
The rise of solar is ‘jeopardising the grid’ and it's a lesson for Australia - clouddrover
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-01/rise-of-rooftop-solar-power-jeopardising-wa-energy-grid/11731452
======
BLKNSLVR
Strong motherfucking opinion warning.

South Australia is the driest state in the driest continent. It's the most
perfect place for solar power. Australia as-a-whole is a perfect place for
solar power.

A university lecturer of mine got one of the first solar panel installations
in South Australia, it was mentioned in the local Adelaide paper, that's how
much of a big deal it was. This was around 20 years ago. Twenty years!

South Australia (still) has some of the highest priced electricity in the
world. There's been talk of privatization as the cause of this, which has been
somewhat debunked[0], and the primarily agreed reason for the high prices is
what's referred to as "gold-plating of the network" in which there was an
agreement that the 'poles and wires' companies could not lose money on any
infrastructure investment they committed to - the regulator would allow them
continually increase the prices they charge in order to cover the cost of the
infrastructure investment[1][2][3].

So, despite how perfect Australia is for solar power, private or commercial,
despite the fact that solar panels have been getting commercially installed on
private homes for 20-odd years, and despite the networks being given carte-
blanche for infrastructure investment, somehow, Australia is un-prepared for a
flood of solar power.

The various organizations that are meant to be on top of this shit have been
asleep at the wheel for fucking YEARS. This was highlighted by the big power
failure in South Australia in 2016 when a number of wind farms shut down due
to 'safety settings' being set at overly paranoid parameters, which was a
problem that had already been solved in Europe (the frustrating irony of this
is that the wind farms were being blamed for the power failure, when the
actual situation was that the wind farms could have PREVENTED it, if their
configurations were 'best practice' \- the problems in the electricity network
that caused the wind farms to trip were powerful winds that took down some
big-arse transmission lines)[4][5]

Australia's issues with renewable energy are entirely of their own making. And
it's far more likely attributable to incompetence than malice. I'd almost
prefer it was malice because malice comes and goes. Incompetence is systemic.

Off on a tangent, here's my 10-years of electricity usage / costs
investigation:
[http://electricity.atcf.com.au/economics/](http://electricity.atcf.com.au/economics/)

[0] [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-03-25/fact-check-does-
priva...](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-03-25/fact-check-does-
privatisation-increase-electricity-prices3f/6329316)

[1] [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-10-02/senate-inquiry-to-
pro...](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-10-02/senate-inquiry-to-probe-gold-
plating-of-electricity-networks/5786578)

[2] [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-25/grattan-urges-
consume...](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-25/grattan-urges-consumers-to-
be-compensation-for-energy-grid-22g/9585284)

[3] [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-01-04/energy-policy-
solar-e...](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-01-04/energy-policy-solar-
electricity-bills-air-conditioning-costs/9298346)

[4] [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-28/wind-farm-settings-
to...](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-28/wind-farm-settings-to-blame-for-
sa-blackout-aemo-says/8389920)

[5] [https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/oct/19/south-
au...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/oct/19/south-australian-
windfarms-revise-safety-settings-after-statewide-blackout)

~~~
mikemotherwell
The argument for Solar always sounds a lot like terra nullius, that was used
to dispossess indigenous Australians of their land, and later their land
rights.

Australia is a MASSIVE country, that is largely uninhabitable by humans. It is
estimated that 75% of the species on the continent are undiscovered:
[https://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-09-07/75-per-cent-of-
specie...](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-09-07/75-per-cent-of-species-
unknown-fact-check/5649858)

Large scale solar is likely to cause problems for large numbers of native
species. YMMV in how important you find that, but to me personally it is a
huge issue.

~~~
marcus_holmes
They did the analysis for the Square Kilometer Array. WA came up as the
perfect place for this kind of construction because of the lack of ecosystem
to interfere with. Politics then moved half of it to Africa _sigh_.

If you had to pick somewhere in the world to build enough solar arrays to
power the entire planet, WA is the perfect spot for it.

~~~
SiempreViernes
Actually, politics moved half of SKA _to_ Australia, South Africa won the
initial site selection ([https://www.nature.com/news/south-africa-wins-
science-panel-...](https://www.nature.com/news/south-africa-wins-science-
panel-s-backing-to-host-ska-telescope-1.10205)).

The site evaluation itself states both sites are about the same, and I think
I've read that the eventual political compromise means there will be less RFI
overall, at the unspoken cost of some simultaneous coverage of the targets.

~~~
marcus_holmes
interesting. That's not the version of events I heard from some of the people
involved ;) But I heard it in WA, so they may have been audience-pleasing

~~~
SiempreViernes
On just merit it seems to have been a rather close thing (though South Africa
was the better site), which I think was known in advance. So the entire
process was pretty highly politicised; you can find much more information
here: [https://www.skatelescope.org/site-
documentation/](https://www.skatelescope.org/site-documentation/) though there
is quite a bit of reading between the lines.

Of note to the sort of sociological questions we are discussing here, I note
not only is the Site selection report ~200 pages, but also fairly interesting
is a 16 page "Report on Validation of the SKA Site Selection Process". This
comes with a lot of other documents as appendices, but also lays allows one to
make out the timeline a bit more.

The final site report is from February 2012, while an "evaluation plan" was
set in November 2011, and a " _Revised_ Plan for SKA Site Selection" approved
in May 2011. The Siting Group was created in 2010, to help with the "final"
site selection. All this paints a picture of a somewhat fluid process.

------
8bitsrule
"excess solar power from households and businesses spilled uncontrolled on to
the system, pushing the amount of power needed from the grid to increasingly
low levels.... The only way to manage the solar was to scale back or switch
off the coal- and gas-fired power stations that were supposed to be the
bedrock of the electricity system."

Wow, that sounds like a great problem to have. Note the aggressive rhetoric
... 'spill', 'uncontrolled','pushing', 'bedrock', 'solar smashes utility
finance'. Well-crafted FUD from ABC's Mercer, _if_ he wrote it all.

Coal and gas being endangered sounds perfect, if you give a rat's ass about
climate change. But let's do everything we can to get in the way of progress
by painting the result as blackly as possible. Maybe instead of pushing that
excess onto the grid, people can sell it their neighbors instead ... or 'the
industry' could install more batteries to store it in.

~~~
Reason077
> _" excess solar power from households and businesses spilled uncontrolled on
> to the system" ... Wow, that sounds like a great problem to have._

It's also a problem that has already been solved at the technology level.

Australia just needs an equivalent to California's updated "Rule 21"
regulations for smart inverters, which came into force in 2019. These rules
require inverters to support "remote control" management by utilities, so that
their output can be throttled back in low-demand scenarios.

Rule 21 also specifies features like dynamic volt/VAR (dynamic reactive
compensation), so inverters actively work to _stabilise_ the grid in the event
of voltage deviations, as well as ramping and "ride through" requirements to
prevent large numbers of inverters tripping simultaneously during
voltage/frequency deviations which could result in a cascading fault.

~~~
makomk
Yes, that is in fact exactly what the original article is arguing - that the
stability of the Western Australian grid requires a switch to "smart" solar
which the grid operator can remotely curtail the output of on demand. Hence
all the rhetoric about how excess power "spilled uncontrolled" onto the grid
which the previous comment complained about.

This is also not, in fact, a good situation to be in. The stability of the
power grid depends on balancing supply with demand in real time, and if that
can't be done then the whole thing fails. Not only that, the old-fashioned gas
and steam power plants have inertia that helps stabilize the grid and as that
decreases overall stability margins fall. I think wind farms can emulate this
inertia to a certain extent, but that doesn't always seem to work so well...

~~~
NohatCoder
Wind mills have to be designed to deliver inertia, older mills generally
aren't as this wasn't an issue when they were built. If you have a grid that
relies primarily on solar, you might want to build dedicated flywheels to keep
it stable.

------
rossdavidh
So, "jeopardising" in the seense that, say, me driving west on a road which
comes to a north-south "T" in the road, would be "jeopardising" the car's
safety...if I don't turn the car in an appropriate manner when I get to the
"T". Yes, if you add solar with absolutely no changes elsewhere to accommodate
that, you will eventually have problems.

But, that's like saying smartphones jeopardized the cell phone infrastructure,
which they did except the cell phone companies added capacity. Bicycles can
jeopardize the road network of a city if they become widely used, and you
don't do anything (e.g. bike lanes) to accommodate that change. Every change
in technology can jeopardize the network it is part of, if nothing else is
changed to accommodate it.

But, you know, there are several (already known, developed) methods of
handling this (big batteries, utilities being able to turn off your solar like
they can currently remotely control my thermostat). It seems a bit of an
overstatement to say that it's jeopardizing the grid.

~~~
grecy
The powers that be in Australia are very, very, very friendly (read: in bed
with) the coal industry. For the last 5 years they have been doing everything
possible to discredit renewables, and there is a lot of money at stake.

It's a fascinating view into what happens when a few very rich and powerful
people control essentially all the media in an entire country.

~~~
hanniabu
That pretty much describes governments around the world, it's nothing
exclusive to Australia unfortunately.

~~~
EdwardDiego
Hmm, I'd say Australia's mining industry holds a significantly more hefty sway
over politicians than it does in other countries, just because of how much of
Aussie's GDP is based on mining - plus how the miners have attempted to
controk the media there:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gina_Rinehart#Business_career](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gina_Rinehart#Business_career)

> In 2010 Rinehart took a 10 per cent stake in Ten Network Holdings; James
> Packer had acquired an 18 per cent stake in the same company shortly before.
> Since then she also acquired a substantial stake in Fairfax Media. Rinehart
> was a major player in the media and no longer limits her interests to the
> mining business. In February 2012 she increased her stake in Fairfax to over
> 12 per cent, and became the largest shareholder of the company. Fairfax
> journalists were reportedly fearful that she wanted to turn them into a
> "mouthpiece for the mining industry". In June 2012, she increased her stake
> further to 18.67 per cent, and was believed to be seeking three board seats
> and involvement in editorial decisions in Fairfax's newspaper division.
> Negotiations between Fairfax and Hancock Prospecting broke down in late June
> because of disagreements over Fairfax's editorial independence policy and
> other issues relating to board governance; chair Roger Corbett subsequently
> announced that Rinehart would not be offered any seats on the board. After
> failing to get board representation she sold her shareholding in 2015.

~~~
hourislate
In Canada you have one family that owns almost all the news media in the
country and also Reuters. From what I understand they are the 5th richest
family in the world.

~~~
mrep
27th according to Forbes [0].

[0]: [https://www.forbes.com/profile/david-
thomson/#2d5599fa5628](https://www.forbes.com/profile/david-
thomson/#2d5599fa5628)

~~~
twic
But 5th according to Reuters!

------
D_Alex
What a dumb article.

To begin with, nothing is jeopardising the grid right now in Western
Australia, it is running just fine.

The claim seems to be that if we do not account for the increasing share of
solar power in the future generation mix, then we may grid stability have
problems sometime in the future...

Given that the solutions to such problems are well known and inexpensive - how
about we don't plod stupidly into the future? Was that ever the plan?

And the "lesson for Australia" is what, exactly? Plan ahead?

------
technofiend
>On those days, excess solar power from households and businesses spilled
uncontrolled on to the system, pushing the amount of power needed from the
grid to increasingly low levels.

>Ms Zibelman said WA's isolation amplified this trend because the relative
concentration of its solar resources meant fluctuations in supply caused by
the weather had an outsized effect.

>The only way to manage the solar was to scale back or switch off the coal-
and gas-fired power stations that were supposed to be the bedrock of the
electricity system.

>The problem was coal-fired plants were not designed to be quickly ramped up
or down in such a way, meaning they were ill-equipped to respond to sudden
fluctuations in solar production.

Sounds like it's time rebalance the system with lower baseload assumptions for
coal and gas plants. I'm quite sure the incumbents are loathe to suggest that
since it means investment in buffers to soak up so-called excess power from
solar panels and splitting the profit with solar panel owners.

~~~
jjeaff
How does a lower baseline estimate factor in when you have a particularly
cloudy day or week?

~~~
adrianN
Traditional power plants are perfectly able to adapt to weather patterns.
Weather forecasts on a time scale of 12 hours or a day are very accurate. For
very shorts fluctuations you can always buffer into batteries.

The _real_ problem is that fossil fuel plants are designed to be profitable at
high load factors. Building a coal plant and only running it at 50% load is
not profitable.

~~~
jjeaff
Traditional power plants have never had to deal with weather patterns that can
significantly increase or decrease output, no?

------
fghorow
In 2008, when I was working in geothermal in Australia, I was at a meeting
where the 2008 AUD price of a transmission line was quoted at 1.4 million/km.

Multiply that by 1100 or so km across the nullarbor (rough guess; what really
matters is the path between closest transmission lines of sufficient capacity)
and you begin to see the scale of the problem.

Oh, and Australia has roughly the land area of the lower 48 of the US, with
roughly the population of Southern California. In other words, it's bloody
empty.

~~~
grecy
I'm originally Australian and a huge hot springs nut. Out of curiosity, where
in Australia is there geothermal potential?

~~~
fghorow
There's theoretical potential pretty much everywhere -- in that hot rocks
exist underground, and some form of permeability can be created. Economical
potential is quite limited, and technology dependent.

In particular, the Cooper Basin project, while technically viable with
demonstrated generation capacity, died after failing to get investment needed
for a transmission line. At the same meeting I referred to in my top post, I
also heard that the CB project was about 600 km away from the nearest
transmission lines.

N.B. I was not working on that project, so my knowledge is not firsthand.

Birdsville Qld, is still the only operating geothermal power generation plant
in Oz as far as I'm aware.

If you are only interested in hot springs, there are developed baths on the
Mornington Peninsula in Vic.

~~~
grecy
Thanks!

------
zmmmmm
Funny how things are a matter of perspective. I view the baseload / coal
generation as what is jeopardising the grid. It can't react to fluctuations in
demand or supply so it's just not a tenable solution for a modern power grid
where demand is intrinsically variable.

Having said that, I feel like some regulation mandating a certain amount of
storage be supplied with rooftop solar wouldn't be a bad thing. It doesn't
seem responsible to set up generation capacity without the storage to buffer
the effect of that capacity's generation on the grid.

~~~
stjohnswarts
Sorry not everyone in SW Australia has a solar energy supply, so just because
you have that advantage doesn't mean others should have to suffer with
blackouts. Has the whole world forgotten how to compromise and work together
as a society rather than "my solar tribe" vs "your coal/poverty stricken
populace who can't afford solar roofs tribe". I thought you Aussies were more
civilized than us people in the States.

------
dazlari
This really is just another poor-me major piece of spin that we Aussies have
had to cop in the media in the last decade - following on from these other two
gems: 1\. too much air-conditioning is overloading the grid; 2\. the power
bills have been high because they've over-spent on the grid (apparently
preparing it for future demand); 3\. too much solar is stressing the grid...
Looks like the grid is the weakest link. Time to go off grid perhaps?

1\. could be loosely verified - mid-day black-outs were a common occurrence on
extremely hot days in Sydney, esp. in the noughties. Or was the grid just not
up to it? Lucky they over-spent on it. 2\. price gouging is still be rampant,
the rates are still as high as ever, and solar feed in tariffs are a joke; If
we're swimming in free/cheap electricity, where is the lowering of the rate?
and why is green energy still much higher for the consumer? Good reasons I'm
sure... probably something along the lines of "the grid can't handle it".

3\. Given that we're now (apparently) swimming in all this extra grid-damaging
power, maybe it was the solar that really stopped the blackouts - after all,
the air-con comes on when the sun shines! Just tell everyone to turn on their
air-con. That should solve it!

Good luck to anyone trying to get a clear answer on any of it - like it's been
noted, too many vested interests in politics and the media. My view: go-off
grid as soon as you can.

------
toomuchtodo
Just researched this today after talking to some Aussies about it!

The problem is that Australia is so married to coal that they have no national
electrical grid strategy, including transmission line investment, so it’s
harder to get generation to load centers (“follow the sun” generation”). They
also don’t have natural gas to fill in when renewable generation dips (unlike
the US).

The solution is going to be a lot of utility battery storage (Hornsdale Power
Reserve Tesla battery is currently being expanded, for example), more
renewables, and actual transmission infrastructure investment.

~~~
wisdomdata
that comment (while technically correct) is undoubtedly from someone who has
obviously never driven across the nullabor.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Haven’t been through the Nullabor myself, but I can’t imagine it’s so
treacherous that you can’t drag a few five inch HVDC conductors through it
(which only need to be buried, no concrete channel or conduit required, to
support ~2500MW of transmission capacity).

If I recall, that’s where the latest Mad Max film was filmed.

~~~
9nGQluzmnq3M
It's not that it can't be done, it's that the Nullarbor is 1,100 km of
_absolutely_ nothing. More broadly, it's ~3000 km from Perth to Adelaide, vs
~4000 km for the continental US.

Also, the last Mad Max was mostly filmed in Namibia. The older ones were
filmed in Australia, notably Coober Pedy, which is north of Adelaide and not
near the Nullarbor.

~~~
grecy
> _Also, the last Mad Max was mostly filmed in Namibia. The older ones were
> filmed in Australia, notably Coober Pedy, which is north of Adelaide and not
> near the Nullarbor_

The originals were filmed just outside Broken Hill actually. There is a sign
on the highway way to Mildura, and there is a big lot where you can see some
of the props from Number 3 (notably the plane). I grew up in Mildura.

Also, the latest was filmed in Messum Crater in Namibia, I spent some time
exploring there too - (bottom half of this post/pictures)
[http://theroadchoseme.com/riverbeds-and-
craters](http://theroadchoseme.com/riverbeds-and-craters)

~~~
dwd
The first film (pre-apocalypse) was actually filmed mostly in and around
Melbourne. I grew up in Warrnambool and Horsham so any trip to Melbourne would
take you through some of the filming locations along the old Western Hwy. The
first film was really about 70s Australian car culture and filled with utes,
panel vans and of course big V8s. More early Fast & Furious than the later
dystopian theme.

You're correct about the second being up Broken Hill way.

------
keanzu
Solar did not just rise mysteriously - it was driven by government policy,
first by huge feed in tariffs (US$270/MWh) and later with massive rebates.

"West Australians who applied for rooftop solar panels from the 1st of July
2010 till the 30 of June 2011 could lock in a 40 cent feed-in tariff for 10
years and those who applied in July 2011 could lock in 20 cents for 10 years."
[1]

"The current Rebate subsidises 54% of the price when purchasing a Solar System
for a home or property." [2]

[1] [https://www.solarquotes.com.au/systems/feed-in-
tariffs/wa/](https://www.solarquotes.com.au/systems/feed-in-tariffs/wa/)

[2] [https://www.solarmarket.com.au/wa-solar-rebate-
scrapped/](https://www.solarmarket.com.au/wa-solar-rebate-scrapped/)

------
ourmandave
Reading all the comments, remote, cheap powered Western Australia sounds like
the perfect place to set up shop if you're a super villain. (There's only so
many extinct volcanoes to go around.)

If it weren't for that pesky non-compete clause with the evil villain run
government.

------
mushufasa
This sounds like the "Utility Death Spiral" and also happened in Germany,
Hawaii, and Nevada.

Best article on it IMO (2014):
[https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/this-is-what-
th...](https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/this-is-what-the-utility-
death-spiral-looks-like)

tldr:

Renewables require additional grid maintenance costs (storage + two-way
distribution) while simultaneously prompting more consumers to buy less
conventional energy from utilities. Historically, utilities made money from
selling electricity. Now they have fewer customers and higher costs. They have
to charge higher prices to the fewer customers. Then more people want to
choose renewables. This keeps going until the utilities bankrupt.

The solution is to change the business model for utilities, which are
regulated monopolies. So it's a policy question. Absent strong leadership, the
utilities tend to claw back against renewables instead of innovating (saga of
Nevada)...

fun fact: this is named after ants, where some species will literally march
around in circles to starvation if the pheromone scent trails get tangled up.

~~~
cannonedhamster
This is exactly right. There's utility in being an as needed source of power
as well as storage point. There's so many different types of storage options
as well. There's batteries, liquid potential energy storage, potentially
flywheel but this hasn't worked out too well, there's adding wind capacity.

As a business model they get to charge for storage maintenance and generation
when needed. Storage is a consistent amount of money with extra coming in from
power generation as needed.

------
sandoooo
On the other hand, if a technology requires higher levels of organizational
competence than is available from the government of a major first-world
country, maybe it isn't ready for primetime.

------
Thorentis
An interesting technical problem to face, but it had to be solved eventually.

All sorts of solutions need to be combined to upgrade the the grid to
something which is ready to accommodate so many renewables. Breakthroughs in
battery technology need to happen very soon (globally). Hopefully the push
from large nation states and the accompanying investments in it will make this
possible.

An interesting problem here is energy security, especially for places like
hospitals or the military. You do not want a country who's critical
infrastructure relies on the power generation of suburban rooftop solar but
unfortunately the large amount in WA, Aus seems to indicate that might be a
possibility.

At the very least, a move away from coal is needed. Even though natural gas
isn't ideal as a final destination, it might be needed in the iterim. Quick
fire up/down during rapid demand change periods is needed to allow the shift
to renewables to happen. Sadly, building natural gas generators - even if with
the aim of supporting renewables long-term - would probably be met with
opposition by some on the eco-left in WA. Worth a shot though.

~~~
api
Nuclear requires something to help load follow too since reactors don't
throttle quickly. The French use hydro and import/export.

Load leveling is a problem that must be solved to go beyond fossil fuels, and
even without climate concerns we will run out of cheap easy fossil fuels
eventually anyway.

~~~
Filligree
Reactors _can_ throttle quickly. The current designs just don't.

------
Const-me
Can't they do something useful with the energy?

E.g. aluminum is used everywhere, the ore is also everywhere it's 8% of the
crust, the major cost to convert ore into metal is electricity. Can't they
engineer a robotic aluminum factory which scales fast enough to capture the
cheap power?

~~~
keanzu
If you invest in a aluminium smelter you will want to run it 24/7, not just
when there's cheap power. Also Australia enjoys the most expensive power in
the world because of grid costs.

~~~
Xylakant
Modern aluminum plants can operate in a fairly wide band around "expected
power" and are often used in a load shedding/load taking capacity to use
excess capacity or make up for lack of capacity. They get cheaper electricity
prices to pay for that grid stabilization service.

It seems that at least some of australias smelters haven't caught up with that
development yet:
[https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/oct/31/austra...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/oct/31/australias-
aluminium-sector-is-on-life-support-it-can-and-should-be-saved)

------
syllable_studio
This is another real-world example of why our lack of energy storage is
becoming a crisis. Without energy storage, large amounts of wind and solar
energy will wreck our power grids. We must build more storage immediately to
prevent a climate crisis.

This is why our project, Terrament, is studying this problem and working on a
solution. [https://www.terramenthq.com/](https://www.terramenthq.com/)

~~~
Junk_Collector
I'm curious how you approach the earthquake problem with underground pumped
hydro storage?

------
ZeroGravitas
> The only way to manage the solar was to scale back or switch off the coal-
> and gas-fired power stations that were supposed to be the bedrock of the
> electricity system.

Oh no. What a tragedy.

~~~
9nGQluzmnq3M
The problem here is the fluctuations in supply: you still need that coal & gas
power for when renewables aren't producing. And the specific problem is that
coal plants are not good at starting up and spinning down rapidly.

Gas plants, however, are quite fast, so if this leads to coal plants becoming
obsolete, that's win all around even if it requires more gas power in the
interim.

~~~
hyperpallium
The Big Battery of South Australia seems to be working.

~~~
xyzzyz
Are you talking about the Elon Musk's project that can store 3 minutes of
South Australia's electricity needs?

~~~
rswail
No, they're talking about the battery that has taken substantial costs out of
the network by providing the stabilizing supply when there are swings in
demand.

The battery was never meant to supply "South Australia's electricity needs"
and quoting that shows how the anti-renewables lobby in Australia has
corrupted the debate.

[https://reneweconomy.com.au/how-the-tesla-big-battery-
kept-t...](https://reneweconomy.com.au/how-the-tesla-big-battery-kept-the-
lights-on-in-south-australia-20393/)

------
henearkr
I would love to see all this surplus energy used in direct-air-capture
stations to pump CO2 from the air and transform it (either store it as a
liquid, or convert it into plastic precursors, etc).

------
ngcc_hk
Should say better and smarter management. It should not be accusing the solar
panel. Computer jeopardising a lot of things otherwise.

------
tyzerdak
Need to make big accumulator. Problem solved. xD

