[sudo-discuss] Power grid: part one: was Re: Sudo room should be about creating

Tue Mar 26 16:54:03 PDT 2013

george you beat me to most of it!

alcohol-based auxilliary power units instead of natural gas turbines??? if only we could synthesize a form of chlorophyll...it's like a magic wand if you look at the molecule

also "how much of what should exist" is a less useful question than "what is underutilized, and what can i do personally to fill in that gap".  I don't think it will be apparent what the final generation split will be as much as it will be which ones are underutilized due to the combined lack of funding and mass adoption

Mar 26, 2013 04:44:41 PM, di.franco at aya.yale.edu wrote:
Relevant design questions:How much power generation / storage / transmission capacity exists at various scales?

How much of each should exist at each scale if taking advantage of currently little-used technologies to improve overall system goals (efficiency, resilience, ...)?

I claim a promising answer to the second set of questions is more generation and storage at smaller scales (village / neighborhood / city mainly with some at home), with a corresponding reduction in that at the larger scales, not inconsistently with any of the things you pointed out. Involving a very broad range of options including such as growing crops for fuel to burn alongside waste at small scales.

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>On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 4:35 PM, Anon195714 anon195714 at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
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    Here I'll have to differ, speaking from experience a) having worked
    on a couple of household solar installations, and b) having worked
    on design engineering and business planning for wind farms of 49 MW
    and 250 MW rated capacity, and c) from knowledge gained from folks
    at the nation's oldest regional solar contractor, that has been a
    client of mine for the better part of a decade.  
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    Decentralized power generation as compared with major power plants,
    is like desktop computers as compared with mainframes or server
    farms.  The value of a desktop computer or a hand-held device is not
    only in what it can do by itself: the value of it increases
    radically when it's networked with other devices.  
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    If you want to "cut the wires," be prepared to spend thousands of
    dollars for a battery bank at your home, to store the solar power
    from your roof.  This represents not only large cost, but a large
    commitment of material resources used in an ecologically and
    economically wasteful manner.    
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    But when your household solar is connected to the grid, you can
    "upload" power you don't need at the moment, and "download" power
    when you do.  You can optionally have a small backup battery that's
    sufficient for night-time power for essentials (a couple of lights,
    telecoms, and fridge) if the grid goes down in an earthquake. 
    Economically and ecologically it's a winner.  "Grid-tied solar" is
    the business model that has been so successful that nationwide solar
    firms have sprouted to provide solar leasing to the public.  
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    The same case applies to wind, and here, basic physics and
    arithmetic prove the point.  The efficiency of a wind generator is
    proportional to the swept blade circle, based on the relationship
    between the diameter and the area of the circle.  Home-sized wind
    generators are insufficient to power homes except in Class 4 and 5
    (high wind) areas.  Wind generators only begin to become efficient
    in the range of 250 KW and up; the largest ones today are in the 5
    MW range.  
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    Wind is subject to intermittency, so it requires either storage or
    integration with other power sources.  The ideal case is to use
    water as the storage medium, for example by teaming up a new wind
    farm with an existing hydroelectric dam.  New-design "micro
    reactors" or "nuclear batteries" using intrinsically safe fission
    technology are also viable in this role, and lastly, natural gas
    turbine "peaker plants" can be used (they are the cleanest
    carbon-based option and acceptable in conjunction with renewables). 

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    It may be that at some point, a new type of solar, fission, fusion,
    or advanced-physics technology, becomes feasible for household use. 
    But even then: interconnecting homes and other buildings, provides
    backup for times when you have to take your machine off-line for
    maintenance, or if it malfunctions and has to be replaced.  
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    More about a better model, "the internet of electricity," in my next
    posting...
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    -G.
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    =====
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    On 13-03-26-Tue 3:41 PM, Anthony Di
      Franco wrote:
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        Production of alternative energy can be
          and for most reasons probably should be much less centralized,
          equivalently, smaller-scale, than production of energy mostly
          is now. (Off-grid, as you mention, but very literally.)
        Large-scale up front + large, complex
          distribution networks is revealed as an obsolete architecture;
          large scale distribution networks become relatively less
          important, so even if the answer to your question is no, which
          it probably isn't given crowdfunding and other
          disintermediated finance gaining momentum, it's moot, or at
          least of much less relative importance.
        Put another way, when the most important
          goal is maximum efficiency rather than maximum centralization,
          large upfront capital investment + large, complex distribution
          network is stupid; proper
            accounting of all costs and benefits in a global rather
          than piecewise local sense reveals this now for agriculture,
          manufacturing, energy, ...
        Even now, buffering between supply and
          demand is a constraint on grid architecture leading to great
          economic demand within the current paradigm for distributed
          storage / production of energy according to someone who came
          through sudo room whose name escapes me.
        This loosely-drafted email brought to you
          by the slogan,
          "localize
            production, virtualize everything else" and the acronym
          STEMI
          compression.

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        On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 3:17 PM, Romy
          Ilano romy at snowyla.com>
          wrote:
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            Is it possible to create alternative energy
              distribution networks (biofuels/solar/ wind etc) that
              replace mainstream petrol and natural gas based energy
              without a large financial sector? 

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                the vc system that funds these alternative energy
                start-ups piggy backs off the investment banks, etc. and
                big private equity and institutional investment funds.
                vcs are like a fly on the @ss of a financial hippo.

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              I haven't heard people discuss off-grid that much in
                the tech talks I've been to( which are excellent). Is
                there a conversation here that would show how off grid
                is a viable alternative, even if it's not a big money
                solution?
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                  On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 1:56
                    PM, hol at gaskill.com>
                    wrote:
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>this
                      talk about imports and exports always reminds me
                      of energy flow
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                      compare 2011
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                      https://www.llnl.gov/news/newsreleases/2012/Oct/images/25306_LLNLUSEnergy2011650.jpg
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                      with 2002
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                      http://www.hubbertpeak.com/us/images/us_energyflow2002.jpg
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                      fascinating
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