tunetardis

The article suggests the problem is that rooftop solar has taken off to the point that it may overload the grid if the community solar farm continues generating also. Does this mean there is no kill switch so-to-speak on the rooftop generation? This bothers me.

Sounds like they’re one Carrington Event shy of a major disaster where everything gets fried, since the best defence against that would be to kill the grid altogether until it passes. But if they are unable to do so—if these rooftops keep the voltage up no matter what—everything that’s plugged into the wall could get blown out.

My parents had a property that survived a hurricane. But when the local utility tried to restore power, there was a big surge. When they got back to assess damages, they were surprised to find the neighbours (who had their key) using the fridge because it was apparently the only one on the street that still functioned. They had unplugged it before leaving.

So, not exactly the same situation, but it illustrates the point that utilities really need to stay on top this sort of thing.

Well, Skynet’s not just gonna up and build itself I suppose?

Ok I watched his little presentation there. Though I’m no expert on the topic, my hyperbole detector started ringing.

Most of what I’ve read concerning solar/battery farms have indicated relatively modest investments on the battery side. Like maybe a few hours of peak generation worth of storage? A drop in battery costs of the kind he’s indicating could increase this to cover perhaps the whole overnight period, but if the following day is cloudy, you’re still going to have a problem.

What’s not mentioned, and I suspect is true, is that getting to successively more reliable levels of power delivery requires exponentially more storage. Like if you think oh, I’ve got 50% reliability at the moment (meaning you only have to fall back on backup generation half the time), I only need to double the storage to get to 100%, I think you’re in for a rude awakening. It is very hard to get to 100%. And even if you could get to 99%, that’s still 3 days out of the year when you need a backup. So you still need a backup.

That’s not to say this isn’t good news though. If battery storage can eliminate peaker plants, that alone would be a worthy goal, since these tend to be far less fuel efficient than base load plants.