Mod parent up. rsilvergun is chronically off-topic and interferes with discussion of topics at hand.
I think his sock puppets intend to keep me at -1 troll.
A degree of irony there, don't you think?
I know, those pesky proprietary parts are just laying around by the thousands, no problem getting them from a company that closed its doors. Coincidentally, that's what happened to the wind turbine the local VA installed... like a year or two after (installation), a bearing failed... apparently, it was a non-standard thing, the company folded up, and not a single outfit (who was cleared for that kind of work) would touch it (it was proprietary), and the other outfits wouldn't service someone else's shit... it sat, not running for like 5 years until they demolished the thing (wish I would've seen that).
"Properly selected panels" from one outfit... are all other outfit's panels the same rating and cost? Are we going to walk (hand-in-hand, 'cause we're best buds!) through a field of pallet racks filled with "hail-proof" panels and test the panels we pick at random with the MythBusters 'chicken cannon' and cans of beans? Sounds like a fun day!
The owners of these data centers aren't gonna be buying the best... they're gonna be buying the cheapest, so, figure for that... same for the wind turbines... all that for "green" energy to make them look good at the next board meeting.
I see- well it is good to know that nuclear plant and gas fired power sources will always have parts available for everything forever, until proton decay happens. 8^/
Your point is awkward, You use one point to declare an entire industry worthless. Machine Shed Fred pointed out the Nuclear plan in Oregon that was decommissioned after only halfway through its licensing period. And if they recommission the TMI reactor two, do you think that all its parts are still available?
I don't know about your particular Wind turbine manufacturer. But when shopping for them, it is very prudent to ask about replacement parts. Seems weird that a non-standard bearing would be used by that manufacturer, Bearings are supposed to be replaceable items. So that sounds like a sketchy manufacturer.
As I noted in another post, our turbines have been up over 10 years now, and are functioning well. Replacement parts? Available. In some cases however, they are replaced with bigger turbines - they didn't fail.
The green thing - I think you have the concept that being pro-renewables is some kind of "tree hugger" thing. I'm certain that some tree hugger types are indeed pro renewables.
But the people who are shakers and movers have another metric. Cost/benefit analysis. Here's one for you, tell me what you would do:
Our local city and townships are growing. New divisions are being built.
A problem has surfaced. Many of these divisions and sub-divisions are around the end-lines of electrical substations. This happens when the line voltage drops enough that a substation is needed, yet after exiting the transformers, no longer has enough "oomph" to supply the needed current draw.
So there are two solutions. Run new towers using much heavier high tension lines to a newly built substation built at the subdivision, declaring right of way and eminent domain. Deal with the lawsuits likely to result as those who are losing their property take you to court.
The second solution is emplacing a renewable source of electricity at the substation, and inject its output into the lines. The only thing you have to worry about is the land where the panels will go, and storage if you use it. In our area, farmers are happy to sell or lease fallow fields. You just send the renewed voltage to the new division or subdivision.
You save a lot of money, have happy customers, and at some point, you don't have to deal with the issues of emplacing a new power generating station.
Same with our wind sources. Take the wind and solar away, and you are looking at building whole new power plants.
Short answer - yes. I take it you believe that only wind power needs replacement parts? How much is refurbing or replacing a nuclear plant turbine rotor?
Well, in one documented case - the Trojan Nuclear Generating Station - fixing the cracked piping in the steam generator was going to be more expensive than just shutting the thing down early and decommissioning it after 17 years of operation on a 50 year license.
It's now a helipad, a dry-cask storage warehouse for nuclear waste, and a frisbee golf course.
I'm not surprised about that. The requirements for steam generator pipe are tough enough in general, and even moreso in a high radiation environment. Although I see that this case the failures were in the "safe zone".
And that just adds fuel to my idea that humans aren't actually capable of building safe nuclear power systems. Too much stuff to go wrong, and in this case, they essentially made a disposable power station. But bean counters and managers call the shots, so on-time and cheap trumps the "good" part of the project triangle, which ironically tends to result in late, over budget, and not so good, it seems.
Fortunately, wind turbines are a lot easier to work with.
Well, considering the stupid rush to build LLM-AI data centers, this is the time to be worrying about what's going to feed their power-hungry appetites. You're gonna want nuclear and fusion, wind and solar ain't gonna coast you through several days of calm winds and cloudy skies.
This whole LLM-AI thing is too soon and too un-thought out... will it be worth all the hassle in two years? Do we even need it at all?
While a different subject - The AI push is not sustainable in the present form. This form is a bubble that is going to burst. Whatever AI we end up with will be much less power hungry.
"Don't worry, my 70 year old mom is there to hold your hand and explain these foreign concepts to you"
Did I offend you somehow? All apologies.
Perhaps people are not thinking strategically. Allow me to illustrate. If I had a country that I thought might be an adversary, I would encourage them to build as large and as few humongous power generation facilities, using the oft heard "economies of scale" argument.
When if we ever do end up in war against them, I can eliminate their entire countries electrical grid with as few missiles as possible.
I've had this discussion with my NucE colleagues, most of whom follow the "As big and as few as possible" concept. it gets them thinking.
Tell mum I said hi!
"Doommongering"? He's talking about what they *do* with the battery storage, and you, inhaling the fumes from your rolling coal oversized pickup (but have no stocks or job in the petrochemical industry), attack him for... talking about reasons?
He most very specifically said he did not watch a video he claimed was good, Is that talking about what they do? Then he called our civilization insane, and then said our apparent goal was giving Musk and Bezos more money.
Highly technical stuff, homie. Seems like you fellows need to make up stuff in your head about me to fit some stereotyped meme to attack.
No, I don't own a Pickup, diesel or otherwise, but I've been thinking about a Rivian if Jeep doesn't come up with a EV soon. You rsilvergun sock puppets are missing the point so badly and that's why I'm wondering if you are either a sock puppet or just not terribly intelligent or insightful.
I suggested therapy because yes, an obsession such as his - and maybe yours - that will eat away at one's very soul.
To the point where you rage post with made up things about me, who supports renewables like solar and wind, storage battery solutions, EVs and other solutions. And no, I own no petrochemical stocks - though in full disclosure, my wife owns some oil wells. But don't worry, she's big on switching to renewables as well.
So you thought through all of that, but couldn't extend the thought to "they don't need to charge every battery in the place, all at once, all in the same hour."
They can spend a month or two bringing it online. Sheesh.
I'm having trouble grokking how you think this won't work.
Electric service demand îs not steady. There are times of day when demand is high, and times when it is very low. Obviously straight solar won't work to charge at night, but they are now emplacing batteries locally at the panel level
We see this demand service implemented in a number of ways. Electrical generators offer discounts for off peak hours. Some providers that use hydraulic storage pump water into reservoirs they use to service peak hours.
Furthermore, no engineer would charge depleted batteries by hooking them all to the power source at the same time with no current limits. That sounds like battery abuse.
But a system that charges batteries by a rate based on demand is really trivial. Like first year engineering trivial. But on top of it all is that batteries can be trickle charged, or charged at a relatively slow rate that won't trip the breakers on the grid. Years ago I designed and built a synchronizer to connect multiple commercial power sources. Something like that along with this this charging circuitry would still be involved, only with some updates. It ain't rocket surgery
Have you sought therapy?
Dude, look who you're replying to. Obviously, the answer is "no." Honestly, if I were a therapist, I wouldn't feel safe in the same room.
Well played sir - well played indeed! 8^)
So someone shouldn't comment about the insanity of our energy policy making on an article about alternative methods of mass grid-level electricity storage.
Why? Because it hurts your fee-fees to see billionaires be criticized? Are you one of these people who, despite the overwhelming evidence since... well the dot-com era... is just unable to see billionaires as anyone other than your "better" who must be "better" because they got richer than you despite the fact you didn't because of bad luck and a possible lack of being a greedy psychopath?
You think Musk is a genius? I used to think he might be smart until he started talking about topics I happen to know quite well. Most of Slashdot is full of people who realized he was an idiot roundabout the time he bought Twitter and started talking about firing people based upon printouts of code done the previous week and bullshit about microservices.
Perhaps mate it's time you got therapy.
Sorry, mon amie, but you and your friends here, who ironically claim I am trying to put billionaires above criticism, then go through some argument you are making with me in your head, next somehow make me a fan of Elmo, who seems to live in your head rent free - damn homie - listen to yourself! You make shit up for me to say, then say I need therapy?
Now if you can drop the rageboner for just a second, my actual thoughts on Musk, renewables, and battery technology is as follows.
For what it is worth, I knew Musk was an asshat who was deteriorating long before he bought twitter. My prediction is he is going to be a 21st Century version of Howard Hughes - which is not a good thing if you know your history. Hughes was a technocrat who went nuts, and Elmo appears to have a thing for Ketamine. Perhaps that has some influence on his more outlandish projects, which seem to be all of them lately.
Renewables. To me it seems silly to not take advantage of that working fusion reactor some 93 million miles away - creating both solar insolation and the Coriolis force that creates wind - and powers wind turbines are products of that reactor) I have a solar + battery system at home that I am incrementally adding to. Its final form will probably be to recharge my EV - when Jeep comes out with one - soon I hope. If they don't, I might look into a Rivian.
The future is definitely renewables. We are implementing them in stages. Some people seem to think that we're going to abandon everything else for renewables in one fell swoop. Civilization doesn't work that way, and it would be economically disastrous. Renewables are the future, but even though I am a huge fan - they are not quite ready yet. We're getting there.
Battery technology. Here's the thing. There are many types of battery that can be made. And the Lithium-ion is not the end all and be all.
Sodium-ion batteries are a very exciting alternative to Li-ion. They were being researched at the same time as Li-ion, but were beat to market, and Li got a head start. S-ion batteries are safer, and the components are more common. I'm paying close attention to this test.
Even with those two alternatives, there are many more. I've agitated for years for power storage via Nickel-Iron batteries. They are nothing you would put in a phone or car, but they are one of the toughest batteries out there. And their weight hardly matters, just pour a concrete pad and put up a building around it.
There are many more alternatives. What it takes is the research to develop them. That takes time.
But seriously, complaining about society, oil companies and religious leaders - when discussing renewables and batteries - can you tell me how that advances what you want? I deal on the technical and practical end of things. If you or rsilvergun come into my meeting room when I'm looking for technology updates, opportunities, and paths forward, and you tell me angry stories about big oil, that society is insane, and religions leaders are also insane, and have us by the short hairs, then start accusing me of random stuff, if I don't agree with your off-topic accusations - you won't be in the meeting very long. Because it is pointless and disruptive to both morale and perception. There's another person who wants to talk - with a battery that is longer lived, battery technology that can be applied at solar panel emplacement, or a Wind turbine that is both bigger and easier starting - Ima listen to them.
Think about it. I'm doing my part to implement and advance renewables. It takes time and effort, and adoption will be incremental. In my area we have no need to build nucs or even new NatGas power generation now. It is working. People who think society is insane, and all the other stuff you people spout, and then make up things for those they consider the enemy to say that aer not even true, stand on the sidelines, we don't want them, because all they are is angry people who don't accomplish much, only stereotype anyone who isn't as angry as them. Like I say - think about it.
Well, the precious LLM-AI data center has to run at night, so you've gotta coast through the night and the cloudy, windless days.
Will those solar panels survive 60+MPH winds?
Ours do.
Golf-ball or bigger hail?
A lot better than you think https://solartechonline.com/bl...
Can you get parts for the wind turbine two-ten years down the road.
Short answer - yes. I take it you believe that only wind power needs replacement parts? How much is refurbing or replacing a nuclear plant turbine rotor?
You might think your "questions" are insightful, and impossible to solve, making these solar and wind power setups unworkable. Meanwhile, we're getting wind power electricity here in PA along the Allegheny front, 24/7/365, and solar is increasing by a lot. We've lost none.
Side note - Our wind turbines are getting larger, so we aren't always getting those parts you might claim as unobtanium. We're emplacing bigger and more powerful turbines. We're extending our end-of line substations with solar panels and storage, which avoids the expense and political issues of eminent domain to run new High-Tension wires and towers.
What can I say - you seem to believe something we use every day as unworkable.
^100% agree^ Don't worry... soon, this'll turn into a "blame it all on the administration" fest on here. rsilvergun and the AC who posts links to rsilver's posts over and over are the same person, and rsilver has their own little cheer squad/fanboi team.
In the early days of teh intertoobz, we had a name for those people. "Kooks". People with axes to grind. People who would turn every story into their favorite axe.
Some had some severe psychosexual issues. Who can forget Crisco Cathy and the West Virginia criminal report Doxxers or the "With the punce gotcha" guy on USENET?
While I'll make no claims as to this group's psychosexual inclinations - if they have any - They do like to turn every article into their well ground axe.
I will make claims that they are woefully bereft of intellectual ability. If a story on sodium- ion batteries is to be responded with claims that society is insane, religious lunatics run the place along with along with oil companies is a completely appropriate response, then they shit their collective panties if someone has th nerve to point out that maybe they might need a little counseling - yeah, their intellectual quotient is hovering around 0. If I err, perhaps it my insensitivity to people who are working to their maximum ability.
Back to sanity...
Back to the topic, sodium-ion could be a good idea, but still... the power to charge a 40,000 sq. ft. building full of them has to come from someplace... 12 hours of daylight ain't gonna get you there, unpredictable wind conditions won't... that means sucking the power grid dry, which defeats the purpose of the whole thing.
It's not as difficult as it might seem. https://www.chugachelectric.co.... https://library.e.abb.com/publ...
Charging is done slowly at first, then essentially "topped off" during normal operation.
Except the post did not "question silvergun", it merely hurled insults. Just like yours.
Sometimes people need to be told to get help - I just gave examples of rsilvergun's habits that make me think that might be indicated. And not for nothin' I'm not seeing any contradictions.
But let's subject this all to a little analysis.
A company brings on some technology that shows promise - sodium-ion batteries. This is a very promising alternative to Lithium Ion batteries. S-Ion batteries are safer, they use much more common elements, and their main drawback is a bit less energy density, which is not an issue in most cases. Certainly not an issue with off-grid energy storage.
Now, allow us to determine if a post that explicitly claims society is insane, and this technology is being suppressed by petrochemical companies and religious people who are also insane is somehow an appropriate response.
If it is - well, there is everyone's problem. Left wing version of conspiracy theorists, as viable as flat earth, and moon landing conspiracies.
Which part of what he said do you disagree with? You haven't addressed the subject at all. You've wandered off topic because you're triggered and are arguing that he has problems? womp womp
Funny how your scokpuppet can claim all of society is insane, and that religious lunatics (and oil companies) run the country. Two separate instances that you apparently approve of.
Yet I am not allowed to.
But that's okay. If you want to think everyone's crazy - maybe it is you.
Did a good video about grid scale solar and wind. The too long didn't watch is if we were a sane civilization that wasn't run by oil companies and religious lunatics we would be rapidly transitioning to wind and solar as our primary form of energy with just a tiny bit of nuclear in places like Japan where they just isn't enough land. It's bizarre to think that we have basically solved every single shortage problem the human race has except we can't do it because we're too busy fighting to see who can give Elon Musk musk and Jeff bezos the most money.
Have you sought therapy? Seriously. Because taking a story about an alternative battery source, Firstposting it trying to change subject to your doomongering, and your constant oftopic whiningbitchingmoaning is not the sign of a healthy mind, but of a deeply troubled and spiraling mind.
That is not normal, it is a shattered soul crying out for help, but not knowing how.
im sure that has nothing to do with your apparent complete unfamiliarity with windows and complete bias against it.
Were you not aware that the last two Windows 11 updates, January and February have broken many machines? This is a parody but it summarizes the issues.
I am painfully aware - made a fsck'ing mess of my class. And it's broken more than just those. I've had forced onedrive implementation even after turning it off, which broke programs, I ended up deleting it, but I'm sure it will be back in a future update.
My students want the next session to explore Linux, because they understood that W11 is not a stable OS, and the majority express hatred for it now.
im sure that has nothing to do with your apparent complete unfamiliarity with windows and complete bias against it. why would you teach anything about windows when you dont even use it and apparently hate it. good luck sending those kids to the real world when their employer plops an AD connected dell in front of them because the company actually needs to manage systems and get shit done. rude awakenings all around.
If someone is intelligent enough to explore Linux AND realize the fact that they're also operating in a Windows environment, then I'm going to assume that person is in fact intelligent and capable enough to operate the OG Windows with a UI designed for fucking toddlers.
Stop pretending the average user is going to do FUCK-ALL with AD other than log into it.
I guess the widdle coward hasn't paid attention to my other posts. I've used Macs since toaster Mac days, Windows since 3.1 for workgroups, and every version since. Even did a stint on the Amigas. Before that I was working with IBM360s. Am I an expert? Who gives a damn, actually? Just handing out my bona fides.
I use all three OSs today, and am just as familiar with Windows as MacOS and Linux. Maybe more, since I spend all of my troubleshooting time on Windows machines.
Another thing the middle Coward is missing is the idea that Mac users are stupid. While quite stable, and for certain you don't have to be a genius to use MacOS, or iOS successfully, I find terminal on MacOS Unix and Terminal quite powerful. I did change from the new default zsh to bash for ease of use among the two OSs.
C makes it easy for you to shoot yourself in the foot. C++ makes that harder, but when you do, it blows away your whole leg. -- Bjarne Stroustrup
