Nice Photovoltaik Peak in Germany

[kladner]

Originally Posted by Uncwilly

http://www.computerworld.com/article...-coal-oil.html

The rationale, as given by utilities, is that they must build and maintain the electrical grid over which all power is transferred, so solar installations should be charged a fee to help pay for that.
Last year, for example, Arizona's largest power utility -- Arizona Public Service -- sought a monthly rate increase of $50 to $100 for solar-using customers.

The utility only got a $5 surcharge (this time), but it's plain that the real aim of these charges is to make using solar more expensive than conventional sources, exclusive of installation costs.

[Nick]

Originally Posted by VictordeHolland

Google has made a deal with Eneco (electric utility company) for the use of a complete windmill-park that is currently under construction in Delfzijl. The park will consist of 19 turbines with a combined capacity of 62MW. It will power the 600 million euro costing data centre Google is building in the Eemshaven. The deal is for 10 years, starting in 2016.

Original article (in Dutch):
http://www.nu.nl/internet/3931925/go...indmolens.html

Wind power for their cloud?

[kladner]

Wind supplied 98% of Scotland’s household Power in 2014 and other Amazing Green Energy Stories
-Juan Cole, Informed Comment

With regard to the households, i.e. domestic energy consumption, Scotland’s wind turbines generated enough to cover 98% of it in 2014. In addition, in some months of the spring and summer, those homes that have solar panels generated all the electricity the household used. Scotland tripled its solar installations in 2014.
Scotland is well on its way to getting 100% of its energy from renewable sources by 2022.

[chappy]

http://www.slate.com/articles/busine...ergy_here.html

Energy Storage will be the next revolution. Suddenly all the bad decisions made by "greens" over the past couple decades will become good decisions.

Though this particular solution is "cool" (see what I did there?) it would be less beneficial in New York, for example. That's why I prefer generic solutions like fly-wheels which also provide grid stability.

[kladner]

Originally Posted by chappy

http://www.slate.com/articles/busine...ergy_here.html

Energy Storage will be the next revolution. Suddenly all the bad decisions made by "greens" over the past couple decades will become good decisions.

Though this particular solution is "cool" (see what I did there?) it would be less beneficial in New York, for example. That's why I prefer generic solutions like fly-wheels which also provide grid stability.

I hope their system works better than the one installed decades back in the State of Illinois Jim Thompson Center in downtown Chicago. It did not help that the building itself is a HVAC nightmare. It is really hard to keep things balanced when there is a multistory atrium to which the different levels are open. That aside, I don't think the off-hours freezer system ever really lived up to expectations.

[chalsall]

Originally Posted by chappy

That's why I prefer generic solutions like fly-wheels which also provide grid stability.

I agree with you.

I don't have the keystrokes to find the sites, but fly-wheels are a very viable solution space for energy storage.

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by chalsall

I agree with you.

I don't have the keystrokes to find the sites, but fly-wheels are a very viable solution space for energy storage.

Here is one example, still experimental, engineering test bed.
http://thesource.metro.net/2014/10/03/71489/

A couple more links.
http://beaconpower.com/carbon-fiber-flywheels/
http://www.power-thru.com/carbon_fib...echnology.html

[Mark Rose]

Originally Posted by chalsall

I don't have the keystrokes to find the sites, but fly-wheels are a very viable solution space for energy storage.

But wheels can be dangerous when they go flying: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RR7wJEmKds0

Now imagine a wheel with a million times the inertia.

[xilman]

Originally Posted by Mark Rose

But wheels can be dangerous when they go flying: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RR7wJEmKds0

Now imagine a wheel with a million times the inertia.

Many things can be dangerous when they break down. I don't see why flywheels should be thought in any way exceptional.

[fivemack]

Energy-storage flywheels tend to be on a vertical axis, and the big ones are buried underground. Also they're usually made of carbon-fibre in such a way that they turn into a mass of stationary useless fluff rather than a whirling disc of death if something goes wrong with the axle.

There are certainly some good applications for flywheels - a data-centre I know uses them instead of a bank of batteries for UPS, it can hold a megawatt or so of computers for a minute or so, letting it deal with brief power outages itself and keep the servers serving while the diesel generators light up if the outage is more than a couple of seconds. Admittedly it takes two shipping containers to do this; I haven't seen inside them, I suspect they are mostly power electronics with a small flywheel in the middle.

Outage lengths tend to be either a few seconds while the grid switches to a redundant path, or a few hours while grid operators remove the wreckage of the JCB and fix the non-redundant cable, so dealing with brief power outages is very handy.

[Mark Rose]

Originally Posted by xilman

Many things can be dangerous when they break down. I don't see why flywheels should be thought in any way exceptional.

Not exceptional, just different. It can be surprising how much energy is contained within one.