posted by
martyb
on Sunday June 28 2015, @03:55PM
from the but-using-same-old-approach-for-non-humans dept.
from the but-using-same-old-approach-for-non-humans dept.
The renewable-energy boom is here. Trillions of dollars will be invested over the next 25 years, driving some of the most profound changes yet in how humans get their electricity. That's according to a new forecast by Bloomberg New Energy Finance that plots out global power markets to 2040.
Here are six massive shifts coming soon to power markets near you:
- Solar Prices Keep Crashing
- Solar Billions Become Solar Trillions
- The Revolution Will Be Decentralized
- Global Demand Slows
- Natural Gas Burns Briefly
- The Climate Is Still Screwed
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The Way Humans Get Electricity Is About to Change Forever
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(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2015, @04:14PM
It's not about fixing it, it's about preventing it from getting any worse.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by VLM on Sunday June 28 2015, @07:19PM
Hasn't the climate always been screwed, posts the guy sitting where there was a mile of ice just a couple thousand years ago (and will be again)
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2015, @10:12PM
As the OP said, it isn't about being screwed, it is about being screwed worse. The rate of change is key and the current rate of change is extra-ordinary. It took hundreds, if not thousands of years for that mile of ice to build up, if it were to come back in the span of a century that would disastrous for everybody living there now.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2015, @04:36PM
Solar Prices Keep Crashing
Solar Billions Become Solar Trillions
The Revolution Will Be Decentralized
All true, but there are pressures to slow/stop this. It started with reductions / elimination of incentives. Now it is moving into charging for the interconnect to reduce distributed solar. It is not inconceivable that connecting more solar to the grid will be made illegal. And, wind farms have already been legislated against (at least in the US), as "eye sores".
I have a friend who works for the Public Utilities Commission in California, who is about as anti-renewable as you can get (especially distributed). The reason is that this power source is feast / famine, and destabilizes the grid. Of course they could create incentives for folks to use power during peak solar periods, but that is not how government regulators wholly owned by industry, work.
Global Demand Slows
Yeah, we are still deep in a long-going recession. In spite of the economists' claims to the contrary. Folks are not working. And, those that are are getting shitty wages, that leave little discretionary income.
Natural Gas Burns Briefly
Apparently the author has never heard of Russia? And, fracking is a global phenomenon. In New Zealand, they are fracking with even fewer environmental controls than in the wild west US-- NZ frackers just dump the waste water into the streams.
The Climate Is Still Screwed
Yup. But, it is no where near as rosy a picture as the author paints.
(Score: 5, Informative) by sjames on Sunday June 28 2015, @06:39PM
Now it is moving into charging for the interconnect to reduce distributed solar.
Power companies in Australia tried that and ended up blowing their foot off. People started adding batteries and connecting the solar output directly to various appliances (sometimes with a switch to go from grid to solar. Some were ticked off enough that they went off the grid entirely [reneweconomy.com.au].
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday June 28 2015, @08:09PM
Another possibility is alternative grids such that neighbors could trade energy with each other and eliminate the need to have a batteries and solar panels for every need possible at anytime. It would at least do wonders with peak loads for anything that contains motors like fridges.
On top of that, such grid may even be utilizing HVDC to do away with cumbersome conversions. Arcing can be controlled by electronics and if it were to occur, transmission lines like this usually are outside of homes that can burn down.
The main problem with cutting the cord to the electrical grid is a cost efficient energy storage. Batteries wear out..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 29 2015, @11:11AM
Just FYI,
In Spain it is being legislated to make it illegal to produce your own energy, (unless you still pay for it more as if the government sold it to you)
(Score: 2) by davester666 on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:35AM
Of course you have to pay for it. The gov't owns the sunlight hitting your property.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Monday June 29 2015, @05:12PM
Thankfully, here in the US, they've already made that illegal...
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 29 2015, @12:39AM
Got a source on that? I live in NZ and haven't heard a peep about it.
(Score: 1) by Absolutely.Geek on Monday June 29 2015, @12:53AM
NZ frackers just dump the waste water into the streams.
Sources? As someone who works around the O&G industry in Taranaki NZ...the place where all of the O&G is here; I have to say I have never heard of this happening.
I'm a control systems engineer; and have worked on many different O&G sites; along with other industries. Doing automation and control work. So I am not directly involved with the drilling and fracking groups. But news like that tends to get around. Especially since a lot of the guys on those teams are hunters and go bush frequently and would be very unimpressed if their hunting grounds were getting messed up.
Environmental incidents get reported here quite quickly.
So if you could post some sources I would be very keen to look at them and if the claims are relevant I know many people and groups that would be very interested in this.
Don't trust the police or the government - Shihad: My mind's sedate.
(Score: 2) by Non Sequor on Monday June 29 2015, @03:48AM
Home batteries might round out the difference. The game changes if it saves people money to buy batteries to store enough energy during the day to last all night.
Alternatively, it might start to make sense to have some sort of storage in the grid itself. Buying excess solar from a neighboring area could make this happen.
Write your congressman. Tell him he sucks.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2015, @04:58PM
just want to start by saying that electricity is a good thing. more of it is not a bad thing.
how it is generated however is a issue.
-
i got some grid-tied solar, licensed and unlicensed.
it is still a pain in the butt to get a licensed solar-generator up and running.
i really do NOT understand that you can go to home depot, home pro or whatnot a see isles and rows of fridges, water-heaters, fans and whatnot from every imaginable manufacturer on the planet to chose from but if wanting to connect a PV-generator then sheets and sheets of paper are required to proof that it is "national grid conform".
imagine if every grid connected device, like your microwave or dust-sucker needed a individual certification before it could be used.
i'm pretty sure the scientific and technology workings of a power-grid are well understood and that pv-generators shouldn't be "made difficult" to use then say a grid-connected tooth-brush.
why can a grid connected PV-generator not be the same as a grid-connected fridge or grid-connected TV or grid-connected popcorn-maker?
how can a "green" government implement a feed-in-tarif and at the same time not create a central country wide "certification" buero for grid-tie inverter? they do it for every other freaking grid-tie appliance!!!
so before off-loading your mega-ton container ship with PV-generators head-over to the buero, let them run it thru their "certification" process and then you're free to sell it to anyone anywhere. Isn't this how they do it with every other grid-tied appliance?
but this last hurdle comprised of a stigma that PV-generators generate (duh!) electricity and are thus not the same as devices using electricity seems to be the last firewall before solar can be exploited by anyone: alternating current go figure.
the planet is climate-changing but daily sunshine isn't the answer because our legacy grid cannot handle it ... so too bad .. go away. :P
(Score: 5, Touché) by M. Baranczak on Sunday June 28 2015, @05:08PM
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2015, @05:17PM
i'll send you a email next time i comment SHIFT-less so you can gather some more mod points.
(Score: 2) by M. Baranczak on Sunday June 28 2015, @05:50PM
(Score: 2) by JNCF on Sunday June 28 2015, @08:38PM
...and then M. Baranczak got a postcard from the ghost of E. E. Cummings.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 29 2015, @08:46AM
"Oh no! It's e e cummings man!"
"Evildoers!
Faaaa
a
a
a
a
a
all beneath my might!"
Free beer to anyone who can identify that reference.
(Posted anonymously so I don't have to buy anyone any actual beer)
(Score: 3, Insightful) by pogostix on Sunday June 28 2015, @10:39PM
There's safety issues when you are putting power into the grid that don't exist when you are just drawing from it. And it will get easier in time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2015, @10:44PM
Sounds like we need a certified device that sits between the grid and the electrical panel so that whatever generators are on the house-side of the circuit are isolated from the grid when the utility power is disabled for things like guys working on the lines. Probably also needs some sort of shunt to dump that power to ground(?) in those situations so that the generators don't have to be very smart about it either.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by sjames on Sunday June 28 2015, @11:36PM
Yes, and any device that can be approved will not feed power if the grid goes down. That would be one of the criteria for certifying devices. There's no reason to make that happen individually. Surely, that approval could be applied to all units in a model so you just need to write the approval number onto a single sheet of paper and you're done.
I note they don't have such a problem with gas powered generators even though the occasional idiot does end up back-feeding the grid while people are working on the lines.
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Monday June 29 2015, @01:13PM
You don't need safety approval for a hot water heater, fridge, microwave, computer or desk lamp. The manufactures already ensured this. The same standards can and are easily applied to the grid tied solar systems. As long as they certify that their system will operate safely and properly in accordance with government and possibly even utility guidelines then you should be free to install as big or small a PV system as you like. From there it should be as simple as calling a contractor or electrician. If you want rebates then paperwork would be involved which makes sense.
(Score: 2) by pogostix on Monday June 29 2015, @04:04PM
Yes, and I think it will get easier in the future... it's just not "easy" now. I wouldn't be surprised if a solar tie in point became a code requirement for new installations in the future.
(Score: 2) by hubie on Sunday June 28 2015, @05:03PM
Fairly similar long term outlook. [optics.org]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2015, @09:22PM
There is a problem with utility grades source of variable renewable energy like solar and (to a lesser extent) wind - marginal costs are near zero. Sounds great, but it produces non-obvious results in a scarcity-based marketplace [vox.com] like we have today.
In short, solar power comes on during peak demand periods which are the most profitable for energy companies. But because the marginal cost is nearly zero it drives the price during those periods down and the more solar capacity the closer to zero the peak pricing becomes. Once solar capacity reaches a tipping point it makes it very hard to recoup the capital investment costs of those solar plants. In effect it is a victim of its own success. The utility companies see that and stop building more solar once that tipping point is reached.
The solution to that problem is energy storage, so that solar becomes less peaky. But we need good utility scale storage systems to make that work. That's probably good news for the future of guys like Tesla and other battery companies. But as of today there isn't much in the way of cost-effective energy storage technology, so solar penetration has a limit. Will we reach that limit before storage tech catches up? That is the billion dollar question.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 29 2015, @03:01AM
The solution to that problem is energy storage, so that solar becomes less peaky.
Or variable power combined with a power sink. Maybe your desalination plant or small batch aluminum smelter is uneconomic with normal operation. But maybe when you'd otherwise have to pay to get rid of the excess power, it makes sense to dump that power into something with some modest economic value to it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 29 2015, @05:59PM
My Grandmother had a coo-coo clock that didn't need batteries. You would pull a wight up once or twice a day and then it would change that potential energy to mechanical energy to use for the rest of the time. I can't think of a more 'peaky' power source than one that is only available for 30s each day.
It seems that such a weight system should be scalable.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 29 2015, @07:53PM
> It seems that such a weight system should be scalable.
It is not.
(Score: 1) by rickatech on Monday June 29 2015, @06:04AM
Just visualize this until most utilities are irrelevant =-P
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 29 2015, @07:45PM
so, the animal kingdom and aliens are going to remain on fossil fuels? is this why the climate is still screwed?