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California utility augments 1,800 air conditioning units with “ice battery”
A Santa Barbara-based company called Ice Energy has partnered with NRG Energy to deliver 1,800 “ice batteries” to commercial and industrial buildings served by electric utility Southern California Edison (SCE). The units are expected to reduce air conditioning bills by up to 40 percent and eliminate 200,000 tons of CO2 over the next 20 years.
Ice Energy has been building ice-based cooling systems since the early 2000s. Much like pumped storage or compressed air “batteries,” Ice Energy essentially stores electricity by drawing power from the grid at non-peak times to freeze water in a special container. Then at peak times, when the cost of electricity is high and grid operators are struggling to keep up with demand, Ice Energy’s systems kick in and use that block of ice to cool the space that the air conditioning unit normally serves.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @10:38PM (1 child)
Installed by H1Bs, Maintained by H1Bs.
SoCal is NoJob for Americans.
The Future of America for Americans, as predicted 30 years ago...
They Live Cops destroy shanty town [youtube.com]
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Saturday May 06 2017, @11:54PM
Select another installer?
Maybe there's a new "committee of un-american activities" ..? :p
One that would happily use the legal arm to make them wish Americans did the job.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @10:44PM (3 children)
I remember reading about a hospital doing this on a large scale, harvesting snow during winter and then drawing cold from it during summer saving was it a million dollars or something in cooling costs. I though it was very neat.
Of course, there's no snow available in some places, ever. :-/
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @11:07PM
Of course not. Redistribution of snow would be Socialist.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @11:50PM
I believe that's why they're freezing the water themselves.
You do know that freezing water is something trivial to do in the 21st century, right?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 07 2017, @12:52AM
A cheese factory near us (western New York state) runs a sprinkler during the winter and makes an ice mountain on top of a grid of heat exchanger pipes. Might be 20 feet (6 m) high? They save a lot of money all summer long using the cold to chill incoming milk.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by requerdanos on Saturday May 06 2017, @11:19PM (29 children)
Ice Energy [draws power] at non-peak times to freeze water... Then at peak times, when the cost of electricity is high... [The system uses] that block of ice to cool the space that the air conditioning unit normally serves.
Analysis 1 [Bottom Line]: So, by drawing more power at OFF-PEAK times, the financial cost of electricity is REDUCED for doing the SAME work. GOOD!
Analysis 2 [Energy Friendliness]: So, it draws MORE total power to do the SAME thing, saving on the energy BILL, but WASTING energy, not saving energy, overall. BAD!
Decisions, decisions.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday May 06 2017, @11:40PM (8 children)
(Score: 3, Informative) by butthurt on Sunday May 07 2017, @01:51AM (7 children)
A recent report by the California government stated:
Coastal California is already experiencing the early impacts of a rising sea level, including more extensive coastal flooding during storms, periodic tidal flooding, and increased coastal erosion. The rate of ice loss from the Greenland and Antarctic Ice Sheets is increasing.
[...]
Waiting for scientific certainty is neither a safe nor prudent option.
-- http://www.opc.ca.gov/webmaster/ftp/pdf/docs/rising-seas-in-california-an-update-on-sea-level-rise-science.pdf [ca.gov]
It was in the news:
http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/04/30/oceans-rising-faster-than-scientific-forecasts/ [mercurynews.com]
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/rising-sea-levels-will-hit-california-harder-than-other-places/ [scientificamerican.com]
There's an effort to use less fossil fuel, in the hope that parts of San Diego, Los Angeles, and San Francisco won't have to be moved to higher ground or sea-walled.
During a recent drought, farmers in California engaged in "massive but unsustainable groundwater pumping.
http://pacinst.org/publication/impacts-of-californias-ongoing-drought-agriculture/ [pacinst.org]
They also reduced the acreage they were planting.
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/california-drought/california-farmers-near-survival-mode-drought-drags-n332566 [nbcnews.com]
The price of energy is the main factor hindering the uptake of desalination. If the price of energy is keeping us from having as much food and water as we'd like, then energy is not as cheap as we might want. We do have far more energy available to us than did pre-industrial societies--but we've harmed the natural environment to get it. It behooves us to be provident in the ways we use it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 07 2017, @03:01AM
Have they considered putting a Prop 65 warning on the rising sea level?
(Score: 1, Interesting) by khallow on Sunday May 07 2017, @03:03AM (5 children)
Second, their water mismanagement problems are completely predictable and solvable without requiring the use of desalination plants. Pumping water out of the ground many times faster than it can be replenished will end with extreme, long term drought, but you don't see them taking even basic precautions against that.
Third, I wouldn't take the word of California for a variety of things, including panicked climate change propaganda. They're the ones requiring balsamic vinegar to carry warning labels about lead consumption and requiring businesses and other buildings with public accommodation to put up blanket warning signs about cleaning compounds [consumerreports.org].
The price of energy is the main factor hindering the uptake of desalination. If the price of energy is keeping us from having as much food and water as we'd like, then energy is not as cheap as we might want.
Or it just might be a matter of financially incompetent state and local governments unable or unwilling to spend for desalination. I don't see pathological energy conservation, which is a thing California has done before, helping here.
We do have far more energy available to us than did pre-industrial societies--but we've harmed the natural environment to get it. It behooves us to be provident in the ways we use it.
That horse left the barn long ago. Conservation won't get you out of the overpopulation trap since it doesn't make poor people less poor. Wealthy societies and female workers will do that, but it requires one to have a sensible opinion on conservation of resources that are very plentiful, despite whatever the state of California thinks.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 07 2017, @04:14PM (2 children)
The water problems are not easily solvable without the desalination plants. Why would you even say that? Besides the Northern Californians that are pissed about the Southern Californians stealing their water, the rights that go to the natives as well as the farmers that have owned rights for many decades, it's hardly what any reasonable person would say is easily solvable. Between those groups you've got enough voters to easily flip the legislature in one way or the other.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday May 07 2017, @10:12PM (1 child)
The water problems are not easily solvable without the desalination plants.
Charge farms and other users what the water costs. If they can't afford it, then that means less demand for water. The problems don't have to be solved.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday May 08 2017, @04:36AM
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Wednesday May 10 2017, @10:01AM (1 child)
> [...] obstructing construction of new power generation since the 1970s.
That does seem to be true of nuclear power:
A 1976 state law prohibits construction of new nuclear power plants in California until a means of disposal of high-level nuclear waste is approved. A bill to repeal this moratorium was voted down in April 2007, but may be reintroduced. Meanwhile the California Energy Commission is reviewing the prospects of new nuclear capacity in the state.
-- http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profiles/others/californias-electricity.aspx [world-nuclear.org]
However, glancing at the list of electric generation facilities that were approved and denied since 1996, I see that 22.965 GW of capacity have been approved and constructed in that period (the "ON-LINE TOTAL - In Operation" line) with another 2.054 GW approved and ready to build ("Subtotal Approved and "Available" for Construction" line).
http://www.energy.ca.gov/sitingcases/all_projects.html [ca.gov]
[...] California electricity crisis [...] mix of market and non-market components [...]
That did happen, and "insane" is a good word for it.
> Second, their water mismanagement problems are completely predictable and solvable without requiring the use of desalination plants.
I see a similarity to the possibility that these IceBear units could obviate the construction of power plants.
> Third, I wouldn't take the word of California for a variety of things, including panicked climate change propaganda.
I didn't expect you to agree with the report. However, perhaps you see the possibility that the state's government may take the report seriously.
> Or it just might be a matter of financially incompetent state and local governments unable or unwilling to spend for desalination.
Were energy less expensive, they might well be more able, or more inclined.
> [...] pathological energy conservation, which is a thing California has done before [...]
Do you see these ice units as an example of that? What else did you have in mind?
> Conservation won't get you out of the overpopulation trap since it doesn't make poor people less poor.
If, because of conservation, a poor person purchases, for example, less electricity, that person has spent less money. That money can be used for other purposes.
> Wealthy societies and female workers will do that, but it requires one to have a sensible opinion on conservation of resources that are very plentiful [...]
You see a tragedy of the commons pertaining to water; I see one pertaining to fossil fuels. If the latter could somehow be burned without resulting in global warming and pollution, they are nonetheless finite--and we're using them far faster than they are being formed.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday May 10 2017, @11:20PM
since 1996, I see that 22.965 GW of capacity have been approved and constructed in that period
I did say the situation had improved somewhat.
I see a similarity to the possibility that these IceBear units could obviate the construction of power plants.
But that shouldn't be the reason IceBear units are developed. After all, if reducing electricity supply is your only goal then the obvious solution is to supply nothing.
If, because of conservation, a poor person purchases, for example, less electricity, that person has spent less money. That money can be used for other purposes.
And if because of conservation, a poor person either ends up spending more money or otherwise has a reduced standard of living, which incidentally, I consider a more likely outcome, then it's not so good for that poor person. I don't believe that conservation efforts have ever furthered the well being of poor people. Instead, it's just another cost pushed on them.
You see a tragedy of the commons pertaining to water; I see one pertaining to fossil fuels. If the latter could somehow be burned without resulting in global warming and pollution, they are nonetheless finite--and we're using them far faster than they are being formed.
We can stop using fossil fuels when they become too expensive relative to the alternatives (that is, are "used up" for purposes of generating energy). This situation doesn't need to last forever, it just needs to help us now when we really need it. The pollution argument has modest traction, but the argument that we're using up a resource that somehow will be more valuable in the future, is not.
I didn't expect you to agree with the report. However, perhaps you see the possibility that the state's government may take the report seriously.
I do indeed see the possibility. I don't respect it nor believe, even if sincere, that the rest of us should share their delusions as a result.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 07 2017, @12:36AM (1 child)
It's actually not. Because sometimes energy goes unused. Lets say we have a bunch of solar cells, they may be able to output N Gigawatts of power around noon. That power might not be able to be stored, so if only 50% of the power generated is used, the other 50% of the energy is wasted. On the other hand, if we need power at night, it can't come from solar. So we burn coal. So energy from sun vs energy from coal. Yes, using at non-peak times does save energy because some energy is free and other energy is not.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Sunday May 07 2017, @01:20PM
It's actually not. Because sometimes energy goes unused. Lets say we have a bunch of solar cells
During the summer (air conditioning season), off-peak hours [sce.com] are 11pm - 8am.
There isn't a lot of solar going unused from 11pm-8am. As a wise man once said,
if we need power at night, it can't come from solar.
(Score: 4, Informative) by butthurt on Sunday May 07 2017, @12:57AM (6 children)
> WASTING energy, not saving energy, overall
A fair bit of California's electricity is from wind and solar, which are intermittent. If more electricity is being produced than is needed, the excess production goes to waste:
On March 27[, 2016], a sunny day, some solar farms had to shut down because there was more power on the grid than Californians were using.
-- https://ww2.kqed.org/science/2016/04/04/what-will-california-do-with-too-much-solar/ [kqed.org]
These ice-making systems would instead do something useful with that electricity.
Another consideration is thermodynamic efficiency. These systems will be able to run at night, using less energy than if they were running during the day because the outside air is ordinarily cooler at night than it is during the day. Of course, the proper comparison is to more conventional cooling systems, and I don't have the expertise to make that comparison.
The peaking plants in California burn natural gas. The article I linked explains it, although not very well. In the comments, MITDGreenb says that they are seldom shut down because doing so creates a great deal of wear on the machinery. Instead, he says, they are kept running, but at much less than their full capacity--and much less than their full efficiency. He likens it to a car idling. Little electricity is produced, but a fair bit of fuel is needed. With enough of these ice-making systems, peak demand might be reduced enough to close one or more peaking plants. The amount of electricity consumed might even be greater than otherwise, but the amount of natural gas burned would be less.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 07 2017, @01:29AM (2 children)
Minus: Lower efficiency due to the usage of storage mechanism.
Plus: Greater efficiency at night time due to generators operating at a higher capacity (i.e., higher efficiency)
Plus: Alleviating daytime peak load demand.
Minus: Added cost of distributed installation/maintenance.
So we will just to have to try and see how they will sum out in the real world.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Sunday May 07 2017, @03:22AM (1 child)
Sorry if I was too long-winded. You left out one point: for the same initial and final indoor temperatures, it takes less energy to run an air conditioner when the outside temperature is cool rather than hot (a plus). I left out a related point that I meant to make: normally we don't cool buildings below the freezing point of water. Theoretically, we expect to use more energy if we make ice then melt that ice to cool a room to a comfortable temperature than to just cool the room directly to that same temperature (a minus).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_efficiency#Carnot_efficiency [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 07 2017, @04:09AM
Not long-winded, I was just summarizing the factors brought up. And the point(s) you elaborated would be included in the reduced efficiency due to the storage mechanism.
And I am sure there are other factors not mentioned.
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Sunday May 07 2017, @01:40AM
That's induced demand. We shouldn't build any more power plants because low prices will encourage use and pollution.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Sunday May 07 2017, @01:46PM (1 child)
A fair bit of California's electricity is from wind and solar, which are intermittent. If more electricity is being produced than is needed, the excess production goes to waste:
On March 27[, 2016], a sunny day, some solar farms had to shut down because there was more power on the grid than Californians were using.
...These ice-making systems would instead do something useful with that electricity.
Although that day was a Sunday and therefore classified as off-peak all day, most days, the summer off-peak use is going to be 11pm - 8am when the solar farms are already shut down. It seems to be basically an at-night system, which mostly rules out solar.
Sources of electricity generation in CA [eia.gov] during the night-time seem to be Natural Gas, hydroelectric, nuclear, and renewables like wind, in that order.
So what it seems is that, with solar off the table at night, a higher percentage of the energy available (by whatever margin) is going to be the creating-carbon-exhaust variety, and since the system can't be 100% efficient, it is going to use more overall energy than just running the air conditioner. (Instead of 'wasting energy'--if it's doing work it arguably isn't wasted--I should have said 'using more energy' above).
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Sunday May 07 2017, @11:39PM
> [...] summer off-peak use is going to be 11pm - 8am [...] It seems to be basically an at-night system [...]
The article says:
What the utility gets in exchange for its discounts is control over when the IceBears are turned on and off [...]
which seems to mean control over when the ice is melted. I see nothing that contradicts what you said; an earlier article says specifically that the units were intended to be run "at night"
https://cleantechnica.com/2014/11/22/25-mw-ice-energy-storage-southern-california-edison/ [cleantechnica.com]
Just as a conventional air conditioner can run during the day--albeit less efficiently than at night--these could run during the day if their controller had been designed to allow it. Again, I see nothing that says they were designed that way, which is too bad: solar energy used for freezing in the morning could lessen electric use in the afternoon and evening, when the load is highest in the summer:
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=19111 [eia.gov]
> [...] since the system can't be 100% efficient, it is going to use more overall energy than just running the air conditioner.
You seem to disregard the last two paragraphs of my previous comment (#505638): cooling at night can be more efficient than cooling during the day; running a gas-fired (or coal or nuclear) power plant at full capacity around the clock is more efficient than using it for peaking. Overall energy ought to include the energy embodied in the natural gas. You seem to be considering just the electric energy used, which could be higher with the Ice Bear but not necessarily (because of the Carnot thing).
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Sunday May 07 2017, @02:03AM (9 children)
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Sunday May 07 2017, @02:02PM (8 children)
From TFA [arstechnica.com]:
Ice Energy says IceBear 30 units can eliminate up to 10,000 lbs of CO2 per year.
(Emphasis mine). I didn't find the math they use in the article. On Ice Energy's website [ice-energy.com] they say that the CO2 savings comes from displacing peak generation plants and by being "renewable friendly," but also on the "Ice Energy Says" basis.
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Sunday May 07 2017, @04:47PM (7 children)
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Sunday May 07 2017, @06:04PM (6 children)
Not sure your argument here, you basically just repeated what I said.
Sorry, I guess it's something like the following:
- Ice Energy says they will save so many tons of carbon, but I don't see any evidence to back it up.
- They say that the displacement will avoid using peak generation during the day to save carbon release, but drawing power at night draws from sources that necessarily exclude solar and therefore are more likely to have a higher carbon-output-source factor than during the day, when solar is in the mix.
- Since no system is 100% efficient [imascientist.org.uk], they are necessarily using more energy for the same amount of air cooling. Even if they cool the water at night, when it is easier to cool water all other things being equal, it still remains a fact [livescience.com] that no system is 100% efficient, and so they are necessarily using more energy for the same amount of air cooling. I am not sure how they are saving carbon emissions by using more energy, and that during a time when no solar is online. Not saying that's impossible; just don't see how this system would do it.
- According to TFA, the system is not being chosen on its merits but rather because the California legislature requires a certain amount of off-grid energy storage regardless of the sane-or-zany factor involved; saying nice things about this system might be true, or might simply be an effort to make the choice less unpalatable.
- For some of Ice Energy's smaller custom systems, using excess solar whenever it's available is a component, but emphatically not this system: This is a system by which SCE can unilaterally turn off large customers' air conditioners at peak times of the day, replacing A/C with frozen-the-night-before Ice-based heat transfer for a few hours on a massive scale to manage demand.
- Their website technical section seems to contain more hand-waving than mathematics, and I don't take their word for it. These matters are complex: Maybe they are telling the truth and not being misleading in the least. I doubt it.
Apologies for the previous ambiguous post--it made sense in my head at the time, as do so many things.
Energy management, renewable & sustainable energy, and energy cost are tightly intertwined issues that we as a society must, must face, advance, and keep ahead of to avoid a transition to regression instead of progress. I salute Ice Energy for working on the issues; I salute the state of California for recognizing the need and taking action. Doesn't mean I trust them, but I am glad someone's doing something. Admittedly, for all the designs that wander through my head, I have built precious few of them and none of them is currently harvesting nor providing energy.
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Sunday May 07 2017, @08:57PM (2 children)
- The savings comes from displacing peak demand, and reducing the use of CO2 generating peaker plants that come online to help fill in generation demand during peak times when the normal grid generation plants can't keep up. Those other plants run 24/7 so their output is fairly stead, the peakers add additional output. Elimination of those would result in a net CO2 reduction.
- The peaker plants it is being deployed to address are not solar, they are fossil fuel systems. These are systems turned on during high peak times. Eliminating those most definitely reduces carbon output. That it uses sources available at night doesn't affect the overall CO2 output over a 24 hour period, as those plants will be operating 24/7 anyway. Taking the peaker plants offline is the goal here.
- The system does not have to be 100% efficient to be more efficient than running a multi-ton AC, it just has to be more efficient than the equivalent cooling time it replaces. Remember it's replacing AC for up to 3 hours, not running along side it. That means while the ice system is running, the AC compressors are not.
- You are making a statement not supported by TFA. Can you back up that it was not chosen for it's merits as an energy storage platform?
- This is due to the fact that those systems do not also have solar deployments at the site. Again, however, reducing peak demand means reducing the use of natural gas peaker plants, which produce CO2 in excess of the normal grid generation.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Sunday May 07 2017, @11:54PM (1 child)
> Remember it's replacing AC for up to 3 hours, not running along side it. That means while the ice system is running, the AC compressors are not.
Ice Energy's promotional video from 2011 shows it running alongside an existing air conditioner.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g69Y9B3nZOI [youtube.com]
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Monday May 08 2017, @05:00AM
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Sunday May 07 2017, @09:09PM
(Score: 2, Informative) by khallow on Sunday May 07 2017, @10:16PM (1 child)
- Since no system is 100% efficient [imascientist.org.uk], they are necessarily using more energy for the same amount of air cooling.
Unless they aren't. Lower temperatures at night are a big deal since you're dumping the heat into the cooler night rather than into the hottest parts of the day. It doesn't have to be 100% efficient in order to be more efficient than 100% efficient daytime AC.
(Score: 1) by butthurt on Sunday May 07 2017, @11:43PM
Yes, thank you. That's the idea I was attempting to convey in my comment about Carnot efficiency.
/comments.pl?noupdate=1&sid=19375&page=1&cid=505697 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Sunday May 07 2017, @05:17AM
Analysis 3: The thing holds 480 gallons, for a total weight exceeding 2 metric tons, each.
Can't drop that on just any basic roof, and strengthening roofs for the added load also has a cost...