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In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

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Re: In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

#561

Post by ordu »

epolanski wrote: post #496
lejalv wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do time my dishwasher and washing machine to align with peak solar where I live. I'd like to appeal to you to evolve that frame of mind. To help avoid first world problems (I can't wash a dish by hand, I need it now ) devolving into third-world ones (power cuts, crop failures, torrid tropical nights on mid latitudes, mountains disintegrated). Sometimes its important to remind we're on a generational mission, and it…

I don't like your feedback, it's condescending and you know nothing about me. 1. In my area 96% of energy is gas-based. I live in Rome, Italy. It's written in my energy bill. I ain't got no solar. Night or day it's mostly a matter of relatively small changes of demand. 2. If you want to do something real for the environment change your diet! I'm sick of this neverending focus on energy when the biggest impact you can…

> And just to add, I don't even own AC, and I can assure you it gets 40C/100+ Fahrenheit, with high humidity in Rome at summer. That's how sensitive I am to the topic.

This addition doesn't really add anything. Your tone says it much clearly. You don't like advice, do you? I'm sorry, but I can't help myself. I'd recommend you to try to lower your sensitivity.

But really I can't understand you. You've said:

> I ain't gonna use the dishwasher when the system wants me to, but when I can or want.

I need a bit of a guesswork to understand what you are implying, but still... I think you are sure that system will do no better than you from an effectiveness standpoint, while making things less comfortable to you. So you are enraged from mere proposition of such a system. It seems to me like a hyper sensitivity.

You see, if such a system would work as proposed and your allocation of resources is close to an optimum, then the system will do the same or something close to it. Nothing to be enraged of.

Also, I like how you combined:

> If you want to do something real for the environment change your diet!

with

> You know nothing about the people you interact with.

There was nothing about their diet but you kinda guessed it just by looking at their writing?

Re: In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

#562

Post by _carbyau_ »

lejalv wrote: post #467
epolanski wrote: post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I ain't gonna use the dishwasher when the system wants me to, but when I can or want. I pay low energy prices during night than day, that's normal, but I'm still not gonna do laundry at 9 pm, I'd rather pay the 10/20 cents more during the day.

I do time my dishwasher and washing machine to align with peak solar where I live. I'd like to appeal to you to evolve that frame of mind. To help avoid first world problems (I can't wash a dish by hand, I need it now ) devolving into third-world ones (power cuts, crop failures, torrid tropical nights on mid latitudes, mountains disintegrated). Sometimes its important to remind we're on a generational mission, and it…

> Sometimes its important to remind we're on a generational mission, and it's not maximising Netflix time.

Get that into the society's rules and then we'll talk.

I like to think I'm modest and sensible but I'm not bending over backwards while my neighbours get to do what I perceive as ridiculous things.

I used to live in a two bedroom unit, conserving things for the environment and next generation. But next door the neighbour in his huge house, 5 SUV's, heated pool streaming heat into the air all winter can just pay for it with money.

My actions are shaped to societies rules and monetary incentives. I'm not going out of my way to "roll coal" or anything stupid. But I'm not wasting my time either.

Re: In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

#563

Post by warkdarrior »

filloooo wrote: post #460
mekdoonggi wrote: post #2

Curious if this will eventually change China's calculus with regards to Russia. If Europe is a big customer for Chinese exports, and Russia is antagonizing, it seems like China would have an incentive to put pressure on Russia. It already seems like Russia is positioned to be completely subservient to China in the future.

Your geopolitical views are so naive it's hard to take seriously. EU is now an unwilling dumping ground for China, hostility and paranoia are growing by the day now that China is no longer a lucrative market itself and is pursuing its interests outside commerce, the cordial days are numbered. Russia would never be subservient to China, once the war ends Russia would be back being a geopolitical player because of its…

Ah, yes, Russia can become a "real western country", "geopolitical player", strong economy "substituting even Chinese products" any time it wants! Just like an alcoholic can quit any time he wants.

Re: In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

#564

Post by _fizz_buzz_ »

torginus wrote: post #502
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadly we got a warning in 2014 with Crimea being seized and fossil apologists like Bjorn Lomborg argued against rolling out wind and solar faster in response. Because he's so "reasonable" and "pragmatic", he didn't say we shouldn't phase out Russian gas, he just said solar and wind don't work and so we should invent some totally new type of energy for this purpose. It's only with a few years hindsight that he's obvio…

This is just a conspiracy theory of mine, but how credible is the notion that in Germany, the Greens who campaigned (successfully) for nuclear shutdown were in fact funded by Russia?

Very unlikely.

- The greens opposed the Nord Stream pipelines for years. And have been opposed to relying on natural gas for a long time.

-Nuclear power is generally a contentious subject in German society. Probably because of Chernobyl and how a lot of the radioactive cloud blew into Germany. Whoever lived through this will have some dramatic memories of those weeks (kids not allowed to playgrounds/outside etc.). It was actually the CDU and FDP that finally decided the phase out of nuclear power after the Fukushima disaster. (The Greens also voted for it)

- The Greens are very strong supporters of Ukraine.

I personally believe the nuclear phase out was a mistake, but it had broad support in the German parliament and society. The phase out would have happened even if the greens hadn’t voted for it.

Re: In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

#565

Post by csomar »

WarmWash wrote: post #66
mschuster91 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If Europe is a big customer for Chinese exports, and Russia is antagonizing, it seems like China would have an incentive to put pressure on Russia. China wants Russia to at least keep the Ukraine war going, if not eventually win the darn thing. Russia winning (or getting away with an armistice that lets them keep Crimea and Donbas) means a precedence China has for a land-grab of its own - obviously Taiwan, but othe…

Donbas is mostly wheat fields, Taiwan is mostly SOTA semiconductor fabs that currently are the sole pillar holding up the AI (and compute in general) zeitgeist. The global response would not be the same, even remotely. And what would China get from it? A tiny island of rubble and an ego boost, while losing enormous global favor? The cost of that island may well be a few trillion for China, just so they can say they d…

I think you need to define what global means. Does it mean the global media opinion of the "major" media news outlets? Yes. Does it mean the world's global population of 8 billion? No. Most of these 8Bn don't know what TSMC is, don't understand the Taiwan issue, don't care and could live happier without AI.

Re: In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

#566

Post by csomar »

mekdoonggi wrote: post #9
mschuster91 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If Europe is a big customer for Chinese exports, and Russia is antagonizing, it seems like China would have an incentive to put pressure on Russia. China wants Russia to at least keep the Ukraine war going, if not eventually win the darn thing. Russia winning (or getting away with an armistice that lets them keep Crimea and Donbas) means a precedence China has for a land-grab of its own - obviously Taiwan, but othe…

That makes sense, but if that's the case, why aren't they invading Taiwan now? Wouldn't now be the perfect time?

It seems like the timing gets more perfect every day. China is just watching the US self-destruct while Western Europe gets bogged down in its own issues. If the US continues to destabilize and Europe becomes vulnerable as a result, China could get Taiwan without firing a shot. No need to fight a war for it. TSMC would come out unharmed as a bonus.

Re: In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

#567

Post by grumbelbart »

m4rtink wrote: post #477
grumbelbart wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. It is in general (much) more efficient to burn natural gas in a power plant and use the electricity for heatpumps compared to simply burning gas at home for heating.

Yeah, in combined cycle plants you burn the natural gas first in a gas turbine first, use the waste heat from that to boil water and run steam turbine. Then condense the steam using your district heating circuit. You can say this is 100% efficient as you make some electricity and the rest does house heating.

The thing is that your home's heatpump has an efficiency of 300%-500%. So even if your power plant and power delivery only has say 50% gas-to-electricity-at-home, you are still looking at 150%-250% gas-to-heat-your-house efficiency.

Re: In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

#568

Post by csomar »

foobarian wrote: post #440
testing22321 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The price of panels is falling so fast I don’t think anyone truly understands. I paid nearly double that for our 450w panels 18 months ago.

People keep saying that prices of panels keep falling, and yet any time I look at getting panels on my roof the price is the same $3/W it has been for 10 years already.

The prices are falling at the source, but free trade was never real; and it's even less so today. By the time these panels reach your roof, all kinds of fees and taxes have been tacked on. You'll be paying the maximal extractable amount.

Re: In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

#569

Post by tsimionescu »

pcchristie wrote: post #530
evan_a_a wrote: post #422

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In engineering the simple solution is often the best solution. Creating a demand-side network of devices is not that. Plus, such a system would provide even more ways for nefarious actors to sabotage the grid, by influencing the demand side. For example, setting every appliance to run its load at the same time. The grid would be fucked.

I don't disagree with your broad comment but it's not hard to fix by slightly dispersing the control/responsibility. 1. Electricity moves for 5/10 min clearing intervals with defined caps at either end (currently in Western Australia it's simply 2 intervals, peak & off-peak). 2. Expose the pricing/market data via API 3. Develop existing home automation frameworks/tools/device IOTs/routers to access that. 4. End user…

If the devices are accessing a 3rd party API over the Internet to get this info, that control is still ceded, and attackers can still exploit vulnerabilities in all of these devices to attack large swaths of the network at once.

Re: In Europe, wind and solar overtake fossil fuels

#570

Post by jmward01 »

Is anyone accurately predicting solar and renewable adoption? Year after year I see terrible predictions that fall way short of the reality in the world. If so, when do those models predict the death of fossil fuel based power plants? There is generally some moment where keeping the infrastructure going becomes so expensive that things just shut down. Are we close? I wonder what the graphs of fossil fuel plan construction and upgrades looks like. Are they near 0 yet?
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