Electricity in Alberta today

[AlbertaFarmer5]

The point of the chart is that solar cost per MWh is down 90% in the last 11 years.
2009: $359/MWh
2020: $37/MWh
2030: ???

That is great news. So when should we be expecting these cost savings to translate into lower costs for the consumer? So far they have had the exact opposite effect. Every single time they have been added, everywhere. Chuck has been searching in vain for years, unable to find a single exception.

It is almost as if the consumer isn't yet willing to contort their own lives and energy usage around the suns schedule to take full advantage of the theoretical cost savings. They seem to expect first world type reliable energy 24/7, as they have become accustomed to over the past century.

[ALBERTAFARMER4]

In 2009 China produced 35% of the worlds solar panels, today China produces 80% of the worlds solar panels. No domestic production in Canada and I believe one producer left in the U.S.

How much does is cost to generate solar power during the night? You didn’t respond to any of my questions on post 52 or 59 and of course Chuck2 didn’t respond either!

As I have said many many times, I am not against solar power, I am against it being promoted as the only answer and renewables are promoted as the only solution and I don’t agree, that simple.

What will happen is solar will eat away at coal generation. Coal will trend down to 0%.
Solar doesn't generate during the night but can have excess during the day. Grid scale batteries will store excess solar production for use at night.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

What will happen is solar will eat away at coal generation. Coal will trend down to 0%.
Solar doesn't generate during the night but can have excess during the day. Grid scale batteries will store excess solar production for use at night.

Normally you bring a lot of good info to the discussion, but in this post you have gone full chuckChuck.

all of the lithium ion “Tesla-style” batteries in service would only supply the global electricity demand for … wait for it … two-hundredths of one second. And the US for three-hundredths of one second. To listen to the media, or read propaganda such as yours and Chucks, one could be excused for thinking that battery storage is, or ever will be in any way a significant part of any electrical grid.

When storage is included, renewable energy is still orders of magnitude more expensive than coal.

In fact I would be so bold as to predict that when energy storage costs are included, that renewables will never ever be cheaper than coal.

[shtferbrains]

No motivation to develop battery storage if you get subsidised to sell to the grid
.

[ALBERTAFARMER4]

Normally you bring a lot of good info to the discussion, but in this post you have gone full chuckChuck.

all of the lithium ion “Tesla-style” batteries in service would only supply the global electricity demand for … wait for it … two-hundredths of one second. And the US for three-hundredths of one second. To listen to the media, or read propaganda such as yours and Chucks, one could be excused for thinking that battery storage is, or ever will be in any way a significant part of any electrical grid.

When storage is included, renewable energy is still orders of magnitude more expensive than coal.

In fact I would be so bold as to predict that when energy storage costs are included, that renewables will never ever be cheaper than coal.

Coal has increased 1% in price per MWh over the last decade.
Solar has decreased 90% in the same period.

Solar and batteries are technology. Coal is not technology. There are no Silicon Valley software developers designing phone apps for coal. There is no future for coal besides a slow decline to obsolescence (when it comes to generating electricity).

[TSIPP]

Coal has increased 1% in price per MWh over the last decade.
Solar has decreased 90% in the same period.

Solar and batteries are technology. Coal is not technology. There are no Silicon Valley software developers designing phone apps for coal. There is no future for coal besides a slow decline to obsolescence (when it comes to generating electricity).

Yet coal electricity is 99% more affordable and 99% more reliable than an off grid solar battery setup.

[jazz]

Yet coal electricity is 99% more affordable and 99% more reliable than an off grid solar battery setup.

The question that is never answered by renewable advocates is whats the hold up. Why isnt the govt buying up huge tracts of land and forcing this so called better technology on us, while at the same time coal and oil use continue to climb especially in the part of the world where 1B people still have never had electricity.

Musk himself said renewables are not ready for prime time, no where close. He said FFs need to continue at current scale for the foreseeable future. Smart man.

[ALBERTAFARMER4]

Please be clear, solar panels have decreased a lot but the overall package not nearly as much. Buying panels and tying into the grid in Alberta just isn’t cost effective, the distribution and transmission charges remain unless you can completely free yourself from the grid. The power itself is not really that expensive.

Those are great points. If you purchase a kWh from the grid it's $0.20/kWh. If you supply the grid with a kWh you're paid $0.07. The reason I don't like off grid is that any excess generation is completely useless and you will not get paid for it.

There is still labour and other materials involved (steel, copper, aluminum) that have likely gone up as much as solar modules have gone down. I still think that the best value of solar today is putting it into an EV.

[ALBERTAFARMER4]

Yet coal electricity is 99% more affordable and 99% more reliable than an off grid solar battery setup.

So relying on someone else to mine and burn coal for power and then send it down a transmission line to your house is more reliable than a properly designed off grid solar system?

[Hamloc]

So relying on someone else to mine and burn coal for power and then send it down a transmission line to your house is more reliable than a properly designed off grid solar system?

AB4 I looked at going off grid a couple years ago. Boyd Solar used to have a good website with all the equations to figure necessary storage and to size your solar array based on consumption. So I calculated it all out, using a ground mount array and flooded lead acid batteries(most affordable) and up front cost was roughly $150000. My yearly power bill is just under $4000, it didn’t make sense. If I went to lithium storage, the cost was over $200000. That was basing the solar array at $3 an installed watt. Today a ground mount system is down to about $2.50 an installed watt and government subsidies apply if you put up a grid tie system, they won’t subsidize an off grid system. As for putting on the roof, probably ok if you have a brand new roof but if you have to remove the panels to redo the roof adds extra cost to redoing the roof. What do you think it would cost AB4?

[Hamloc]

Those are great points. If you purchase a kWh from the grid it's $0.20/kWh. If you supply the grid with a kWh you're paid $0.07. The reason I don't like off grid is that any excess generation is completely useless and you will not get paid for it.

There is still labour and other materials involved (steel, copper, aluminum) that have likely gone up as much as solar modules have gone down. I still think that the best value of solar today is putting it into an EV.

So using solar power to charge an EV. Most people use their cars during the day. Solar power is generated during the day not at night. So how do you propose that the average worker who works during the day charge his car at work? Will every business have to install chargers run by solar to charge their cars for the workers?

[AlbertaFarmer5]

So relying on someone else to mine and burn coal for power and then send it down a transmission line to your house is more reliable than a properly designed off grid solar system?

If reliability is the goal, and money is no object, then the obvious choice is off-grid solar with enough storage. My next door neighbor installs these very systems on remote well sites. They install 3 months of battery storage. The economics work since they are using milliamps to run vfd pumps for chemical injection only.

I believe we did the math for running a farm or household off of the same system with three months worth of storage. Does anyone remember how many zeros were in that cost estimate?