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We're going to need a lot of solar panels

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Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#81

Post by ben_w »

walrus01 wrote: post #4

We're going to need a lot of solar panels and an efficient way to transport power from a very sunny place to another location where the loads are. For instance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_DC_Intertie The pacific DC intertie right now often ends up being used to transport power from hydroelectric dams in WA/OR to California. But there's nothing to say that something couldn't function the other way if there…

A global grid was my favourite solution until recently. The problem is that it needs the combined cables to have cross section in the order of a few (3?) square meters (at 640 kV), and that in turn is in the order of 52 years of global copper production (we make more aluminium than copper but Al is a worse conductor).

Using even higher voltages makes everything much easier, and the cables’ combined cross sections may need to be less (depending on how much lower the maximum demand at night is) or more (depending on future increases in daytime demand).

Downside is that’s still order-of a few trillion dollars, close to the same as the cost of 36 TWh of batteries (i.e. global overnight only), and we’re likely to make those batteries anyway for the electric cars and when their condition deteriorates enough to be taken out of the cars they're still good enough for grid storage.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#82

Post by Nzen »

mgerdts wrote: post #60

There's a lot of optimism in this article. Perhaps too much as it seems to gloss over some important details. > Our process works by using solar power to split water into hydrogen and oxygen, concentrating CO2 from the atmosphere, then combining CO2 and hydrogen to form natural gas. Then later it talks about how much desert there is, implying it's a great place for low-impact solar. How do the electricity and power c…

While desalination requires disposing of all the waterborne particulate, the water can sometimes be precious enough that we bear it. I heard a radio report yesterday [0] about how investing in desalination helped mitigate USA CA Catalina Island's direly depleted resivoir. That's not to say that brine treatment or disposal isn't costly, more that - so long as people are committed to living in dry areas and can afford to, they will pressure their local governments to keep the area habitable.

[0] https://www.marketplace.org/2022/07/18/drought-technology-po...

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#83

Post by johncearls »

greenthrow wrote: post #62
mgerdts wrote: post #60

There's a lot of optimism in this article. Perhaps too much as it seems to gloss over some important details. > Our process works by using solar power to split water into hydrogen and oxygen, concentrating CO2 from the atmosphere, then combining CO2 and hydrogen to form natural gas. Then later it talks about how much desert there is, implying it's a great place for low-impact solar. How do the electricity and power c…

It makes a lot more sense to transport the energy to the water than vice versa. I don't agree with their plan to make synthetic hydrocarbons, but they are right about solar. In 50 years solar will be so ubiquitous and cheap that people will be horrified that we kept burning fossil fuels and building nuclear plants for so long.

But this way is carbon neutral. Every CO2 molecule you pump out, started out as a CO2 molecule you took from the air. There is no reason to dislike fossil fuels, if they no longer come from fossils. It's the releasing of carbon from millions of years ago that's creating the excess.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#84

Post by phkahler »

walrus01 wrote: post #4

We're going to need a lot of solar panels and an efficient way to transport power from a very sunny place to another location where the loads are. For instance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_DC_Intertie The pacific DC intertie right now often ends up being used to transport power from hydroelectric dams in WA/OR to California. But there's nothing to say that something couldn't function the other way if there…

>> I searched for "high voltage DC" in that article and didn't see a mention of it, or anything much else about long distance transport of power.

Since they want to use solar/electricity to produce hydrocarbon fuels, there is no need to transport electricity. Make the fuels where the sun shines. Maybe build a pipeline or two out of the desert.

I think it might be viable for aircraft even if ground transport eventually goes all electric.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#85

Post by Gwypaas »

jjk166 wrote: post #65
walrus01 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read the article, I disagree with the concept of using PV to generate artificial hydrocarbon fuels in general, as not a great business plan. It's not the best use of the technology when we should be bypassing that entirely. Go use excess PV to pump water uphill back into a reservoir or something if you need energy storage, not drive a complicated process to make artificial hydrocarbons to store in a tank and burn i…

Pumped reservoir storage is horrifically inefficient, environmentally terrible for the local ecosystem, and not scalable. You can't just go and build a reservoir anywhere you like. Chemical energy storage is simple, scalable, and allows for the easy movement of vast amounts of energy over great distances to be used anywhere with minimal changes to existing infrastructure.

When talking about pumped hydro the roundtrip efficiency usually is around 70-80%. Not even close to batteries but way more scalable.

Chemical storage is horrific. Creating diesel and burning it in a turbine or similar you start at 40-50% for the burning phase, without even converting anything in the first place.

If you go the fuel cell route you tend to end up somewhere at 40-60% efficiency.

So no, the only use case for chemical storage is either where you want energy density. Say aviation or maritime shipping. Or nation state like energy security, where you can pay the efficiency price.

For all other use cases any optimization done, or better usage of the energy, will eat into that horrific round trip efficiency.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#86

Post by worik »

walrus01 wrote: post #4

We're going to need a lot of solar panels and an efficient way to transport power from a very sunny place to another location where the loads are. For instance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_DC_Intertie The pacific DC intertie right now often ends up being used to transport power from hydroelectric dams in WA/OR to California. But there's nothing to say that something couldn't function the other way if there…

> and an efficient way to transport power from a very sunny place to another location where the loads are

The point of the article is to make synthetic hydrocarbons, so no, do not need HVDC so much.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#87

Post by adamrezich »

akira2501 wrote: post #70
gregschlom wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like you didn't read the article. They aren't talking about putting solar panels everywhere, they're talking about using massive amounts of solar panel in a specific location and use the energy to convert the CO2 in the air into methane.

This is such an odd way to address an argument. From the article: "Substituting solar power into our electrical grid and atmospheric CO2-derived hydrocarbons into our fuel supply chain is just the beginning. We want to support a future of abundance and wealth, while avoiding starvation even as legacy climate damage shifts rainfall patterns and causes extreme weather." Seems pretty one-track to me. Also, there are no…

> it's a back of the envelope analysis that just projects trend lines on charts and makes no thoughts for emergent phenomenon due to the massive market swings it projects.

seems like there's a lot of this going around recently

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#88

Post by walrus01 »

ben_w wrote: post #81
walrus01 wrote: post #4

We're going to need a lot of solar panels and an efficient way to transport power from a very sunny place to another location where the loads are. For instance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_DC_Intertie The pacific DC intertie right now often ends up being used to transport power from hydroelectric dams in WA/OR to California. But there's nothing to say that something couldn't function the other way if there…

A global grid was my favourite solution until recently. The problem is that it needs the combined cables to have cross section in the order of a few (3?) square meters (at 640 kV), and that in turn is in the order of 52 years of global copper production (we make more aluminium than copper but Al is a worse conductor). Using even higher voltages makes everything much easier, and the cables’ combined cross sections may…

I don't know of any long distance HV AC or DC transmission lines that use copper. It's all aluminum already.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#89

Post by jp57 »

phkahler wrote: post #84
walrus01 wrote: post #4

We're going to need a lot of solar panels and an efficient way to transport power from a very sunny place to another location where the loads are. For instance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_DC_Intertie The pacific DC intertie right now often ends up being used to transport power from hydroelectric dams in WA/OR to California. But there's nothing to say that something couldn't function the other way if there…

>> I searched for "high voltage DC" in that article and didn't see a mention of it, or anything much else about long distance transport of power. Since they want to use solar/electricity to produce hydrocarbon fuels, there is no need to transport electricity. Make the fuels where the sun shines. Maybe build a pipeline or two out of the desert. I think it might be viable for aircraft even if ground transport eventuall…

But it seems they need places with ample sunshine and water to electrolyze. That rules out the American west, the Sahara, etc. If they can use seawater, then arid coastal areas could work.

Re: We're going to need a lot of solar panels

#90

Post by adaml_623 »

ben_w wrote: post #81
walrus01 wrote: post #4

We're going to need a lot of solar panels and an efficient way to transport power from a very sunny place to another location where the loads are. For instance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_DC_Intertie The pacific DC intertie right now often ends up being used to transport power from hydroelectric dams in WA/OR to California. But there's nothing to say that something couldn't function the other way if there…

A global grid was my favourite solution until recently. The problem is that it needs the combined cables to have cross section in the order of a few (3?) square meters (at 640 kV), and that in turn is in the order of 52 years of global copper production (we make more aluminium than copper but Al is a worse conductor). Using even higher voltages makes everything much easier, and the cables’ combined cross sections may…

The good news is that humanity has saved up a few trillion for emergencies. The bad news is that it's been saved up and hidden in tax havens. Pity
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