Everyone is talking about building very large #batteries for energy storage, for when the sun doesn't shine or the wind doesn't blow. Turns out, that is the most expensive solution. There are faster solutions that yield money.
"Lovins and many other #EnergyEfficiency experts have spent decades pointing out that an integrated system approach that focuses as much or more on consumption than supply will be so much cheaper than the current approach focused on supply."
@CelloMomOnCars the main reason for energy storage is to allow for sudden demand surges, aat the moment this is done by ramping up the turbines in oil/coal/gas/etc power stations. Without storage of some kind it is much harder to ramp up wind/solar, even Nuclear is slow to ramp up (due to reaction times etc.)
@CelloMomOnCars one of the cheapest is being done in Finland storing energy as heat in sand, which is cheap, easy to obtain and has few environmental downsides.
As you say, most current utility batteries are for frequency stabilisation., and it's perfect for that. But the storage capacity is really too small to cover, say, an extended outage, never mind seasonal storage.
Lovins is pointing out that there is a large range of options to build flexibility in the grid, and some of them are fast and negative dollars (i.e., saves money, in the long run).
“Today’s exponential battery growth could get global power over 60% of the way to net zero, but that’s not the only option. The first two boxes on the left, negawatts and flexiwatts, are both several fold bigger than had been thought, yet cheaper. "
Add comment