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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, 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.