acre-feet
I can’t stop laughing at this as a unit of measurement
Do some quick math. How much pumped hydro in terms of acre-feet would be required to power a hypothetical city like Chicago at night? Where would this theoretical reservoir be built?
Korhaka@sopuli.xyz 8 hours ago
MagicShel@lemmy.zip 5 hours ago
It’s easier to visualize than kilo-gallons.
frezik@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 hours ago
That’s a completely unnecessary way to do things. The mistake you’re making is that this specific way must provide all power.
It doesn’t. You combine methods for a reason. The wind blows at times when the sun isn’t shining, and vice versa. We have weather data stretching back many decades to tell us how much a given region will give us of each. From there, you can calculate the maximum lull where neither is providing enough. Have enough storage to cover that lull, and double it as a safety factor.
Getting to 95% water/wind/solar with this method is relatively easy and would be an extraordinary change. Getting all the way to 100% is possible, just more difficult.