Energy prices will go up anyway because of the planned gas power plants. They will be paid even for not running at all and are expensive as hell to build and operate.
The price of electric power is due to the pricing zone being all of Germany. Patching up a fundamentally broken system (in the age of renewables) will only ever yield subpar results when changing to a modern pricing structure is somewhat easy and done in many other parts of the world.
Pricing zones help match the reality in the power grid to the electricity market in a geographical sense. That still means infrastructure has to be built. For example today the weather is generally sunny in Germany, but there is little wind. Being able to store a good bit of the electricity for the night, when the sun is not shining, would really help a lot. Also if you use pricing zones, that probably would lead to more connections between the zones being built.
I'm not very familiar with different pricing structures. What does a modern pricing structure look like? Regional pricing? Dynamic pricing house by house?
Pricing by substation is among the most modern. This wasn't easy to do 60 years ago. But it is now.
Having region based prices (e.g. north west south east would also be better than the status quo)
Dynamic pricing per house is nonsense. And you should be well aware of that. Why even suggest it?
I mean, You could also just build more fossil fueled power plants and rely on those. Than we could keep the pricing model as fossil fuels are competitively easy to move.
They are already working on it. The new storage subsidies they are working on require use a week long storage base line, which is too long to be sensible for batteries. Those are fairly expensive per unit stored, but have relatively low losses. So perfect for short term or daily storage, but less good for an entire week. A good system combines both. Short term storage for the night and long term using hydrogen or biomass for dunkelflaute.
What's wrong with that? The entire point of subsidies it to encourage people to do something that's not currently very economical.
Day-to-day selling of storage is extremely profitable without any subsidies already, so why should it be subsidized? The only thing blocking the addition of more day-to-day storage facilities is the process of actually applying for a grid hookup because there's simply too many people making applications (because its so profitable)
What’s wrong with that? The entire point of subsidies it to encourage people to do something that’s not currently very economical.
That the guidelines allow for fossil gas power plants. So basically battery storage has to compete with free power plants with maintenance also being paid by the government.
Yes day to day selling is profitable. However dunkelflaute is about two weeks a year in Germany. If you want to do that cheaply, you could just use biomass in the current coal power plants. That can be done pretty cheaply. I know biomass has issues, but they are certainly less bad, then building new gas power plants.
You just changed the subject. Nothing you said there has any bearing on whether or not it's a good idea to move subsidies from day-to-day batteries towards week-scale battery storage. In fact, you complaining that they have to compete with gas plants is more of a reason to subsidize them, not less. Gas plants can't outcompete batteries on day-to-day trading anyways, with or without subsidies. It's only at the week-scale that things get competitive.
We should absolutely not be burning coal instead of gas. Coal should be phased out.
These gas plants do burn biomass. Germany harvests and purifies methane from biomass, and mixes it into the fossil derived gas that powerplants burn. that's one of the primary ways that biomass contributes to the grid. Also, these gas plants don't even represent an increase in overall gas plants. Older less efficient gas plants are being decomissioned and newer gas plants are replacing them.
It's fine if you don't like the current government, I don't like them either, but this habit where people just reflexively assume that literally everything they do is stupid and evil is not helpful.
You just changed the subject. Nothing you said there has any bearing on whether or not it’s a good idea to move subsidies from day-to-day batteries towards week-scale battery storage. In fact, you complaining that they have to compete with gas plants is more of a reason to subsidize them, not less. Gas plants can’t outcompete batteries on day-to-day trading anyways, with or without subsidies. It’s only at the week-scale that things get competitive.
But they are competing with each other. The longest dunkelflaute in Germany in the last decade lasted for 1610. We are talking about 10GW of gas power plants being added(and they are being added to the current fleet and do not replace old gas power plants) That means 1610GWh of batter storage could also do the same job. Today in summer Germany is producing about 350GWh of fossil fuel electricity on a sunny day. You roughly need that to make summer nights work. That is a significant part of what is needed to survive a dunkelflaute.
So this is at the very least gifting fossil fuel companies 2GW worth of gas power plants. Probably more since long duneklfaute is pretty rare.
We should absolutely not be burning coal instead of gas. Coal should be phased out.
LNG is 33% worse then coal and Germany imports a lot of that. Also building a new power plant also produces emissions. We really should do neither and pay no subsidy for any infrastructure that forces that.
These gas plants do burn biomass. Germany harvests and purifies methane from biomass, and mixes it into the fossil derived gas that powerplants burn. that’s one of the primary ways that biomass contributes to the grid.
Most biogas is burned at a constant rate though and it is a huge wasted potential. It is easily enough to replace a good bit of gas and it would make perfect sense to force companies to not use fossil gas, when they receive subsidies.
The large scale batteries generally have to follow safety regulations for fire and electrical safety, as well as vehicle access. Most of these standards require a particular amount of spacing, buffers, setbacks, between components.
14 Comments
testaccount372920@piefed.zip · 17 pts · 12h
It's a good start that hopefully stabilizes the grid and keeps energy prices from exploding too much.
FleetingTit@feddit.org · 11 pts · 10h
Energy prices will go up anyway because of the planned gas power plants. They will be paid even for not running at all and are expensive as hell to build and operate.
Gladaed@feddit.org · 6 pts · 10h
The price of electric power is due to the pricing zone being all of Germany. Patching up a fundamentally broken system (in the age of renewables) will only ever yield subpar results when changing to a modern pricing structure is somewhat easy and done in many other parts of the world.
Melchior@feddit.org · 4 pts · 9h
Pricing zones help match the reality in the power grid to the electricity market in a geographical sense. That still means infrastructure has to be built. For example today the weather is generally sunny in Germany, but there is little wind. Being able to store a good bit of the electricity for the night, when the sun is not shining, would really help a lot. Also if you use pricing zones, that probably would lead to more connections between the zones being built.
testaccount372920@piefed.zip · 2 pts · 9h
I'm not very familiar with different pricing structures. What does a modern pricing structure look like? Regional pricing? Dynamic pricing house by house?
Gladaed@feddit.org · 4 pts · 9h
Pricing by substation is among the most modern. This wasn't easy to do 60 years ago. But it is now. Having region based prices (e.g. north west south east would also be better than the status quo)
Dynamic pricing per house is nonsense. And you should be well aware of that. Why even suggest it?
I mean, You could also just build more fossil fueled power plants and rely on those. Than we could keep the pricing model as fossil fuels are competitively easy to move.
ZkhqrD5o@lemmy.world · 16 pts · 9h
Shhh, no one tell the German government or else they'll sabotage it again like they did with solar.
Melchior@feddit.org · 5 pts · 9h
They are already working on it. The new storage subsidies they are working on require use a week long storage base line, which is too long to be sensible for batteries. Those are fairly expensive per unit stored, but have relatively low losses. So perfect for short term or daily storage, but less good for an entire week. A good system combines both. Short term storage for the night and long term using hydrogen or biomass for dunkelflaute.
eigenspace@feddit.org · 3 pts · 8h
What's wrong with that? The entire point of subsidies it to encourage people to do something that's not currently very economical.
Day-to-day selling of storage is extremely profitable without any subsidies already, so why should it be subsidized? The only thing blocking the addition of more day-to-day storage facilities is the process of actually applying for a grid hookup because there's simply too many people making applications (because its so profitable)
Melchior@feddit.org · 0 pts · 7h
That the guidelines allow for fossil gas power plants. So basically battery storage has to compete with free power plants with maintenance also being paid by the government.
Yes day to day selling is profitable. However dunkelflaute is about two weeks a year in Germany. If you want to do that cheaply, you could just use biomass in the current coal power plants. That can be done pretty cheaply. I know biomass has issues, but they are certainly less bad, then building new gas power plants.
eigenspace@feddit.org · 2 pts · 6h
Okay, so three things here:
You just changed the subject. Nothing you said there has any bearing on whether or not it's a good idea to move subsidies from day-to-day batteries towards week-scale battery storage. In fact, you complaining that they have to compete with gas plants is more of a reason to subsidize them, not less. Gas plants can't outcompete batteries on day-to-day trading anyways, with or without subsidies. It's only at the week-scale that things get competitive.
We should absolutely not be burning coal instead of gas. Coal should be phased out.
These gas plants do burn biomass. Germany harvests and purifies methane from biomass, and mixes it into the fossil derived gas that powerplants burn. that's one of the primary ways that biomass contributes to the grid. Also, these gas plants don't even represent an increase in overall gas plants. Older less efficient gas plants are being decomissioned and newer gas plants are replacing them.
It's fine if you don't like the current government, I don't like them either, but this habit where people just reflexively assume that literally everything they do is stupid and evil is not helpful.
Melchior@feddit.org · 1 pts · 3h
But they are competing with each other. The longest dunkelflaute in Germany in the last decade lasted for 1610. We are talking about 10GW of gas power plants being added(and they are being added to the current fleet and do not replace old gas power plants) That means 1610GWh of batter storage could also do the same job. Today in summer Germany is producing about 350GWh of fossil fuel electricity on a sunny day. You roughly need that to make summer nights work. That is a significant part of what is needed to survive a dunkelflaute.
So this is at the very least gifting fossil fuel companies 2GW worth of gas power plants. Probably more since long duneklfaute is pretty rare.
LNG is 33% worse then coal and Germany imports a lot of that. Also building a new power plant also produces emissions. We really should do neither and pay no subsidy for any infrastructure that forces that.
Most biogas is burned at a constant rate though and it is a huge wasted potential. It is easily enough to replace a good bit of gas and it would make perfect sense to force companies to not use fossil gas, when they receive subsidies.
Tabula_stercore@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 3h
Fantastic news. But what i dont get is why the batteries are placed on an empty lot. Why are the solar pannels and batteries not better integrated?
sparkyshocks@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 2h
The large scale batteries generally have to follow safety regulations for fire and electrical safety, as well as vehicle access. Most of these standards require a particular amount of spacing, buffers, setbacks, between components.