#ableg Alberta is currently capable of generating 19671 mWh of power between all the various power plants, wind, solar, geo, hydro, etc.
So I'm wondering, which claims actually make no sense?
The skeptics will say "but solar doesn't work at night"... which is true! But wind still does. Hydro still does. Nuclear still does. And guess what? It works for Ontario, Quebec, BC, and the Maritimes.
@chad#ableg In Québec, variable production such as solar and wind works well with Hydro: when there is wind, they close some turbines at various generating stations and re-open them when wind dies down. Very dynamic comouet controlled release of water to the turbines. But where you have coal or nuclear, you can't quickly ramp production up/down to adapt to wind/solar and when you have too much, you have to dump/sell it at very low price. Natural gas can be more variable if planned correctly.
@chad I woudl rather see that carbon left deep undergroud where in belongs. It is the extraction process which introduces the carbon into atmospheric cycle. These carbon taxes as silly. The government should siply cap extraction of fossil fuel and lower that cap each year till we reach target in 2035 (or whatever year) and let the market adapt to having demand for fossil greater than supply.
@chad#ableg In fact, Québec takes advantage of ienfficient "fixed" production in NE USA. When NE USA has surplus of production, Québec buys that electricity at hefty discount while turning off turbines in Québec and keeping the water in the reservoirs for later. And when the USA lacks power, Québec then runs that water through to sell electricity to USA at fill price.
Renewables work really well when you have dynamic base production, does not work so well with fixed slow moving productiuon
@chad it also doesn’t need to. The idea is to reduce burning fossil fuels. We can make more renewable sources- when they produce we can use 100% renewables- or sell the extra - or store it. Our system isn’t isolated we import and export electricity. Not having the option is ridiculous
@chad With regards to the night time problem, Alberta has perfect terrain for pumped hydro storage including some old mine sites, like Tent Mountain, that could be converted relatively easily.
@chad “Solar doesn’t work at night” - and neither do most people. Go check your grid operator’s demand charts.
Done well, solar can produce so much power that you have to pay people to use it (See: Germany) which means there’s an economic opportunity in grid-scale storage.
People arguing against green power are today’s version of “The internet is a fad” or “Who needs a mobile phone?”
In this specific case, they’re paid for not understanding how it might work.
@JustinDerrick@chad In Ontario where Nuclear is the bigger producer of electricity, because they can,t ramp up/down quickly to adapt to availability of solar/wind, the addition of solar/wind doesn't work so well.
They do have pumps at Niagara Falls to use surplus electricity to pump water to a higher reservoir which can then drive turbines later but not sure this is scaled up to absorb all surplus.
@jfmezei@chad There are tons of major solar & wind installs in Ontario. MicroFIT was very successful at bringing online residential rooftop solar and kickstarting solar power projects.
@JustinDerrick@chad Ontario is broken because power generation is separate from distribution and billing. So when retail demand drops, it does not automatically translate into the separate production companies agreeding to lower production (and make less money). But longer term having solar on homes will lower avreage demand and Ontario can have longer term plans. But not dynamic production adjustement minute by minute.
@JustinDerrick@chad In Canadian winter, a peak is dinner time when it is already dark. (people come back from work, turn on lights, start cooking dinner , turn on TV and turn up the heat.). So you need base generation big enoug for those peaks. The wind/solar are neat "add ons" that lets you save on your base generation to be used later. (keeping water in reservoir, or keeping natural gas in tanks).
@JustinDerrick@chad Energy storage is the holy grail of renewables truly replacing base load done by fossil fuels. Until this happens, you still need to be able to supply full load with your base generation capacity and if lucky, you can just turn that down to use less fossil fuels when renewables provide power.
The challenges of renewables do not explain or justify Danielle Smith's moratorium even if storage tech not yet mature enough.
@jfmezei@chad I don't think we disagree here -- solar and wind augment existing production capacity with near-zero-carbon production. Every megawatt produced by solar and wind is one less megawatt of power needing to be generated by fossil fuels. When the green power contributes so much energy to the grid that it starts to cause problems, that's when power storage projects become feasible. It's not a bug, it's a feature! :)
@JustinDerrick@chad Pedantic: with coal and nuclear, every megawatt produced by wind/solar does not save fossil fuels because these plants cannot quickly ramp production up/down so they still produce power that could be replaced by wind/solar. And not all natural gas plants can quickly modulate output.
@jfmezei@chad Even if the ratio isn't 1:1, and it's 1:0.8, it's still 80% closer than you were before that solar/wind capacity was installed. Again -- there's an entire new economy around balancing the grid that will develop strictly from monetizing the spare capacity that green power produces, and time-shifting it to hours where demand (and price) is highest.
@jfmezei You're putting the cart before the horse. Storage is a response to excess daytime generation, not something that has to be in place first.
But adding more daytime supply doesn't mean we need more nighttime supply. It's actually the opposite, and storage isn't the only factor. If daytime power is cheaper than nighttime power, then activities that can be time-shifted (by industrial users who pay spot prices), will be, thus reducing nighttime demand.
Alberta has 36% coal, 54% natural gas, 10% renewables. If the natural gas can easily be started/stopped as needed, then there is plenty of room to still grow wind/solar to allow up to 54% of natural gas production be stopped when renewables produce.
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