Post AcjsNPiWe30hxGfMZM by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
(DIR) More posts by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
(DIR) Post #AcjdJ74cWMTTf6UZE0 by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T13:44:50.695633Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
Complexity of building electricity grid based on #renewables is probably best illustrated on days like this in #Germany[^1]:instantaneous electricity consumption is 67 GWGermany has 66 GW in wind, but it’s merely potential output if there was wind - and there’s now enough wind to produce 3.8 GW satisfying 5.67% of the demandGermany also has 69 GW in PV, but same story here - there’s enough light to produce 5.3 GW (7.74%)Note that each of these, wind and PV, have installed capacity alone exceeding the current demand! But installed capacity isn’t much worth when it doesn’t produce any electricity. Statistically that’s the case with wind and PV _most of the time (capacity factor <50%)🤷 I think this gives you some idea about the feasibility of postulates such as “we just need to build more renewables!”Now let’s factor in time. Watt is the unit of instantaneous power, how much the country uses electricity right now. At this load (66 GW) to survive one hour Germany needs 66 GWh (unit of amount of electricity). Lower than that, and you need to start switching off factories, electricity supply to houses, trains, hospitals etc. Germany, like most of us, is not ready for these consequences of variability. And this is the sole reason why it runs on gas and coal, including lignite, the dirtiest form of coal: these can be switched on and off whenever needed (they are dispatchable). Of course, there are other dispatchable sources of electricity which are also as safe and low-carbon as renewables, such as #nuclear (see #France for comparison)[^2]. However, Germany governments in the course of #Energiewende decided that 0.03 deaths/1 TWh (nuclear)[^3] is too much and instead chose to switch to 24.6 deaths/1 TWh (coal) as the dispatchable source.[^4]Of course, there are days when wind and PV perform much better so would electricity storage help? Let’s take the 66 GWh hourly consumption: there was much talk about how battery storage is going to fix the whole variability of renewables. ElectricityMaps doesn’t show the total capacity (GWh) of available batteries directly, but it can be somewhat estimated from 30 days average (at the bottom)[^1].Over the last 30 days German batteries supplied 1 TWh to the grid, which makes ~53 GWh per day, which makes ~2 GWh per hour. While we don’t know their total capacity to estimate maximum period they could keep the country running, that’s still 30x less than the hourly consumption. A very rough guess, the battery farms built in Germany in over a decade (Energiewende started in 2011) could power the country for around 2 minutes.I guess from now on you can make your extrapolations and assess the feasibility of statements like “we just need to build some more storage!”[^1]: https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/DE[^2]: https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/FR[^3]: https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy[^4]: https://write.as/arcadian/ideological-origins-of-energiewende
(DIR) Post #AcjfjKw9nbv862AK8m by freemo@qoto.org
2023-12-12T14:12:09Z
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@kravietz Im glad to see they seperated out "low carbon" and "renewable".. most people shit a brick when I remind them that coal is considered renewable.
(DIR) Post #AcjgRzuSpCrDudfZR2 by Sweetshark@chaos.social
2023-12-12T13:57:05Z
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@kravietz Such nonsense. The whole blurb assumes that demand is constant, which it is very much not. The french nuclear powered grid for example very much relies on German gas, coal and renewables to provide what it lacks during peak demand.The grid needs storage and connectivity unless you run on #fossilfuel only.And e.g. Solar is way better at matching demand than nuclear as it is usually available during times of peak demand.
(DIR) Post #AcjgS16YNk7dcQKjuy by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T14:20:06.001079Z
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@Sweetshark The french nuclear powered grid for example very much relies on German gasThank you for your valuable and incredibly thoroughly sourced comment! Checking https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/FR4.66% electricity available in France is exported to Germany (3.4 GW)Which matches the imports from France on https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/DE(except it’s 5% of demand in Germany)
(DIR) Post #AcjgnDsA6exbIaiJYO by max@med-mastodon.com
2023-12-12T13:54:53Z
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@kravietz moving to renewals will be complicated but that's not stopped us before - putting man on Mars will be complicated and certain people won't shut up about it. AI will be complicated, same deal. Renewables have this "well it's hard so we might as well not bother" fatalism about them, like mass shootings in America.I.e. It's hard and also not in our lobbyist's interests.
(DIR) Post #AcjgnEyvyxyIjstEkS by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T14:22:59.972930Z
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@max Is your objective moving to renewables or decarbonisation? As you can see on the example of Germany, these two aren’t necessarily the same thing.
(DIR) Post #AcjgooydddxsfLVNtQ by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T14:22:01.910325Z
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@Sweetshark The grid needs storageThat’s one of the main points of my post. Germany over 12 years managed to build storage capable to run the country for 2 minutes. Which is why it runs on coal, in spite of having 2x redundant capacity in renewables.
(DIR) Post #AcjiqrxRj7Y0Ok3HWq by RonRevog@social.tchncs.de
2023-12-12T14:27:46Z
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@kravietz This ist "cherrypicking". Average over the last 30 days was 60% Low-Carbon and 60% Renewable. Yes, we need a backup for the renewable, but we have them and we use them. But we use them less often and strong with more renewable power supplies. At the same time, we are building cleaner “backup” power plants that can run more and more on hydrogen.You can see Germany is ready for variability of renewables and will get better. We don't need the f*cking nuclear producers of eternal waste
(DIR) Post #Acjir23qACbVjT7Wsq by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T14:46:33.144708Z
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@RonRevog We don’t need the f*cking nuclear producers of eternal wasteNuclear waste is produced at very low volume (tons per year) and in just 100 years loses 93% of its activity.I’m sure you will be surprised to find out that German chemical industry, including producing PV panels and modern insulation, produced thousands of tons of toxic waste containing cyanide, arsenic, mercury etc. Unlike nuclear, this chemical waste loses toxicity… never.And it’s stored at two salt mines in Germany:https://www.kpluss.com/en-us/our-business-products/waste-management/underground-disposal/
(DIR) Post #AcjisS9CezBKvaJ3Sa by notsoloud@expressional.social
2023-12-12T14:32:47Z
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@kravietzGermany needs lots more wind, solar and batteries, especially wind for the winter. Solar and batteries are dropping seriously in price.For the dunkelflauten they should burn electrolytes that can be stored long term as gas.And, of course, it's stupid to shut down working nuclear reactors.
(DIR) Post #AcjixrMEMBeaYzygm8 by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T14:47:50.103475Z
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@notsoloud Germany needs lots more wind, solar and batteriesThat’s my very point: since 2011 Germany managed to build battery storage sufficient to keep the country running for 2 minutes. How realistic this “should” sounds?
(DIR) Post #AcjlicGGVAUZGJbuoy by notsoloud@expressional.social
2023-12-12T14:50:44Z
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@kravietzYeah, but the exponentials are on the side of batteries. Just the car batteries already in Germany would make it a lot more than two minutes.
(DIR) Post #AcjlidgtBfNnhB4gxU by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T15:18:42.484783Z
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@notsoloud I’ve heard the very same arguments back in 2011, yet a decade later Germany is using more coal than before. And because I’ve seen the “exponentials” being based on overly optimistic - to put that lightly - assumptions, I don’t think it makes the current predictions any more reliable :(
(DIR) Post #AcjmCl5aFFTVKPzH9c by RonRevog@social.tchncs.de
2023-12-12T15:21:21Z
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@kravietz Bullshit.Germany alone have 30.000qm of strong and 600.000qm weak radioactive waste and no place to store it. At the moment it is underground in wet, old mines in rusty tons or nearby old nuclear plants. In 24000 years it will lost the half of radioactivity. We don't have any plan,what we should do with that shit. And when you now argue with any transmutation bullshit,that is not more than a wet dream of nuclear fanboys (or trolls) I will block you immediatly.https://www.bund.net/themen/atomkraft/atommuell/
(DIR) Post #AcjmClyAyH8y3jWsFM by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T15:24:35.579859Z
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@RonRevog no place to store itWell, that’s 100% your choice, not a physical constraint. You already have two deep geologic repositories which are perfectly safe for storing highly toxic chemical waste.
(DIR) Post #AcjmE2sDbmJom8LjQe by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T14:44:04.819956Z
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@RonRevog But we use them less oftenPlease, don’t make statements you can’t support by evidence. Here’s #Germany CO2 intensity and electricity sources for the last 6 years from https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/DEin 2020 Germany’s CO2 averaged annual intensity was 399 gCO2eq/kWh, in 2022 it was 486, so it’s actually 22% higherin 2020 coal contributed 24.1% to electricity production, in 2022 it was already 33%After Germany switched off nuclear it started to use much more coal and it’s CO2 intensity significantly increased.
(DIR) Post #AcjmdXMJOxCOZ0a4h6 by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T15:29:28.956400Z
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@RonRevog And I’m very sorry the information about increase of coal share and CO2 intensity has triggered you emotionally so much, but these are the facts 🤷https://agora.echelon.pl/notice/AcjiZbTcMn8H4xODL6
(DIR) Post #AcjsNOoryyUVAecuoq by RonRevog@social.tchncs.de
2023-12-12T15:43:31Z
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@kravietz Do you think, you alone can play with the electricity maps app? You forget a little detail. There is a little small war in europe. So germany switched his energy away from russian gas to coal. Not fine, but we don't want to support asholes and we don't want nuclear power anymore. Bad for CO2 but neccessary. Here you see the charts with the difference Q3/2022 vs Q3/2023directly from "Statistische Bundesamt". Less fossile Power generation, more renewables.
(DIR) Post #AcjsNPiWe30hxGfMZM by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T16:32:12.449407Z
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@RonRevogI would like to kindly draw your attention to the fact that the Russian gas, which you planned to replace nuclear with, is a fossil fuel as well. Gas has CO2 intensity 2x lower than coal but still 40x higher than nuclear. So you're not going to impress anyone with your "but we wanted to switch to gas".And one of the reasons why Russia started the war in the first place was because Germany built Nord Stream bypassing Ukraine and Poland. And you happily ontinued Nord Stream 2 after Putin invaded Ukraine in 2014, thus giving him green light for the full-scale invasion.
(DIR) Post #AcjsUS748ThhPdV7Ls by Ardubal@mastodon.xyz
2023-12-12T15:37:50Z
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@Sweetshark @kravietz No, solar is not at all better at matching demand. You can't just move the clouds aside when you need it. Nuclear can just do normal load following.Volatile sources such as solar and wind can only provide 40% of direct electricity demand, the rest must either go through storage or come from »backup«.Solar and wind are a useful addition to our decarbonization efforts. Nuclear energy is not in competition to them, but to the other 60%, where it replaces fossils.
(DIR) Post #AcjsUUSPQ5xsgPVBtg by Sweetshark@chaos.social
2023-12-12T16:13:50Z
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@Ardubal @kravietz Nuclear has never demonstrated load following in practice. #Renewables however did provide way more than 50% of German electricity in 2023 in practice. And that _despite_ a missed decade of building the grid for it.via https://energy-charts.info/charts/energy_pie/chart.htm?l=en&c=DE&interval=year
(DIR) Post #AcjsUVmIVdT4mNoaXI by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T16:35:02.784526Z
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@SweetsharkNuclear power plants in France and UK do load following all the time, it's no rocket science. As a matter of fact any nuclear plant built after 1990's can do load following up to 140 MW/min, so faster than gas and coal.@Ardubal
(DIR) Post #AcjsoTEPgdxgfnU0bA by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T16:38:41.042895Z
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@Sweetshark I always thought the whole exercise with renewables is about decarbonizing electricity generation, rather than flexing "50% renewables" or "for 3 hours renewables powered the country"? Just look at Germany's CO2 intensity, it's *always* 5-10x higher than France, because both have renewables, except Germany has coal as baseload.@Ardubal
(DIR) Post #AcjtRLqL5eHL3JlKIy by Sweetshark@chaos.social
2023-12-12T16:26:32Z
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@kravietz Yes, and that is likely no accident. There is a lot of entrenched interest to keep storage and capacity low, because it means you need to buy local and on demand.The big provider lobby was OK with phasing out nuclear as long as they could still sell coal power for high prices in the south (as the net capacity and storage was stalled, to not allow northern production in).
(DIR) Post #AcjtRMoFUuCW37nAga by Sweetshark@chaos.social
2023-12-12T16:35:43Z
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@kravietz Note that e.g. Saxony has not a lot of industry beyond brown coal. And that a lot of the hard coal power companies in the south west have a strong share of ownership by the local Kommunen: approx. 23% according to https://lobbypedia.de/wiki/RWE .So those local politicians together effectively own a quarter of the coal plants there ...
(DIR) Post #AcjtRNe0OTbKde0VMG by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T16:45:12.754737Z
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@SweetsharkI understand the challenge with lobbies, Poland is even worse in this aspect as the coal lobby is holding literally everyone hostage and coal is used for heating residential houses. But people need jobs and businesses, you can't simply dump them without offering an alternative. And to be honest, the German renewables lobby with its extremely biased, pseudoscientific and hysterical anti-nuclear campaign apparently wasn't very reassuring as an alternative for these sectors.Most importantly, this policy resulted in what looks like a "compromise" between the two lobbies: each is allowed to play their own toys and the outcome is one of the most expensive and dirtiest grids in EU 🤷♂️
(DIR) Post #AcjyggjiBxETxwnLua by RonRevog@social.tchncs.de
2023-12-12T16:53:03Z
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@kravietzYes, because gas has 1/2 CO2 pollution, german CO2-values increased after switch to coal to compensate the loss of gas.And now in the 2. war-winter the dependency from rus. gas and uran is zero.That's cool. And everybody in the past cried. "If you go out of nuclear power you will run into a blackout!You die." It didn't happen.And after your stupid theory Russia has stopped his war against Ukraine immediatly after Nordstream 2 destruction because they couldn't sell their gas anymore
(DIR) Post #AcjyghRfYWOWAHMSQa by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T17:44:28.960936Z
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@RonRevog It didn’t happen.Of course, because you switched to coal 😂
(DIR) Post #Acjz46BBlEN1XLoHgm by Sweetshark@chaos.social
2023-12-12T16:45:28Z
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@kravietz Yeah, except there are not that many build after 1990. But back to the original argument by @Ardubal that you need at least 60% nuclear for base load: You need not -- as Germany demonstrated this year even with shitty net capacity and storage.So France and UK are absolutely not required to extend or even keep their share of nuclear: Germany demonstrates today that they _could_ go down to 40% nuclear. They don't have to, but they have options.
(DIR) Post #Acjz47lNs8uwRtkhkG by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T17:48:44.287267Z
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@Sweetshark I’m absolutely not against 40% nuclear with renewables, quite the opposite - many countries with low-carbon grid run on such a mix (Sweden, Ontario). But as the example of Germany illustrates, it’s practically impossible to get a low carbon mix with zero nuclear regardless of how much renewables you add.@Ardubal
(DIR) Post #Ack0C8kmAsmFn5r0ym by RonRevog@social.tchncs.de
2023-12-12T17:56:39Z
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@kravietz Exactly, because of the war there was a step back. And now we will go out of coal till 2035 (perhaps 2030) and are green only (renwables and hydrogen) and other countries will struggle with their expensive nuclear power and their problems to dig in their nuclear waste in their backyards.https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ausstieg_aus_der_Kohleverstromung_in_Deutschland
(DIR) Post #Ack0C9Zp75buLPjmXw by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T18:01:22.929247Z
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@RonRevog And now we will go out of coal till 2035😄I’ve heard that already, in the Energiewende foundational document:The Ethics Committee is firmly convinced that the phase-out of nuclear energy can be completed within a decade by means of the energy transition measures presented here.That was in 2011. Now it’s 2023/2024 and Germany runs… on coal.
(DIR) Post #Ack2Cz3rtX1PvgJYJs by Sweetshark@chaos.social
2023-12-12T18:13:28Z
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@kravietz @Ardubal I don't think Germany shows that: The was a huge interest by local politicians to keep as much coal in the mix as possible.So assuming German politics tried to get rid of #fossilfuels is just not a good premise. German policy -- at least in the Merkel years -- did not even try to phase out fossil fuels with #renewables and thus it also did not fail.As it did not fail, it's still possible -- and nuclear is not proven to essential for the transition.
(DIR) Post #Ack2CzvOgVq8bhMIkq by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T18:23:56.937571Z
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@Sweetshark I don’t think Germany shows that: Well, have you looked at the CO2 intensity of German electricity generation? did not even try to phase out fossil fuels with renewablesGermany built double of its demand (!) in renewables (120 GW) but you say they “did not even try”? And of course they did not phase out fossil fuels, because otherwise you would have blackouts.Did you forget about DESERTEC and other “ambitious” projects that were expected to magically complete the Wende part? None of these worked, but you’re already back to “oh let’s try again by the same recipe, maybe it works this time” :)@Ardubal
(DIR) Post #Ack5volzIEeuuk1MS8 by RonRevog@social.tchncs.de
2023-12-12T18:50:21Z
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@kravietz I don't know, why you always talk about this minor energy sources in our energy mix. Every year coal and gas gets smaller and smaller. Nuclear power is away...You are in a polish domain.Perhaps you ought to start askin' questions a little closer to home.
(DIR) Post #Ack5vphPqib1mqtDxw by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T19:05:40.723122Z
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@RonRevog 2020: total coal 24.1%2021: total coal 29.7%2022: total coal 33%2023: total coal 27.2%Do you need me to run linear regression to tell you that the overall trends isn’t going down too fast?
(DIR) Post #Ack9uz6jmcVeUfaJIe by Ardubal@mastodon.xyz
2023-12-12T19:37:48Z
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@Sweetshark @kravietz Nuclear load following in practice, example.
(DIR) Post #Ack9v16SMdTOgNT78i by Ardubal@mastodon.xyz
2023-12-12T19:39:01Z
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@Sweetshark @kravietz Also, France does it all the time, that's why their capacity factor is so low.
(DIR) Post #AckAApdekyKRl8XSwi by notsoloud@expressional.social
2023-12-12T19:26:07Z
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@kravietzThe exponentials are not entirely in my head.What Germany needs most is the ability to build *anything at all*, solar, grid, nuclear, whatever.At least they've shown they can do LNG terminals fast, so there's hope....@t_mkdf @RonRevog
(DIR) Post #AckAEqZLEtpRnrR2I4 by Ardubal@mastodon.xyz
2023-12-12T19:09:54Z
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@Sweetshark @kravietz You're right: Germany did not try to get rid of #fossilfuels. To illustrate, in 2006, Hansen tried to talk to then-minister Gabriel (SPD) about reducing coal use, and Gabriel flat-out refused because »we are getting out of nuclear, so we will need coal«.What kind of proof do you need? Past data? Take a look!
(DIR) Post #AckAINmiCVeLgkNJ2G by Ardubal@mastodon.xyz
2023-12-12T19:33:35Z
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@Sweetshark @kravietz I didn't write »renewable«, I wrote specifically about solar and wind (»volatiles« as some call it).(Whether biomass is »renewable« is debatable, but it is definitely not climate friendly, by the way.)Yes, you can nominally have a larger part than 40% (yes, a very rough approximation) in Germany IF you can use the entire European grid as a sink/source as needed (and if your neighbours don't do the same…). But that's running into diminishing returns quickly.
(DIR) Post #AckAPrySM6kFLXRElE by Sweetshark@chaos.social
2023-12-12T19:44:10Z
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@Ardubal @kravietz Both Germany and France are using the european grid as a sink/source to buffer their main source (Germany: renewables, France: nuclear) -- and dirty German coal and gas are buffering for both.The crossborder stuff is not even a big issue compared to the lack of capacity to get power to the south. Currently wind power in northern Germany does the most painful "load following" -- it just gets turned off because net capacity _inside_ Germany is lacking.
(DIR) Post #AckB0uQsB7ibgYOLom by RonRevog@social.tchncs.de
2023-12-12T19:45:48Z
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@kravietz Are you trolling? Are you the next shift? We already had the war as reason for changing priorities in our energy strategy and short increase of using fossil energy. You can see here.
(DIR) Post #AckB0v9XV3Rnv5I1RI by kravietz@agora.echelon.pl
2023-12-12T20:02:08.816448Z
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@RonRevogWar started in 2014. In 2015 Gazprom signed contracts with German companies to start construction but it was blocked by other EU countries. In 2018 Germany finally granted all permissions to start construction.And your prime minister Schroeder all that time worked at Gazprom and Nord Stream, lobbying for Russian interests in Germany and EU.