Posted on 12/25/2021 8:03:33 AM PST by Chad C. Mulligan
IMO, solar is a lost cause in Germany, wind a possibility in areas on the Baltic Sea (but you better winterize them half the year), tidal wave generation a small possibility.
Nuclear is the smart move here, but they passed on that, too bad, so sad.
There will soon be a lot of German popsicles; hypothermia is just around the corner.
They’re doing away with that, too.
“Germany also has a plan to kick its natural gas habit, with plans to end power generation from gas by 2040. Currently, half of all German homes are heated with natural gas. By 2026, a ban in Germany on the installation of heating in new homes using any type of petroleum products will go into effect in favor of heat pumps that draw electricity from the grid. “
https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/287rpl/solar_irradiance_map_of_europe_2922x2068/
I expect the Fourth Reich will not lack for Kinder und Soldaten.
That's until you draw all the heat from it. For adequate heat you either need a large area dug up 10 feet deep or at least two deep wells tapping into groundwater.
Not in Illinois. 55 degrees: https://sustainability.illinois.edu/geothermal-energy-coming-to-a-midwest-state-near-you-part-i/
I’m in the power industry in Texas I deal with ERCOT on a regular basis. First off Texas grid failed due to 40,000+ megawatts of thermal generation tripping off line due to the record cold. We told ERCOT in 2008 and again in 2011 to.mandate the winterization of generation units. We also told them to winterize the natural gas grid they ignored both. The freeze froze solid the wellheads and surface run HDPE gas gather lines which we told them to bury below the frost line years ago. Texas does not keep natural gas in salt storage domes the gas in the grid is coming directly from the wellness through the clean up plant and pumped to pipeline pressures directly. Those pumps used to be run by the gas they moved the EPA mandated NOx scrubbers on all the engines this means SCR cats and DEF fluid injections. Most of the compressors are so remote that the weekly maintenance is cost prohibitive so the pumps were switched to grid electricity. When the grid started to trip off due to plants freezing equipment from lack of winterizing it a cascading failure mode started. ERCOT and the PUC only forecast at most 10,000 megawatts from renewables during this period and wind still put up 4000 to 6000 of the expected amount contrary to what uniformed and people not even remotely in the industry screamed wind was not the cause AT ALL it was the thermal plants all 40,000 megawatts of them that brought the grid down. A nuclear reactor with 1350 megawatts went down for two days due to its cooling inlet lines sensors freezing solid as did a host of gas turbines which still had access to gas but could not run due to frozen sensors. Texas lost 50% of its gas grid capacity the first night and it went up from there due to frozen surface lines,frozen gas separator towers and compressors run off the grid which collapsed due to lack of gas. Wind actually kept the.lights on to the tune of 4000 to 6000 megawatts of additional energy while the gas grid was crippled. Had ERCOT and the RRC/PUC listened to the industry professionals in 2008&2011 the gas grid and thermal plants would have stayed online with 40,000+ megawatts for the grid there would have been not a single blackout as that 40,000 would have more than covered the record demands at the time. I have real time access to ERCOT and the generation pool. I watched in horror as the grid frequency dropped to 59.2 hz as thermal plant after thermal plant tripped out the call went out at $9000 mwh the max allowed by law for any and every generator to operate at peak power. At those rates everyone who could generate did the economics as so strong you could have burnt diesel at $200 a bbl and turned a profit. There simply wasn’t enough gas in the grid to run the turbines what little there was was reserved by law for residential heating use. Abbot signed 11 laws since February to address the gas grid collapse and reign in ERCOT profit ability. At 59.2 hz Texas came within four minutes of total grid collapse and a black start event. Which would have taken month’s to bring the grid back up. Texas has 17 black start capable plants 13 of them were frozen and off line that February the other 4 were gas turbines or gas piston engines with no on-site back up fuels with the gas grid down they would have been useless Texas would have been dark for at least a month if not 6 in some places. Not a single nuclear power plant has black start in Texas in fact of the grid goes down they scram and then use back up diesels to keep them from melting down their steam turbines are not locally excited they must have grid power for the rotor excition, same for the few growing large thermal coal, and every large gas turbines. The black start plants have large diesels on site that power up brushed AC generators the old school way at 1800 rpm to generate a 60hz sinewave which is feed to the gas turbine rotors and brought online one by one synced off a single black start generator this signal must then be sent down dedicated powerlines to the next plant who uses it to.sync and power it’s rotors then it sends it down the line to the next its a long and detailed process that takes days to do in ideal circumstances it would have been weeks to get the grid back up at best month’s is more realistic.
Germany’s reaction to just about everything is catastrophic.
Why, it just magically squirts out of wall sockets. Everybody knows that.
Everything comes around full circle. This circle will usher in a new stone age.
ERCOT and the politicians should listen to people like you who actually know what the hell they are talking about.
Heat pumps suck and I live in coastal NC. We replaced one unit with gas heat.
Ant imagine living in Northern Europe and trying to heat with the pumps.
I think that this is called "irony".
The New England states are planning on importing Canadian hydro-power due to an energy shortage;
whereas neighboring Pennsylvania has sufficient reservoirs of natural gas and petroleum to supply the area.
I had forgotten that "ex-Chancellor Schroeder went to work for the Russian energy concern after having “led” Germany before Merkel “led” Germany."
Interesting !
I have an electric hybrid hot water heater that uses the conventional electrical elements and a heat pump. Operating costs are considerably cheaper than an electric water heater. I don’t have access to gas.
Be difficult to start the Fourth Reich with solar power.
Pontificating on coal and nuclear are just virtue signalling. Rationing and outages are where the rubber meets the road. We will see how they do with that.
Right-Liberals never think past what's immediate, temporary, personal and concrete.
We are way behind the far east on heat pumps. Those mini split systems are crazy efficient.
The United States recorded a Government Debt to GDP of 128.10 percent of the country's Gross Domestic Product in 2020. source: Office of Management and Budget, The White House
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