Renewables Chuck

[AlbertaFarmer5]

Nobody is arguing that solar is currently going to replace hydro or fossil sources of electricity without some sort of storage system. But we already know that engineers are working on storage systems to make renewable forms of electricity much more usable. Read about the MIT research on batteries.

If a 25 kw system produces 35000 kwh in a year and that 35000 kwh is not produced by coal then there are obvious benefits to solar in cleaner air and lower carbon emissions.

Even without a subsidy, solar panels are going to produce electricity at a lower cost than what Saskpower charges for a kwh. Solar panels keep getting more efficient and cheaper and electricity from Saskpower keeps rising in price. So how can this be a bad deal?

So based on the fact that solar systems are already affordable, can pay for themselves and produce lower cost cleaner electricity from a free source of fuel, why are you so opposed to individual, farmers and utilities investing in solar PV systems?

In short, there is a good business case for farms on the southern prairies to invest in Solar PV.

I ask once again, why would electricity continue to rise in price if solar is making it cheaper and is being installed in significant quantities going forward?

Personally, I am all for farmers and individuals installing solar or any other alternative generation system with their own funds. Utilities is another story. Current regulations of power generators actually encourages non-economic choices since they are permitted to raise their rates to cover the additional costs. If they can do it without subsidies and without raising rates to cover the costs, then I am all for that as well.

[chuckChuck]

"I ask once again, why would electricity continue to rise in price if solar is making it cheaper and is being installed in significant quantities going forward?"

According to Wikipedia if it is accurate, Saskpower has 4437 MW of available generating capacity most of it owned some of it purchased. Of that total, 212 MW are from wind or less than 5%. There would be a very small amount of solar PV under their net metering program and other solar programs.

Two of Saskpowers big projects were the $1.5 Billion invested in Carbon Capture and Storage at Boundary and an ongoing investment of $680 million in the 350 MW Chinook natural gas facility due to come on line in 2019.

Saskpower serves a very small population with over 500,000 customers over a very large distribution system with ongoing maintenance and upgrades. Generation is only part of their costs.

There is no case to be made that their investments from 2005 to 2018 which saw a 60% increase in farm rates had anything to do with investments in wind or solar.

If you have further questions contact Sask power or The Sakatchewan Rate Review Panel which over sees rate increases.

http://www.saskratereview.ca/index.php
"The Saskatchewan Rate Review Panel advises the Government of Saskatchewan on rate applications proposed by SaskEnergy, SaskPower and the SGI Auto Fund. The Panel reviews each application and provides an independent public report stating its opinion about the fairness and reasonableness of the rate change, while balancing the interests of the customer, the Crown corporation and the public."

[Jay-mo]

"Oh but there's new battery technology coming" Great, dig another 1000 pit mines in China to supply more rare earth metals to store "clean" energy.

Some thick skulls(skull) here for sure.

Bottom line: You can grow solar/wind to supply 1000% of peak usage but if it does NOTHING at night,when it's cloudy or when there's no wind, the power company's have to have a parallel system that CAN supply 24/7 either on coal, hydro, gas, etc.

[chuckChuck]

A battery made of molten metals

New battery may offer low-cost, long-lasting storage for the grid.

http://news.mit.edu/2016/battery-molten-metals-0112

A battery made of molten metals

New battery may offer low-cost, long-lasting storage for the grid.

Nancy Stauffer | MIT Energy Initiative
January 12, 2016
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A novel rechargeable battery developed at MIT could one day play a critical role in the massive expansion of solar generation needed to mitigate climate change by midcentury. Designed to store energy on the electric grid, the high-capacity battery consists of molten metals that naturally separate to form two electrodes in layers on either side of the molten salt electrolyte between them. Tests with cells made of low-cost, Earth-abundant materials confirm that the liquid battery operates efficiently without losing significant capacity or mechanically degrading — common problems in today’s batteries with solid electrodes. The MIT researchers have already demonstrated a simple, low-cost process for manufacturing prototypes of their battery, and future plans call for field tests on small-scale power grids that include intermittent generating sources such as solar and wind.

[chuckChuck]

Jay-Mo
The modern technological world wouldn't exist without mined materials and energy.

Your farm would not exist unless you are still using a piece of wood for a plow and animal manure or fish for fertilizer.

Are you willing to stop using a smart phone and cordless tools too because they both use lithium?

I thought most people on this site were in favour of mining as a wealth creator. Apparently not if it supplies materials for solar panels or anything else they don't like or doesn't fit their narrow political views!

[Robertbarlage]

Nuclear. best battery on earth and proven .

[oneoff]

Chuck

Take the sand out of your mouth and eyes and contemplate the deficiencies you tout as solutions going forward. We all know what can benefit a select few who know how to best milk subsidies and grants of all kinds; niche markets that represent markets of same size as solar energy production in Sask and so on.

Why you would rush the adoption of technologies which are still in less than infancy is beyond me. Your fixation on battery technology as just being around the corner ; demonstrates how foolhardy it would be for anyone to count on its introduction with any certainty.

Perhaps reading history would remind you of some quite foolish investments made in the last dozen years.
Such as DEF that many wish had never seen the light of day; or Flex fuel engines that never saw a drop of 85% ethanol; ( the majority of whose owners never knew even what that capability was involved) ; or carbon taxes that will in short order have to be built into costs and will make this country totally uncompetitive. And the thought that minimum tillage is not a vast improvement over "the singularily most destructive agricultural practice in Sask farming history" shows a complete lack of judgement and respect for those who inhabit the prairie and plains regions.

Not that posters such as chuck could ever understand the situation that all but a few do face. There is a limit to what the majority have to take from those who have admitted they would not be farming had there not been government subsides. Milking the system and cowing to customers demanding GMO free food; the end of using nitrogen fertilizers and banning man made agricultural chemicals is irresponsible at this time.

Is that not what is being said?.

[furrowtickler]

Jay-Mo
The modern technological world wouldn't exist without mined materials and energy.

Your farm would not exist unless you are still using a piece of wood for a plow and animal manure or fish for fertilizer.

Are you willing to stop using a smart phone and cordless tools too because they both use lithium?

I thought most people on this site were in favour of mining as a wealth creator. Apparently not if it supplies materials for solar panels or anything else they don't like or doesn't fit their narrow political views!

[Jay-mo]

Jay-Mo
The modern technological world wouldn't exist without mined materials and energy.

Your farm would not exist unless you are still using a piece of wood for a plow and animal manure or fish for fertilizer.

Are you willing to stop using a smart phone and cordless tools too because they both use lithium?

I thought most people on this site were in favour of mining as a wealth creator. Apparently not if it supplies materials for solar panels or anything else they don't like or doesn't fit their narrow political views!

Does irony just sail over your head on its way to a wind turbine

[AlbertaFarmer5]

"I ask once again, why would electricity continue to rise in price if solar is making it cheaper and is being installed in significant quantities going forward?"

According to Wikipedia if it is accurate, Saskpower has 4437 MW of available generating capacity most of it owned some of it purchased. Of that total, 212 MW are from wind or less than 5%. There would be a very small amount of solar PV under their net metering program and other solar programs.

Two of Saskpowers big projects were the $1.5 Billion invested in Carbon Capture and Storage at Boundary and an ongoing investment of $680 million in the 350 MW Chinook natural gas facility due to come on line in 2019.

Saskpower serves a very small population with over 500,000 customers over a very large distribution system with ongoing maintenance and upgrades. Generation is only part of their costs.

There is no case to be made that their investments from 2005 to 2018 which saw a 60% increase in farm rates had anything to do with investments in wind or solar.

If you have further questions contact Sask power or The Sakatchewan Rate Review Panel which over sees rate increases.

http://www.saskratereview.ca/index.php
"The Saskatchewan Rate Review Panel advises the Government of Saskatchewan on rate applications proposed by SaskEnergy, SaskPower and the SGI Auto Fund. The Panel reviews each application and provides an independent public report stating its opinion about the fairness and reasonableness of the rate change, while balancing the interests of the customer, the Crown corporation and the public."

I think I now understand why you never answer the questions, apparently you are unable to differentiate between different tenses, as in past, present and future tenses. A quick lesson:

Past Tense: Yesterday ( and the day before and the day before...)I asked you why you expect electric power rates to rise when adding supposedly cheaper renewables.

Present Tense: Right now I am asking why you budget for power rates to increase when adding more cheaper renewables.

Future Tense: Tomorrow, because you still won't have answered, I will be forced to ask again, why do you expect power rates to increase in spite of adding significantly more (progressively) cheaper green energy.


In response to my question about rates in the future ( which was asked because you told us that rates will rise, and that renewables will become the dominant generation source), you responded by telling us what already happened, that is past tense, I asked in the future tense.


You have had the same problem with your catastrophe theory. Every time I have asked in the present tense, what catastrophes are we experiencing right now(such as dropping yields, declining standard of living, temperature or weather extremes, sea level rise, polar bears dying etc.), and you respond in the future tense, telling what the beloved models say will happen at some indefinite period in the future, but that future never becomes the present, it is always the future.

Perhaps tomorrow we can go through simple, perfect and continuous tenses.

I apologize for the confusion caused by using such complicated concepts as tenses, then getting frustrated at you for not responding accordingly, I took it for granted that you understood the concept, perhaps now that we are on the same page, we can make more progress.


And yes, wasting $1.5 billion on the utterly futile, bordering on treasonous effort to capture and store beneficial plant food definitely had a negative effect on electricity generation costs, glad we can both agree about that.

[chuckChuck]

A5 you are getting caught up in irrelevant grammar issues.

I clearly showed that renewables had no significant impact on rising electricity costs in Saskatchewan (below). No matter what type of electrical generation is used there is going to be costs into the future. Wind and solar in many parts of the world are becoming the lowest cost source of generation as prices fall. But both systems require backup or storage which adds cost. So how this plays out in the long term electricity prices is dependent on location and a lot of factors. Your question is best answered by experts who work on utility scale systems.

But I know this, on an annual basis I can produce most of my own electricity from solar pv for a long term lower cost than I can buy it from Sask Power.

You can try to manipulate or spin my answers anyway you want, but rational people won't buy it.

From a previous post:
"Saskpower serves a very small population with over 500,000 customers over a very large distribution system with ongoing maintenance and upgrades. Generation is only part of their costs.

There is no case to be made that their investments from 2005 to 2018 which saw a 60% increase in farm rates had anything to do with investments in wind or solar.

If you have further questions contact Sask power or The Sakatchewan Rate Review Panel which over sees rate increases."

[chuckChuck]

Chuck

Take the sand out of your mouth and eyes and contemplate the deficiencies you tout as solutions going forward. We all know what can benefit a select few who know how to best milk subsidies and grants of all kinds; niche markets that represent markets of same size as solar energy production in Sask and so on.

Why you would rush the adoption of technologies which are still in less than infancy is beyond me. Your fixation on battery technology as just being around the corner ; demonstrates how foolhardy it would be for anyone to count on its introduction with any certainty.

Perhaps reading history would remind you of some quite foolish investments made in the last dozen years.
Such as DEF that many wish had never seen the light of day; or Flex fuel engines that never saw a drop of 85% ethanol; ( the majority of whose owners never knew even what that capability was involved) ; or carbon taxes that will in short order have to be built into costs and will make this country totally uncompetitive. And the thought that minimum tillage is not a vast improvement over "the singularily most destructive agricultural practice in Sask farming history" shows a complete lack of judgement and respect for those who inhabit the prairie and plains regions.

Not that posters such as chuck could ever understand the situation that all but a few do face. There is a limit to what the majority have to take from those who have admitted they would not be farming had there not been government subsides. Milking the system and cowing to customers demanding GMO free food; the end of using nitrogen fertilizers and banning man made agricultural chemicals is irresponsible at this time.

Is that not what is being said?.

Since you have retired from farming let me remind you that in your career you have received a lot of support and subsidies from the taxpayers of Canada.

The fossil fuel industry has also received a lot of subsidies and extracted a lot of wealth from consumers.

So it is more than a little rich that your biggest criticism of renewables is that they are subsidized. LOL

Even without subsidies solar pv will pay for itself and generate lower cost electricity in the long run that what I can buy it from Saskpower.

The rest of your "opinions" are just that opinions and irrelevant on the question of solar pv.

Some people can't adapt to a rapidly changing world and are resistant to changing their thinking. That is a frequent characteristic of retired farmers.