:31 PM UTC

saalweachter wrote: post #153

sfifs wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heating and cooling needs are fairly inelastic temporally. Your house is going to get cold in winter and hot in summer. You'll need to consume energy for this which is largely during the evening when everyone returns from work as you have fewer and fewer single income families. The refrigerator runs through the day. Sure you can set the dryer and dishwasher if you have one to run at a time when the power rates are lo…

You can add components with high, desirable thermal mass to your heating/cooling system to time-shift that as well. You heat and cool your thermal mass when energy is cheap and then use your thermal mass to heat and cool your house much more efficiently during expensive energy periods.

Post by toomuchtodo » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 4:34 PM UTC

coryfklein wrote: post #167

saalweachter wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can add components with high, desirable thermal mass to your heating/cooling system to time-shift that as well. You heat and cool your thermal mass when energy is cheap and then use your thermal mass to heat and cool your house much more efficiently during expensive energy periods.

In most cases adding a swimming-pool sized tank of water to your house complete with a heat-exchange system to save $40 a month on your electric bill isn't going to be very economical, let alone practical.