this post was submitted on 19 Feb 2024
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The memes of the climate
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Why do we need gigawatt grid level storages?
What about decentralized storages, e.g. a battery in your home in conjunction with solar power, or using your car battery? A lot of the arguments against renewable energy comes from demanding the electricity grid to follow the same principals as it did under fossil fuels. But a fully renewable grid can be governed by different principles.
For home use, sure that distributed model may work. For industrial use, it won't. The power demands are too high. Especially if you want to cut out the emissions from things like steel production.
Steel production is an example of an industry that has many activities being best suited for a base load. Many industries and also some activities in steel production would be suitable for load balancing approaches.
We currently have a demand driven grid. We should shift the paradigm to a supply driven grid. This of course runs into problems with capitalism, as a main profit driver is the externalization of the costs for damages. If we adequately price the damages into the energy provided, it will drive industries to take a flexible production approach.
To continue with the heavy industry examples, many run 24/7, not because of direct profit motives, but because of the massive cost associated with letting the process go cold. I've done work at a glass recycling plant where the said point blank: if the furnace ever goes cold, they will just close the plant entirely, since it would cost too much to clean it out and get it going again. Not all processed lend themselves to being turned on and off again constantly.