EV politics mandates (corrupting) science and engineering to become political - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: MT
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 03:05:06 pm
content: EV Mandates vs. Freedom with Mark P. Mills11 Reasons why the "EV Transition" will NEVER happen | MGUY Australia

author: Smoky
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 03:50:15 pm
content: I always wondered why the Left in the United States always targets my gas car as the main culprit to their "climate change" hysteria but never the diesel-burning container ships that pollute the seas traveling back and forth from China.I think solar panels and electric cars are a scam because the purchaser isn't paying the full price for them. It's the taxpayers who can't afford them that are.

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 04:20:33 pm
content: Quote from: Smoky on December 26, 2024, 03:50:15 pmThe point of a government subsidy is to make something cheaper for people who use the subsidy, and make it more expensive for everyone else. Here in the Netherlands there is a lot of crying that the electricity becomes more expensive for people without solar panels.Guess what. That's the whole point of a subsidy. Congratulations, you just learned what the word means.

author: RJSV
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 04:21:37 pm
content: Thanks for the subject, as I was just self-censuring the same thing, due a wish to not piss off a large swath of readers. So, I've been 'naited', in a good way.My concern is cases when the U.S. (liberals) wish to extend their reach, and politics, over to other sovereign countries.That means both good incentives, and bad influence. A good incentive would allow for large profits for, say, a country like Cambodia, that's to supply battery charger systems. (Just a random country as example).The negative influence might be passing a new U.S. law, getting into the internal structures, by requiring 'DEI' hiring practices, in, say, South Africa, before any technology imports can come in,...that being parts and services for EV expansion in the U.S.It's a bit of a way, to convey, that U.S. elections have consequences to suppliers. The DEI thing might end up looking ridiculous, if there are direct requirements for 'racial balance', to an African country, that is 85 % black.I can almost picture an office worker shaking her head in wonder, at a couple of 'DEI' classes in a contract correspondence just received.'Racial balance ?' she might say; 'We aren't even in America, and have no relevance to the DEI goals (already there).Affects the independence of other counties, to run their own systems.thanks...Rick-Jacknear Oakland, Ca

author: RJSV
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 04:50:09 pm
content: I would even go so far as to suggest that arguments concerning EV takeover, and fossil fuels 'bans' aren't poised to be successful, that's flawedA total EV mandated system won't work, today, practically....DON'T MATTER. It's a system of bribes and political contest funding.Ditto for the U.S. 'medical system' where the big pharma corporations get their profits, and spend a portion to feed back to the politicians that vote for these bloated systems.They aren't needing to work, in the usual metrics of efficiency, etc. although I suppose some, err, accidental efficiencies can occur too.EV system mandates aren't meant to fund the industry, although they (politicians) won't and can't tell you that. That's actually a bit of relief, to know, to think that way, because it (no longer) has a baffling context...crazy things start to make sense.No,...Obama can't tell you this.

author: coppercone2
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 04:59:21 pm
content: I see a ghost of a horse, that has had its body entropically destroyed

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 05:04:47 pm
content: Quote from: tszaboo on December 26, 2024, 04:20:33 pmThese subsidies are just one more government manipulation stacked on a whole bunch of other manipulations, that distort things in ways nobody wants to properly acknowledge, Installing solar panels is nice if you live in a house you own and control. For poorer people, living in small apartments, installing solar is rarely a choice. So, its another poor people subsidising the better off scheme.

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 05:19:16 pm
content: Nice, we don't have enough political tinfoil hat nutjob threads here yet

author: BrianHG
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 05:24:59 pm
content: Careful, the government also subsidizes the petroleum industry even more then EVs and solar panels. Its just that it has been happening for so long and has been baked in so thoroughly that only new modern subsidies are commented upon.I do believe that all subsidies should be stopped and we would have to live a few years in pain as all the prices of everything gets adjusted, but even so, all governments will still create back-room deals with powerful interests propping up one industry over another in hidden ways.

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 05:30:23 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 26, 2024, 05:04:47 pmOr you can look at this another way without this inherent disgust. For example you can look at it this way. People with houses have to work at this twice as hard, since all the city dwellers cannot do anything to fix it. And there are all those backwards people that would burn down forests or drive coal rollers. Shouldn't they be compensated for their efforts?

author: vad
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 05:41:14 pm
content: Quote from: BrianHG on December 26, 2024, 05:24:59 pmTo make things equal, fuel excise taxes should also be repealed.

author: I wanted a rude username
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 06:00:53 pm
content: Quote from: Smoky on December 26, 2024, 03:50:15 pmThe cynical answer is that they want their fleece snuggies, bamboo homewares, and whatever Apple's selling this season.The phlegmatic answer is that container ships areastoundinglyefficient. Shipping a new mobile phone in retail packaging from Shenzhen to Sydney consumes about 10 ml of fuel oil ... equivalent to driving a Prius 250 m (⅙ mile). The other parts of the manufacturing and supply chain are far larger carbon contributors ... the highly competitive shipping industry is just not worth bothering with (andthe recent switch to low-sulfur fuel has been somewhat counterproductive due to decreased cloud seeding).

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 06:08:27 pm
content: Quote from: tszaboo on December 26, 2024, 05:30:23 pmDid you type something wrong, or did you actually mean what you wrote? The people with houses are being subsidised. How are they working any harder? The poorer apartment dwellers are the ones forced to work harder to pay for both their higher taxes, and the higher energy prices being inflated by government action.

author: BrianHG
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 06:16:08 pm
content: Quote from: vad on December 26, 2024, 05:41:14 pmAssuming you are specifying the tax based on 'The excise tax on fuel-inefficient vehicles is calculated on the basis of the weighted fuel consumption rating', then YES. I should not be taxed because someone else chose a heavy vehicle. Its like the BS carbon tax here in Canada. What for? Who gets that tax money? What is it used for? I haven't seen that tax applied to closing down existing oil fields and pipelines with direct investment into nuclear energy across the board with reductions on my electric bill.

author: m k
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 06:19:47 pm
content: Quote from: Smoky on December 26, 2024, 03:50:15 pmIt's a size of understanding.

author: Ice-Tea
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 06:34:06 pm
content: Make a video about 11 reasons about why the EV Transition will never happen and then proceed to give no such reasons.1) Won't reduce oil ussageDude tells you it would be a 10% reduction.2) EV's don't reduce C02 emissionsSaves only 0.4% at the current addaptation rate. Sooo... itdoessave CO2 emissions but just not as much as you'd want?3) Mining for EVs emits more than it savesTalking about how difficult it is to quantify etc. Discarding the countless studies that have done exactly that and time and time again have proven this is BS.Also: batteries can be recycled, reducing the need for future mining. Oil that is burned is just gone.4) EVs are just as complexSo what??? Even if it was, why would that mean the EV transmission will never happen???5) Not enough minerals being mined.It would require an increase of 400% guess what happened over the last decade.Also: funny how this doesn't seem to factor in when considering ICE cars. Who burn a fuel we have knows for a long time to be limited in supply.6) EVs will get more expensive, not cheaperPrice pressure will make materials more expensive.Meanwhile:7) EV charging infrastructure is expensiveTransporting electricity is expensive (more so than gasoline). The argument being we know how much it would cost because we have payed that cost in the past once already to build the current grid.Which is also how we knowit doesn't matter. The cost of the current infrastructure is being amortisized in what we pay for electricitynow already. Whatifwe have to expand the grid??? If a tomato farmer has to double his production, does that make his tomatoes more expensive? No, because he already figured out how to grow them and what the cost structure is. Doubling demand on an item that you can scale up is what is known in economics as " a nice problem to have".EVs will always be a minorityReally weird argument there... Something about horses??Think he lost the plot there a bit.Meanwhile in the real world: more EVs sold in Belgium than petrol cars. China is at 40% right now I think.9) It's not about reducing emissionsMore emissions would be saved by more fuel efficient engines my dude says. The Mills clip included barely seems to have anything to do with it. He seems to talk about who should be the benificiary of subsidies.It's probably fair to say some subsidies could be distributed better or preferably not at allbut that is once again not an argument against EVs!but rather against subsidies and the politicians that use them.10) The goal is to take away your carThat may be a stated goal of certain organisations or notBUT IT DOESN'T HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH EVs. AGAIN!This dude just puts clips out there with the simple (and apparently efficiently served goal) of instilling fear into people. They're coming for your car. Or your guns. Or your church. Or whatever.11) You can't change human natureOnce again, argument against sharing cars. Not against EVs. This is not a list of reasons against EVs. Dishonnest clickbait.

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 06:36:51 pm
content: You may want to come to Finland. We have an EV tax. This does not prevent people from complaining that EVs are "subsidized", so we have both, the anti-subsidy plus culture of complaining and I'm sure you would enjoy both.

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 06:52:01 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 26, 2024, 06:08:27 pmYes, I think people who do something should be subsidized, as opposed to those that do nothing. Or less than nothing.Living in an apartment or a house is a choice, both exist in all price levels. Nobody is forcing you to choose either.And not everyone is subscribing to your anti-establishment ideology, let's just leave at that. Does this surprise you that much?

author: Smoky
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 07:22:20 pm
content: Quote from: I wanted a rude username on December 26, 2024, 06:00:53 pmThat may be true but the container ship and all of its contents were manufactured with total disregard to the harm to the environment.My Redneck/Blue-collar opinion has always been, anyone from the West who utilizes China's slave labor to manufacture their product is a scumbag...and if I had the power, I would removeany and allcopyright and patent protections by the USA on their products and allow anyone to manufacture them.

author: RJSV
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 07:50:37 pm
content: China, likely, does not have a DEI initiative.Since there is a heavy environmental component here, I'd like to ask: Whatever happened to the U.S. 'Paperwork Reduction act ?'That, seems abandoned, which applies to discussion here, when questions come up on sincere efforts vs popular GREEN activists.(Someone here HAS mentioned burning down forests, maybe that meant 'harvesting all forests'.)Analysis, and debates aren't necessarily 'backwards' behaviour. Animals, you notice, DO look where they are going. Not an attack on EV technology, but a caution that for one thing, we don't have the (fossil fuel) capacity, to feed an electric grid.That's a bigger concern, than the automobiles.I wouldn't want 'coal' based energy, but some regions are stuck with that, for some number of years (Pennsylvania for example).

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 07:51:03 pm
content: Quote from: Ice-Tea on December 26, 2024, 06:34:06 pmBetter lookup a source for that. Politics likes to boost that number so they count hybrids as electric cars as well. So read the fine print very carefully; if the statistics doesn't include hybrids as a seperate heading, they are added under 'electric vehicles'. The reality is that BEV sales growth is stagnant across Europe as many countries are stopping subsidies for BEVs. 2025 will probably show a sharp decline in BEV sales across Europe.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 07:58:36 pm
content: Quote from: tszaboo on December 26, 2024, 06:52:01 pmOnly the privileged have much choice about where they live. Most people live in one of the very few options open to them. Even people buying a home have very limited choices, unless they are wealthy. You seem completely out of touch with reality.

author: Ice-Tea
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:05:35 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 26, 2024, 07:51:03 pmACEA. 38,3% BEV. 11,3% PEV, 9,1%hybrids.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:16:18 pm
content: Quote from: Ice-Tea on December 26, 2024, 08:05:35 pmHow many people in Belgium actually plug in those 11.3% of PEVs? The experience in countries where I've seen it studied is they are hardly ever plugged in. Some people reported in the UK that a number of PHEV cars were traded in with the charging cable still sealed in the plastic bag it came in.

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:22:30 pm
content: QuoteSo on the one hand, a car that is 100% dependent on the supply of petrol/diesel, which has few other uses, so which can be heavily taxed or made harder to get if "they" wanted to take away your car...or an EV, which runs on the energy source which would be the last thing to ever go away, as it's also used for everything else, and impossible to distinguish car use form any other use.Not to mention is also available for free to anyone with a few solar panels.This is one of the crazier anti-EV arguments that I've heard more than once from various clueless morons.

author: Ice-Tea
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:23:12 pm
content: Oh, no doubt.It's just a fiscal thing. But to be clear: those PEV arein additionto the 38% BEVs.

author: Ice-Tea
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:24:45 pm
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on December 26, 2024, 08:22:30 pmThat's what the video does. It takes fairly general complaints (the left/greens/whatever would prefer less people owning cars and more people sharing one) and presents it as an anti-EV argument. Somehow.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:26:17 pm
content: Quote from: Ice-Tea on December 26, 2024, 08:05:35 pmThose are not the numbers I get:https://www.acea.auto/pc-registrations/new-car-registrations-1-9-in-november-2024-year-to-date-battery-electric-sales-5-4/Select Belgium jan-nov (year-to-date): 24.4% hybrid, 28.8% BEV. November shows a peak due to EV subsidies / tax excemptions stopping next year but you can't claim that is a trend.

author: RJSV
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:27:50 pm
content: Yes, I did make a 'choice' on where to live, (being cash-exausted):I 'chose' to live in my brother's basement, back a few decades. Didn't want to buy a house, ...(yawn).(Sorry if answers get stale, if messages flying too fast, within a thread).

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:30:28 pm
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on December 26, 2024, 08:22:30 pmIMHO you are severely underestimating what a rare commodity electricity actually is and how vulnerable it is. Look at Ukraine. Electricity is the first thing that goes away in case something bad happens. The people with a coal / oil / (bottled) gas heater are way better of compared to those who rely on electricity one way or another. And it is not just Ukraine which is under attack. Today the news headlined a story about a Russian ship cutting an electricity cable between Finland and one of the Baltic states bordering Russia.Where it comes to taxes, the government can also decide to tax by distance driven. That way it doesn't matter where the energy to run your car comes from or how expensive it is made to through taxes. You can't escape death and taxes.

author: Ice-Tea
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:34:19 pm
content: https://www.acea.auto/pc-registrations/new-car-registrations-6-1-in-september-2024-year-to-date-battery-electric-market-sales-5-8/

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:45:53 pm
content: Let's look at this from another perspective, which is that of AGW, anthropogenic global warming.Now before you get your knickers all in a twist, consider at least thepossibilitythat all those pointy-headed scientists are correct and that we're entering an era of accelerated climate changedriven by the burning of fossil fuels.Not claiming here that this is the case, although the evidence seems to be steadily mounting that it is. So taking an openminded attitude here.Soifthis is the case, andifthe consequences are as dire as some are predicting, up to the "sixth great extinction" including our own species, then clearly some kind of drastic counteraction would be indicated. (Assuming, of course, that we're not already over the tipping point and that any action at this time is futile, because as even conservative bodies like the IPCC tell us, the present climate change is irreversible.)So EVs would be a natural response to the threat of AGW (assuming, of course, that it is real and ongoing).Of course, the question then arises: that being the case, can EVs actually save our sorry asses?That, to me, is not clear at all. Again, assuming AGW, assuming the need for alternatives to burning shit to power our world, would switching to EVs (and to electricity for all other uses) actually solve the problem? I'm becoming more and more convinced that the answer to that is a resoundingNO. I think the headlong rush to an electricity-based energy economy is very poorly thought through.So where does that leave us?

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 08:51:19 pm
content: Quote from: Ice-Tea on December 26, 2024, 08:24:45 pmThe same greenists / leftists advertise BEVs as being beneficial because they can be shared. That is an equally crazy suggestion but it feeds the 'taking cars away' feeling. Fight crazy suggestions with crazy comments...In the end owning a car is always cheaper compared to renting one unless you need a car once or twice a year. But this is true for any kind of tool.

author: Wallace Gasiewicz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 09:00:21 pm
content: I have worked in the auto industry for many years. There were two big government mandated changes in the industry.The first was the tailpipe emissions or pollution. This took years to iron out out after the first ICE engines were configured with all sort of gimmicks to comply with regulations. Eventually the industry figured out how to make cleaner gas engines that worked well. .The other one was and still is electric cars. There was a project in the 1980s that included US car manufacturers and the US Govt. They were looking for good safe batteries and good power trains for electric vehicles. Some of this knowledge gained is still with us in the form of the current battery cells. Now, I have not been in the business for years, but one of the problems at the beginning was the load on the grid. I do not think we have improved our grid and our generating power in relation to the increased use by electric vehicles and by the new generation of computing.Although I think it is early, I do believe we will be able to continue with electric vehicles, but I do think the cost of the electric vehicles will be greater than the cost of ICE vehicles. Just my guess.....It is probably more ecologically friendly to use electric vehicles where it is not necessary to burn hydrocarbons to generate electricity. So, perhaps Canada with most of its electricity from Hydro, should be using EVs? (are they?)Anyway, I see this electric vehicle government mandate the same way as I looked at the tailpipe emissions standards, The question remaining is will the EVs actually turn out to be as successful as the emission mandate. Many people in the industry thought the emissions standards were completely idiotic restrictions that could never be achieved.My personal opinion is that I do not think the EVs are as good of an idea as most people think, but what do I know? Ha!

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 09:03:48 pm
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on December 26, 2024, 08:45:53 pmNo. There isn't enough Lithium to cater both BEVs and the required grid scale storage for countries to become CO2 neutral by 2050. Even without BEVs getting enough grid scale storage will be hard. With LFP batteries the amount of Litium needed is about 1Mt (t= metric ton) per 1TWh. With solid state batteries the storage capacity is 5 to 6 times better (0.15Mt to 0.2Mt per TWh). But there is only 28Mt of Lithium known to be mineable according to several sources (I really triple checked this number as it seems low to me). So solid-state Lithium battery technology is likely limited to 186TWh of storage. To put that number in perspective: according to TNO (a government related research instutute in the Netherlands), the Netherlands will need 2TWh to 50TWh of storage by 2050. That capacity serves 20 million people while requiring a significant portion of the world's Lithium supply. 2050 may sound far but it is only 25 years from now; I strongly doubt we'll see a non-Lithium battery technology which is mass-deployable by then. So it looks like the point made in the video that Lithium is going to become very expensive is very likely to become reality but not only due to mining capacity. Even if a battery technology is invented which uses 10 times less Lithium compared to solid-state batteries (which don't even exist as a mass produced product).

author: BrianHG
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 09:11:08 pm
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on December 26, 2024, 08:22:30 pmNO.

author: Cyclotron
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 09:42:41 pm
content: Quote from: Smoky on December 26, 2024, 03:50:15 pmThis. Solar panels might one day be recyclable, but today, not so much. I judge recyclability by a simple metric: What is the price for a unit of solar panels to sell to a recycler?But the point of this poster is what I decry the most. Individual solar panel installations will likely cause grid prices to skyrocket over time, and it is even likely that it will cause significant instability to the point that large-scale grids are unfeasible. But importantly, the people who have the most burden here are the less wealthy.Poorer people will, through tax dollars, subsidize more wealthy people's adoption of Solar and also suffer the consequences of price increases due to fewer people buying from the grid.All that said, I will probably do a solar installation at my house. It comes down to timing.

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 26, 2024, 11:11:01 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 26, 2024, 07:58:36 pmHonestly, these conversations are super boring, and predictable.And I'm not going to take part in them, you are slinging mud, and I'm wearing decent cloths.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 12:13:19 am
content: Quote from: tszaboo on December 26, 2024, 11:11:01 pmWell, he is slinging mud, that's for sure.But he does have a valid point: solar energy*is certainly not an egalitarian thing.Not something the poor can afford or are likely to prioritize.*I hate how the term "solar energy" now applies exclusively to photovoltaic applications. I studied solar stuff back in the 70s and 80s, when it was still widely understood that the sun could be directly used to heat dwellings (and conversely, that "sun tempering" to reduce solar insolation was a good way to reduce the need for air conditioning).But nowadays nobody seems to have a clue that there are other ways to utilize the sun besides converting it to electricity, and that those other ways may actually have a bigger impact on our overall energy usage than photovoltaics.

author: BrianHG
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 01:15:45 am
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on December 27, 2024, 12:13:19 amWhat about 4 months of the year when there isn't enough sun to be practical in any form?Or if you live in a rain forest?Solar doesn't solve the world's problems.Opportune climate regions and private dwellings will make sense, but this only constitutes a fraction of the population.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 01:44:49 am
content: Quote from: BrianHG on December 27, 2024, 01:15:45 amNo, of course it doesn't. Who's claiming that it would?What it can and should be is part of a rational plan for dealing with what looks more and more to be a reality, not "fake news": the ongoing warming of the climate due to human activity and its resulting destructive effects.Part of the energy mix, allocated rationally according to its ability to generate electricity and taking into account its costs, both economic and environmental. (Strategic minerals don't grow on trees, and silicon takes energy to manufacture.)Oh, and part of that rational plan should definitely be passive solar. May not be sexy but it's definitely effective. I've spent time in solar or sun-tempered houses that took next to zero energy input to keep warm, even in cold climates.

author: wilfred
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 02:41:22 am
content: All this debate seems to ignore two fundamental issues. Firstly an electric motor is an ideal means to power a vehicle in congested city traffic. It has the maximum torque where it is needed to pull away from a standstill. And secondly if renewable means of generating electricity are the cheapest then nothing will stop them being adopted to the fullest extent. They don't need to be a panacea. I don't see anything wrong with incorporating the cost of global warming into the business case. It is necessary to attract future funding especially from private sources. It reduces financing risk to know all the costs as clearly as possible.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 02:46:53 am
content: Quote from: wilfred on December 27, 2024, 02:41:22 amBut just looking at solar, can it be cheaper than baseline energy (coal/gas/nuclear)?Remember, for true cost you have to add the cost of any storage necessary to make solar into a reliable baseline source.Pumped storage looks to be pretty reasonable, where possible.Batteries, not so much.

author: Marco
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 02:55:11 am
content: Quote from: BrianHG on December 27, 2024, 01:15:45 amIf there is a cost for PV at which hydrogen becomes an achievable backup, it's just a question of making PV that cheap.

author: tautech
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 03:12:16 am
content: Quote from: wilfred on December 27, 2024, 02:41:22 amAnd 1 bigger one, Al Gore's The Convenient Lie < so many have prospered from it at the expense of many.

author: BrianHG
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 03:23:52 am
content: Quote from: Marco on December 27, 2024, 02:55:11 amPlease work out the math in your statement.Now, I would need solar for daily operation.Plus, additional solar for cracking hydrogen.Plus on that plus solar for the inefficiencies of the cracking hydrogen, then the inefficiencies of converting it back to electricity.(It's weird, but lithium battery storage is really efficient and a winner here in efficiency by a landslide...)Also, a place to store 4 months worth of hydrogen. (More like 6 months since you might as well use it as your shorter term battery since you will already need a 4 month storage tank.Remember, my original quote comes from a posting which said each individual can add solar to their dwelling to power their car...I know this is hard to accept, but the lowest carbon footprint continuous long term power source which can manage a city today is nuclear. It may not be the cheapest, but a more modern power plant with fuel recycling cuts down on spent fuel waste 5 fold and the tiny amount left over decades would only fill up a few swimming pools in waste storage. For powering an entire city, until we properly crack fusion, this should be the way to generate electric power for as much of our power needs as possible.

author: Analog Kid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 03:28:52 am
content: Hydrogen = horrible loser.Nuclear? No. Just no.No matter what Bill Gates is pushing these days.

author: wilfred
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 04:38:52 am
content: Quote from: tautech on December 27, 2024, 03:12:16 amOh, I don't really buy into that sort of thing. I just want the cream to rise to the top and displace some of the shit floating there. If I could afford to buy a new EV, or new to me, I think I would. But I don't drive a lot so it is hard to displace the old crud-barge I get around in now. Or I would get around in if I extracted the digit and replaced the valve cover gaskets and did some other neglected maintenance.My thinking on global warming is we well understand the greenhouse effect and we know more heat is being captured within the biosphere. So where does it go? It has to go somewhere if not back out into space. And on a personal level I can remember mowing the backyard in Brisbane in the 70's after 6 weeks of rain that made it too muddy for the ground to support the mower. After working my way through knee-high grass with one row left I just knew there were at least three cane toads concealed within it and if I plopped the mower down on them just right I could launch them into the neighbours yard (side throw mower). My sister tells me she has never seen the like of it since. And that's getting on to half a century. It isn't proof of anything except things aren't like they once were and it might be related. Since I don't have an axe to grind like a job in the fossil fuel industry I can err on the side of caution and take a long term view. I do own shares in Woodside (ASX:WDS) so it isn't ideological.

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 07:35:12 am
content: The idea that "leftists" advocate EVs is amusing. At least here EVs are mosthatedby the left, for obvious reasons (cost; being a symbol of wealth). Typical EV owner would vote liberal right wing.Not that any of this matters the slightest, but just funny.

author: BrianHG
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 08:15:42 am
content: Quote from: Analog Kid on December 27, 2024, 03:28:52 amWhat does Bill Gates have to do with any of this?LOL, scratch another win for the Chinese....They just completed safety meltdown tests on their world's first test thorium nuclear reactor.They already won the manufacturing of solar panels.How many more years until the US is no longer a superpower with such backwards attitudes?I guess you will now have to shut down and cease any newer US's most powerful military aircraft carriers and submarines as they are currently nuclear powered...

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 09:26:05 am
content: Quote from: BrianHG on December 27, 2024, 03:23:52 amSure, here is the math: Power to gas reaches 80% round trip efficiency, so you would need ~120% of your energy need. Natural gas storage cost (I don't believe in hydrogen economy, but this is only a minor detail) are according to some quick google search, is 141 times cheaper than battery storage.So the two competing system:120% solar, and natural gas storage.105% solar panel, and batteries that cost about 141 times as much money or100% Nuclear, which is currently 5 to 8 times more expensive than solar.Solar is getting cheaper and nuclear more and more expensive each year, due to it being in a burocratic hellhole.So no, the math isn't on your side. And there are even better solutions than 100% solar, as you can add wind, existing nuclear, geothermal and other sources, and reach a cheaper end result. Power to gas has the benefit that it can also cover existing heating as renewable, which is probably even more important than just making more electricity. And new nuclear can be added, and look at it as a more strategic decision than monetary decision.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 10:25:09 am
content: Quote from: BrianHG on December 27, 2024, 03:23:52 amThe problem with nuclear is that all existing (near future deployable) nuclear reactor types use uranium which has a very limited supply so nuclear can only provide a few percent of total energy at most. Not due to mining capacity but simple because there is only so much uranium on earth. Lithium for storage has the same problem: not enough Lithium. Also keep in mind that batteries in themselves may be efficient, their manufacturing is not. Compared to hydrogen you are only shifting losses to a different place.Using technology we know today, the only way out is hydrogen. A few postings above I wrote that the Netherlands needs 2TWh to 50TWh of storage. With hydrogen this is totally doable by using empty gas fields and (to be developed) salt caverns (this is existing technology already in use in the UK and the US). According to the same report, the Netherlands alone has a storage potential over 250TWh for hydrogen and it doesn't take mining or processing a massive amount of materials in countries far away.

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 10:40:34 am
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 26, 2024, 09:03:48 pmGrid-scale storage does not necessarily require lithium, as it doesn't require the power density that's needed for cars.Plenty of alternatives in the pipeline.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 10:44:54 am
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on December 27, 2024, 10:40:34 amYou mean pipe-dreamFor anything to be deployed on the mass scale needed and the timeline required, the planning & building preparations need to have started already. You can't plan with technology which doesn't exist yet. It is not just about building / manufacturing storage, but the supporting infrastructure (pipes, grid, roads, etc) also needs to be build which requires going through planning procedures, dealing with permits, people complaining. It can easely take 10 years of paperwork and legal proceedings before the actual building process starts. An actual example: in the Netherlands there are plans to add a piece of railroad with a length around 100km. The planning phase takes 11 years, building & testing it takes 11 years. So 22 years just for a piece of railroad -assuming the project stays on schedule-.

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 10:49:31 am
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 26, 2024, 08:30:28 pmI was only addressing the aspect of "control" cited by some anti-EV interests- of all the fuel sources, electricity is the most important as its use is so widespread. Things like taxation would affect far more than just transport compared to fuel.When it comes to war/disaster type situations, oil refineries and distribution infrastructure are at least as vulnerable as electricity, if not more due to the large amount of flammable stuff present.

author: Marco
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 10:56:31 am
content: Quote from: BrianHG on December 27, 2024, 03:23:52 amYes, make it that cheap.QuoteLikely the more limiting factor. As I said, "If there is a cost for PV ...". I think the cost of uninstalled PV can fall almost arbitrarily low and for some nations even the installed cost.

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 11:13:00 am
content: Quote from: tszaboo on December 26, 2024, 04:20:33 pmNo, the point of a government subsidy is to encourage the use of something that will benefit society as a whole but where the cost is preventing its widespread use.Just because government corruption sometimes creates stupid subsidies that shouldn't exist to benefit the rich doesn't redefine what they are supposed to be doing. It's the corruption that cause bad subsidies to exist that is wrong.

author: vk6zgo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 11:21:02 am
content: Quote from: RJSV on December 26, 2024, 04:50:09 pmHate to tell you Rip Van Winkle, but Obama ceased being POTUS eight years ago.

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 11:38:27 am
content: A lot of the anti EV argument come about because things are happening in parallel rather than in series.For EV adoption to have a really big/good effect on climate change many different things have to all be sorted out.- Need high energy density batteries that are safe, cheap, environmentally friendly to manufacture.- Need a source for charging energy that is cheap/environmentally friendly- Need a vast charging infrastructure- Need optimized manufacturingetc. so many different things.It creates so many opportunities to point to areas where current EV's don't achieve what they need to achieve to fulfil the goal, and then complain about those areas and how EVs don't make sense.If all of those items above got fully sorted out first and only then did we start making the transition from gas to EV's then there would be no reasons to be anti-EV. The anti-EV stuff is only happening because we are doing the transition in parallel, actively developing things that are needed while also making the transition. Some areas are not ready, others are, some are somewhere in the middle. Some need new tech that's coming soon.The important point here is that it MUST be done in parallel. There needs to be a big EV industry to create the need to develop the new tech needed to improve EVs and the energy / manufacturing industry and get us to where we need to be.We cannot wait until everything is perfect and then make the EV transition because it will never be perfect without the need for it.No one is going to fund development of things that are currently not needed just because they will be needed in the future.

author: coppercone2
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 12:01:17 pm
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on December 27, 2024, 10:49:31 amI think the biggest benefit is potentially getting rid of so called 'oil related war' which seem to have been at bit of a nuisance for the last... 30 years?I suppose minerals can cause a problem too, but perhaps we can at least try it out, I am not convinced sticking to oil wars is the only safe option for humanity. Are we really so sure that oil war is a safer bet then nickel or manganese war? Healthier diet.

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 12:21:40 pm
content: Quote from: Psi on December 27, 2024, 11:13:00 amGovernment works from taxes. Someone will pay for taxes if you like it or not. Therefore the subsidy will every single time make more taxes for people who don't use the subsidy. There aren't other methods. You can restrict the subsidy all you want, based on income or DEI or other misguided notions, but the end result is the same. Someone will pay more.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 02:39:23 pm
content: Quote from: coppercone2 on December 27, 2024, 12:01:17 pmMinerals will cause war as well. Why do you think Russia and China are investing massively in the African continent in order to get in control? It is all about the minerals.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 02:58:37 pm
content: Quote from: BrianHG on December 27, 2024, 01:15:45 amI don't agree with that completely. What subsidies have done is make solar panels utterly cheap to produce. The next step is to put massive amounts of solar panels in areas with lots of sun & minimal seasonal variations and export the energy. This is already being done and further expansion is planned. A solar panel which is under the sun for about 12 hours a day, all year long is going to produce more energy compared to a solar panel installed somewhere close to the Artic / Antarctic circles in a climate with many overcast days.

author: themadhippy
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 02:59:14 pm
content: The way things are going water will soon be a cause to kick off.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 04:31:35 pm
content: Quote from: themadhippy on December 27, 2024, 02:59:14 pmWhen you look at what is happening to the vast water tables under the US, India, and other massive areas, the unsustainability of current levels of farming irrigation does make it look like a more immediate problem than many others the world faces. Rising CO2 does reduce the amount of water needed, but it seems unlikely this could be enough to offset the loss of water pumped from the water table.

author: rstofer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 05:19:59 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 27, 2024, 10:25:09 amToo bad Jimmy Carter canceled the US' breeder reactor program. He was a nuclear engineer under Admiral Rickover before venturing in to politics. I believe that Japan and France are actively recycling spent nuclear fuel.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinch_River_Breeder_Reactor_Projecthttps://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/three-president-carter/https://www.google.com/search?q=japan+nuclear+fuel+recyclinghttps://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/frances-efficiency-in-the-nuclear-fuel-cycle-what-can-oui-learnhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor#Notable_reactorsThen there is Microsoft attempting to buy a portion of 3 Mile Island to provide power for their AI efforts. I though I read about another tech company trying to buy a different plant.https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/09/26/1104516/three-mile-island-microsoft/

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 05:22:53 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 27, 2024, 02:58:37 pmThis is a very logical approach. The snag is when you factor in political instability it all falls apart.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 05:25:47 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 27, 2024, 10:25:09 amThe Japanese, and I think others, have experimentally extracted uranium from seawater with some success. Its more expensive than mining it right now, so it wouldn't be a practical industrial venture today. However, they claim the cost is not crazy if it needs to be done in the future. There is also thorium, which there is far more of.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 06:24:56 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 27, 2024, 05:22:53 pmAustralia has vast desert areas and a stable political system under king Charles.

author: BILLPOD
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 08:38:39 pm
content: AND.....let us not forget the amount of electric energy that is required by crypto mining ...according to current estimates, cryptocurrency mining, particularly Bitcoin, consumes a significant amount of electricity, with annual usage ranging from 67 to 240 terawatt-hours (TWh), with a central estimate around 120 TWh, which is comparable to the power consumption of a small country like Poland; this represents a substantial portion of global electricity usage, with some reports stating it can reach up to 2.3% of the total U.S. electricity demand depending on the mining activity level.

author: NiHaoMike
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 09:15:33 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 26, 2024, 05:04:47 pmJust make sure that renters have access to variable rate plans that provide incentive to adjust energy use to match up with solar production. Then they can support solar without having to install any.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 09:29:15 pm
content: Quote from: NiHaoMike on December 27, 2024, 09:15:33 pmThat is a very bad idea and it won't work. It may seem logical from an engineering perspective but it just isn't acceptable. The whole idea behind electricity is that it is available at all time for a reasonable price. Any variable pricing scheme is doomed to fail. The general public don't want it as they don't want to be bothered when to turn the washing machine on and companies will make money from levelling the electricity prices; this is already happening by companies building grid storage.

author: Someone
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 09:35:25 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 27, 2024, 09:29:15 pmWhy should consumers be forced into paying the middle man and not being able to access market pricing? No one here is suggesting people be forced onto time of use, but you say they should be prevented from accessing it?Oh, you've got solar and want the feed in tariffs to be artifically sustained. Can't have the poors cutting in on your subsidies....

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 09:45:00 pm
content: Quote from: NiHaoMike on December 27, 2024, 09:15:33 pmAre you suggesting the renter buys energy from the landlord, and the landlord prices it according to whether they can provide it from the roof, or they have to buy it in from the grid? That sounds like ensuring people don't get cheated would be difficult. With publicly available variable rate tariffs the consumer knows in time segments how much their energy will cost. A landlord would have to price according to whether a cloud is just passing over. Cheap overnight rates are a straightforward scheme for a consumer to use, but fine granularity pricing is messy.

author: Someone
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 11:11:26 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 27, 2024, 09:45:00 pmGreat job to unnecessarily over complicate the simple point:If a home owner can install solar and get cheap power during the sunlight hours, why can't a renter also see the same market forces?With uptake of solar, sunlight hours become the new off-peak time when pricing is the cheapest not the overnight period it once was (when the coal couldnt/wouldnt slew down). Why should overnight be artificially designated the off-peak when the market doesnt match that anymore? The UK is not representative of world markets.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 11:28:13 pm
content: Quote from: Someone on December 27, 2024, 09:35:25 pmBecause spot market pricing doesn't do you any good. Just compare average spot market pricing compared to an annual contract. You'll see that in the end you'll pay the same and the annual contract doesn't require you to care when to watch TV. An electricity supplier can do what you can't: buy electricity for a fixed price in advance for several months ahead which allows them to keep prices stable at a low level (*). The whole 'spot market pricing' for consumers is a farce meant for people who want to feel in control. But in the end they are locking themselves into a hamster wheel which spins at random times. And either way you won't cut out the middle man; you'll always pay a margin to the supplier. The house always wins.* This situation is similar where it comes to try and make money from buying & selling shares (and derivatives). Professional parties have much better tools and sophisticated means at their exposal that you simply won't be able to compete c.q. outperform them as an individual. So it is more beneficial to leverage their know & how and tools compared to spending lots of time yourself and still end up with a mediocre result.

author: tom66
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 27, 2024, 11:43:51 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 27, 2024, 11:28:13 pmIt's not my game but there are companies offering dynamic half hourly tariff pricing in the UK. The biggest one is Octopus with their Agile tariff.Users typically try to shift their loads to avoid high priced periods for instance 4-7pm period. And they run off peak stuff in the periods that they get cheapest prices (charging car, dishwasher, washing/drying clothes etc.) Or they have a home battery and do daily arbitrage using that.In some cases users get paid for using electricity in times of low demand and high supply, because CfD contracts to wind power generators guarantee a price, and if no one uses that energy that energy must be paid for. These events don't occur all that often though and are likely to disappear in the next decade as more storage joins the grid and older CfD contracts expire.The reason such arbitrage benefits some consumers is because they can be flexible with their energy, with some users reporting average prices of around half or less the standard unit rate. Now, whether you want to do that is entirely a personal decision, personally I do not. I am happy enough just shifting usage to an off peak period of the day where I get a fixed discount for doing so.

author: Someone
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 12:03:33 am
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 27, 2024, 11:28:13 pmWithout any incentive for customers to use cheaper sources of energy, they will continue to make poor economic choices because they see no immediate/personal benefit. You can push your dreams of a one size fits all completely levelled socialist energy system, but it leads to wildly inefficient consumer activity.... which drives up price of production.That should be a choice, which people can opt in to. Not the only option where people with more flexibility are forced to subsidise others (like solar users wanting to use the grid as storage for free/discount as you have argued for your personal gains). The wholesale market with intermediate retailers does enable choices for consumers so they can vote with their wallet.Quote from: nctnico on December 27, 2024, 09:29:15 pmUnlimited electricity is not a fundamental human right, or some enshrined benefit. Variable pricing is essential to drive the demand side. Are you seriously claiming that all off-peak rates should be abolished and all users charged fixed rate regardless of time of use?

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 12:05:25 am
content: Quote from: tom66 on December 27, 2024, 11:43:51 pmThe problem in the landlord with rooftop solar situation is the fair price they can offer to the renter varies moment by moment, as the clouds roll over. That's easy enough to measure, but without regulation there will be a lot of cheating. It sounds like something for WELMEC/OIML regulation.

author: Someone
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 02:23:51 am
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 12:05:25 amWho is proposing the landlord gets in the middle of the electricity contract?A renter should have a choice to buy electricity at variable time of use tariff if they choose. Contact between the renter and the electricity retailer. Just as any other retail consumer should be able to.If the only choice is flat tariff then (residential) solar producers are free-riding and gaining an indirect/unintended subsidy.

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 08:35:00 am
content: Hourly spot pricing has been very popular in Finland for many years, 10% of household contracts are hourly spot. Almost every study done reveals the same result: a spot price contract is cheaper for almost every user of energy in the long runevenwithout any adjustments to how they spend their energy. The reason is extremely simple: companies are not charities, and companies do not take risks. A fixed contract customer is going to pay for the real price ofaverage customeris using, plus a hefty safety margin. Your consumption profile needs to besignificantly"worse" (biased on expensive hours) than average for fixed contract to become cheaper than spot contract.For example: long-term average spot price in Finland is approx 6c/kWh. Since average customer biases their consumption on the more expensive hours (that is why they are more expensive!) and use more electricity during winter, weighted average they are going to pay is approx 7 - 7.5 c/kWh. And, 2-year fixed contracts currently run at 8.5 c/kWh.As such, taking the spot contract and doing nothing tends to save a bit, but of course not much. What's better, it opens up the possibility for automated or non-automated load shifting to cheaper hours, and the more you do it, the more you save. You can also choosenotto do that now, but if shit hits the fan and prices increase more than you would expect, you always have that option, since you are managing your own risk, and you can affect your own cost (even if you don't need to do itnow).The only losers of the system are those who panic during temporary expensive periods and swap to a 2-year (non-interruptible) super-expensive fixed contract. These are the same people who like to put their savings in stock market, follow some interesting companies for months while stock price increases, then buy at the peak, and then a few months later panic and sell at the low.Spot pricing exposed down to the end-users works really well, and I wholeheartedly recommend trying to transition into similar system everywhere. It also creates true incentive to create simple automation within the free market rules due to the own free will of customers. The problem is not that automation is difficult to make technically, it's lack of incentive since risk of electricity price variation has been traditionally carried by the operators and averaged (shared) to all customers. Combined with lack of options, this resembles communism more than free market.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 11:25:36 am
content: What you are forgetting is that most people are on a constant income and thus want predictable outgoings. Your 10% number reflects that and I wouldn't call that popular by any metric. Probably also because the savings are so minimal that it isn't worth bothering and investing in automation isn't worth it. People who have money can gamble if they like. Ofcourse there are edge cases of people who can't deal with money at all but these are not reflecting the majority

author: tom66
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 11:59:01 am
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 11:25:36 amI know plenty of retirees using Agile, it seems to be a significant user base, probably because they have free time to use it and saving money on a smaller pension is worthwhile. Also, there are home batteries & EV chargers that integrate now with Agile, to charge on the cheapest electricity for instance.According to Octopus, they have over 1 million customers using one of their flexible tariffs (Agile, 'Go' for electric vehicles, 'Intelligent Go', and Tracker). I suspect the expansion is limited by our rather rubbish smart metering systems.

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 12:09:53 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 27, 2024, 06:24:56 pmThat's not the case for Europe. It isn't as though we can cover the Sahara in solar panels and run a massive cable.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 12:12:42 pm
content: Quote from: tom66 on December 28, 2024, 11:59:01 am1 million may sounds like a lot but it is less than 4% of the households. So again, not very relevant.It maybe a popular view that getting into the spot market cuts out the middle man, but prices may rise in an uncontrolled manner at some point and then you are stuck. An annual / multi-year contract prevents that. It costs more but the extra cost is basically an insurance premium you pay to protect your income. In 2022 and 2023 at lot of people got into financial trouble in the Netherlands because they could no longer afford the high energy prices (caused by the war in Ukraine) due to being on a flexible contract. In many places the prices quadrupled (like going from 200 euro a month to 800 euro a month) and the government had to step in to provide financial support. The people with multi-year contracts didn't have any problems (except when they where customer at one of the flaky energy suppliers which went belly-up).

author: tom66
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 12:26:37 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 12:12:42 pmYes, but people clearly do benefit from it given their unit prices on their bill average out to be half as much as what others pay, so your statement that "you'll pay the same" doesn't agree with the observed facts.I suspect demand for these tariffs will increase when more people have electric cars, home batteries and solar power. The numbers increase every year.Here's my most recent bill - 2/3rds of my usage is during off peak, about 3/4ths of that is charging the car but the remainder is off peak usage. I pay an average rate of about 13p/kWh, which is around 60% of what the standard unit rate is. This is just with a very standard intelligent EV charging scheme where I get fixed price discount from 11.30pm-5.30am, and then further discounts whenever the car is charging... I arrived back home with 8% yesterday and charged to 80% for today so I got a lot of half-hourly slots at a discount including surprisingly 3-4pm.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 12:31:26 pm
content: You didn't read properly. For a multi-year contract you pay more but with a somewhat flexible contract you pay the same compared to buying from the spot market directly without needing to jump through hoops. In the NL people with a spot market contract pay around 22ct/kWh. That is the same what I'm paying for a flexible (annual ) contract. Theoretically I also have peak and off-peak tariffs but these have been (nearly) equal for many years already. To me the huge difference between peak and off-peak in the UK looks like there is a serious problem with balancing generation and consumption of electricity. Whatever the electricity companies lose at night, they probably make up during the day.

author: tom66
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 12:40:24 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 12:31:26 pmNo, I read exactly what you said, but you might need to be clearer about what type of flexible tariff you are talking about. If you are saying that your half-hourly or hourly pricing averages out to nearly the same as a fixed tariff, that must be unique to NL then. If you're saying the daily spot price offers little saving I agree, that is true for the UK too.Here is Agile HH pricing for my region, it's quite clearly a wide spread, but if you can shift your usage away from the peak time then it is worth doing. Average price is about 16p/kWh, whereas a fixed contract is 22.5p/kWh (both inc VAT).

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 01:15:41 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 12:12:42 pmHere, too, in 2022 lot of people got into financial trouble because they could not afford "high energy prices". The only reason this happened was that people were panicking and taking those "multi-year contracts" which, according to you, "prevent getting stuck", which is an insane claim, obviously a fixed two-year contract isvery definitionof being stuck.Actual energy prices never skyrocketed, only some energy companies decided to sell extremely overpriced contracts and many people fell for that.Media talked about energy crisis, which never came. People took 2-year fixed contracts for ridiculous prices like 40c/kWh. Meanwhile, spot energy ended up being in the usual 6-7c range.At least here, all spot contracts can be terminated any day for any reason, so you don't get "stuck".This is why I recommend spot contract especially for poor or "normal" people: they pay only for the real energy price, which is something that average customerwillpay in any case. By choosing other type of contract, they end up either paying roughly the same, ormuchmore if they choose unwisely. And many choose, because it's hard to see the future, and easy to panic.It is a simple fact that at least in Finland, risk of expensive spot contract hasneverrealized on any customer, but on the other hand risk from other types of contracts has realized for tens of thousands of customers, simply because any other contract type than "raw spot" requires careful reading of terms and conditions, understanding them, and understanding what is the expected price of electricity. Here it was demonstrated that many people, especially elderly, simply did not understand that 40c/kWh is an extremely expensive price, they had afeelingthat it's safe because it's fixed.This bullshit escalated into the government coming up with five(!) different temporary laws to try to support those who fell into stupid contracts, none of those laws being of any use. And I'm quite sure these people still don't understand what they did wrong, and will repeat the mistake in the future.

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 01:43:43 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 11:25:36 amThis is an exception, not a rule. Most countries will bill you monthly based on your consumption, both for heating and electricity. In East Europe there are outlets for electricy which only get power a few hours a day. During the night when the Nuclear power plant would idle. It's used for water boilers.Only here do I see that companies over-bill people and only transfer back the end of the yearly contract. It's a way for us to lend money to utility companies, that use it to make profit. Not a very good idea. Even Belgium started billing you extra based on your consumption peaks. Don't take the system we have in the Netherlands granted or universally adapted.

author: m k
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 02:28:26 pm
content: Quote from: themadhippy on December 27, 2024, 02:59:14 pmHow much better or worse it would be if cotton etc. fields are irrigated by filtered sea water?

author: tom66
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 02:52:45 pm
content: Quote from: tszaboo on December 28, 2024, 01:43:43 pmThis happens in the UK. It was a particular problem when a number of energy retailers (not suppliers) folded over the price increases where they had made bets that the prices for energy would not increase, but then Ukraine war and post-COVID gas rush pushed prices sky high, so they were suddenly thousands of pounds underwater. Many of their customers had large credit balances, and under the regulator's scheme, these are 'protected' but the retailers are not actually required to take any special measures like holding them in a segregated account, they can be used to pay bills, salaries, etc. So in the end, other customers had to pay to cover this cost, which was taken out of the standing charge for everyone.Basically, we all paid for businesses failing, which is bloody stupid, but then the regulator has no teeth at all and is staffed by employees from the industry, another revolving door quango in the UK.On a related note, a few providers did give interest for their credit balances, with one particular company offering rates better than most banks; I know some people took advantage of this and had thousands 'saved'. But if it all went wrong, I wonder how much protection they would actually have and how long it would take to get those funds back.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 03:49:44 pm
content: Quote from: Zero999 on December 28, 2024, 12:09:53 pmNo, but you could cover a large desert area in solar panels, use the energy to synthesis a light liquid hydrocarbon, pulling any carbon needed from the air, and use that as your fuel in other places. Then you have something with pretty good sustainability, predictable energy where you need it, and you don't need to care too much about round trip efficiency, as solar panels and related electronics are getting really really cheap. What you do need is stable politics and trade arrangements.

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 04:27:10 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 03:49:44 pmNow show your working to prove it's economical viable, compared to fossil fuels, nuclear power, wind turbines etc.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 04:29:08 pm
content: Quote from: Zero999 on December 28, 2024, 04:27:10 pmHow did wind turbines get in that list? They are something that needs a massive amount of something like fuel synthesized in a desert to overcoming their shortcomings.

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 04:37:49 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 04:29:08 pmIs it cheaper to simply put some wind turbines in the North Sea, or use your newfangled Sahara solar synthetic fuel plant?

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 04:44:35 pm
content: Quote from: tszaboo on December 28, 2024, 01:43:43 pmNot true. You pay a monthly amount. If you pay too much, you get your money back once a year, if you pay too little, you have to pay extra. There is no over-billing! It is up to you how much you pay every month and take the risk to pay too much or too little. The power companies provide an estimate monthly sum so you won't need to pay much extra or receive a lot of money back. Personally I like to be a bit at the high side so I get a money back instead of having to pay extra. But it typically amounts to less than the monthly sum. Still, the bottom line is that customers are free to choose the monthly sum.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 04:47:18 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 03:49:44 pmIt is not going to work as pulling carbon from the air takes too much energy. All the countries with deserts are gearing up to export hydrogen by ship and/or pipelines.Quote from: Zero999 on December 28, 2024, 04:37:49 pmThe costs are not in generation but storage. It gets dark in the Sahara during the night and there are seasonal variations in the number of hours the sun is shining as well.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 04:52:33 pm
content: Quote from: Zero999 on December 28, 2024, 04:37:49 pmJust how out of touch are you? This is not an either/or choice. If you want to get a lot of your energy from wind you need a reliable backup to cover extended periods of little to no wind. Not hours, like a pumped storage system will cover, but weeks. Fuel from the deserts could be a way to provide that coverage.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 04:55:14 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 04:47:18 pmHandling hydrogen at scale is a nightmare. We've been doing it for more than a century, in applications where there was no choice, and nobody has been able to simplify it. I find it hard to believe hydrogen is the way forward, and more and more people seem to be coming to this conclusion. When I see someone push a "green hydrogen" project it seems to be a politician, not an engineer or scientist.Turning CO2 into a light hydrocarbon fuel takes a lot of energy, as you are putting back the energy that was released when some hydrocarbon was burned to make the CO2. Its not wasted energy. Its re-stored energy.

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 04:58:12 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 04:52:33 pmYes wind turbines are intermittent, but they are only one of the items I listed in my post. You've not provided a shred of evidence to show Sahara solar synthetic fuel plant economically viable.

author: tom66
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:04:37 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 04:52:33 pmWeeks, no, not really. It depends on the scale of your wind and other sources. The relationship is proportional to how oversized the supply is compared to the generators, and depends on whether you add solar into that or not.This concept is known as "renewable superpower" (or "U-Curve") and the concept is to build something like 3x capacity for wind and rely on a relatively small amount of storage and demand management to keep the lights on. For instance, you may need only one day's worth of storage with 3x capacity to survive the worst event in 100 years. (For the UK, that would be roughly 16 million conventional EVs worth of battery packs, if used in full. It is probably not going to be batteries alone that will be used for storage, other techniques will be in use, such as hydrogen.)The surplus electricity can then be used to create synthetic fuels for applications that can't be electrified easily such as aviation.https://www.rethinkx.com/energy/in-depth/clean-energy-u-curve

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:09:10 pm
content: Quote from: Zero999 on December 28, 2024, 04:58:12 pmYou listed 3 things:Nuclear energy is a great choice. People get too emotional about it, but compared to other options is really green. If you do it sensibly its pretty good on costs. The UK built its earlier nuclear fleet at pretty reasonable cost, but the designs were terrible. The AGRs were supposed to be higher cost for higher safety, but had really stupid design flaws. Now we have access to more proven designs, and we shouldn't have too much development cost to deal with. However, the new stations are costing a fortune, and taking too long. This is a bureaucratic problem, not an engineering one.The cost of fossils fuels is pretty low right now, but this is irrelevant if the goal is to stop using them.Wind turbines. We've covered this one.

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:11:41 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 05:09:10 pmSo you admit that your idea is uneconomical?

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:12:11 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 04:44:35 pmWhen I moved in, the water supplier estimated that I'm going to use more water than a small village, and I should send them like 40 EUR a month. The same happened with the electricity supplier, their estimates were a lot higher than reasonable. Same with gas or district heating. If I go with their estimates, I would pay them about 800-1000 EUR per year extra. Which they pay back after the 12 month, sure. If they don't go out of business. And you can choose this, but most people have no idea how to do that, or no idea how much they use. Especially that you need this "newfangled smartphones" for it with registration and all kinds of technical roadblocks. And if they do this with two million households, then we collectively lend them a billion EUR on average, that they can use, invest, without any interest paid back.Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 04:52:33 pmA single LNG ship can cover months of energy use of millions of household, not just electricity, heating as well. But you are right, it not either or, we should do both.Quote from: Zero999 on December 28, 2024, 04:58:12 pmThere you go:https://fse.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/18423/1/mEES_2018_VicthaliaZ.pdf

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:12:53 pm
content: Quote from: tom66 on December 28, 2024, 05:04:37 pmIf you can refute the work of people like Simon Michaux, please do and I might start to take you seriously.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:13:39 pm
content: Quote from: Zero999 on December 28, 2024, 05:11:41 pmCan you actually make an effort to make sense, please?

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:15:48 pm
content: Quote from: Siwastaja on December 28, 2024, 01:15:41 pmOver here clever people took 3 or 5 years contracts for a good price and they coasted through the price spikes of 2022/2023. And right now they are renewing for low prices again. Sure they might have paid less, but they are sure they won't pay more. It is similar to protecting against share prices falling through options. Ofcourse there are edge cases where people got unfavourable contracts but it is possible to get out of those.

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:19:18 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 05:13:39 pmYou're the one who has the burden of proof, that such an outlandish idea will work.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:22:01 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 05:15:48 pmWhen you say they are renewing at low prices, do you mean your local prices have returned to historic ones, or they just aren't as bad as in 2022? Here prices are still way above pre-2022 ones. Current government policies seem set to ensure they aren't heading significantly down any time soon.

author: tom66
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:49:42 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 05:12:53 pmOh... that guy? We're still going on about him? I thought his (not peer reviewed) paper had been debunked so many times that people weren't taking him seriously any more.This seems like a good write up about the whole "not enough resources to go green" problem:https://cleantechnica.com/2023/07/04/how-many-things-must-one-analyst-get-wrong-in-order-to-proclaim-a-convenient-decarbonization-minerals-shortage/I doubt we will see days long grid-scale storage from batteries any time soon, simply due to the cost of batteries over anything else. But that doesn't mean days long storage is impossible.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 05:56:21 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 05:22:01 pmSince early 2024 I have been paying less than before 2022 (around 0.25 eur/ kWh). Much to my surprise as I had estimated the electricity prices to hover between 0.35 to 0.4 euro / kWh for various reasons (including the Netherlands permanently shutting down one of the world's largest natural gas reserve). I guess this is the advantage of having many interconnections within Europe compared to the UK being on an island. For example, the German electricity prices show a similar trend over the past 5 years.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 06:02:44 pm
content: Quote from: tom66 on December 28, 2024, 05:49:42 pmThat is a terrible write up. It spends more time on ad hominem attacks than addressing his arguments. It also makes some wild claims about how things are going to get magically better about our energy demands. Historically they just go up. We don't even replace any old energy sources as we introduce new ones. We are still using vast amounts of dung, and wood, and coal to provide energy. Renewables are not currently even keeping up with the global expansion of energy use, as more of the world moves out of poverty. Much of the apparent drop in industrial use of energy in the west is just the same processes moving to India or China, with the same amount of energy being consumed there.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 06:06:17 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 05:56:21 pmBefore 2022 I would have been paying about 13p/kWh on a 12 months contract. Its now about 20p/kWh on a 12 months contract. It peaked in between those, but its still about 50% up on the pre-2022 price.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 06:11:29 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 06:02:44 pmYou are missing the bottom line here: Simon Michaux is a single person and while he has a compelling story, it is not the full picture. After all he is a geologist / mining expert. Better refer to institutes like IPCC where a multitude of experts and scientists work / debate together to come up with coherent studies and plans. I'm quite sure we'll see a big move towards using alternative energy sources after 2030 but the infrastructure needs to be setup first. Rome also wasn't build in 1 day.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 06:22:41 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 06:11:29 pmIf you actually look at the IPCC reports, rather than the media takes on the IPCC reports, they look a lot less scary.The reason I referred to Simon Michaux is he is one of the few people I have seen trying to look at the full picture. Most people are pushing their own little area, with little regard for any knock on effects.

author: Zero999
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 06:44:50 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on December 28, 2024, 06:22:41 pmThe problem with large organisations such as the IPCC and WHO is they're prone to group think. That doesn't mean they are wrong, but it's something one needs to take into account.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 06:57:41 pm
content: Quote from: Zero999 on December 28, 2024, 06:44:50 pmYep. The answer of a scientist also depends on the question. So the answer also depends on what the ones asking for an answer find important. In case of the WHO this was clearly visible during the Covid pandemic. Scientists didn't disagree perse but where just giving answers based on what the ones asking the questions found important. Bottom line: the likelyhood of a getting a totally wrong, unfounded answer from institutes like IPCC and WHO is extremely low AND for many questions there is not an answer which is 100% 'correct' c.q. applicable to everyone / every situation. Unfortunately there are always those seeking for 100% 'truth' and call anyone who is 99.9999% correct a liar.

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 08:05:20 pm
content: With these groups, you also need to understand how they are organized and how that all works. The scientists who study the topics of interest do indeed study what they are asked to study specifically (which introduces a bias), but that's not per se the main point. The point is that the people drawing and redacting the conclusions of all those reports are not the scientists who conducted the studies. Read the IPCC reports for instance. They are hard to digest but there are some interesting points in there. Then when you read the conclusions (which are what 99.99% of people, politicians first, read, and nothing else), you usually don't see how they got to these conclusions from the included papers.So no need to even talk about any kind of "consensus", because this is basically irrelevant in how those organizations work. They publish conclusions that are often hard to link to the papers they cite, and those conclusions being almost purely made to influence politics, they are political in nature.But don't take my word for it. Just read those reports and see for yourself. And don't just read the conclusions and just a few random pages with flashy and scary graphs. Read the papers, and see for yourself if they really say what the reports conclude.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 08:06:06 pm
content: Quote from: Zero999 on December 28, 2024, 06:44:50 pmThe problem isn't usually group think, its group speak. You can't expect an honest opinion from someone whose next mortgage payment relies on them not rocking the boat.

author: Marco
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 08:11:11 pm
content: Nuclear is orthogonal to EVs. Even if it could deliver electricity too cheap to meter, that's only a small part of the cost of synthetic fuel. The cost of CO2 at net zero is the limiting factor in creating synthetic fuel ... it becomes very expensive.

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 28, 2024, 08:11:26 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on December 28, 2024, 05:15:48 pmFixed that for you:Clever peoplePeople who happened to renew their contract at lucky timing, and in retrospect bragged it being intentional timing as if they could see to the future.Same happened here, and they made it sound much more grandiose than it really was by comparing to other idiots paying ridiculous prices. Compared to spot price, they did not save even that much.QuoteI'm sure they are not. Companies are now more careful, and they are now paying probably 20-50% over raw market value, negating their earlier gain. This is exactly what happens in the long run: the luck averages out of equation.