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Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

the-independent.com

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Re: Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

#501

Post by Moldoteck »

psychoslave wrote: post #113
Moldoteck wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Cooling french nukes was never a problem. In that period France was net exporting 14GW. Cooling in general isn't a problem - some modulation is done just to save fish. Maybe you are confusing with 2022 when half of french fleet was shut down to check for potential pipe cracks/corrosion esp in one of their reactor designs due to poor geometry. But that's unrelated to droughts

That said, cooling does have an effect on ecosystems. Not the worst energy plant impact on that regard, but still not like it's all environmental friendly. And of course, there is the what to do with the waste dilemma. And at least with current French park, there is a dependence on the rarer kind of uranium.

Waste dilemma? You either bury it (Onkalo, Cigeo, Fosmark, etc...) like any other waste that must be isolated forever (herfa neurode) or you do some recycling one way or another, or both.

Impact on environment from nuclear is minimal per UNECE. And cooling impact is minimal too, esp with towers. Uranium can be sourced from a variety of countries and enriched locally. Nuclear in general needs least amount of mining and materials per kwh

Re: Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

#502

Post by Moldoteck »

tialaramex wrote: post #374
hunterpayne wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All thermal plants have this same issue, not just nuclear. And if you lose the natural gas peakers (which are also thermal and thus has this issue), you lose your baseload renewables too. Not that it matters, renewables used for baseload make more CO2 than just using FFs. Variability is a terrible quality in an energy source.

Right, so rather than "We should have more thermal plants" what you want is a non-thermal electrical generator, and what do you know all the major renewable sources qualify, whether that's a wind turbine, hydro-electric or PV. Do you know what else you'd get a lot of if it's so hot in the summer that you can't use lake and river water for cooling? Sunlight to run your PV. Because that's exactly why the water was heat…

you can in fact use water for cooling. It's that sometimes you may be concerned about fish and not hurt it, esp with passthrough systems. But there are even more adv solutions (wastewater, dry cooling combo)

Re: Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

#503

Post by ViewTrick1002 »

littlestymaar wrote: post #496
ViewTrick1002 wrote: post #495

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Random sources on the internet" = the pan European entity responsible for the largest grid in the world and FERC. Thanks again for confirming that not a thing I've said has been false. Why are you so afraid of renewables? When will France fix their economy by not wasting hundreds of billions on insane handouts and state capitalism?

> "Random sources on the internet" = the pan European entity responsible for the largest grid in the world and FERC. = a source that you picked at random without reading it (and which doesn't back your argument since it acknowledges the fact that renewable render the grid more vulnerable, but who cares about the facts). > Why are you so afraid of renewables? I'm not, it's a projection of your own fear of nuclear thou…

I just read enough of it to verify its accuracy as to the point I was making.

It also verifies that the US has required non-synchronous plants to manage this for the past decade. And for that matter, I just picked the US because it is well known jurisdiction. All reasonable grids, except Spain until after the blackout, have the same regulations in terms of managing reactive power.

Managing reactive power is trivial to do today. But since it is not free it won't be done unless if the grid operator requires it.

I have no fear of nuclear power. I always argue that we should keep our existing nuclear reactors around as long as they are:

1. Safe

2. Needed

3. Economical

In that order. The problem is wasting decades of opportunity cost and trillions on handouts to new built nuclear power when we still need to decarbonize industry, aviation, shipping, construction, agriculture etc.

And then you finish off by living on almost half a century old merits. Like I said, the French should keep the fleet around as long as the criteria I mentioned above requires it.

The problem is wasting hundreds of billions on handouts to new built nuclear power when renewables and storage are the cheapest energy source in human history.

Don't let the French pride make you become the next Greece.

Re: Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

#504

Post by ViewTrick1002 »

mpweiher wrote: post #493
ViewTrick1002 wrote: post #492

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are. Why are you so afraid of renewables and storage?

You are projecting your unfounded fear of nuclear onto me. I am not "afraid" of renewables in the least. I know their limitations. And I know that nuclear works. Despite your rants that have nothing to do with the facts.

You are. As evident by all your ramblings, desperately clinging to outdated talking points.

All you know is that half a century old nuclear power works acceptably. Built in an entirely different economic era.

What we also know is that forcing new built nuclear power costs on the ratepayers would lead to an energy crisis. You can pay it with the taxes, but that doesn't make the cost dissappear.

Why waste trillions on handouts and decades of opportunity cost on new built nuclear power when renewables and storage are the cheapest energy source in human history?

We still need to decarbonize industry, aviation, shipping, construction, agriculture etc. We don't have the luxury of dallying with the dead end that is new built nuclear power we have already confirmed.

Re: Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

#505

Post by Earl_Bardsley »

peterashford wrote: post #476
XorNot wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the cost and expense of building a pumped hydro plant though, you could just deploy batteries which will do the same thing for a much lower capital and management investment and vastly simplified engineering. And a higher round-trip efficiency. LiFePO4 works to demand shift on a daily cycle just fine and scales better to solar input (where you need much higher power handling so you can charge it on limited sunlig…

I think that's the point about the lake Onslow project - its MASSIVE. So yes, expensive, but months of backup for the whole country would not be cheap even with batteries

It seems a long time ago now since I first proposed the possibility of pumped storage at Lake Onslow. But just confirming - having the equivalent amount of energy (4-5 TWh) in batteries would be impossibly expensive. Also, the batteries would need to be replaced from time to time.

Re: Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

#506

Post by devilbunny »

bogeholm wrote: post #134
direwolf20 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are blessed with all three of hydro, geothermal, and wind.

Do we have many countries around where wind is not a thing?

I'd imagine quite a lot of smaller ones don't have anything. Take a look at https://energy.usgs.gov/uswtdb/viewer/ and notice that huge swaths of the US have almost no wind turbines.

Re: Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

#507

Post by Earl_Bardsley »

peterashford wrote: post #476
XorNot wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the cost and expense of building a pumped hydro plant though, you could just deploy batteries which will do the same thing for a much lower capital and management investment and vastly simplified engineering. And a higher round-trip efficiency. LiFePO4 works to demand shift on a daily cycle just fine and scales better to solar input (where you need much higher power handling so you can charge it on limited sunlig…

I think that's the point about the lake Onslow project - its MASSIVE. So yes, expensive, but months of backup for the whole country would not be cheap even with batteries

The 1000 MW installed pump/generating capacity of the proposed Lake Onslow Scheme is not unusual by world standards. However, its energy storage capacity (up to 5 TWh) would appear to make it the world's largest pumped storage scheme by energy storage measure. The unusual ratio between energy storage and installed capacity comes about from New Zealand's special hydro generation situation. Hydro is the dominant mode of power generation but national hydro storage capacity is relatively limited. This makes hydro electricity output vulnerable to extended dry periods. Developed to 5 TWh of storage, the large Lake Onslow Scheme would more that double New Zealand's total hydro storage capacity. The scheme would thus provide dry period insurance as well carrying out the usual short-term pumping and generating operations. It would be an open-cycle system. The lower reservoir is the Clutha River, which is New Zealand's largest river by discharge measure.

Re: Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

#508

Post by thatcat »

ViewTrick1002 wrote: post #484
littlestymaar wrote: post #481

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You do realize that it’s quite telling that you still haven’t been able to point out a single of these ”falsehoods” nor been able to provide any factual information of your own? Brandolini's law. And I'm not going to spend any effort with someone who use "sources" they haven't even read… > Why are you so afraid of renewables and storage? I'm not afraid of them. I'm afraid of people making wrong decisions based on i…

I have read all the sources I linked. Well, to be perfectly honest, for the ENTSO-E final report I read the summary and the relevant sections and for the actual FERC regulation, rather than the news posts I used to find the true root source, I left it at the introduction which says "non-synchronous sources must provide reactive power as per this technical specification from Y date". But that's of course not good enou…

You build small scale modular systems at the sources of maximum power consumption to reduce transmission losses and grid requirements.

Re: Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

#509

Post by mastermage »

Moldoteck wrote: post #497
mastermage wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EEG Subsidies no longer exist. Germany's high electricity price is due to the weird af Laws on Renewables, terrible planning, and well Gas Power, which is just expensive as shit.

eeg still exists. It just moved to state expenditure when before it was paid directly. "weird af Laws on Renewables" - which laws? Gas firming was planned long time ago and mentioned even by fraunhofer

Specifically alot of the laws on Windpower. Where it has to be amount x away from any populated place. Meaning there is only something like 0.1% of the area of Germany where you would be allowed to built Windparks.

My bad on the EEG i thought that stopped since I do not pay it anymore directly.

Re: Seven countries now generate nearly all their electricity from renewables (2024)

#510

Post by Moldoteck »

mastermage wrote: post #509
Moldoteck wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eeg still exists. It just moved to state expenditure when before it was paid directly. "weird af Laws on Renewables" - which laws? Gas firming was planned long time ago and mentioned even by fraunhofer

Specifically alot of the laws on Windpower. Where it has to be amount x away from any populated place. Meaning there is only something like 0.1% of the area of Germany where you would be allowed to built Windparks. My bad on the EEG i thought that stopped since I do not pay it anymore directly.

I doubt wind laws expansion makes it that expensive. Laws were recently liberalized anyway.

But there are many more cost factors. With co2 tax, gas and coal firming are getting very expensive. Add to that massive transmission and distribution expansion/upgrades costs for distributed grid, add massive curtailment costs and you get what you get

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