When the price goes up it’s because the renewables don’t produce power when there is no wind and sun (which pretty much sums up January here). Building more of something that does not produce power is not going to help with the price shocks.
We need to figure out grid scale storage, fusion or build nuclear power to get rid of fossil fuels. Until then utility bills will be occasionally more shocking than jamming a fork in the outlet.
figure out grid scale storage, fusion or build nuclear power
You don’t necessarily need that, actually. Another option is to invest in a larger, wider grid with more interconnects and more long-range transmission capacity.
Maybe the sun isn’t shining and the wind isn’t blowing where you are … but the sun is shining somewhere, and the wind is blowing somewhere. If you can transmit the power from those places to where you are (and vice versa) then you really don’t need nearly as much storage capacity or continuous generation. If you can transmit power from farther away, that can really help even out the random variability in renewable power sources by averaging them out over a much wider area.
Another often-overlooked constant source of renewable energy is geothermal. Geothermal power plants can be extremely green and efficient, and their power capacity basically never changes at all. They’re only viable in certain places that have geothermal hot spots, of course … but once again, you can solve that by increasing long-range transmission capacity. Build massive geothermal plants in the few places where they’re viable, and then transmit that power to all the places where geothermal isn’t viable.
When the price goes up it’s because the renewables don’t produce power when there is no wind and sun (which pretty much sums up January here). Building more of something that does not produce power is not going to help with the price shocks.
We need to figure out grid scale storage, fusion or build nuclear power to get rid of fossil fuels. Until then utility bills will be occasionally more shocking than jamming a fork in the outlet.
You don’t necessarily need that, actually. Another option is to invest in a larger, wider grid with more interconnects and more long-range transmission capacity.
Maybe the sun isn’t shining and the wind isn’t blowing where you are … but the sun is shining somewhere, and the wind is blowing somewhere. If you can transmit the power from those places to where you are (and vice versa) then you really don’t need nearly as much storage capacity or continuous generation. If you can transmit power from farther away, that can really help even out the random variability in renewable power sources by averaging them out over a much wider area.
Another often-overlooked constant source of renewable energy is geothermal. Geothermal power plants can be extremely green and efficient, and their power capacity basically never changes at all. They’re only viable in certain places that have geothermal hot spots, of course … but once again, you can solve that by increasing long-range transmission capacity. Build massive geothermal plants in the few places where they’re viable, and then transmit that power to all the places where geothermal isn’t viable.