Renewables supplied 65% of new US utility-scale generating capacity in Q1 2023

Re:Renewables supplied 65% of new US utility-scale generatin... by bryanlarsen on Tuesday May 16, 2023 @03:34PM (#35966626)

But we already have a lot of natgas plants. I'm willing to bet that we could have handled all of our baseload requirements on all 3 mainland grids using the existing natgas plants as peakers.

Sure, once we hit 60% or so of our power from renewables we'll need to have a proper strategy for handling intermittency. But we're far from that number now.

Too meet our commitments, all natgas plants will need to be shut down or have carbon capture added by 2035. If you amortize your capital costs over 12 years instead of 50 years, that natgas plant doesn't look so cheap any more.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Renewables supplied 65% of new US utility-scale generatin... by ZeroGravitas on Tuesday May 16, 2023 @03:48PM (#35966832)

Some new gas plants are sold as being compatible with hydrogen mixes and/or pure hydrogen.

https://www.ge.com/gas-power/future-of-energy/hydrogen-fuele...

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Renewables supplied 65% of new US utility-scale generatin... by binarymax on Tuesday May 16, 2023 @05:16PM (#35967853)

So the idea is to use excess power to make and store hydrogen? How efficient is making hydrogen?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Renewables supplied 65% of new US utility-scale generatin... by generic92034 on Tuesday May 16, 2023 @05:37PM (#35968096)

Isn't it infinitely more efficient than just letting the potential power be wasted? If supply surpasses demand eventually wind farms are shut down. That has to change, IMHO.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Renewables supplied 65% of new US utility-scale generatin... by toomuchtodo on Tuesday May 16, 2023 @05:17PM (#35967865)

> How efficient is making hydrogen?

https://www.iea.org/reports/electrolysers

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S254243512...

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Renewables supplied 65% of new US utility-scale generatin... by ZeroGravitas on Tuesday May 16, 2023 @05:47PM (#35968195)

Yeah, we need to generate a lot of green hydrogen anyway, to decarbonise fertilizer, steel production, aviation fuel and a bunch of other stuff (Ideally we'd force fossil fuel producers, the number one users of hydrogen today, to replace their hydrogen with green hydrogen as part of the process of kick starting this).

And in that world, using some of your stored hydrogen or ammonia as emergy reserve makes sense, though you'd want to avoid actually using it too much as if you do then you'd probably have been better spending the money on more generation and/or batteries.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Renewables supplied 65% of new US utility-scale generatin... by ch_sm on Tuesday May 16, 2023 @07:18PM (#35969082)

Industrial electrolysis is roughly 70% efficient. Generating electricity from it with a fuel cell is about 40%-60% efficient. There are (realistic) newer approaches to improve on this (up to 85% for fuel cells). And yes, it’s infinitely better than nothing.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolysis_of_water [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell

[ Parent | on HN ]