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A comment on The UK is wasting a lot of wind power. Parent comment

Re:The UK is wasting a lot of wind power by Reason077 on Thursday January 12, 2023 @05:31PM (#34361186)
> "just short the generator coils and you have a free brake"

You'll soon end up with a burning/melted generator.

> "pump some water in a loop"

OK, but you're going to need huge pumps (1000+ MW!). Expensive.

> "or discharge through some resistors"

Again, you'll need extremely large resistors, and a way to dissipate an awful lot of heat. We're talking about a huge amount of energy here!

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Re:The UK is wasting a lot of wind power by Scoundreller on Thursday January 12, 2023 @05:46PM (#34361342)
sadly, my searches for "gigawatt resistor" and "gigawatt electric load" have been fruitless.
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Re:The UK is wasting a lot of wind power by blibble on Thursday January 12, 2023 @06:04PM (#34361514)
try "reserve ultimate heat sink" instead of "gigawatt resistor"
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Re:The UK is wasting a lot of wind power by moffkalast on Thursday January 12, 2023 @05:49PM (#34361364)
Pump water in a loop through a radiator to cool the braking generators and the resistor bank :P

Could try also melting some salt on the side.

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