Comment by belorn
4 days ago
That sounds great, but those batteries are both too expensive right now and not available. People choose the cheaper alternative which are to use thermal energy where they burn gaseous hydrocarbons when the panels can’t see the power source. When the time and price is right we may stop building new such thermal power sources, but for now we can define them as the current best choice and even call them green since everyone has the intention to replace them in the future some day.
> That sounds great, but those batteries are both too expensive right now and not available.
In December, Chinese battery pack prices declined to 100 $/kWh according to BNEF, which was a new record low. Also battery production goes up by at least 20% per year for the last years and battery energy storage installations go up by 30%, see BYD, CATL, and Tesla annual reports.
Availability might be a problem in the West, but China is installing them on a massive scale. So being “not available” (if that’s the case) should, I think, be interpreted as a Western call to action and not as a fact of life. South Korea produces 30% of all car batteries and multiple South Korean plants are planned for the US, so I have hope that things will start moving.
Europe has a fresh new battery factory in northen Sweden called Northvolt. When the subsidies ran out they filed for a loan from EU, and when those money ran out they asked the goverment for more subsidies and they got a no. They were offered a loan, but they declined that offer since they are already $6 billion in debts.
As a result they filed instead for bankruptcy last fall.
I would like to see EU issue a law against building new natural gas power plants, dictating that either countries start building that cheap grid-scale battery solutions or find non-fossil fuel alternatives, which ever is currently cheapest. Im tired of seeing that even countries like Sweden are investing into new natural gas power plants in order to address days when the wind and sun are not producing enough energy.
I don’t think such a ban would be a good idea but I agree 100% with your sentiment that non-fossil based energy generation would probably be a better idea (especially for energy independence for example).