The primary finding of the study asserts that wind and solar energy have the potential to generate a staggering 2,896 terawatt-hours (TWh) of energy annually.
Yes, and most of that will be produced during summer, where our needs are at their lowest, and will therefore be wasted. The problem with solar and wind has never been production potential.
Seriously? Anyone involved economically will care. The energy company, their suppliers and vendors, and the customers. No one wants to pay for huge overcapacity.
If we could store the excess energy and use it in higher-demand times (like long winter nights) that would be another story. But storage has always been the major challenge with solar and wind.
It’s hard to say it’s “wasted”. That just means the sun will shine, and the wind will blow, and nobody will use some of the electricity it could generate.
By that metric, almost 100% of wind and solar power is currently “wasted”. By putting up all that capacity, the amount “wasted” goes way down.
And what becomes possible if you have huge amounts of no cost energy available for some of the day/year? Direct carbon capture? Widespread desalination to produce fresh water? These are things that would help a lot, but are currently infeasible for to energy cost. You don’t have to do them 24/7 - just turn them on to soak up the excess grid capacity. If the cost of electricity went way down, I guarantee you somebody would figure out what to do with the power.
I’m talking about “wasted” as in the energy is collected but then not stored or put to use. That’s just needless wear and tear on the machinery. If it’s not collected in the first place I would just call that untapped.
And extra capacity is never really free. Someone has to invest in the infrastructure and upkeep. It’s takes money and effort to get energy to the right place at the right time, such as those carbon capture and desalination plants you seem to suggest will appear out of thin air.
Tesla battery apparently have a density of 244-296 Wh/Kg, so does that mean 1000 metic tonnes of of batteries at 289.6 Wh would be enough to provide annual storage here? That doesn’t seem infeasible or unreasonable for something potentially so beneficial.
Lithium battery is usually not what’s is used for grid scale batteries. The new natrium batteries could do that and are made from far cheaper and more abundant materials. The energy saving concrete also promises to be a good solution when used instead of regular concrete and candy be built directly beneath renewable power plants.
Terrawatt is 10^12 so 1000 tonnes of battery would give you around 200MWh of storage. To get to 2000 TWh you are looking at 10,000,000,000 tonnes of Li-ion batteries. For a bit of scale, thats like turning around 10% of mount Everest into battery.
Yes, and most of that will be produced during summer, where our needs are at their lowest, and will therefore be wasted. The problem with solar and wind has never been production potential.
Yeah. Wind energy production is always lowest in the winter. Right. Gotcha.
Who cares if its wasted?
Seriously? Anyone involved economically will care. The energy company, their suppliers and vendors, and the customers. No one wants to pay for huge overcapacity.
If we could store the excess energy and use it in higher-demand times (like long winter nights) that would be another story. But storage has always been the major challenge with solar and wind.
It’s hard to say it’s “wasted”. That just means the sun will shine, and the wind will blow, and nobody will use some of the electricity it could generate.
By that metric, almost 100% of wind and solar power is currently “wasted”. By putting up all that capacity, the amount “wasted” goes way down.
And what becomes possible if you have huge amounts of no cost energy available for some of the day/year? Direct carbon capture? Widespread desalination to produce fresh water? These are things that would help a lot, but are currently infeasible for to energy cost. You don’t have to do them 24/7 - just turn them on to soak up the excess grid capacity. If the cost of electricity went way down, I guarantee you somebody would figure out what to do with the power.
I’m talking about “wasted” as in the energy is collected but then not stored or put to use. That’s just needless wear and tear on the machinery. If it’s not collected in the first place I would just call that untapped.
And extra capacity is never really free. Someone has to invest in the infrastructure and upkeep. It’s takes money and effort to get energy to the right place at the right time, such as those carbon capture and desalination plants you seem to suggest will appear out of thin air.
https://newatlas.com/energy/highest-density-lithium-battery
Tesla battery apparently have a density of 244-296 Wh/Kg, so does that mean 1000 metic tonnes of of batteries at 289.6 Wh would be enough to provide annual storage here? That doesn’t seem infeasible or unreasonable for something potentially so beneficial.
Lithium battery is usually not what’s is used for grid scale batteries. The new natrium batteries could do that and are made from far cheaper and more abundant materials. The energy saving concrete also promises to be a good solution when used instead of regular concrete and candy be built directly beneath renewable power plants.
Nice, sounds even better!
Over production of energy may well be cheaper than battery storage anyway
Terrawatt is 10^12 so 1000 tonnes of battery would give you around 200MWh of storage. To get to 2000 TWh you are looking at 10,000,000,000 tonnes of Li-ion batteries. For a bit of scale, thats like turning around 10% of mount Everest into battery.