The future of energy generation and storage

SirRumpole said:

you have basically ignored the cost of infrastructure required to charge electric vehicles. Power prices are already getting out of reach in this country, sending businesses broke and consumers into more debt, imagine if we have to pay even more to charge our cars.

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You know vehicle owners already pay ship loads to fuel their vehicles right? it's not like the current ICE cars are free to run.

There are plenty of companies (and even consumers) willing to make longterm investments in the electricity grid and generation capacity.

Also, higher utilisation rates of the existing infrastructure lowers costs.

SirRumpole said:

Anyway I'm not against electric cars, just the banning of alternatives.

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When the government banned the burning of household rubbish across Sydney suburbs, were you against that?

Surely, when it comes to improving the Air quality (and saving lives), some personal freedoms take a back seat.

We already have rules about how much pollution an ICE vehicle is allowed to pump out, it makes sense that when alternatives become viable, the use of ICE cars could be banned.

McLovin said:

And there's the externalities...

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and another little one here ... Coal has 'given' us so much

We already have rules about how much pollution an ICE vehicle is allowed to pump out, it makes sense that when alternatives become viable, the use of ICE cars could be banned.

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So what is your plan for generating the power to charge these vehicles ?

How much extra will be required ? How much will it cost ? How many more power stations do we need to build ?

I don't think you have thought it all through, if you had you would have realised that hybrids are a better way to go. They generate their own electricity which means owners are not dependent on finding a charging station, although they can use one if they want.

SirRumpole said:

The batteries only last 15 years.

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That is why Musk is in the "renewable" energy game. Every so often the batteries have to be renewed. Smart (yet vacuous) Musk, desperate S.A. government.

Wysiwyg said:

That is why Musk is in the "renewable" energy game. Every so often the batteries have to be renewed. Smart (yet vacuous) Musk, desperate S.A. government.

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I guess the SA government is buying some time so they can build gas turbine stations like they said they would, and maybe some pumped storage.

They would be crazy to rely just on batteries.

This battery storage won't exactly power many homes off the figures will it?
After 10-15 years is it just a right off apart from the infrastructure?
Seems like a "look at me, I'm green" political statement.

moXJO said:

This battery storage won't exactly power many homes off the figures will it?

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I heard 30 000 homes.

After 10-15 years is it just a right off apart from the infrastructure?

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There is the disposal, recycling and replacement of the exhausted batteries.

Seems like a "look at me, I'm green" political statement.

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Yes.

Wysiwyg said:

I heard 30 000 homes.

There is the disposal, recycling and replacement of the exhausted batteries.

Yes.

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Thats the figure they gave, I'm hearing figures from 30000 to 1300 depending on length of time and consumption. I'll have to find the figures.
SA just seems to be mashing the grid with populist solutions. I'm all for green tech. But rolling out long lasting well thought out plans is important as well. If electricity remains high you can say goodbye to the economy and frivolous tech solutions.

Elon Musk is one of the great pioneers of our time. His strike rate isn't the best though.

I'm keeping my posts brief and infrequent at the moment - something called "life" is taking up my time presently...

Somewhere in the last page or two someone was asking how much power a house uses and thus how many houses this 100 MW / 129 MWh battery could run. Here's some data:

For SA, an average household consumes 587 Watts from the grid on average. This is the second lowest in Australia (Vic is the lowest at an average 560 W per household and Tas is the highest at an average 1006 W per household). Those figures are for residential electricity as such, so they do not include general business, heavy industry, street lighting etc.

Seasonal variation in total consumption in SA is actually quite modest. The low being an average of 502 W in Autumn and the high being an average of about 665 W in Winter.

Daily and hourly variation is far more extreme however and in this regard SA is about as extreme as it gets anywhere. Push the temperature up to 40+ degrees and total power consumption in SA literally doubles. Given that there would be no high temperature related increase in demand from industrial processes, electronic devices, lighting and so on it can be said with confidence that more than 50% of all electricity at those times is powering cooling devices. At the extreme it's would be nudging 60% used for cooling if some assumptions are made that as a whole there are probably less people running welders, using electric lawnmowers, cooking a roast and so on when it's 45 degrees than would be the case on a milder day (that is, non-cooling related consumption likely goes down at least to some extent when it's seriously hot such that the total cooling load is likely somewhat higher than simply the difference between a 45 versus 22 degree day).

So how many houses could be powered by this battery varies hugely depending on the time of day and weather and the time. But if you want an average then the answer is 199,000 homes could be powered using a maximum discharge rate of 100 MW. That is, of course, until the battery goes flat which would take about 77 minutes at that rate. Power fewer homes with it it you want it to discharge more slowly.

Overall it's a help but it's not massive. A pragmatic way to view it is that it's able to supply about 3% of the state's extreme peak demand so is comparable to a smaller but still significant power station.

So a 100 MW battery. For reference:

Torrens Island power station (literally half of SA's non-intermittent generating capacity that's still operating but some of the machinery is getting very tired and worn out these days ) = 1280 MW

Northern Power Station (closed, SA) = 540 MW

Hazelwood Power Station (closed, Vic) = 1600 MW

Anglesea (closed, Vic) = 160 MW

Playford B (closed, SA) = 240 MW

Morwell (closed, Vic) = 170 MW (potentially up to 190 MW)

Closest to 100 MW:

Mintaro (SA, gas turbines, fully operational) = 90 MW

Trevallyn (Tas, hydro, fully operational) = 95 MW

So the battery is significant but not massive. It's better than nothing that's for sure and there are circumstances where it will avoid or at least reduce the scale of load shedding that would otherwise occur.

I don't see this issue with infrastructure.....isn't it just plugging the car into a power socket? We have electricity everywhere already. Once the likes of China decide they are going all-in, economies of scale for any required infrastructure should mean it's not an expensive transition, we can follow their lead.

Furthermore surely the manufacturers of electric vehicles will forge the way in this area; the ability to charge ones' vehicle as and when required will need to be proven.

We just need to sort out the 'energy crisis' in this country as demand could go through the roof.

Junior said:

I don't see this issue with infrastructure.....isn't it just plugging the car into a power socket?

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I hope you are joking.

Yes we can turn a water tap on too, but the water has to come from somewhere. We are currently in a power drought after Hazlewood was shut down and other generators go down for maintenance or out of business permanently due to age.

Do you remember that NSW and Victoria were on the brink of blackouts last summer ? The generating capacity isn't there at the moment to guarantee that the lights won't go out, never mind charging thousands of electric cars.

SirRumpole said:

I hope you are joking.

Yes we can turn a water tap on too, but the water has to come from somewhere. We are currently in a power drought after Hazlewood was shut down and other generators go down for maintenance or out of business permanently due to age.

Do you remember that NSW and Victoria were on the brink of blackouts last summer ? The generating capacity isn't there at the moment to guarantee that the lights won't go out, never mind charging thousands of electric cars.

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We seem a bit complacent in this country regarding power.
"Let's wait till things really fcuk up" seems to be the publics attitude.

SirRumpole said:

I hope you are joking.

Yes we can turn a water tap on too, but the water has to come from somewhere. We are currently in a power drought after Hazlewood was shut down and other generators go down for maintenance or out of business permanently due to age.

Do you remember that NSW and Victoria were on the brink of blackouts last summer ? The generating capacity isn't there at the moment to guarantee that the lights won't go out, never mind charging thousands of electric cars.

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In Australia, almost all power for electric cars has the potential to be free, after installation and maintenance costs.

CanOz said:

In Australia, almost all power for electric cars has the potential to be free, after installation and maintenance costs.

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Could you explain that ? Solar cells on top of vehicles perhaps, unless they are parked in underground car parks.

Looks like consumers have given electric cars the thumbs down in favour of hybrids.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/technol...d/news-story/a6213d73c01820a90edd87e6c2fa1103

SirRumpole said:

Looks like consumers have given electric cars the thumbs down in favour of hybrids.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/technol...d/news-story/a6213d73c01820a90edd87e6c2fa1103

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Of course they have. There is no infrastructure for electric cars at the moment. A horse was still the preference over a Model T before petrol stations became ubiquitous.

McLovin said:

Of course they have. There is no infrastructure for electric cars at the moment. A horse was still the preference over a Model T before petrol stations became ubiquitous.

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Chicken and egg. Who is going provide electric car infrastructure without a demand, and who is going to buy EV's without infrastructure ?

SirRumpole, are you proposing ECs should be disregarded because it's all too hard?

I'm well aware of the energy/power generation issues in this country. However, they are absolutely not insurmountable. We have vast resources, wealth and the technology is there to ramp up energy production. Just need some half decent leadership and we'll get there eventually.

The alternative is to do nothing and continue to breathe in toxic fumes and be held hostage to the price & availability of oil.

SirRumpole said:

Chicken and egg. Who is going provide electric car infrastructure without a demand, and who is going to buy EV's without infrastructure ?

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The infrastructure is being rolled out. The charging stations cost sweet FA and can make carparks additional money. The price of batteries keeps falling and the capacity keeps growing. It's not going to happen overnight, but I don't think anyone is arguing it will. This all seems to be getting a bit defeatist. None of the hurdles that EVs currently have are insurmountable. Then again, in this country we seem to not look further than our feet. Probably why we have clowns hauling lumps of coal into the national parliament with stupid grins on their faces proclaiming it's the future.

Let's see where it is in 10-15 years, not six months or a year.