SUMMARY:
Today, electricity
is delivered
"just-in-time",
immediately
upon generation.
That's most efficient,
when there's no "inventory".
Many leftist organizations
are demanding electricity storage
to fix the intermittent power
generation by "renewables".
Today's U.S. grid storage capacity
is less than one millionth
of national electricity output.
Practical battery storage systems
multiply the cost of renewables
by at least 10.
It will be many decades before
grid battery storage plays
a significant role in
large-scale power systems,
if ever.
DETAILS:
Large-scale storage of electricity
is the latest proposed solution
to boost solar and wind power.
Renewable energy advocates
plan to use batteries to
store electricity, solving
the problem of intermittent
wind and solar output.
Right now large-scale storage
is a tiny part of the electrical
power industry ( see chart below ).
29 states have renewable portfolio
standards laws, requiring utilities
to purchase increasing amounts
of renewable energy.
But wind and solar energy
is intermittent.
Wind output averages
25% and 35%
of rated full output.
Solar output averages
15% to 20%
of rated full output.
Arizona, California, Hawaii,
Massachusetts, New Jersey,
New York, and Oregon adopted
statutes or goals to develop
storage systems for grid power.
New York has
the most ambitious
target in the nation.
In January 2019, as part of his
mandate for “100 percent clean
power by 2040,” New York Governor
Andrew Cuomo announced a target
to deploy 3,000 megawatts (MW)
of storage by 2030.
Renewable advocates say
when wind and solar output
is high, excess electricity
should be stored in batteries
and then delivered when
renewable output is low.
Growth of battery installations
was +80% last year and
up +400% from 2014.
But the amount
of US electricity
stored by batteries
today is tiny.
Pumped storage,
not batteries,
provides about 97% of
the grid power storage.
Pumped storage uses electricity
to pump water into an elevated
reservoir to be used to drive
a turbine when electricity
is needed.
Besides the capital cost ,
and land required for a
reservior, there is an
energy loss of at least
20%.
Less than one of every
100,000 watts of US
electricity comes
from pumped storage.
In 2018, US power plants
generated a total of
4.2 million GW-hours
of electrical power.
Pumped storage capacity
totaled about 23 GW-hrs.
Battery storage provided
about 1 GW-hr of capacity.
Less than one-millionth
of our electricity
is stored in grid-scale
batteries.
Electricity storage
is expensive.
Pumped storage is the least
expensive grid storage
at about $2,000 per kilowatt.
Battery storage costs
about $2,500 per kilowatt
for discharge duration
of two hours or more.
Batteries are more expensive
than onshore wind energy,
which has an installed price
of under $1,000 per kilowatt.
The effectiveness of storage
depends on the length of time
the system can deliver
it's stored electricity.
New York State plans
call for 9,000 MW of
offshore wind capacity
by 2035 and 3,000 MW
of battery storage by 2030.
The wind system will cost
more than $9 billion, and
the battery system will l
cost about $7.5 billion.
If the wind system has
a typical average output
of 33% of its rated output,
then the planned 3,000 MW
of battery storage would
only be able to deliver
the average wind output
for about two hours.
To replace output for a full day
when the wind isn’t blowing,
36,000 MW of storage
would be needed at a cost
of $90 billion, or about ten times
as much as the wind system itself.
But several days without wind
is common in many locations,
so even a full day
of battery backup
may not be enough.
Traditional coal, natural gas, and
nuclear systems last for 35 years
or more.
Wind and solar systems are rated
for 20-25 years of service life,
with wind turbines surrounded
by salt water having the shortest
lifespan.
The expected 10-15 year lifetime
of grid-scale batteries is not good.