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Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

economist.com

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Re: Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

#21

Post by r00fus »

PlunderBunny wrote: post #9

> "lots of self-generated power will ultimately be wasted." This is sunlight falling on a roof. If you convert it into electricity but then don't use that electricity, is it really a waste? It's like saying that the overflow from my water tank that collects rain water off the roof is 'wasting' water. It could be argued that it's a waste in the sense that the generated electricity could have gone to someone else if th…

The hubris in this article is unreal: it's posing that privately owned utilities are a good thing and that bypassing them is some crime that's done by ratepayers. I hope that business model dies in a fire.

Instead the entire paradigm of centralized generation may need to be called into question and we should instead be focusing on a hybrid centralized baseline + local generation and storage. Places like China do fine with promoting residential solar where nearly half the solar was on residential rooftops (2023) [1].

[1] https://globalenergymonitor.org/report/china-continues-to-le...

Re: Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

#22

Post by pests »

0_____0 wrote: post #14
conradev wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> After ComEd receives confirmation that the project has passed municipal inspection, it can take anywhere from 6 to 18 weeks to complete the permanent residential electric service and up to 6 months for a permanent industrial electric service, depending on the amount of work required. 6 month turnaround sounds pretty weak. https://secure.comed.com/MyAccount/MyService/Pages/RequestIn...

How long do you expect it to take? Related: I've been trying to get my electric company to register the meters they installed in August so I can get billed properly. It's been months of back and forth. I just want to pay them money for electricity, it's all I want from them.

Had a similar situation back in 2018/2019. Electric company offered a flat rate for electric vehicle charging but you needed to install a second meter. Took them forever to install the actual meter (it had been jumped by the electricians and covered by cardboard) and then months of not being billed for it.

Re: Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

#23

Post by Vecr »

bb88 wrote: post #19
YurgenJurgensen wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solar panels use energy to create, and have a finite lifespan. If energy is generated but not used, it makes the average lifetime efficiency decrease. This does result in wasted energy.

Do you know the mechanism behind this?

The electricity is switched off. If the system is fancy, maybe it's on a lower duty cycle. The panels just sit there, rotting, wasting their embodied energy.

Re: Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

#24

Post by sanderjd »

daedrdev wrote: post #16
PlunderBunny wrote: post #9

> "lots of self-generated power will ultimately be wasted." This is sunlight falling on a roof. If you convert it into electricity but then don't use that electricity, is it really a waste? It's like saying that the overflow from my water tank that collects rain water off the roof is 'wasting' water. It could be argued that it's a waste in the sense that the generated electricity could have gone to someone else if th…

The other grid operators have to lower their production during the day. That itself can be expensive, but more importantly they run their same equipment to power fewer hours of the day; when solar is not available, which is expensive since they have significant fixed costs. Batteries are not a grid scale solution any time soon, but maybe one day.

I guess you could say "batteries are not a grid scale solution" as long as you ignore ERCOT and CAISO...

Re: Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

#25

Post by sanderjd »

conradev wrote: post #7
flyinghamster wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ComEd, the main electrical provider in northern Illinois, actively encourages homes and businesses to install solar power and offers net metering to solar-equipped customers. https://www.comed.com/smart-energy/my-green-power-connection...

> After ComEd receives confirmation that the project has passed municipal inspection, it can take anywhere from 6 to 18 weeks to complete the permanent residential electric service and up to 6 months for a permanent industrial electric service, depending on the amount of work required. 6 month turnaround sounds pretty weak. https://secure.comed.com/MyAccount/MyService/Pages/RequestIn...

Six months for "permanent industrial electric service" sounds pretty reasonable, actually.

Re: Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

#26

Post by strken »

4d4m wrote: post #3

I mean, what power grid provider makes it easy to work with them to sell solar back to the grid? Bogus fees, negative rate metering, and lobbying against the consumer drives consumers to ever-cheaper solar and storage options. This is self inflicted behavior from monopolies that ignore user research.

What's wrong with negative electricity pricing? Are utilities meant to let consumers overvolt the grid and use their industrial customers and utility-scale generators to counteract it without any compensation or disincentive?

Re: Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

#27

Post by bb88 »

xrd wrote: post #13

Lots of threads lately about power utilities making bad decisions and barriers to starting public utilities, indirectly which can lead to fires and home loss. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42971311 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42975492 If the privately owned utilities are left to their own devices when solar comes in and eats their lunch, expect more "climate change driven disasters," right?

Don't forget about regulatory capture too. If Idaho Power (e.g. because they're in a republican state with a bunch of wildfires lately) fails or is culpable for billions caused by fires by their lax equipment, someone will bail them out -- probably the tax payer.

If the tax payer is ultimately on the hook, then the tax payers should own the utility.

Re: Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

#28

Post by advael »

Weird how when the rapacious whims of capitalists destroy things people value the economists posit that "those things weren't viable in the market, we have to be realistic" but when business models that capital finds valuable are under threat from technological commodification the line is "disaster, death spiral"

I have to say, my days of not taking economics seriously as a science are certainly coming to a middle

Re: Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

#29

Post by chironjit »

PlunderBunny wrote: post #9

> "lots of self-generated power will ultimately be wasted." This is sunlight falling on a roof. If you convert it into electricity but then don't use that electricity, is it really a waste? It's like saying that the overflow from my water tank that collects rain water off the roof is 'wasting' water. It could be argued that it's a waste in the sense that the generated electricity could have gone to someone else if th…

Exactly. This statement quite really does not make sense as this is literally how electricity works with grid too, since you need to have a reserve margin

I do find the rest of the article more or less balanced in the discussion of the issue, even though it tries very hard not to actually squarely put blame where it lies

Re: Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

#30

Post by twelvechairs »

daedrdev wrote: post #16
PlunderBunny wrote: post #9

> "lots of self-generated power will ultimately be wasted." This is sunlight falling on a roof. If you convert it into electricity but then don't use that electricity, is it really a waste? It's like saying that the overflow from my water tank that collects rain water off the roof is 'wasting' water. It could be argued that it's a waste in the sense that the generated electricity could have gone to someone else if th…

The other grid operators have to lower their production during the day. That itself can be expensive, but more importantly they run their same equipment to power fewer hours of the day; when solar is not available, which is expensive since they have significant fixed costs. Batteries are not a grid scale solution any time soon, but maybe one day.

You can also adjust energy prices to shape demand. It's not like baseload power plants have ever had constant demands there's always a curve.

The solution is of course a mix. Solar/wind/hydrogen/gas/etc., big grid/home systems. It will require grid upgrades.

Batteries are already happening [0]. And electric cars + home solar systems with batteries have a further ability to allow additions to this at scale if the grid supports it

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battery_energy_storage_syste...

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