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Re: Boardman Oregon The sky is not falling... But, get the coal train pictures now... Like refer trains in the 60's they're actually an endangered species...
Author: BOB2
Date: 10-16-2020 - 16:20
Coal is becoming too expensive to make electricity, due to all of the reasons other folks have quite rightly noted. So get those coal train pictures, now...
The major wind zone 50 miles off of the Eureka coast has enough capacity to power half of California, and "never" really stops blowing.
We stored "off peak" wind generated electricity nearly 20 years ago, during the Enron market rigging, in the Coachella Valley, by simply using "free" off peak excess wind power to make hydrogen from Colorado River water. It was then burned at a 20% ratio with natural gas in the "peaker" plants they installed as wind back up to provide additional peak capacity. Today, with turbines or large scale fuel cell plants, we could do the same with Eureka off shore wind power, make off peak hydrogen and store it for peak demand. Offshore windmills power much of the Netherlands and Denmark, today.
The next generation of solar panels are developing up to 35% efficiency, doubling current out put, and will cost less to produce, and be able to be used in thin film applications, as things like roofing material, or even a "tinted" transparent film which could be applied to windows, or as building coatings (or even auto coatings, to recharge your Tesla or Leaf while it's parked). These next generation of solar collector "coatings" also have much higher efficiency in partial light, or cloudy conditions.
Battery storage technology, for both peak load management and back up, is also beginning to ramp up capacity, and production costs are falling. And, if you live in these fire prone rural areas, which have experienced most the brown outs, mostly due to fire risk to the transmission grid, you have clean back up power for emergencies as well. Grid safety has been one of the main reasons for even for the few urban "brown outs" and flex alerts that have occurred this year. Most of this years brown outs/flex alerts have not been because of any actual generating shortages.
While some folks seem to like ruminate in an agitated state about the impending doom from the falling sky, the science and technology continue to bring the costs down for these clean electrical generation and storage technologies...
The major wind zone 50 miles off of the Eureka coast has enough capacity to power half of California, and "never" really stops blowing.
We stored "off peak" wind generated electricity nearly 20 years ago, during the Enron market rigging, in the Coachella Valley, by simply using "free" off peak excess wind power to make hydrogen from Colorado River water. It was then burned at a 20% ratio with natural gas in the "peaker" plants they installed as wind back up to provide additional peak capacity. Today, with turbines or large scale fuel cell plants, we could do the same with Eureka off shore wind power, make off peak hydrogen and store it for peak demand. Offshore windmills power much of the Netherlands and Denmark, today.
The next generation of solar panels are developing up to 35% efficiency, doubling current out put, and will cost less to produce, and be able to be used in thin film applications, as things like roofing material, or even a "tinted" transparent film which could be applied to windows, or as building coatings (or even auto coatings, to recharge your Tesla or Leaf while it's parked). These next generation of solar collector "coatings" also have much higher efficiency in partial light, or cloudy conditions.
Battery storage technology, for both peak load management and back up, is also beginning to ramp up capacity, and production costs are falling. And, if you live in these fire prone rural areas, which have experienced most the brown outs, mostly due to fire risk to the transmission grid, you have clean back up power for emergencies as well. Grid safety has been one of the main reasons for even for the few urban "brown outs" and flex alerts that have occurred this year. Most of this years brown outs/flex alerts have not been because of any actual generating shortages.
While some folks seem to like ruminate in an agitated state about the impending doom from the falling sky, the science and technology continue to bring the costs down for these clean electrical generation and storage technologies...
