Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Datadog dashboard for the Texas power grid

p.datadoghq.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 137 posts

Re: Datadog dashboard for the Texas power grid

#51

Post by dpierce9 »

hk1337 wrote: post #37
dpierce9 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Texas interconnect is not federally regulated. There is also no such thing as a federal operator. There are three interconnects in the US, east, west and Texas. The other interconnects are not run by one central authority (let alone a federal agency). Each one has a mixture of authorities. The eastern interconnect, for instance, is run by several interstate operators (MISO, PJM and ISONE), intrastate orgs (NYISO)…

ERCOT actually falls under Public Utility Commission. Natural Gas actually falls under the Railroad Commission which was one the issues during Uri, ERCOT had no authority to get natural gas flowing to power plants. One of the issues, not the issue.

Thanks for the correction.

FWIW, none of the ISOs I mentioned have the ability to order natural gas to flow either. What they do have, and Texas does not, is a contract with the generators that requires the generators to offer their supply to the market regardless of the price of gas (and associated risks). This doesn’t help if gas isn’t available but generators are not allowed to say ‘buying gas was too expensive or risky or we went home for the evening’. In exchange for signing this contract, the generators receive constant and regular payments during the year for their ‘capacity’, i.e., to be ready and willing to run when called. These payments are significant. This doesn’t always work but it is a notable difference.

Re: Datadog dashboard for the Texas power grid

#52

Post by ajross »

epistasis wrote: post #40
rossdavidh wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tariffs are a thing, but there is absolutely no shortage of demand right now, and hasn't been for a while.

It's a bit more insidious than that, because uncertainty on the part of the importer means that they don't know how much to charge. A tariff action in the future can be assessed on past sales, and when you don't know how much can be assessed, you can't even really hedge or buy and then give rebates later. It's a really fucked up situation.

That may be so, but it remains the case that every wafer that comes out of a solar panel fab gets sold, with a large backlog of demand in every market. And the supply side is responding to that by building out capacity rapidly. Tariffs may or may not be "fucked up" as a matter of principle, but in practice they aren't a barrier.

Re: Datadog dashboard for the Texas power grid

#53

Post by TaylorAlexander »

ajross wrote: post #52
epistasis wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a bit more insidious than that, because uncertainty on the part of the importer means that they don't know how much to charge. A tariff action in the future can be assessed on past sales, and when you don't know how much can be assessed, you can't even really hedge or buy and then give rebates later. It's a really fucked up situation.

That may be so, but it remains the case that every wafer that comes out of a solar panel fab gets sold, with a large backlog of demand in every market. And the supply side is responding to that by building out capacity rapidly. Tariffs may or may not be "fucked up" as a matter of principle, but in practice they aren't a barrier.

Is every wafer that comes out of Asia being purchased in the USA or have tariffs shifted demand to other countries? How have tariffs affected future purchase orders and new factory build outs? I’m just having a hard time believing they have a negligible effect when the worlds second largest economy adds added cost to solar panel imports.

Re: Datadog dashboard for the Texas power grid

#54

Post by epistasis »

ajross wrote: post #52
epistasis wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a bit more insidious than that, because uncertainty on the part of the importer means that they don't know how much to charge. A tariff action in the future can be assessed on past sales, and when you don't know how much can be assessed, you can't even really hedge or buy and then give rebates later. It's a really fucked up situation.

That may be so, but it remains the case that every wafer that comes out of a solar panel fab gets sold, with a large backlog of demand in every market. And the supply side is responding to that by building out capacity rapidly. Tariffs may or may not be "fucked up" as a matter of principle, but in practice they aren't a barrier.

They get sold, just not in the US, or specifically, Texas, as the original poster was asking.

This hurts us in the US, quite a bit. And I wouldn't mind, if it meant that there was going to be a more robust US industry for panel production, as that would be fantastic. But the tariffs don't appear to be designed for that, but instead to benefit a few tiny manufacturers that are not expanding.

Re: Datadog dashboard for the Texas power grid

#55

Post by chasd00 »

maxerickson wrote: post #18
dvasdekis wrote: post #14

The surprising inference from me, as an energy layman, is that solar output coincides with periods of peak demand. Obviously this is seasonally adjusted, but in an era when the Saudis have solar contracts being supplied for $10USD/MWh [0], the potential profits for a solar provider at periods of peak demand seem more than sufficient to encourage investment, especially with interest rates still at a historic low for b…

Solar capacity in Texas tripled since last summer . https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/07/21/heat-ener...

What does it take to setup a decent size solar farm? There’s a lot of cheap, flat, easy to develop land in far west Texas (Brewster county).

Re: Datadog dashboard for the Texas power grid

#56

Post by epistasis »

chasd00 wrote: post #55
maxerickson wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solar capacity in Texas tripled since last summer . https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/07/21/heat-ener...

What does it take to setup a decent size solar farm? There’s a lot of cheap, flat, easy to develop land in far west Texas (Brewster county).

The hardest part tends to be the interconnection to the grid, at least in most of the country. I think that ERCOT is also experiencing geographic regions with consistent grid congestion, though I can't recall which. That data is all public, but there are some providers that make it nice and easy to view:

https://www.energyacuity.com/blog/ercot-lmp-map/

Re: Datadog dashboard for the Texas power grid

#57

Post by oldjavacoder »

maxerickson wrote: post #18
dvasdekis wrote: post #14

The surprising inference from me, as an energy layman, is that solar output coincides with periods of peak demand. Obviously this is seasonally adjusted, but in an era when the Saudis have solar contracts being supplied for $10USD/MWh [0], the potential profits for a solar provider at periods of peak demand seem more than sufficient to encourage investment, especially with interest rates still at a historic low for b…

Solar capacity in Texas tripled since last summer . https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/07/21/heat-ener...

No post body was provided.

Re: Datadog dashboard for the Texas power grid

#58

Post by Godel_unicode »

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #53
ajross wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That may be so, but it remains the case that every wafer that comes out of a solar panel fab gets sold, with a large backlog of demand in every market. And the supply side is responding to that by building out capacity rapidly. Tariffs may or may not be "fucked up" as a matter of principle, but in practice they aren't a barrier.

Is every wafer that comes out of Asia being purchased in the USA or have tariffs shifted demand to other countries? How have tariffs affected future purchase orders and new factory build outs? I’m just having a hard time believing they have a negligible effect when the worlds second largest economy adds added cost to solar panel imports.

They’re pushing purchases to places where there’s already significant renewables and nuclear at the grid level. All uses of solar are not equivalently useful in reducing green house gas emissions.

Re: Datadog dashboard for the Texas power grid

#60

Post by Thorentis »

Chilko wrote: post #45
dvasdekis wrote: post #14

The surprising inference from me, as an energy layman, is that solar output coincides with periods of peak demand. Obviously this is seasonally adjusted, but in an era when the Saudis have solar contracts being supplied for $10USD/MWh [0], the potential profits for a solar provider at periods of peak demand seem more than sufficient to encourage investment, especially with interest rates still at a historic low for b…

I found this really interesting as well as here in New Zealand that relationship is inverted - we don't typically have residential air conditioning yet use a lot of electric heating so our peak demand is in the mornings and evenings, and most intense in the winter. This makes the business case for solar a lot trickier here as the periods of max generation (daytime during the summer) coincides with low demand and subs…

People need to realise that not all forms of renewable generation are good solutions in all parts of the world, just because they're renewable. I hate the "green energy" cults that shout you down for suggesting solar might be bad idea for these sorts of reasons.
Post reply on HN