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from the re-energizing-the-power-industry dept.
Tesla's Megapack Battery is Big Enough to Help Grids Handle Peak Demand:
Tesla announced a new massive battery today called Megapack that could replace so-called "peaker" power plants, which provide energy when a local electrical grid gets overloaded. Tesla says that Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) will deploy several Megapacks at Moss Landing on Monterrey Bay in California, which is one of four locations where the California utility plans to install more cost-effective energy storage solutions.
Each Megapack can store up to 3 megawatt hours (MWh) of energy at a time, and it's possible to string enough Megapacks together to create a battery with more than 1 GWh of energy storage, Tesla says. The company says this would be enough energy to power "every home in San Francisco for six hours." Telsa will deliver the Megapacks fully assembled, and they include "battery modules, bi-directional inverters, a thermal management system, an AC main breaker and controls." Tesla says the Megapack takes up 40 percent less space, requires a tenth of the parts to build, and can be assembled 10 times as fast as alternative energy storage solutions.
Also at cnet.
Would also have the benefit of essentially instant activation versus peaker plants which take some amount of time to spin up, even if kept warmed up and idling.
(Score: 3, Informative) by takyon on Wednesday July 31 2019, @02:45PM (7 children)
Solar and battery technology are still seeing relatively rapid improvements. We'll probably see at least a doubling of maximum battery energy density and lower costs. And then there's grid storage stuff you mention, like pumped-storage hydroelectricity.
It bodes well and solar is continuing to grow exponentially [wikipedia.org], at least for now.
Solar is a good stopgap until we get fusion, or dare I say... thorium?
(And that's not to ignore natural gas, which is a better option than coal.)
By stuffing enough large-scale storage into the grid, we can accommodate a future in which almost every new home/building has solar panels on it, but a grid connection is needed to account for bad weather or high individual demand.
In a more distant future, every building with roof tiles should have "solar tiles" instead, or solar panels. And the grid will be powered by cheap fusion energy.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday July 31 2019, @04:47PM (1 child)
Another place where utilities are resisting progress is on smart grids. To have more decentralized power like batteries and wind/solar the grid needs to be smarter. But that costs money and the utilities resist.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 01 2019, @07:22AM
It isn't just the utilities resisting. The one around here had to go through recertification of their meters to switch to smart ones. There are normally a handful of people at utility meetings and even less comment. There were 5 people there to comment because the smart meters would allow the meter to charge different amounts in each direction. There were 38 people there to comment about the smart meters causing everything from headaches, nausea, and muscle pain, to cancer, autism, and infertility. Finally, one of the board asked the utility representative for a six month delay because she wanted the utility to provide evidence that the meters were safe. "After all, these people didn't show up for nothing. There must be some sort of evidence it's bad, right?" My friend, the utility representative, just told her she could call one of their engineers would be happy to talk about it with her.
That was a long story, but should illustrate the problems they do have when they finally want to put them in. But, you really should Google it because that crazy goes quite deep.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Wednesday July 31 2019, @05:56PM (1 child)
I like your non-dystopian views of the future of the composition of the electric grid. Here's hoping for something even remotely close to what you've outlined.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Wednesday July 31 2019, @07:11PM
In solidarity with using less fossil fuel, I too raise my cigarette lighter in honor of your ideas ... wait, sorry about that.
(Score: 2) by legont on Thursday August 01 2019, @12:28AM (2 children)
The price for it will be similar to what we pay now for the whole electricity consumption.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday August 02 2019, @03:13AM (1 child)
Why would you assume that? It would cost a lot less to provide, and even a grid monopoly would still be in competition with the much more competitive battery industry.
(Score: 2) by legont on Saturday August 03 2019, @01:22AM
Let's take an extreme example. Hover dam will cost us roughly the same no matter how much electricity we get from it. All other, shall I call them classic, ways of getting electricity are very similar to this once all the costs are factored in, including, again for example, a cleaning costs of abandoned coal station, which will be more than building it. Note that the coal station clean up will not be done by the utility who owned it. Similar to mining industry the utility in question will simply go under and all the costs will come from taxes.
I am all for the new and green energy, but the way to get there is not what happens now.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.