Hedges
I See Electromagnetic Fields!
- Joined
- Mar 28, 2020
- Messages
- 22,892
I thought peakers were uneconomical due to lower cost battery storage? Solar doesn't replace peakers because solar never produces at times when peakers would run.
FEATURE: Battery storage capacity rapidly rising across California, thermal remains strong
Battery storage is taking off in California with nearly 1.2 GW of capacity added in the last year and expected to double before the end of the year, despite COVID 19 related supply chain delays that h
"California leads the nation in battery energy storage at 1.391 GW by the end of second quarter 2021, an increase of 50% from Q1"
"California currently has 7.1gigawatts (GW) of gasturbine orinternal combustion peaker plants along with 5.9GW of once-through cooling plants and 4.3GW of combined cycle plants currently used as peakers (having capacity factors under 15 percent)."
1.4 GW battery vs. 17.3 GW peaker
(But that doesn't mean California wouldn't decommission them anyway.)
"solar never produces at times when peakers would"
It was suggested this would breath new life into solar-thermal plants with steam-electric generators, which were uneconomical compared to recent PV prices but do have storage.
I don't think they've put nearly the effort into shifting time when loads are applied. What fraction of A/C is left off during the afternoon, turned on only when people come home in the evening? But no money in fixing that. If there was an add-on thermal reservoir for A/C, could chill it during peak PV or nighttime base load. That would have to be retrofit at each customer.