https://twitter.com/markchediak/status/1572285949249486854

  • CanYouFeelItMrKrabs [any, he/him]
    ·
    2 years ago

    Not sure about anything Tesla is building but battery storage helped California avoid blackout during the heatwave last month. At its peak the batteries were providing 6% of electricity being used (3300mw)

    • edwardligma [he/him]
      ·
      2 years ago

      oh yeah, not clowning on battery storage in general, and im sure properly-built battery storage will be a required part of any sustainable energy mix (though i honestly know fuckall about the topic). kinda just seems like almost everyone except daddy elon have figured out how to make batteries that dont spontaneously combust every five minutes

    • Multihedra [he/him]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Do you have any links or project names? I’m very interested to learn more. 3.3gw is pretty considerable, I’m curious how it integrates into the grid

      • CanYouFeelItMrKrabs [any, he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        Here's one article I saw about it. Not sure about the details on how it works with the grid though

        https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-california-kept-the-lights-on-during-monster-heat-wave/

        • Multihedra [he/him]
          ·
          2 years ago

          Fascinating, thank you!

          That’s such an incredible amount of battery storage. You’re right that it doesn’t give too many specifics about integration.

          The reason I’m so curious is that batteries are generally pretty low-voltage and low-current devices; I was under the impression that even the most hardcore batteries were limited to around 1 or 2 kV, which isn’t even a high enough voltage for the primary distribution system. There are def batteries that can handle secondary distribution voltages, but the currents at that level are generally pretty large (since the voltage gets stepped down but power doesn’t, the current increases to compensate). I thought batteries wouldn’t be super helpful given that, so clearly I’ve got other misunderstandings to clear up

          Sadly we don’t have many renewables near me, so i haven’t had a chance to see actual schematics and get a sense of necessary equipment and implementation

          • Multihedra [he/him]
            ·
            2 years ago

            And if you do the battery pack thing and connect a bunch together, you need extremely sophisticated charging and discharging controls to make sure that all the batteries maintain the same operating profile; if they start to get out of sync, you’re asking for potentially catastrophic failure!

          • CanYouFeelItMrKrabs [any, he/him]
            ·
            2 years ago

            It definitely is a complex situation. There were some scheduling issues with batteries releasing power into the grid too early, when they were not needed. I'm assuming that'll be sorted out by next year since I think this is the first time the batteries were relied upon so heavily