3. Yes, you can see that batteries are charging from solar on CAISO Today's Outlook.
4. There is an enormous amount of home solar which shows up as a drop in "Demand": http://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/index.html#section-... . Set the date widget to April 8, and notice "demand" rise to 20GW at the 11:15 partial eclipse peak and drop almost 6GW over the next couple hours. Figure > 10 GW of peak output from home solar
5. Grid and home solar together (> 25GW) are roughly comparable to total load (~26GW on this cool spring day).
6. Neither the transmission nor the distribution networks can efficiently send supply to load; both have bottlenecks.
7. This waste is an opportunity for more batteries, grid-scale electrolysis, etc.
8. A GWh is worth roughly $50,000. In the context of California's (~$4T/year ÷ 365=)$10B of daily economic activity, wasting $500k is not that big a deal. Particular matter from the state's natural gas plants kills many people a day.
Got sucked into this (shakes fist). EIA.gov estimates 16.6 GW nameplate of behind-the-meter solar at end of 2023 (having grown ~150MW/m through the year; it was 14.5 in January), generating 1.7 TWh/month in December and 3TWh in high summer, or 50GWh/day in winter and 100GWH/day in summer. If the growth continues at that rate, in July we will have 17.6GW generating 3.4TWh. Note that California has mandated panels on new buildings ...
What will the plan be to meet demand before sunrise? They've gone so heavy on solar there's not much scope to add wind to cover pre-sunrise. I assume they just keep installing more lithium ion batteries to the point they can run them all night, but I read somewhere that the cost sweet spot for lithium ion is 2-3 hours, although I don't know how reliable that claim was
The most recent(?) state plan: https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/sites/default/files/2022-11/2022-sp.p... . On page 203 you see the plan is 20GW of offshore wind, an enormous amount of storage and new solar, and smaller contributions from everything else. I'd bet enhanced geothermal and heat and iron storage would be weighted higher today. If we can permit it, we'll do it.
A lot is hanging on that 20 GW offshore wind. Would be a bummer to see permits canceled due to politics... I have a feeling the next administration may not have any good will toward California.
Yeah, there's a bunch of British wind power which you can only see in public data as a small but noticeable dip in demand when there's wind power available. If you own a hilltop farm in England, unless your neighbours are complete assholes with political power (e.g billionaires or maybe MPs) you're going to install a small wind turbine because it's free electricity - it's not environmentalism it's just capitalism, and when it's blowing your small industrial processes are run off the turbine whereas when weather is calm you pay like anyone else. Needing a loan for a net-profitable business investment isn't a novelty for a farmer, and this one at least isn't predicated on future food prices - it's predicated on electricity costing money, so your bank manager will be happier.
A co-author of the first study is employed by Humira's maker; the second study was funded by it. Doesn't mean they are wrong, but it does suggest some skepticism is due.
If you scroll to the "Declaration of interests", you will see that the authors are heavily entangled with the drug industry. That doesn't mean the study is wrong, but ...
HN community, why can't we regularize, if not automate, the very simple process of linking to studies rather than thin rewrites of studies? When a study assesses a commercial endeavor, why can't we regularize tagging it with the author's interest in that endeavor?
"The purpose of this paper is to describe and explain some highlights associated with the contemporary business practice of out-sourcing more and more of a companies’ activities in the belief that doing so will increase profitability. A strong case is made that it will not always be possible to make more and more profit out of less and less product and that, worse, there is a strong risk of going out of business directly as a result of this policy. The point is made that not only is the work out-sourced; all of the profits associated with the work are out-sourced, too. The history of the former Douglas Aircraft Company is cited as a clear indication of what these policies have done – and as a warning of what more may be done. The subcontractors on the DC-10 made all of the profits; the prime manufacturer absorbed all of the over-runs. The circumstances under which out-sourcing can be beneficial are also explained. They involve better access to improved facilities with which to make more precise detail parts to reduce the cost of final assembly. A strong warning is included about the perils of sub-optimum solutions in which individual costs are minimized in isolation."
