Thread by @GarthGodsman

Levelised cost is not an appropriate way to compare dispatchable versus non-dispatchable (renewable) generators, and renewables ARE NOT cheaper than fossil fuels.
manhattancontrarian.com/blog/2022-8-18…
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Which is why even pre-Ukraine Germany had the most expensive power in Europe, despite doing more than virtually any comparable country in the world to incorporate renewables into its grid.
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The actual high cost of power in Germany was a feature, not a bug, of Germany's high use of renewables.
(And the fact that this was actually built on reliance on Russian gas is simply the icing on the cake.)
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"Since the cost of storage is the dominant cost of the all-renewable system, LCOE is the opposite of a “neat quantification” of comparative electricity generation costs"
manhattancontrarian.com/blog/2022-8-16…
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Levelised cost ignores the significant additional costs of incorporating high volumes of renewables, ie "the costs of energy storage and/or backup, of overbuilding, and of additional transmission"
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Now, you may argue that the additional costs of large-scale renewable energy are worthwhile for environmental reasons, but at least be honest about that.
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And if we are going to be honest about the costs of renewable energy, let's also be honest about its effects on birds and bats
latimes.com/world-nation/s…
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A *well sited* combined wind and solar system rated at 10MW will actually on average only produce about 3MW, 30% or so.
The rest must come from backup or storage.
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But doing what Germany did, which was to double its installation of wind and solar collectors, won't double the amount of power generated by renewables.
On this example, 30% doesn't become 60%.
The increase is between 45 - 50%.
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"That’s because when the wind and sun are at full strength together, you must throw away half or more of the generation; and when they both are at zero (a calm night) you will still get nothing [as the UK found out last winter]."
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So, "how about a 3x overbuild" of wind and solar collectors and its escalating costs?
manhattancontrarian.com/blog/2022-8-16…
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"With each round of overbuilding, the percentage of generation that is wasted goes up."
The figure of 76% wind/solar that Andrew Dessler recently claimed was easy and cheap to achieve is based on a 4x overbuild of plant, not 3!
But he didn't mention that 🙄
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And then ON TOP OF ALL this additional cost, you have the further costs of storage and/or fossil fuel or nuclear backup.
Because as the UK found out, you can have cold, cloudy weather with little or no wind for weeks.
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"If you need to build four times the amount of wind and solar generators to provide the same amount of electricity, your so-called “levelized cost” just got multiplied by four."
manhattancontrarian.com/blog/2022-8-16…
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"the system Dessler was proposing would have to cost a minimum of five times what a standard fossil-fuel generation system costs."
And that's to meet only 76% of power needed - the remaining 24% would still have to come from fossil fuels or nuclear!
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So economically, wind and solar make little sense and are NOT cheaper.
Cue ... more government subsidies!
The US government just tipped another $370B worth of subsidies into the renewable energy sector's pockets.
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And the other thing re Germany - despite it spending something like half a TRILLION euros on its 'energy transformation,' its energy sector is still substantially more carbon-intensive than France's!
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