I assume it’s because INL near Arco is one of the very few places in the US where a critical mass of people are likely to believe that SMRs are a good thing.
This is a great start, but still a drop in the bucket, as I understand it, compared to what we will need if we intend to largely rely on solar and wind in the future.
Yes, but also, that graph is in GW, not GWh. It’s saying that, at peak discharge, batteries can already provide about 5% of record peak demand. That’s ~4.3 doublings from what we need in that record. But, those are on average only 2 hr batteries − 83GWh. We’ll need at least 7 doubles of capacity to be able to deal with the intermittency of a mostly-renewables grid—exact amount TBD based on how many other things we can get right. Luckily that also means when we move beyond ~4 hrs or so we can largely switch to (what should become) cheaper but lower-peak-power options than Li-ion (that are also less critical mineral intensive).
The US Forest Service wanted to implement a wildfire prevention plan, so it had to fill out an environmental impact statement. Before they could complete the environmental impact statement, though, half the forest burned down.
I take it as given that in a saner world, we would be rushing to gather up excess fuel that feeds wildfires, and turning it into biochar, or putting it into bioenergy plants. Instead, we can’t even give ourselves permission to controlled-burn it, when it’s going to uncontrolled-burn anyway.
“There exists a physical world that keeps going whether or not you want to deal with it” seems to not be a part of our societal consensus.
I assume it’s because INL near Arco is one of the very few places in the US where a critical mass of people are likely to believe that SMRs are a good thing.
Yes, but also, that graph is in GW, not GWh. It’s saying that, at peak discharge, batteries can already provide about 5% of record peak demand. That’s ~4.3 doublings from what we need in that record. But, those are on average only 2 hr batteries − 83GWh. We’ll need at least 7 doubles of capacity to be able to deal with the intermittency of a mostly-renewables grid—exact amount TBD based on how many other things we can get right. Luckily that also means when we move beyond ~4 hrs or so we can largely switch to (what should become) cheaper but lower-peak-power options than Li-ion (that are also less critical mineral intensive).
I take it as given that in a saner world, we would be rushing to gather up excess fuel that feeds wildfires, and turning it into biochar, or putting it into bioenergy plants. Instead, we can’t even give ourselves permission to controlled-burn it, when it’s going to uncontrolled-burn anyway.
“There exists a physical world that keeps going whether or not you want to deal with it” seems to not be a part of our societal consensus.