Just another voice yelling into the void.
I’ve probably protested for your rights. I’m definitely on at least one list.
I believe firmly that everyone should have a fair shake and as much freedom as they can be afforded - so long as it does not encroach on the freedoms of others.
Feed me trolls.
40 series Nvidia was still humoring the raster crowd. 50 they are literally providing tools to tell you what your “real” frame rate should be. It’s the same thing companies got burned at the stake for gaming benchmarks. This is what happens when you don’t have enough competition. The industry leader starts selling bullshit quality dives off a cliff.
Exactly. It’s a tired argument that’s been made in a lot of different mediums. It’s not worked in any of them.
Damn. Hats off to the developers there. It’s immersive and well thought out.
Man I was ready to trash this post as an ad, but this stopped me. IMO you should put your opinion in the post to make for a more compelling interaction… otherwise it’s just an RSS feed with more steps.
On topic: I like the concept of handheld that can do double duty via oLink etc. With a lot of these handhelds I think we’re on the verge of seeing something finally replace laptops. There’s some hurdles to jump but I genuinely feel like this formfactor is part of the next step.
People that know what ad blockers are frequently use them. The act of punishing the group that isn’t aware of adblockers simply will drive more users to discover/make use of them.
🫂 Westwood was such a great studio.
If you like that theory you should love looking into tech bubbles.
Justice for command and conquer.
I wish this wasn’t the first thing I thought when I saw the statement.
You, like me were probably thinking about this glorious game… and were equally disappointed that it wasn’t. 🥲
Look. If most “productivity trackers” are only tracking active window and mouse clicks / cpm … it more than counts - it should be granted extra points.
Fuck me look at how how hard Johnson is working. Been typing like a madman all day.
Thank you for reminding me to update my filters to include Elon. I keep meaning to and finally have.
I’m going to preface this response with: I will be consolidating / paraphrasing your responses I quote - I do not intend to misrepresent anything you said - it will simply be to manage post length. I have read your post in its entirety and am responding as such.
Yes, that is one of the ludicrous arguments that I acknowledged OP is making.
Consider that OPs statement used a LOT of the same language and recommendations but was horribly off base. I was re-asserting the fault in his views to remind you that he was - without question - completely wrong. This doesn’t mean that you are. It does mean that you shouldn’t give him a pass because he expressed interest in a solution you support. If anything this is a teaching moment where you confirm that he, is in fact wrong, but this is how x works.
With regard to storage…
I’m glad we see eye to eye on its presence in a working solution. Please understand that this has largely been the contentious point throughout the thread so this is where I focused when you asserted that OP wasn’t wrong in (even a particular) capacity. It needs to be clear so information isn’t misrepresented.
With regard to Demand shaping …
This is my view coupled with some basic knowledge of how things work - with a healthy dose of extrapolation: that is to say this response is opinion and not an area of expertise for me… but is where things logically ended up with this particular subject.
I understand the focus you are taking with demand shaping - but from my perspective I do not think the net result will be as great as you believe it to be… but for tangentially related reasons. Before I get into the meat of that - yes, I wholeheartedly agree that optimizations in any form are a good thing. Many gains in the field of energy generation and storage are measured in small steps so ~2-5% still matters.
With that said:
Generally speaking price/kWh is determined by usage overall at that time… Now factor in that these industrial factories you are moving are contributing to the current price (at their current time slot) - which is lower than where you want to move them.
A couple things to consider:
Assuming their usage is significant enough to move the needle: (at scale) most factories would then have their workers on a standard workday as well. Remember that 2nd/3rd shift workers are probably sleeping through at least 1 of the “peak usage” periods which in its own way is also offsetting demand. This in all probability would be a dampening effect on the shift that would be expected from the primary “move.”
Assuming no major effect from the workers changing schedule (which based on my understanding would not be the case) - and indeed a sizable move from the factories proper… you’d still need the factories to be willing to take on the increased energy costs associated with moving into the more expensive energy window. While this is the “ideal” you are looking for: This feels… unlikely. (see utopia comment)
With regard to peaks and troughs:
I believe we both agree that storage is a necessary component of most solar / wind installations. Presently (to my knowledge) most battery systems are used primarily as a “smoothing” buffer for incoming energy as neither sun nor wind are constant resulting in variable returns. Secondarily, they function as a substitute during extended periods on non-generation (nighttime.) Now these battery systems are going to exist regardless what usage is occurring when - they exist to make the solar/wind systems reliable and efficient.
Lets factor in our constants:
Energy generation: The sunlight isn’t changing nor is the solar installation’s size. Daytime generation + nighttime generation should not change functionally at all here as (to my knowledge.)
Daily energy: this should not change - the factories continue to use “roughly” the same energy as before.
Functionally this solution isn’t changing how much energy is in the system, nor is it changing energy consumed. It may be changing how much the batteries are cycling… which, sure, would be an environmental impact… but not production. To resurrect my rain example: we haven’t changed the barrel size, the rain amount, or the plants that require said water. We’re just changing when we water them.
Dude. We are already doing exactly that.
(This is loosely referenced knowledge - but it passes the sniff test:)
Making the change you and OP are referring to works in a bubble but not in the way you are envisioning it. Presently at least. A grid, as you observed, is a series of power stations working together to provide the sum of energy required. The grid, as I asserted earlier, is very exacting in its requirements to function (pressure system example.) It stands to reason that the intermittent producer be locked to a rate they can “safely” achieve based on averages and their storage capacities. They will not be the first pick nor the lions share of “reactive energy” provided. We can’t produce more “sunlight” without robbing Peter to pay Paul - a battery dump during the day to assist with reactive energy results in less energy to provide at night. This system is optimized and sized for a set “average” generation during the day with an expected offload at night. (rain example again)
So who picks up the slack for the move to prime hours? You provided that answer:
But ultimately, the solar, nuclear/coal, storage, and steel plants are all on the same grid.
So yes, the shaping could move demand into the peak hours - and then would re-apply stress to the exact producers that the mills were moved originally to relieve. This feels like a non-starter to me: Task failed successfully …at least in our current conditions - which leads us to:
Again: Storage is important, yes. But, demand shifting is far more important.
Absolutely using solar to offset steel mill energy consumption is an outstanding concept - but it requires build outs, regulation changes, and a lot of different parties to agree to make that change. I may have been hyperbolic in my utopia / teleporter examples but the point is: those changes are neither quick nor easy and may as well be the stuff of science fiction for now. I agree its important to phase out legacy producers like coal / oil - I firmly believe nuclear is here to stay until it is replaced by the next “big” producer. Will renewables eventually be our primary source of power? We see examples of it working - so sure. Its possible. But renewables will continue to be a package deal with storage. The technology may change but the storage requirement will remain constant. (This part is, again, aimed at op- not you.)
Final thoughts: I spent far longer on this than I anticipated - but I think your post warranted it. You provided facts to the best of your knowledge and clearly were compelled to state the case for something you believe in. Ultimately - I wouldn’t say we disagree: I think we are both looking at different time horizons. Currently, in the here and now, your solution isn’t readily available nor easily achieved. That said- it is clear that at least some people are seeking what you presented as an eventuality. ~10 years from now it may well be reality. I still believe that you shouldn’t have defended OP’s position as you did. A partial affirmation likely will be received as “Oh, see! I was right- mostly…” and they will carry on; learning nothing.
This is just factually ridiculous.
Filling a reservoir during the day to run a steel mill overnight is a complete waste of a reservoir: move the steel mill to daytime hours and you don’t need the reservoir.
This isn’t a logical comparison. Here’s an apples to apples: It’s the rainy season - my plants have water … I take excess water and keep it in a rain barrel. An unexpected dry spell occurs: My plants have water.
We’ll return to this in a moment.
And yet, we are doing this now: We are driving consumption to overnight hours that can’t possibly be met by solar.
Being night I’d imagine that’s a tough fight for solar… I’ll give you that. 🙄
…But, those same incentives are killing solar/wind efficiency and artificially increasing the need for storage.
No.
Storage - or a buffer if you will - is simply a requirement of many systems. Electricity is no different. Renewables benefit substantially by having it and would be horribly inefficient without it.
…Shifting demand to time of production (demand shaping) is much more efficient than shifting production to time of demand (storage).
Demand shaping when we’re taking about the grid is largely the result of seasons, the availability of light, and our day to day actions. We turn lights on at night, the heat on when we are cold, and the air on when we are hot. We cook meals before and after work. Demand shaping on the scale that is being suggested requires a positively insane amount of change and has an infinitesimally small chance of occuring.
Now: we have solar during the day and turbines for when it’s windy. This is your production. You cannot shift it. It is raining - my plants are getting water. How then, do you water your plants when it is dry? This answers itself.
OP’s position is rather ludicrous for a number of reasons, but they are not wrong on this particular point.
Op believes that energy storage shouldn’t be necessary. At all. They have clearly stated elsewhere that their opinion is not based on research and it shows. A grid requires a buffer - or a series of fast acting production which effectively simulates one. Solar / wind without that buffer would be nearly unusuable.
Op is misguided at best and while technically not completely wrong: for them to be right we’d need to live in some utopia with vastly different technologies that we have presently. I like sci-fi too… but I’m not going to lobby congress to get rid of planes in favor of teleporters.
OP is… trying his best, I guess.
I commend your faith in … ehm… the human spirit we’ll say.
PS Gravity, except pumped water, is hilariously bad.
Keenly aware. I got a good laugh out of it when I saw it mentioned.
Practical Engineering is great. He does a fantastic job of explaining things simply and frequently provides models to demonstrate things.
100% on the combination of things statement. Many different storage mediums have different advantages and disadvantages. The right tool for the right job. Flawed though it is I always loved reading about molten salt… It just seemed like such a metal way to store energy. 😂
Realistically - I don’t mind people being incorrect or even just leaning into their particular beliefs or preferences… but OP emphatically stating incorrect information and then arguing as people corrected him was irritating.
Read that and was like… fuck me why am I debating the guy when I coulda just asked that. Cheers.
As someone living in Texas presently: you could have saved yourself a full sentence:
This is a shitty Texas-based company cutting corners…
to
Texas company
or honestly:
Texas
Would be sufficient. Any Texan that doesn’t own x texas-based-company is tired of that company’s bullshit. It’s one of the few things natives and transplants agree on.
This PSA brought to you by the makers of: y’all, you all, and all y’all.
The document linked doesn’t go into detail for good reason. It’s a bunch of half cooked ideas distilled to make a good read… but misses a lot of key points. Most notably: it hand waves through storage.
The electrical grid is a lot like a pressure system in a sense: we have a lot of equipment that is designed to work at a very specific pressure. Outside of those ranges things break. The article mentions feeding back into the grid which is fine and well… but fails to mention how that needs to be managed so as to not blow the whole thing up. Also that solar system you have isn’t going to be feeding shit back into the grid without a buffer… which is storage… for the same reason that you likely will struggle to have a solar home without batteries. The sun is variable and your “stuff” needs a very specific range of power. Too much? zap. Too little? brownout. Either way: rip electronics.
The very things you are suggesting as solutions to power storage literally require it to work.
You’re hard pushing hydrogen / oxygen pretty blindly. Do you happen to know what the best efficiency of it is? It’s not great. And it gets worse when you have to harvest it (typically electrolysis which is brutally energy intensive.) Worse still when you need to compress it - and don’t even start me on energy density. Oh and that compressed gas needs to be kept cold. More energy.
Hydrogen cells have been around for ages and are still functionally worthless until the storage and generation problems are solved.
…That are built into the generation pipeline in a way that pads numbers instead of augmenting real frames. It’s dogshit.