LA Solar Power/Storage Contract

[Meredith Poor + 883]

Strictly speaking, this hasn't happened yet since the agency hasn't signed the contract. To the extent that these numbers are correct, welcome to the new world.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2019/07/01/new-solar--battery-price-crushes-fossil-fuels-buries-nuclear/#4bacbb535971

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

All good until an earthquake destroys it or another wildfire burns it to the ground...

[Rasmus Jorgensen + 1,169]

On 7/5/2019 at 6:40 AM, Douglas Buckland said:

All good until an earthquake destroys it or another wildfire burns it to the ground...

Natural disasters wipe out O&G installations as well. 

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

Name one

[Rasmus Jorgensen + 1,169]

2 minutes ago, Douglas Buckland said:

Name one

https://www.ogj.com/drilling-production/production-operations/article/17210522/gulf-cleanup-continues-after-five-major-hurricanes

 

[NickW + 2,714]

36 minutes ago, Douglas Buckland said:

Name one

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_Ranger

[NickW + 2,714]

On 7/5/2019 at 5:40 AM, Douglas Buckland said:

All good until an earthquake destroys it or another wildfire burns it to the ground...

Grazing sheep or goats on the farm will help manage the fire risk and provide a nice supply of Mutton😊

[footeab@yahoo.com + 2,132]

On 7/4/2019 at 9:40 PM, Douglas Buckland said:

All good until an earthquake destroys it or another wildfire burns it to the ground...

Its called planning, and nothing other than a pyramid is foolproof.

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

7 hours ago, Douglas Buckland said:

Name one

O&G operations don't even need natural disasters to blow up, they frequently do it all by themselves.

I'm sure you can easily think of several examples.

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

6 hours ago, NickW said:

Grazing sheep or goats on the farm will help manage the fire risk and provide a nice supply of Mutton😊

They also control invasive weeds. Our city has been using them in local parks and people love them (they are cute).

https://www.edmonton.ca/activities_parks_recreation/parks_rivervalley/goat-pilot-project.aspx

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

11 hours ago, NickW said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_Ranger

Did you even bother to read the 'Causes' section? Are you comparing this to a natural disaster?

It was a design flaw compounded by human error.

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

4 hours ago, Enthalpic said:

O&G operations don't even need natural disasters to blow up, they frequently do it all by themselves.

I'm sure you can easily think of several examples.

But we were discussing natural disasters as a cause. Try to stay on topic.

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

12 hours ago, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

https://www.ogj.com/drilling-production/production-operations/article/17210522/gulf-cleanup-continues-after-five-major-hurricanes

 

YOU couldn't name one but had to look it up...

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

4 hours ago, Enthalpic said:

O&G operations don't even need natural disasters to blow up, they frequently do it all by themselves.

I'm sure you can easily think of several examples.

I can also remember the Titanic, the Challenger and several bridge failures. They also did not require a natural disaster.

Are you insinuating that only O&G operations have failures not due to natural disasters?

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

1 hour ago, Douglas Buckland said:

 

Are you insinuating that only O&G operations have failures not due to natural disasters?

No, but I can't remember a time when a solar panel blew up and killed someone.  Batteries have killed a few... but compare that to the thousands dead in O&G.

Well designed solar fields should only have external risks.   O&G seems to have both internal and external risks (both are on topic as it's risk assessment).

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

15 hours ago, NickW said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_Ranger

2 hours ago, Enthalpic said:

No, but I can't remember a time when a solar panel blew up and killed someone.  Batteries have killed a few... but compare that to the thousands dead in O&G.

Well designed solar fields should only have external risks.   O&G seems to have both internal and external risks (both are on topic as it's risk assessment).

Thousands of dead? Over what period?

You seem to be fixated on O&G incidents. What about nuclear incidents, aircraft, shipping, construction, etc....?

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

8 minutes ago, Douglas Buckland said:

Thousands of dead? Over what period?

You seem to be fixated on O&G incidents. What about nuclear incidents, aircraft, shipping, construction, etc....?

Shipping of O&G is included in what I called operations.

Do your own research; land well sites, refineries, off shore platforms, train derailments (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lac-Mégantic_rail_disaster )... the list goes on forever.

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

3 hours ago, Enthalpic said:

Shipping of O&G is included in what I called operations.

Do your own research; land well sites, refineries, off shore platforms, train derailments (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lac-Mégantic_rail_disaster )... the list goes on forever.

So a train derails hauling oil is an oil & gas disaster? If it would have been hauling cattle would it have been a ranching disaster?

You are obviously in crowd that termed the Exxon Valdez a oil (exploration/production) disaster instead of a transportation/shipping disaster.

If the Exxon Valdez had been hauling milk (which deoxygenates water), would it have been a dairy industry issue?

[butasha + 123]

2653 acres of land to produce 400mw and this article states this is 7% of the LA load during daylight hours. This facility is over 4 square miles of real estate. Just imagine how much land it will take to cover the remaining 93% load covered by thermal generation. I don’t know the actual foot print of a modern 400 MW combined cycle has generator is but my guess would 50-100 acres.

Additionally if LA was able to go completely renewable energy they would have to contract with some entity for spinning and non-spinning emergency power in the event this green power was interrupted. Has the real-estate, emergency backup power and probably other unnamed issues been included in this less than 2cents/kWh rate?

Before the green religion types get all bent out of shape I am not trying to knock this concept. I  just a few questions on what the next steps will actually be.

[Meredith Poor + 883]

24 minutes ago, butasha said:

2653 acres of land to produce 400mw and this article states this is 7% of the LA load during daylight hours. This facility is over 4 square miles of real estate. Just imagine how much land it will take to cover the remaining 93% load covered by thermal generation. I don’t know the actual foot print of a modern 400 MW combined cycle has generator is but my guess would 50-100 acres.

Additionally if LA was able to go completely renewable energy they would have to contract with some entity for spinning and non-spinning emergency power in the event this green power was interrupted. Has the real-estate, emergency backup power and probably other unnamed issues been included in this less than 2cents/kWh rate?

Before the green religion types get all bent out of shape I am not trying to knock this concept. I  just a few questions on what the next steps will actually be.

The Nevada (nuclear) test site (just northwest of Las Vegas) is about 80 miles by 80 miles, or 6400 square miles. This is the surface area required to power the whole country with solar at 20% conversion efficiency. One doesn't have to look far to see 'four square miles' covered by farmland. Covering 4 square miles of desert would appear to be incidental in comparison.

Solar covers 'surface area'. Storage consumes 'volume'. If one assumes that the greater LA area is roughly 18 million people, this would be roughly 7.5 million households. Were one to assume 30Kwh of storage for each household, one would need  225,000,000 Kwh per day for the households. Using LiFePO4 at 120 watt-hours per liter, the volume is 1,875,000,000 liters. There are one thousand liters in cubic meter (10 x 10 x 10), so this translates to 1,875,000 cubic meters. If a 'battery bank were 10 meters (30 feet) high, then it's footprint would be 187,500 square meters. The square root of 187,500 is 13,693, so one side of this bank would be roughly 13.4 kilometers or 8.2 miles on a side.

While this looks like a lot, it's still tiny compared to the real estate torn up by coal mines (sometimes 60 miles in extent) or the tank farms one finds in places like the Henry or Cushing hubs. Since most power plants are more than 30 feet high, battery storage could well occupy higher buildings with more compact footprints.

I suspect that lithium would not be an economical storage resource at that scale - perhaps salt water or sodium ion batteries would make more sense.

[NickW + 2,714]

18 hours ago, Douglas Buckland said:

Did you even bother to read the 'Causes' section? Are you comparing this to a natural disaster?

It was a design flaw compounded by human error.

A big wave was the causal factor, design flaw or not. 

[NickW + 2,714]

4 hours ago, butasha said:

2653 acres of land to produce 400mw and this article states this is 7% of the LA load during daylight hours. This facility is over 4 square miles of real estate. Just imagine how much land it will take to cover the remaining 93% load covered by thermal generation. I don’t know the actual foot print of a modern 400 MW combined cycle has generator is but my guess would 50-100 acres.

Additionally if LA was able to go completely renewable energy they would have to contract with some entity for spinning and non-spinning emergency power in the event this green power was interrupted. Has the real-estate, emergency backup power and probably other unnamed issues been included in this less than 2cents/kWh rate?

Before the green religion types get all bent out of shape I am not trying to knock this concept. I  just a few questions on what the next steps will actually be.

2653 acres of land that's only other practical use is extensive rough grazing which you can still practice as pointed out in my original post

[NickW + 2,714]

18 hours ago, Douglas Buckland said:

YOU couldn't name one but had to look it up...

Alternatively Ramus knew about this but posted a link for everyones elses benefit. 

[NickW + 2,714]

18 hours ago, Douglas Buckland said:

But we were discussing natural disasters as a cause. Try to stay on topic.

Speaking of which in regard to the solar farm,  now we have established that;

• A few goats and sheep will control the wild fire risk
• An Earthquake of sufficient magnitude damaging the solar farm is an extremely rare event

Your statement 

All good until an earthquake destroys it or another wildfire burns it to the ground...

Is groundless?

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

12 hours ago, Douglas Buckland said:

So a train derails hauling oil is an oil & gas disaster? If it would have been hauling cattle would it have been a ranching disaster?

You are obviously in crowd that termed the Exxon Valdez a oil (exploration/production) disaster instead of a transportation/shipping disaster.

If the Exxon Valdez had been hauling milk (which deoxygenates water), would it have been a dairy industry issue?

Yes, I include shipping it because of its hazardous properties (flammability, toxicity).

 If a rail car full of ammonia or pesticide blows up that is only being moved because a farmer ordered it - why not attribute at least some of the damage to the agriculture industry?

Weird stuff happens; imagine dying under a wave of molasses! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Molasses_Flood