DBC

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yes, but west virginia still gets 90% of their electricity from coal.
Amusing that, given there is no economic case for a coal plant, you have an industry which rails at government regulation being propped up by it. Not so amusing is how many people by the messaging.
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DBC

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Of course they are comparable. The flow from these sources are simply baked into the system. Your question lacks context and seems more like a rhetorical talking point than an actual question.

But if you want the actual answer then the cost of adding batteries would be $0. This follows first from from the fact that, as mentioned, the natural fluctuations of production are baked into the system. It also flows from the less obvious fact that businesses have already installed massive amounts of batteries which can make up for supply/demand imbalances. Grid operators haven't figured out how to use these existing resources -- they're human -- but they will because it's such an easy and low cost solution.

All that is necessary is a system that can call and pay for the energy. For example, in the recent California rolling blackouts, on just a few hours notice, non-utility batteries delivered over 100 megawatts to the grid. With one day's notice they more than doubled that. And had the grid operator given a few days notice that would have jumped to over 500 MW. Also note that the problem was caused by a baseload natural gas plant unexpectedly going offline. Since a coal plant could likewise go offline, perhaps you should give me the cost of the coal plant plus the batteries needed for that eventuality?
 

EVer

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Agreed, batteries alone are not "the answer."

https://www.eia.gov/analysis/studies/electricity/batterystorage/
"At the end of 2018, 869 megawatts (MW) of power capacity,[1] representing 1,236 megawatthours (MWh) of energy capacity,[2] of large-scale[3] battery storage was in operation in the United States." [yes it's referring to 2018, but these are the latest data available, report issued July 2020]

https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/us-energy-facts/
"U.S. primary energy consumption by energy source, 2019
total = 100.2 quadrillion British thermal units (Btu)"


100.2 quadrillion BTU is about 30 trillion kWh. With 31,540,000 seconds in a year, that's 931MWh/sec. The total battery storage operating in the US (year ended 2018) would have lasted for about 1.3 seconds.

The better answer to clean energy is nuclear. Terrapower's is among the most compelling, since they use spent fuel rods in failsafe reactors.


Here's my math, if you want to check it:


EIA.gov annual US consumption1.002E+17BTU/yr
times2.931E-04kWh/BTU
equals2.937E+13kWh/yr
divided by3.154E+07second/yr
equals9.311E+05kWh/sec
times1.000E-03mWh/kWh
equals931.1MWh/sec
EIA.gov battery storage capacity1236.0mWh
divided by931.1MWh/sec
equals1.3sec
 
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DBC

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It's well known that coal is dead because it's not price competitive. And since it's apparent that it will become even less competitive over time, utilities aren't building any new coal plants.

If you want to think it's because of government then by all means think that. It's incorrect but not harmful.
 

DBC

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It means that plants are built based on how they fit into existing plants. They aren't built to supply power at times when there is a power surplus.

The grid operator has refused to name the plant. If you're interested you can find plenty of articles that provide detail.
 


Billyk24

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It's well known that coal is dead because it's not price competitive. And since it's apparent that it will become even less competitive over time, utilities aren't building any new coal plants.

If you want to think it's because of government then by all means think that. It's incorrect but not harmful.
It's well known that coal is dead because it's not price competitive. And since it's apparent that it will become even less competitive over time, utilities aren't building any new coal plants.------

There is a slight problem with the above statement: - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...ive-coal-expansion-in-threat-to-climate-goals

- https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...ower-plant-climate-change-tokyo-a9316271.html

- https://www.wired.com/story/china-is-still-building-an-insane-number-of-new-coal-plants/
 

DBC

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I gave you numbers which demonstrate that even the most efficient coal plants can't produce electricity that, on an UNSUBSIDIZED basis, is price competitive with that produced by wind farms, large scale solar arrays, hydro electric plants, or combined natural gas plants. If you think otherwise, please provide some actual numbers. Enquiring minds would like to see them.
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