Thoughts on mega wind and solar projects

[rontaki]

Note that in his EV example of buying solar panels versus buying gasoline over the lifetime of a ICE, he neglected to include the cost of installation of the solar panels, a battery storage system for the energy, and an electrical hook up station from the battery to the car, which would probably triple or quadruple his estimated costs. Other than those large other expenditures, I agree with what he says ;P ;P

The other thing I dislike is there is a huge loss in American labor away from mining fossil fuels.
Everyone knows solar panels and a lot of batteries are primarily produced in China, a hostile nation.
If these components were built here, it would be a lot more acceptable to many Americans to shift to more solar power.
Changing Americans minds from losing 100’s of thousands of petroleum and mining jobs to producing batteries and solar panels is a tough sell.

>"The other thing I dislike is there is a huge loss in American labor away from mining fossil fuels."<
AI and robots will be doing this work in a few years, if still needed. It's really not much of a future job to count on.
Unfortunately, AI will also be producing those panels and batteries. I don't know what or where will be a safe career in the not-too-distant future. @Hay Dude, sorry to say that even your line of work is at risk of full automation doing it. Not with as much aplomb, talent and skill as you have, but still, keep an eye on the rear-view mirror!

 

[jyoutz]

>"The other thing I dislike is there is a huge loss in American labor away from mining fossil fuels."<
AI and robots will be doing this work in a few years, if still needed. It's really not much of a future job to count on.
Unfortunately, AI will also be producing those panels and batteries. I don't know what or where will be a safe career in the not-too-distant future. @Hay Dude, sorry to say that even your line of work is at risk of full automation doing it. Not with as much aplomb, talent and skill as you have, but still, keep an eye on the rear-view mirror!

Coal mining is pretty much nearly dead even without AI jobs.

 

[gsganzer]

And the Texas natural gas plant failures were due to poor design. They weren’t designed for cold weather, unlike most other plants in the U.S.

Like most disasters or accidents, there were compounding/cascading things that led to the severity of the TX failure. Due to Covid, the ERCOT reliability inspections were suspended, and the plants were asked to self-inspect for winter readiness (think fox in the henhouse). It was compounded that many plants decided to delay the typical fall outages for maintenance and upgrades, due to global shortages of parts and supplies, not to mention the risk of the outage crews weren't spreading Covid throughout the country. As someone who frequently visited plants during those years, I was tested for Covid over 30 times to access sites.

Sadly, virtually all TX plants (both power generation and gas production) were designed for those temperatures, but poor construction/installation/maintenance practices can result in condensate collecting in sensing lines and instrument air lines. Making instruments have erroneous readings or instrument air powered valves not actuating (think airlines on a trucks air brakes), tripping safety interlocks. In the gas industry it can be even more troublesome as many systems are remote, without electricity and they rely on the pipeline gas itself (instead of better quality clean/dry instrument air), to actuate valves and controls. This starts a cascade of failures.

Another compounding factor is that the arctic cold hit Texas and stopped. Much like the hot doldrums of summer, the same can happen in winter. The wind stopped blowing and the wind power wasn't at its normal capacity either. Another papercut that became one of many.

I read some really good articles on the TX freeze and it did a great job of cutting through all the finger pointing. There was ample blame all around as well as ample opportunities to learn from it. Hopefully we did.

 

[jyoutz]

Like most disasters or accidents, there were compounding/cascading things that led to the severity of the TX failure. Due to Covid, the ERCOT reliability inspections were suspended, and the plants were asked to self-inspect for winter readiness (think fox in the henhouse). It was compounded that many plants decided to delay the typical fall outages for maintenance and upgrades, due to global shortages of parts and supplies, not to mention the risk of the outage crews weren't spreading Covid throughout the country. As someone who frequently visited plants during those years, I was tested for Covid over 30 times to access sites.

Sadly, virtually all TX plants (both power generation and gas production) were designed for those temperatures, but poor construction/installation/maintenance practices can result in condensate collecting in sensing lines and instrument air lines. Making instruments have erroneous readings or instrument air powered valves not actuating (think airlines on a trucks air brakes), tripping safety interlocks. In the gas industry it can be even more troublesome as many systems are remote, without electricity and they rely on the pipeline gas itself (instead of better quality clean/dry instrument air), to actuate valves and controls. This starts a cascade of failures.

Another compounding factor is that the arctic cold hit Texas and stopped. Much like the hot doldrums of summer, the same can happen in winter. The wind stopped blowing and the wind power wasn't at its normal capacity either. Another papercut that became one of many.

I read some really good articles on the TX freeze and it did a great job of cutting through all the finger pointing. There was ample blame all around as well as ample opportunities to learn from it. Hopefully we did.

I only know that gas plants keep running across this country in lots of places that are normally colder than the Texas “arctic freeze.” Thanks for the back story.

 

[ponytug]

I only know that gas plants keep running across this country in lots of places that are normally colder than the Texas “arctic freeze.” Thanks for the back story.

They do. And part of the debrief was the multitude of ways in which Texas natural gas facilities were not prepared for below freezing temperatures or the potential surges in transmission needs.

I use the Texas freeze as a teaching case for disaster and emergency planning as it has lots of lessons. One of which there were many ways that small changes might have made a profound difference in the outcome.

I think that there were lots of folks at fault. Personaly, I would start with the minor detail that almost none of the Texas grid is attached to other grids, and so the state is unable to import additional power in times of energy stress. I understand the ethos behind that decision, but at some level, this was an own goal, as was the recent flood damage. I sincerely hope that lots of Texans learned from the deep freeze and did something meaningful to keep themselves safe and to protect themselves from disasters.

All the best,

Peter

 

[gsganzer]

But really no joke -- you may want to look at some colleges for part time gigs (full time sucks because you get pulled into admin). The kids are fun, and generally pretty good folks. There are worse things.

Funny you say that. When my daughter was at NCTC for equine science in Gainesville, she had an Ag Shop class, where they learned some basic shop skills. The first day, she came home and said "Daddy, someone's going to die in this class!" and "Daddy, you have better tools in your truck tool box!" She said it was a poorly run class with a very unqualified shop teacher. She tried getting me to apply and teach it. I would have found it pretty fun and would have loved putting together a "Shop Ag reference manual". When I was a field service manager and engineering manager, I put together "Standards" manuals for those groups. It made it easier to get everyone to do things the same way, with the same expected outcomes. If they were making mistakes, I could add or tweak a section, so they'd have a new standard reference to follow.

I could see an Ag reference manual having sections for feed weights (per ton or cubic feet); drill hole sizes for clearance, thread cutting, self-tapping; seeding rates; the cubic feet of a pile of dirt; the list goes on and on.

 

[Larry Caldwell]

2025 Iberian Peninsula blackout - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Final report isn't due until early 2026. Pretty intersting read. The 7 deaths were attributed to carbon monoxide poisoning due to people running generators in poorly ventilated areas.

Comparing that to the 2021 Texas power outage, caused by natural gas plant failures due to freezing, where somewhere between 250-700 people died directly or indirectly and lasting for for a couple weeks, the Iberian outage was about 8 hours with final restorations in 23 hours.

Interesting note... you could fit 7.3 Portugals in Texas. That state is huge!

My whole county went down for 5 days a few years back. A storm took down a BPA feeder in the mountains, and it took them a while to get it back up. We had a telephone land line at the time, and the battery backup only lasted 48 hours. Local radio and television went down too. The NOAA weather radio and shortwave were our only information source. We were fine with wood heat and a generator, so I never checked the cell towers. We have no cell service at our house, so it was irrelevant.

 

[gsganzer]

I guess, like I posted much earlier in this thread, energy diversity is the key. Sure, some energy sources are cheaper, some are more expensive, some are more reliable, some are more sustainable and some are more secure.

Regardless, whenever you put all your eggs in one basket, someone learns how do destroy or exploit it, whether for benign or nefarious reasons.

Cost, sustainability, reliability and security all need to be treated equally.

 

[jyoutz]

They do. And part of the debrief was the multitude of ways in which Texas natural gas facilities were not prepared for below freezing temperatures or the potential surges in transmission needs.

I use the Texas freeze as a teaching case for disaster and emergency planning as it has lots of lessons. One of which there were many ways that small changes might have made a profound difference in the outcome.

I think that there were lots of folks at fault. Personaly, I would start with the minor detail that almost none of the Texas grid is attached to other grids, and so the state is unable to import additional power in times of energy stress. I understand the ethos behind that decision, but at some level, this was an own goal, as was the recent flood damage. I sincerely hope that lots of Texans learned from the deep freeze and did something meaningful to keep themselves safe and to protect themselves from disasters.

All the best,

Peter

The El Paso area is attached to the New Mexico power grid and was one of the few areas with power during that power outage. Being isolated and not attached to the western grid isn’t a great idea.

 

[Phil Timmons]

Note that in his EV example of buying solar panels versus buying gasoline over the lifetime of a ICE, he neglected to include the cost of installation of the solar panels, a battery storage system for the energy, and an electrical hook up station from the battery to the car, which would probably triple or quadruple his estimated costs. Other than those large other expenditures, I agree with what he says ;P ;P

The other thing I dislike is there is a huge loss in American labor away from mining fossil fuels.
Everyone knows solar panels and a lot of batteries are primarily produced in China, a hostile nation.
If these components were built here, it would be a lot more acceptable to many Americans to shift to more solar power.
Changing Americans minds from losing 100’s of thousands of petroleum and mining jobs to producing batteries and solar panels is a tough sell.

1. $1 per Watt is now typical install for full install of cheap Solar PV. That is why it works out to about 2 to 3 cents per kWh "behind the meter." Which works out to about the equivalent of 15 cent per gallon gasoline when that cheap electricity is put into an EV. I have been doing this for about 7 years, now. We can do the math, if you like?

2. No battery required, nor really desired. It is called Grid-Tie? You must have heard of this? Solar Folks send the surplus up to the Grid during the day (high grid demand time), and then get electricity back at night (surplus grid time). Win-Win for all sides.

3. Connection to plug in an EV. About $60. Parts on the rack at Lowes or Home Depot. Picked some up this weekend for a friend.

Real Question? Why do you have such strong opinions about a topic you clearly know nothing about? That is not a gotcha, it is a Real Question. What is up with that?

4. Plenty of Labor in mining Quartz Rock, Silicon, and Aluminum. Along with Silicon Foundries and Assembly and Install sites. US could be doing all that.

5. China is not "hostile" to US. It is the mouth breathing morons of US "Leadership" who are pumping weapons, sending warships, and generating fear and hate. I work with Chinese folks daily. From both Mainland and Taiwan. They are baffled at US ignorance and arrogance. I have seen up close how Stupid US have become, so I just sort of shrug. I did get Chinese Lanterns and Finger Trap puzzles to play with for the kids for Chinese New Year next week. We do season decorations on the robots in the lab windows. They are teaching me some basic Chinese for fun. Our lab tech reads me the equipment spec sheets, now -- mostly Chinese.

6. To build here. Yes US should. US "Leadership" is just too ignorant and arrogant. I do not think you really grasp the level of retardation that has struck US?

7. Americans are happy to work in Solar. Had an install crew of former Oil guys a couple of years ago. They would laugh even on the hard days about how much nicer and cleaner Solar PV is than Oil. And in some years ago, we had lots of fun putting Solar PV on Oil Wells. (end of the line power in deep West Texas gets expensive).

You really sincerely do not understand which side of what lines you are on?

 

[Phil Timmons]

OK, I missed about 30 or 40 posts, so...

The US and the western 1st world (including Japan and S. Kor) have a well established grid system, so feeding medium to large solar plants into the grid is using a largely existing system.

The 2nd and 3rd world, the grid isn't existing, at scale, and requires a Huge investment to build out. small scale, scattered generation makes a lot of sense there. Also many areas have trash land, and solar is the most productive "crop". Its not really want you need to industrial arc smelters or similar, but its fine for pumps, lights, ect.

Solar is fine, gas is fine, hydro is great, nuclear is great, but so is coal (we have hundreds of years available in the US). Solar isnt ideal in dense population, or extreme northern areas. Wind i dont know much about.

The Mega plants do centralize labor/expertise, and take less labor than dozens of small scale plants though.

Solar would be real nice in Cuba right now, wouldnt it, rather than embargo'd oil fired plants from the 1950s.

What is good in Cuba or Portugal may be terrible in China or US.

Ideally, I think 33% nuke, to supply a constant, steady, but slow to ramp up, "base line", 33% oil/gas/coal, that can be stock piled/produced locally, and 33% renewable/hydro (depending on local conditions), is a good mix.

Nukes would be bankrupt long before 33%. They are way too expensive to bear the Surplus. Real modeling numbers drop them below 10%. Presently at about 20%. So about 1/2 of the US existing Nukes could go away and not be missed. US has dropped from "Peak Nukes" in about 2012 with 104 Reactors, and is now down to 94 Reactors.

At this point, Coal can keep dropping to Zero. The existing plants are aging out, and no new US Coal has been built since 2013. Coal plants tend to max age out at 50 years or less, so they will just keep dwindling away.

There is also a mix of Hydro and Big Wind that tend to in-fill well. Right now and last year, US is building mostly Solar PV -- so we can already look ahead and know that is what US will mostly have. Not much new gas is being built, so that will likely drop ahead, as well.

 

[paulsharvey]

Nukes would be bankrupt long before 33%. They are way too expensive to bear the Surplus. Real modeling numbers drop them below 10%. Presently at about 20%. So about 1/2 of the US existing Nukes could go away and not be missed. US has dropped from "Peak Nukes" in about 2012 with 104 Reactors, and is now down to 94 Reactors.

At this point, Coal can keep dropping to Zero. The existing plants are aging out, and no new US Coal has been built since 2013. Coal plants tend to max age out at 50 years or less, so they will just keep dwindling away.

There is also a mix of Hydro and Big Wind that tend to in-fill well. Right now and last year, US is building mostly Solar PV -- so we can already look ahead and know that is what US will mostly have. Not much new gas is being built, so that will likely drop ahead, as well.

You want/need a base line, constant supply, atleast meeting your night time demand, in spring/fall. You have summer demand, which is going to be day time, week day, peak, and its going to be high every day, but kinda a standard peak.

Winter time nights and mornings; those are less predictable, and generally lower demand, can spike to well above summer.

Solar production should deal with summer demand well, as more sun=higher demand. The winter peaks, thats harder, and thats where traditional can come in.

Hydro, it depends... some can run near peak 24/7/365; but not all. Some are much lower for large parts of time, and to some degree act as batteries; storing potential energy in the lake, to convert to kinetic when you open additonal turbines.

I dont know the numbers; but is the constant, low, seasonal demand only 10% of the peaks? That may be true, but would suprise me.

 

[Hay Dude]

1. $1 per Watt is now typical install for full install of cheap Solar PV. That is why it works out to about 2 to 3 cents per kWh "behind the meter." Which works out to about the equivalent of 15 cent per gallon gasoline when that cheap electricity is put into an EV. I have been doing this for about 7 years, now. We can do the math, if you like?

2. No battery required, nor really desired. It is called Grid-Tie? You must have heard of this? Solar Folks send the surplus up to the Grid during the day (high grid demand time), and then get electricity back at night (surplus grid time). Win-Win for all sides.

3. Connection to plug in an EV. About $60. Parts on the rack at Lowes or Home Depot. Picked some up this weekend for a friend.

The average person is not going to tie an EV into a wall mount plug connected to solar panels for 60 bucks. Sorry, that’s just not happening.

Real Question? Why do you have such strong opinions about a topic you clearly know nothing about? That is not a gotcha, it is a Real Question. What is up with that?

4. Plenty of Labor in mining Quartz Rock, Silicon, and Aluminum. Along with Silicon Foundries and Assembly and Install sites. US could be doing all that.

5. China is not "hostile" to US. It is the mouth breathing morons of US "Leadership" who are pumping weapons, sending warships, and generating fear and hate. I work with Chinese folks daily. From both Mainland and Taiwan.

“China is not hostile to the US”
Uh huh.

They are baffled at US ignorance and arrogance. I have seen up close how Stupid US have become, so I just sort of shrug. I did get Chinese Lanterns and Finger Trap puzzles to play with for the kids for Chinese New Year next week. We do season decorations on the robots in the lab windows. They are teaching me some basic Chinese for fun. Our lab tech reads me the equipment spec sheets, now -- mostly Chinese.

6. To build here. Yes US should. US "Leadership" is just too ignorant and arrogant. I do not think you really grasp the level of retardation that has struck US?

I think that’s unnecessarily harsh. What other country(s) do you think are less “retarded”? Please name them.

7. Americans are happy to work in Solar. Had an install crew of former Oil guys a couple of years ago. They would laugh even on the hard days about how much nicer and cleaner Solar PV is than Oil. And in some years ago, we had lots of fun putting Solar PV on Oil Wells. (end of the line power in deep West Texas gets expensive).

You really sincerely do not understand which side of what lines you are on.

Was that really necessary?
And why do you never fail to waste a post bashing the United States? It’s pretty apparent from your previous posts, that’s your real reason for being here.
If you hate the country so much, why don’t you leave and take your hate with you? ;P ;P

China? Everyone sees the direction people are going. They come from China to the US to live here. Few leave the US and go to China to live. The cost of Communism versus Freedom.

Maybe You could buck the trend ;P ;P

I built solar powered homes and home additions years ago, some with geothermal, too.
How many did you build? It’s been a few years, but I’m quite familiar with how they work and how they were installed. I built home made solar panels for the home I grew up in with my father to heat hot water. They were crude, but they worked.

Try a post without a bash on the US for once, or personal digs on anyone who disagrees with you. Humility is not your strong suit.

 

[dodge man]

I’ve seen a few news stories on the local news about battery storage at some solar farms. The amount of batteries is huge. Basically dozens of semi trailers are full of batteries. It doesn’t seem practical to me.

 

[jyoutz]

I’ve seen a few news stories on the local news about battery storage at some solar farms. The amount of batteries is huge. Basically dozens of semi trailers are full of batteries. It doesn’t seem practical to me.

But dozens of freight trains full of coal is practical?

 

[Hay Dude]

But dozens of freight trains full of coal is practical?

Not answering for Dodge man, but yes in the sense that the infrastructure is all in place. The railroads are there. The highways are there. The mines and quarries are there. The transmission lines are built. We made huge investments in them.
There is a level of practicality in that.
Simply abandoning them and tearing it all down makes no sense. We all recognize the promise and affordability of solar, but it makes more sense to keep the fossil fuel infrastructure in place and running when solar can’t, or if China won’t supply us with the solar panels or batteries in a time of conflict. China is making very hostile moves on Taiwan and other US allies. They are clearly involved in dark money schemes. That has to be factored into the process.

Few of us are moronic enough to believe China is not hostile to the US, but there are few out there. ;P

Importing Chinese solar panels, batteries, wire, switch gear and all the components related to going all solar has some impracticalities tied to it and certainly does nothing to help unemployment levels. Giving 100’s of thousands of fossil fuel workers pink slips and telling them to pound sand is impractical, too.

 

[dodge man]

But dozens of freight trains full of coal is practical?

Yes because we’ve been doing it for years. I’m not against solar and wind. With some personal experience I’m not sure they are as green as people think. The news story I saw on the batteries at a solar farm talked about reaching out to local fire departments about fighting a fire at one. Seeing what a Tesla does on fire I’m not sure what happens if one gets started in one of those trailers full of batteries.

My point is I’m not sure battery storage is practical yet for solar.

 

[paulsharvey]

I’ve seen a few news stories on the local news about battery storage at some solar farms. The amount of batteries is huge. Basically dozens of semi trailers are full of batteries. It doesn’t seem practical to me.

Been working 50 feet from one of those battery farms. Its an existing power company property, retired generation plant, like 40 acres. Its been described as basically shipping containers. You can fit a lot of shipping containers in 40 acres.

 

[MossRoad]

My whole county went down for 5 days a few years back. A storm took down a BPA feeder in the mountains, and it took them a while to get it back up. We had a telephone land line at the time, and the battery backup only lasted 48 hours. Local radio and television went down too. The NOAA weather radio and shortwave were our only information source. We were fine with wood heat and a generator, so I never checked the cell towers. We have no cell service at our house, so it was irrelevant.

Several decades back there was an ice storm just south of us that took out power to some folks for six weeks. One of the first things I did when we bought our current house with a well for water was buy a generator so I could cook, shower and flush the toilet. We also bought a wood burning stove.

 

[gsganzer]

But dozens of freight trains full of coal is practical?

I did some work at a coal plant in PA (Homer City). Surprisingly, all their coal came by truck! Can you imagine that? It was something crazy, like 600 trucks a day. I have to assume, it was due to political or labor union pressure to provide jobs in a poor area, because a rail line would have been a no-brainer.

It's in the process of being torn down and will be rebuilt with NG turbines (also Hydrogen capable) as an AI Energy center. It has the possibility of being the largest NG plant in the country.

I recently worked at the worlds largest NG combined cycle power plant, located in Taiwan. It will eventually put out 7500 MW.

Post-edit: A wild (and scary) thing happened when I was working at the Taiwan Plant. A simultaneous alert came over everyone's phones, similar to our Amber Alerts. It was a Presidential defense alert, warning of incoming Chinese missiles and military attack and to take cover immediately. It was just a defense alert test.

It was kind of freaky actually. I'm sure the power plant I was at would have been hit in the first seconds of any such attack. I wondered where I would have taken shelter, there really wasn't anywhere to go.