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Posted on 07/13/2025 12:22:49 PM PDT by george76
I keep reading how big batteries are all it takes to make wind and solar reliable as the sole grid electricity source. The reality is that making wind and solar work at all requires a fantastic amount of battery backup, far more than is possible.
Below is an example using the PJM grid. PJM is America’s biggest grid operator, with a territory covering the Mid-Atlantic and points west. Their territory includes the Washington, DC metro area, where all the federal bigwigs live, making it a good place to start. I also live there.
We are quantifying a fantasy, so let’s keep it very simple. In fact, the basic question is why hasn’t PJM done this simple analysis? They do a lot of sophisticated grid modeling. Or maybe they have done this crucial assessment, but it is a secret, which is even worse.
Consider a single day in a typical peak demand summer heatwave. The heatwave is due to a stagnant high-pressure system called a Bermuda high, so there is not enough wind to generate usable wind power, no matter how much generating capacity is available.
It is sunny during the day, so let’s assume that for 8 hours we get enough solar to meet demand (or, as I prefer to call it, to meet need). For the other 16 hours, we meet demand using batteries. We import nothing because our neighbors are in the same needy boat.
Finally, for simplicity, I assume the demand is at the peak level for the entire 24 hour day. This overestimates things a bit, but we will find that does not matter. A fancier analysis would use a typical demand curve. PJM can handle that.
My example year is 2030, as that is a standard near-term transition target year for which we have reasonable estimates of peak demand. Here then are the very simple numbers.
PJM’s estimate peak demand for 2030 is about 180,000 MW.
Meeting that for 16 hours with batteries requires 2,880,000 MWh of usable storage.
Usable storage is between 20% and 80% of nameplate battery capacity, hence 60%.
Thus we need 4,800,000 MWh of nameplate battery capacity.
Storage facility capital costs vary, but $500,000 per MWh is a reasonable estimate.
This gives a total cost of $2.4 trillion, or $2,400,000,000,000, for the batteries to make wind and solar reliable in this case. This fantastic cost is clearly not feasible.
There are things that could make this number go down a bit, such as reduced cost per MWh. But given last year saw just 130,000 MWh installed worldwide, the production capacity does not exist, so we are talking about new mines and factories. It actually cannot be done by 2030, not even close.
But the realistic numbers would be much higher if this fantasy played out because low wind, near-peak heatwaves often last for several days, even a week. Ten trillion dollars is easily possible. We are, after all, talking about hundreds of thousands of tractor-trailer sized batteries, basically containers full of expensive chemicals. Moreover, this is just for PJM.
Batteries simply cannot make a transition to wind and solar power feasible. The amount, and hence the cost, of storage is far too great.
Given the simplicity of this analysis, using readily available data, the big question is why are these impossible numbers not already widely known? PJM and their big utilities all do detailed modeling and supposed reliability assessments. So does NERC, whose sole mission is reliability. Many utilities file annual Integrated Resource Plans with their state regulators, typically looking out 20 years or more.
That battery backup cannot make wind and solar powered grids possible is obvious given these incredible numbers. The electric power industry must know this, but their silence is deafening.
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Distributed micro-nukes are the way to go.
Everything else pales by comparison.
Cost is no object when the end goal is a totalitarian state that has a few hundred million slaves at its disposal.
To: george76
Cost is no object when the end goal is a totalitarian state that has a few hundred million (tax paying) slaves at its disposal.
Fify
Not today satan! 😂😂😂
renewable energy still cannot compete with oil and gas..
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/4328430/posts
And what about pollution!
Batteries, solar cells and windmills are very polluting and they destroy the nature, usually for good!
The environmentalists seem not to see this?!
This stuff would destroy our land and air, kill all the trees, owls, eagles, and snails.
Worse than the worst pollution during industrial revolution!
“ Cost is no object when the end goal is a totalitarian state that has a few hundred million (tax paying) slaves at its disposal.”
Which is why when I get things from the electric company to put in a smart thermostat I decline. I don’t need them regulating the temperature in my house.
“In fact, the basic question is why hasn’t PJM done this simple analysis?”
Simple answer. There is no need for them to do the analysis.
“AND, WHAT PART OF ‘RARE’ AS IN RARE EARTH ELEMENTS DON’T THEY UNDERSTAND?”
Rare earths elements are quite abundent!
Don't forget inverter capacity. Not only do you need tons of battery storage, you also need to be able to convert that DC power to AC power and however rate the load needs (in this article that's 180 GW).
Is that going to start affecting weather patterns and ocean currents?
All that 'energy' has to come from somewhere.
Just think of all the African children they can enslave in their mines!
“ Cost is no object when the end goal is a totalitarian state that has a few hundred million (tax paying) slaves at its disposal.”
Which is why when I get things from the electric company to put in a smart thermostat I decline. I don’t need them regulating the temperature in my house.
xxxxxxx
yeah that would be a bad move
nat gas or clean coal
“Distributed micro-nukes are the way to go.”
I don’t know if you’re talking the same as Small Modular Reactors (around 77 MW), but their cost per watt is now matching traditional US nuclear plant cost. Seems that every large project gets more expensive as it gets closer to reality.
Thanks for the info. A quick, in my head estimate, is that the population served is about 130M, so at 2.4T, it comes out to about $20,000 per person, or $80,000 per family of 4. Definitely some real money.
The more fun part is how they deal with their huge battery facilities lighting up every once in a while. That would probably happen monthly, given the scale.
Just don’t allow anyone to use electricity for anything except to charge up their e-car overnight.
Then everything will be perfect.
See?
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