Exploring the Power Grid of the Future
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 10 ก.พ. 2025
- Exploring the Power Grid of the Future. Use the code "Undecided" to get Curiosity Stream for less than $15 a year! curiositystrea.... The solar power potential of the Sahara desert is absolutely massive. Solar panels in Algeria could generate 3x more electricity than the same solar panels in Germany. A 10,000 square kilometer solar farm in the middle of the desert would be enough to power the entire world. But there's a challenge. How do you get that energy distributed around the globe? Countries like India are pushing for a "one sun, one world, one grid" power grid concept. And there's a private company that thinks they can export solar and wind electricity from Morocco all the way to cloudy UK over the electric grid. But are macro power grid systems like this really the answer? Or is going smaller with microgrids going to be the future?
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Heck no, but only if it was THE UNITED STATES OF THE WORLD! There is too much chaos in the world to be energy dependent on other countries for power and vice versa. If there is another war, what countries do we cut off and keep on during said war. I'm sorry, but this concept is not a great idea and would only work in Sci-Fi books or movies.
It will not work, states want to be energetical independent.
Why not build a giant solar plant in Sahara and use its power for electrolysis to generate green Hydrogen and build one giant pipeline to supply that hydrogen to a Regional Gas Pipe Lines, and Countries in that region can store and pump it to neighborhoods/ factories using existing gas supply lines ,and each Consumer can have small fuel cell at their premises as per there need , and the by product will be oxygen from solar plant and water from consumers side. its much more economical
While solar power in the middle of the desert may well be very efficient, the transportation costs of that energy makes the wide-scale viability questionable. If that can be solved then obviously it should, nay, must be leveraged.
That said, there's entirely too much energy being wasted *not* to use in some fashion - even if just for desalination.
Even if the US went to a "single" power grid, it wouldn't truly be a single grid. Every business that owned the lines would be responsible for their own upkeep. Good luck getting Duke Energy on board with making less money. They're possibly one of, if not THE worst power company in the US.
The UK strategy is about minimising risk. We already buy nuclear electricity from France, wind power from the Netherlands and soon Denmark, hydro power from Norway and have other connections with Ireland and Belgium. Adding solar from Morocco is a great idea. Up to about 10-15% of the UK power requirement for this project is the right amount to supplement domestic electricity production and other imports. The sun always shines and the wind always blows somewhere, so being able to trade the resource when it's needed makes sense. The cable losses of 10-20% are nothing compared to the 3 times higher output per solar panel you get in Morocco compared to the UK, especially in winter when solar is a poor resource in northern latitudes..
@@rogerstarkey5390 scotland produced an amount equivalent to 98% of its annual energy demand from renewable sources - not quite the same thing. scotland exports its surplus power (mostly to England) and imports at other times. It also has 4 operational nuclear reactors.
They have the advantage of being a small part of a larger grid (like Denmark).
Ireland (north and south) has a tougher time as it is a standalone grid and must balance itself. Ireland has so far managed about 45% renewables, with a target of 70%+ by 2030. However a lot of renewable energy is lost from constraints, lack of long term storage and a need to balance the system in real time
The interconnections that you mention are only a small percentage of the total load, the whole of Europe needs more interconnection capacity. Over Christmas we exported to France at full volume.
From what you said i understood that the UK really doesn't need the electricity from morroco
@@Muppetkeeper Yes, currently 8.4GW of installed cables, or 25% of a typical peak demand, but the typical actual demand for imports is around half that, even at evening peak.
@@nalat1suket4nk0 The more options available, the lower the overall supply risk.
Hey, Interesting video. I design HVDC transmission lines for a living and your distance is about double what the rule of thumb is. I don't know how recent your news is, but the costs keep dropping in HVDC land.
Also, a mega grid is more virtual than physical. Take Europe, that grid operates pretty much like a mega-grid but is governed by unified laws. Super/mega grids are really just unified grid operational conditions, and not "unique stand alone" grids.
Or to put it another way, if you coherently connect a bunch of micro grids, you will make a super grid. That's why modern grid discussions focus on local usage and DERs to reduce transmission level grid capital, but a unified grid operation so that when necessary the energy can be moved effectively.
Robert, that's good news about the HVDC break even distance coming down so fast.
Can you tell me how easy it would be for a solar or wind farm to inject power directly to HVDC?
@@solarute6066 That's a hard question. There aren't any commercial products that I know of, but the design itself is reasonable. The biggest hurdle in power systems is the inertia. If something isn't done already, no one wants to do it. But I know that Wind Farms using MVDC backbones have been proposed, and it's pretty trivial to go from MVDC to HVDC, but the MVDC lines are usually just connected to the AC grid.
The big thing about DC is that you can save about 20% of your conductor material for the same power level. And since wind and pv give off power in DC at generation, you can save the DC/AC inverter for where it makes the most sense. But if we ran a DC grid, we wouldnt even need the inverters. But that's another topic, I stan DC power really hard.
@@Robert-qq9em Thanks Robert. You've answered my question.
In Australia, to my knoledge there are only a couple of HVDC interconnectors, Bass straight being one of them. It seems to me that we should be using more HVDC interconnectors, with big batteries suppling inertia at the load end, and huge solar farms at the edge of the desset connecting to the HVDC.
@@Robert-qq9em i would have thought it impossible to take solar DC and bump it up directly to HVDC. you would need some intermediary step for practicality (to get the power from the farms to the link) and isolation surely?
there would be savings to be made by converting to medium voltage DC rather than artificially creating a AC that needs to smoothed out the other side. but would the savings be enough to develop new equipment rather than use what everyone knows
(not facts here, just spitballing)
@@njipods You can step up the voltage from residential DC to HVDC, but you need the power behind it to actually do it without lots of losses. This can be complicated, because 1 solar panel isnt what we are talking about, but instead MWs of power. HVDC lines are moving massive amounts of power. A 525kV DC line moving 1000Amps is pretty common, but would be something like 2.75 Million 5m solar panels of power (depending on location). So stepping up the voltage a few times would make sense just from a transportation logistic, I agree. But if you wanted to, you could connect all those solar panels to voltage links to step up using semiconductors. How to do things like this are the current challenges, it's not that it's impossible, but where we need to come to some agreements for mass production. If this has happened it happened since 2020 when conversations on standardized LVDC voltages were still pretty open. I know a Dutch company wants a 350v standard, and I like that for a 208vAC replacement, but there are strong arguments for a 48vDC standard like cars use.
As for Medium voltage, or distribution voltages, That is even less worked out in my experience. I know of a single University putting in a MVDC distribution line, and Siemens has some publications on it. Honestly, if DC grids interests you like they interest me, you should consider a Masters in Electrical Engineering with a focus on Power (and if you are young enough or willing), or moving to that field in general. It's still in it's infancy and I expect the field will need lots of hands on deck if we want to meaningfully reduce the footprint of the power system.
The lack of smoothing of voltages creating more efficiency is something that has been seen in laboratory tests. A lab based in California did a comprehensive test of existing AC appliances and to see which could run with the equivalent DC voltage and found energy savings averaging around 10-20%, with some high draw appliances like single phase Air Conditioners seeing up to a 68% decrease in power consumption. Heating appliances like hotplates saw no change in performance, and sometimes didn't work, but anything using power electronics would theoretically work unless it was poorly designed in the first place.
So yes, if we went to DC we would see a lot of savings, based on testing and not real world experience. However real world experience is important when discussing things that determine life or death (ventilators operating for example). One fun fact, transformers for 50-60Hz AC use more metal than DC converters of the equivalent power, so a switch to a DC grid would reduce material in the grid across the board. Downside, is that nothing being sold for residential use has been certified for DC operation at the point of connection to the grid, which would be very expensive to do.
Final Note, when discussing voltages, there's some cross-over nomenclature. I'm using Low Voltage to mean residential or below 1000v, medium voltage is distribution level, and high voltage is about around 69kV and up, with medium voltage being between the two voltages. That's not encompassing of all voltage classes, and is pretty specific to power engineering. If you don't work in power, my nomenclature may be confusing.
i think the best scenario would be to have tiered grid:
Small renewables at household scales connected by micro-grids. These micro-grids would be connected by larger grids which would in turn be connected by even larger grid systmes. Now plug in powerstations into this whole system. This would provide energy to commercial systems while also not putting households competely dependant on far off powerstations. If certain households lose power the powerstations can partly give them a back up the other part coming off of the rest of the grid.
The problem is that you can't just "plug-in" large powerstations which are far away because one power line can't transmit an infinite amount of energy. If you have a solar farm in the Sahara desert, you would transmit the power over e.g. Italy and there you would need many power lines across the country which could carry the energy to central Europe and split it there as well etc. So you would have large amounts of land and landscapes with power lines only to carry energy out of the country again which the people wouldn't like ofc.
But in general it could work well for less far away powerstations
If any government is involved. The project is doomed.
Look at what Elon Musk is doing.
@@traktionskoeffizient6270 yes, it’s not a direct transmission, but “pass the parcel”. Each hop is shorter and the overall supply and demand evens-out across the whole grid. Eg in the Europe grid, Spanish solar being sold to Sweden actually directly powers eg Germany, and then the German power which would’ve been used is what’s sold to Sweden. (Or maybe Spanish solar gets used in France, then French nuclear gets used in the Netherlands, then Dutch wind gets used in Sweden.)
Yeah, the "Not In My Backyard" syndrome is horrible in the US.
Hydro-Québec have a 10TWh contract to supply clean hydro power to New York, but NY, Vermont, NewHampshire and even Maine are roadblocking the power lines while the interconnections already exist in our side of the border...
I have friends in the oilfield who mock wind generators. I say to them, "Nothing stopping you from building a wind farm out of oil money." North Dakota has an ocean of oil, but far more wind. The oil will be gone some day.
Doesn’t it cost more power to make windmills than they ever produce and the blades are an environmental disaster to deal with
Windmills kill billions of birds a year. Greenies just don't care.
@Moth Silly No.
You say you are environmentalists, but then you push windmills that kill millions of birds a year. Don't you see what hypocrites you are? Nuclear power is the only answer to an electric economy. But you be scared...lol.
"Do you think the one sun, one world, one grid approach is the way to go" - Absolely once costs and losses are covered this remains a permanent linkup. Also a country that has a TEMP PROBLEM can be allowed to draw to hold over untill sun or wind up.
A global grid made up of interconnected independent micro grids sharing resources is probably the best compromise we're going to get. The problem with a global grid is that it places too much power (control) in one place and it you piss them off they will turn you off.
@@rogerstarkey5390 What if they make unreasonable demands? Too much power in one place? Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely?
@@rogerstarkey5390 Global stability is not inherently good, it can be quite bad if it is predicated on removal of certain freedoms, especially if enforced by crazy people.
We already know what happens when the source of energy is in a foreign country as it happened already with the oil. It seems that still UK believes the world is theirs and can command Africans to give their land for their energetic purposes.
@@rogerstarkey5390 And is that a good thing?
What is global stability?
More importantly WHOSE global stability?
You might not like what you get so then what do you do? I like my freedom which I won't give it up without a fight.
@@BlueFrenzy Buddy, the people running the corresponding African countries agreed to the projects
you need a lix of both, each new house or reno should have water tanks, solar power, batteries so that each house can live off grid when required
Thanks Matt for another great video. Here in France the emphasis in terms of renewables has been more on private commercial solar than on domestic solar. In the last 5 years we have seen so many farmers cover their barns in panels, companies covering their staff parking areas with solar arrays and companies putting solar on their buildings..the tax breaks for doing this are a big incentive. This has resulted in the power being drawn from the grid going down slightly year on year as companies and communities consume more of their own power. In the UK last month the first crowd funded wind turbine was installed....a 2.5 MWp machine in Wales. Funders of the turbine benefit by having their bills reduced by their share of what the turbine produces. Interesting.
And a few months ago a community-funded baseload river water-turbine was installed in Oxford! (Fish migration friendly, too.)
I think, resilience is one feature we should pay great attention to - which makes me in favour of going more decentralized. I also love the idea of "smartening up" our grids with better coordination between energy production and consumption.
One such project I find particularly intreaguing is Red Grid from Australia. Their goal is to create a fully distributed ecosystem (running on a Holochain network - look that up! Its awesome in itself!), where small energy producers like a roof-top solar array can directly communicate with appliances like fridges or air-cons.
One brilliant aspect of this project is: By using the internet as a communication-pathway, our electricity grid can become way more resilient and avoid critical peaks without having to invest in new power lines (just by upgrading the appliances). And it can grow gradually, over time. Every new connected device adds a little bit of resilience to the network...
I think we need both smaller micro-grids mostly and a few large grids. The macro grids would handle emergencies and some seasonal variations.
This is the best way. I work in Transmission, and I believe a blended approach is the best to overall reliability and cost balance. Simply put, in some areas sometimes the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't move, and it simply isn't cost effective to build triple the infrastructure or generation needed to balance a small region. Good example is just last month my region had a major energy emergency due to high demand and lack of generation because of the extreme cold. In extreme cold wind doesn't often flow and solar isn't an option in Northern December (only 2 hours of actual power generation). As a result all our fossil fuel plants were working max and we had to import power of all the surrounding regions. We were seconds away from a Texas style incident, but because of the "macro"/Transmission grid we got through. If we were islanded we would have had a collapse during -50C temperatures.
@Jorn Paul Winkler France power mix is mostly Nuclear, whereas Switzerland and Sweden are mostly hydro with significant amounts of nuclear. Nuclear is my favorite power source, same with most people who actually work in power. Renewables are a pipe dream.
"Soaking up resources" emm, what? Solar and wind are renewable, which exactly resources the UK will be soaking?
If the project runs (which I highly doubt), Morocco will get:
a) Jobs
b) Tax revenue
c) International recognition as one of the leader in renewables
And what will Morocco spend?
a) Plots of deserted land for construction of solar and wind
Pls tell me which part of this is 'ethically questioanble'
Both! Very excited about the cost of microsystems continuing to decrease making them more accessible to everyone. It makes sense that if possible the macro grid could be a backup system for the micros.
Honestly, the south-west of USA (namely southern California, Arizona, New Mexico, and westhern Texas) could have solar panels powering the whole of USA. There are also lots of small pockets of strong winds, in the USA, which could serve the same purpose. And there's also the option of using conveyor belts with paddles for hydro power with a much smaller ecological impact.
Yes, take the energy where it is the strongest, and use it for areas that don’t have it
half of Nevada and Utah as well... you could easily retire all the coal fired generation west of Denver... but you have to have HVDC and/or super conductors developed to pull it off.
Hello from Algeria and thank you for your videos :) ! We wish as scientists to contribute these efforts ! My country needs to make more efforts for these grids
Serious question: Do you trust the West enough to sell them power? Wouldn't they end up trying to control Algeria again, like they control the oil exporting Gulf States.
@@domtweed7323 I don't trust West of course. I talked about being a potential source of energy. Politics is a big part of it as you say, as much as control.
When a government says a project will pay for itself be afraid, be very afraid, lol.
Says the person whose quality of life is inextricably linked to the dams, highways, and canals governments build
@@haught7576 I'm not really sure what you're getting at there, pal. What does the existence of government run projects have to do with the promise that these projects will pay for themselves, which is rarely the truth. If a project is large enough to require government oversight, so be it, but promising more than what can be delivered is a national governmental trait in almost all countries. So, when a government says a project will pay for itself, there is good, and well founded, reason for sticker shock.
@@johnbartlet6669 governments are not businesses, they’re goal is not to make a profit. Money should not be the pursuit of our society, and evaluating government projects like that fails to understand the value they create for actual people
@@haught7576 You're right, governments are not held to truth in advertising standards, but they should be. But, I guess you think deficit spending and endless inflation are a good things.
@@johnbartlet6669 you clearly don’t know what you are talking about
I had to cut in around the 3:40 mark. I am an Electrical Engineer that works in Transmission. With the different grids in the USA, Yes they are separate grids, but no they are not completely separated. There are many HVDC interties between the East-West-Texas Grids. There are many reasons for this, easy answer is it was more cost effective than resyncing two entire grids, but it offers many advantages. Think of AC lines like Canals, they flow downhill from high to low from source to where it is needed, HVDC is like a multi directional pump with the ability to force power flow in a particular direction which can easily force power from one grid to another if there is a surplus or shortfall. Also one unmentioned perk is that if there is a catastrophic collapse, you will only lose half the continent and can use the other grid for blackstart purposes. From my experience the biggest issue with these interties are they simply are not big enough to make a significant flow difference. I personally oversee one of these interties in my day to day. Its only rated for 100MW which is really small (especially by USA power demands standards) whereas another HVDC line I oversee is capable of forcing a maximum flow of 2000MW in either direction (very useful in grid stability and mitigating power demands/supply). So when a study claims a reduction of 80% CO2 it is a pipe dream, a purely hypothetical thought experiment clearly by people that do not fully understand the complexity of Transmission. It is nice to think about taking solar power from Nevada and sending it to New York, and it is possible with an upgrade to the interties but a total AC system on the surface looks good but there are benefits to keeping grid control.
I strongly believe that personal independent generation offers far more benefits than macro-grids. I believe that energy independence on a personal scale is the only future for us. My country should be spending that money on equipping every building in the UK with renewable generation and storage, starting with low income housing.
Energy independent on a personal scale isolates you from larger failures from natural disasters or cyber terrorism, it allows you utterly complete control of your power, it greatly lowers your fixed costs, and on a large scale it stops other counties or areas from extorting you.
You are forgetting the power requirements for industry and irrigation.
Agreed. Adding communal geothermal wells and neighbourhood power systems can incorporate redundancies into multiple nano-grids that can connect to micro-grids and possibly even manifest a macro-grid. Should disasters strike.
The problem is you are ignoring economies of scale. It is much much more expensive for every home to have individual power generation and storage than it is for large systems to serve whole towns.
@@adrianthoroughgood1191 Then there wouldn't be an ROI for solar, yet there is.
@@adrianthoroughgood1191 Wrong. It isn't much more expensive to have individual power generation (IPG). The people against IPG makes it more expensive by putting blocks (Local regulations, fines, etc.) to prevent the adoptation. They have a lot to lose, billion of dollars. But, IPG cannot be stopped, technology and innovation and general population inventiveness will prevail. IPG means freedom from the "Power producing barons" and better living conditions.
I come from an area in Southern California (Imperial County) that has 365 days of sunshine. They have very little rain too. My last trip back to the U.S. I went through that area and I see they are finally putting up solar panels by the thousands. Everywhere you look there is a solar farm. What the farmers have discovered is that when you sell your water to the coastal cities you can still use your land to solar farming. You don't have the problem of labor and you get a big check every month.
Hi Matt good videos. After the fire in Kent UK.( “National Grid was forced to evacuate staff from the site of the IFA high-voltage power cable, which brings electricity from France to a converter station in Kent, where 12 fire engines attended the blaze in the early hours of Wednesday morning.”) we are still 3 months from reopening. It is a warning about macro grids eggs in one basket etc. Also you can be held to ransom by nation states. Ie Russia and the gas pipeline to Europe. It is a partial solution but has to be a mix n match. Remove subsidies from fossil fuels and create a level playing fluid. Very good animated video on Fully Charged channel if anyone wants to learn more.
I live in Kent, where abouts was the fire? Not heard about this.
@@mrpugster 15 th September, near Ashford .
@@mrpugster Sellindge. They are now saying 2 years to get back up and running. It was at the IFA plant.
@@louisleflick You could build a whole new station in under 2 years. Maybe 2 for the paint to dry on the toilet doors but operational in under 12 months assuming few setbacks.
It does however add weight to the eggs in one basket argument as does the French threats to shut down power to the channel islands.
this isn't an argument against having interconnections though.. its an argument for having LOTS of interconnections to lots of different sources so that no one source or interconnection is a big problem.
the One Sun One World One Grid (OSOWOG) project is actually about interconnecting transnational grids, not constructing a massive one grid. The project aims to connect energy grids across borders to facilitate a faster transition to the use of renewable energy. this dont ignores microgrids. we need a balance mix of macro mini micro grids.
Hi Matt. Great video! Thanks for covering this subject in depth, yet succintly. That's why I watch your videos. 👍
I think micro-grids, sparsely interconnected (at first) are the way to go. Much more resillent to the coming Climate Catastrophy, for sure. And it alleviates the NIMBY problem somewhat, i reckon. And, let's be honest, the Profit-Over-Everything problem too. The micro-er the better.
But I'm biased. I'm working on a project building and testing a 'nano-grid'. 2 1/2 buildings, 12 PV-panels, Solarthermal heating, and combined with rainwater catchment and filtering. In northern Europe. In winter... Developing the software-framework for the controlling computers. Working on an MPPT-algorithm for Solarthermal circulation-pumps. And yes, it will involve machine-learning. This is all built on Linux & Python, by the way, and i will publish this software as OpenSource, of course.
Sounds like Morocco would be a good place to move to for 25% of GB's population. Screw expanding the grid.
Hey Matt, A related interesting topic is Sun Cable from the Australian desert to Singapore.
Exactly. :)
Love your channel Matt. Few important thing I wish you would talk about in future -
1. What is the climate impact of creating renewable resource infrastructure to power majority of world's energy demand
2. What is the climate impact of need to replace solar / wind infrastructure after end of life in terms of disposal and manufacturing every few years
3. Are there enough raw materials in the world to meet worlds energy demand by Solar and Wind
4. Comparison of above points versus Nuclear plants using Uranium/ Thorium
But remember you have far more gain from a given amount of solar/wind in Morocco even allowing for the cable loses, than you would get from installing the same amount of solar/wind in the UK.
Especially over time.
@@dac545j the losses on mega volt HVDC are very small. Look at the HVDC line between UK and Norway or within china. If the Transmission voltage is high enough the losses will be just a few percent.
I recently dug a little deeper into the topic of power grids and there are coming a few things to my mind, watching your (as always) excellent video. For all German-speakers: There are two excellent episodes of the "Omega Tau" podcast (episodes 246 and 253), which dive deeply into that highly interesting topic.
The main goal of a power grid is not only to transport energy, but to do so reliably. Therefore, you always need to meet the power demand in the system by either in-/ or decreasing energy "production" (a decrease could also mean loading up a storage facility like pumped hydro...). This is equivalent in saying that the net frequency is kept stable (at 50 Hz in Europe or 60 Hz in the US). Additionally, you need to make sure, that transmission lines are not overpowered.
Historically, these goals led to the fusion of micro-grids to larger grids (in the past every village was powered by hydro power or a small power plant, but not very reliably).
Today, the most part of Europe's power grid is interconnected. This has the benefit of a quite high grid stability.
I'm not quite sure what the base-line definition of micro- and macro-grid is you referred to in the video. But I don't think that we will see small micro-grids appear ever again (like a stand-alone German grid for example) for the mentioned reasons. You would also never want to concentrate too much energy production in one area ("all eggs in one basket").
Especially with increasing renewable energy production, I think we will see more interconnection in order to stabilise the grid due to the fluctuation of production and to assure security of supply. I'm not quite sure, if the challenges of grid stability entangled with renewables are really broadly understood. Does anyone know, if the often cited low prices for renewable energy do include the necessary infrastructure upgrades for grid stability (in terms of new grid lines and storage facilities)?
What you said about offshore wind in the UK not going beyond a 40% capacity factor is wrong. The newest 12-13MW turbines can have capacity factors of up to 63% in the right locations.
as I understand it, the 40% is what can be readily accessed. As you said the newest turbines have a capacity UP TO 63% IN THE RIGHT LOCATIONS (and probably under optimal conditions). When dealing with power grids/utilities they need to be conservative with estimates.
Windmills kill billions of birds a year.
@@scottslotterbeck3796 no they don't
@@calebmauer1751 So hundreds of millions of birds killed by windmills is OK to you?
Loser.
I hope both are developed concurrently. I also hope that the third element: advancements in energy storage, also plays a key role in the next few years.
Micro grids that share when it is convenient seems like the best bet. If two countries have a fight the country in charge of generating power will simply slow down the power supply.
Can you say Russia and Ukraine
I'm not entirely sure I understand what you are saying. The inherent problem with a micro-grid is that every member will be having the same problem at the same time - I would only "share" my electricity when my battery is full and I'm generating a surplus over my consumption. If the local weather is crap then all my neighbours and I be in the same boat and there'll be no benefit to anyone.
I just want to thank you Matt, you are really great in explaining the topic which is always super excinting, disruptive and great to eat lunch with 😄 Farewell in new year!
I think something being ignored is how we can reduce the amount of electricity we need and lessen the amount of batteries that need to be produced, since both of those reduce emissions significantly. As an example, we already have electric trains that charge off of cables (no batteries) but not many of them, and we could use bikes more for local transportation. You should make a video on something like this, a simpler future and how it could work.
Is there a general graph on where electricity is used? Heating, Lighting, Industrial, Consumer electronics, Food, etc.
@@JeffPalmer42 Not that I know of, but you can probably find one. I just shared what I am most familiar with at the moment.
much of commuter rail and most if not all subways run on electric (in the US). The problem with extending their use further is mostly that the infrastructure isn't there. As solar/wind farms become more of a thing, the ranges for electric rail increases.
@@Babarudra I know, but I think we should get more of that infrastructure and phase out cars as much as possible. Cars are not great forms of transportation.
@@Kaito_Falcon the problem I have with that line of thinking is that it's really the production of electricity that contributes the most to environmental issues, and transportation of goods via truck, rail and ship after that. Politicians and corporations like to point at individuals as being the problem, but it's really their own interests that are the problem. They know that no matter what, we will buy their new cars, and use their rail lines, and buy their products. We are the once that are the only ones who wind up changing anything.
As for changing the infrastructure, you know who will actually pay for that too, right? If we want serious change in the US, we need to change how things are paid for. Most European and Asian infrastructure is so much more advanced than the US because they upgrade things, in the US we repair things when they break, and we do so with the minimal cost. We only replace things when there is no cheaper alternative. The financial bottom line is the only thing that makes changes in the US.
You say micro grids suffer less from transmission loss. That makes sense. But are they more efficient in the first place? Large generation and distribution networks generally put a strong emphasis on optimizing every step of the process. What is done right up front, makes more money later. I would think micro grids generally can not invest in that degree of optimization.
Remember those ‘solid hydrogen’ tapes you mentioned in a prior video?
Charting of those tapes with hydrogen would be a great use of a macro grid in a desert. Don’t need any power lines since the energy is used on-site. Just have to ship the product afterwards.
That was bullshit, he should be embarrassed for making it and you should be embarrassed for buying into it. Channels like this do more than good putting out crap like that.
@@nustada oh, that one was a scam he accidentally hyped? well not too surprising since he touts a lot of new tech stuff all the time. bound to fall into a trap from time to time.
If you think about energy production as an economies of scale question the micro grid idea seems like a better bet in many areas. Making it so we can achieve constant returns to scale for each building that can produce its own energy without having a ton of distance to travel is how I think about the future
This has been my favourite optimistic solution to low carbon electricity for a year or so. Ever since I found out how insanely expensive and mineral intensive grid scale battery storage was. It is always sunny somewhere in the world. If you could link up the world with a super grid then all the intermittency problems of renewables go away without having to use large scale storage. Sure it's expensive and there will be losses. But economies of scale mean they will not be as large as you at first think. If it could be done imagine the potential.
But cables are resource intensive too. I think microgrids spur innovation as you need to make due with what is around you.
As an electrical engineer working with rural communities in Uganda to power up their livelihood with solar, micro grids will play a major role in electrifying the world. Transmission lines are very expensive and most of the off grid communities don’t even need too much power. The just want to keep the lights on and run a few household appliances.
They have no EVs, washing machines, air conditioning or any other related appliances.
Micro grids will be very vital especially in the developing world. The MDCs can afford long HV lines and their people use a lot of electricity. That makes sense for them to invest in transmission and distribution lines. They just have to make them smart, so they can integrate rooftop solar and other alternative clean energies.
IMO, a network of micro grids that are linked and can share loads with a larger mega grid would be ideal. Generation can be local to even the state level depending on the size. It should be encouraged for counties to develop their own green generation as well, mainly solar or wind. But they should still all be connected so in an emergency power can be taken from multiple sources to help the affected areas.
The EU, Morocco, Algeria and the UK should work together and install a solar & wind powered energy solution and grid. In exchange, Morocco and Algeria should get a percentage of the electricity for their own use, free. That would be a win-win situation for all parties. This should be done by the EU and UK governments, not by private corporations. If countries like Senegal and Mali would join, it could also keep a lot of local people from migrating to Europe while at the same time make us independent from Russian gas and tsar Wladimir.
Don't you worry that, if the West starts importing power from North Africa, they'll seek to control it like they control the Middle Eastern oil exporters? (not that they don't already try, but they'll have more incentive to interfere.)
Hey Matt. Thanks for your content! Always very interesting and educational. I'm finishing my bachelors degree in environmental engineering in switzerland. My thesis is about eTanks. Have you heard about them? They are seasonal thermal energy storage systems for buildings. Usually about 100m2 in area and 2-3 meters deep filled with normal sand and PE-Pipes. All sides are thermally isolated except below, so some geothermal energy can flow into the system too. The main part of the energy comes from solarthermal panels on the rooftop of the building. They are already being built in germany and switzerland and they work great! The main advantage is, that you don't have to build complicated structural systems. Just dig a hole, fill with sand and PE-Pipes and put your house on it. Usually you have to dig anyway because of foundations and stuff. Quick calculations with dry sand and no geothermal energy give a storage capacity of about 705kWh at a temperature range of 6-23°C. These temperatures are great in combination with heat pumps. Let me know if you want to hear more about the topic or my little research (combination with phase changing materials)
I fear the one sun, one world, etc. model. Too much "All Eggs in One Basket" concept. Energy should definitely be decentralized. Thanks for all you do. I love your channel!
Except that the "one sun, one world, one grid" concept is anything but "all eggs in one basket". Europe already has, effectively, a single grid. It also currently has energy connections outside of Europe - the controversial natural gas pipelines from Russia, natural gas from Tunisia , electricity from Morocco etc. There are proposals to build an interconnector from Iceland to Europe so Iceland can export electricity generated from it's geo-thermal areas. There are others around the World - there's a proposal to build a 4,200km, 17-20GW inter-connector from Australia to Singapore (the "sun cable") for instance. And many of these connections will be a two way street - the UK is planning to "over build" off-shore wind power, for instance and at certain times it will be a net exporter to it's neighbours.
Not all of these things will be built but enough will be that there will be an ad-hoc worldwide grid - you are reading what I type because exactly this kind of thing has been built worldwide for the internet. Given redundancy then a problem in one place can be avoided as energy is routed around it.
I used to work in wind energy. Although I specialized in estimating the energy output of potential wind farms, I was also interested in grid integration. When you plot consumption over time, and also production from renewable sources over time, you can typically break down the function into a cyclic element and a random element. When you study the matching of supply to demand, you realize that statistical correlations between demand and supply become important. A few examples: In hot sunny climates where people use air conditioners, there is a correlation between sunniness and the demand for electricity for air conditioning. In cold climates where people use electricity to heat in the winter, there is a correlation between windiness and demand for electricity for heating, because of the wind chill effect.
There is another statistical effect which is the reduction in variance when you look at the resource over a larger and larger area. For example if you look at a single wind farm or solar installation, windiness and sunniness will vary with a certain variance. But if you interconnect a series of wind farms or solar plants spread over a large area the size of European country or region of the USA, much of the variability due to random fluctuations in windiness or cloudiness will cancel out. You further reduce the variability if you use and interconnect multiple sources of renewable electricity, such as solar, wind and hydro-electricity.
Another factor is the time lag between cycles of demand and production. For example, electricity demand tends to peak twice a day, around the time people wake up and then in the evening when people eat supper and before they go to bed, but solar production tends to peak at noon. So if you can connect areas in different time zones, you can improve the correlation between supply and demand.
the advantage of connecting grids over continental-scale areas, is that you reduce the variability of random variations in production and demand, and you can also reduce the phase difference in the cyclical components of supply and demand by transporting electricity across time zones.
An additional factor is that with large-scale grid integration, you can take advantage of certain forms of power that have an inherent ability to store energy. The best example is the type of hydro-electric plans that have large reservoirs. If connected to a large grid, the production capacity can be increased and the hydro plant can be used as a sort of large-scale battery, only producing electricity when other sources run short of demand. You can do the same sort of thing with geothermal plants.
Windmills kill billions of birds a year. Disgusting.
Is wireless transmission not the answer to all?
@@scottslotterbeck3796 "Wind turbines are estimated to kill between 140,000 and 500,000 birds a year through accidental collisions, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service." Various safeguards have been and are being implemented to reduce these deaths. Both the National Wildlife Federation and the Audubon Society also support the expansion of wind power, however, on grounds that greenhouse gas emissions and climate change pose a far bigger threat to birds than turbines. WSJ published an article on this in June 2021. Meanwhile, house cats, cars, and buildings continue to kill billions of birds a year in the USA.
@@musicbycarleton4516 I hate windmills and Left wing nuts claim they are for nature, when in fact all they care about is F---ing Money!
Are you one of the greedy bastards?
No more windmills! Nuclear power doesn't kill birds, does it?
@@musicbycarleton4516 the Audubon society is just a buch of f---ing hypocrites and no amount of bull crap from you will change that
Nuclear power kills no big rds.
You money grubbing SOB freeze in the dark turd.
Many countries will always want to produce their own energy, at least enough to sustain themselves in times of war.
I remember back in the 70's (DC vs. AC) Dc current loses power/voltage at such a rate that the copper wires would have to be huge to mitigate the losses. (something on the order of 1 foot diameter wire to run only a couple of blocks) That is 1 reason Tesla won over Ben Franklin. Hi voltage AC has little loss over many miles...
The losses you are talking about are because low voltage, indeed, at same voltage DC has less losses.
The advantage of AC is that it can be transformed to high voltage, transport it over long distances with low losses, then transformed back to low voltage easily.
But nowadays the same thing can de done with DC, the equipment is more expensive, but the reduction is losses is worth in certain caes.
Thomas Edison vs Nicola Tesla, but that's what I understood too. First power plants were DC, however a generator was needed every few miles due to DC line loss. Tesla came up with AC which can be transmitted long distance with far less loss.
That was actually a low voltage DC line. Power loses occurs not because it's AC o DC but because of the voltage level. At that time the technology to convert High Voltage DC to transmit and then Low voltage DC to actually use it, wasn't practical (the known method was using a synchronous motor) so AC won because it could be converted easily with high efficiency using transformers. Tesla won because he thought in everything... Over Thomas Alva Edison 😁
@@equednow Exactly.
And AC has the disadvantage that it emits electromagnetic radiation, losing some energy in the process.
@@arcachofo So, AC has that collapsing field which allows a transformer to cheaply boost voltage for transmission. Today's electronics allow high voltage AC to be converted to high voltage DC, which has big long distance transmission advantages. Well, that's pretty dang cool! Lots happening with electric power these days!
Living in San Francisco, where electricity is now above 30¢ per kWh, it's basically at the point where "block-level" micro-grids are financially preferable for a city block of homes. Homeowners could basically collaborate to get solar on all of their roofs and have a small "battery hut" sitting in the center of the block. In all, they will generate more than enough power during the most sensitive seasons (summer/fall when we have fires) to be self-sustaining should that be necessary. They can also remain grid-tied to sell power back to the grid but cut out from the grid if there's an interruption in grid power and still operate as a micro-grid.
This has the added benefit of no longer paying through the nose to the for-profit utility PG&E that has started fires that have killed dozens of people and caused tens of billions of dollars in damage, all while they have failed to maintain the grid because they funnel the money to execs.
Sam Francisco should secede from America. No one wants your sh*t. Literally.
Whether Macro or Micro, really depends of storage cost against cost of long-distance cables. The UK for example, a few times a year has limited wind or solar for up to 5 consecutive days. At current prices would cost Trillians of pounds to be covered solely by battery storage (the problem with micro grids they need a lot of storage)
Plus the UK is planning over generation of offshore wind. So eventually will offten generate much more capacity than needed (which will also help cover the lighter wind days).
The UK's cheaper solution has been to install many cables to the neighbours (Norway, Netherlands, Belgium, France and Irland) and is planning many more to Germany, Demark, Sweeden and Morocco..............
Most of these cables will be Synonym relationships, power travelling back and forth depending on requirements, so in everybodies interest to maintain a working system. And minimal money payments if system balanced.
And many European countries and surrounding neighbours are also connecting (making one massive macro grid)
And with multiple connections criss crossing will be like the internet, one node goes down you just divert around creating a stable system.
This works on the principle, there is always renewable energy being generated somewhere, so lets share our excess.
So, a mini-One-World type of thing. Other countries might join in and then this "sharing" could grow kind of organically ... am I right?
@@dac545j Indeed - after all, who is going to get together and plan this stuff worldwide? You can't rely on politicians to do anything unless someone is giving them money to get off their behinds. There are a number of shorter (as in a few hundred km) cables suggested to connect Southern Europe with North Africa, a cable has been suggested to connect Icelandic geo-thermally generated electricity to the UK ("Icelink") and thence to Europe. That's a 1200km cable - Iceland to Labrador in Canada would be about twice that distance. Australia to Singapore has been proposed so that solar electricity from Australia can supply Singapore, and there are numerous shorter proposals.
At the moment the key restriction is the the lack of cable production - once that is solved then it could be like the 19th century railway boom.
I personally favor the micro grid system being meshed to form larger, more resilient macro grids. PG&E in California has been regularly shutting off power to communities during high wind in an attempt to avoid lawsuits over wildfires sparked by their power lines. I especially like home solar +battery in my region. There is more upfront cost, but it gives the home owner independence and more awareness of their own power use. Obviously, that isn't going to work for everyone, but local community managed power sources help give the locals control over what happens in their area. Maybe they'll want to partner with a wind farm management company to supply power for local use, but they could decide to make it larger and sell the power to other communities to help pay for a school or something. I could see a system similar to how streets and interstates work, with larger governments controlling the macro grid.
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Hi Matt, Thanks for an interesting video, but before we talk about macro versus micro grids we need to make sure we have done everything possible to reduce the demand for electricity. Have we replaced every incandescent light bulb with LED? Are we building buildings that are truly energy efficient? So on and so on. Until we reduce our outrageous pattern of over consumption, it's going to be extremely difficult to meet carbon neutral goals.
Not a problem in the UK, electricity will be 50p per kWh soon…
Deport all 32 million illegals, starting with the 2 million Europeans here illegally.
@@scottslotterbeck3796 hopefully you’re on your imaginary list too.
Great breakdown as always, Matt!
For anyone who doesn’t want the simple solution of nuclear, Lofstrom’s power loop idea seems to be the ideal combo of transmission and power storage. The longer the loop, the more power it can store.
Ideas don't always translate perfectly in reality. Let's hope we stop using things that can destroy us or our planet to power our planet.
I don't have any faith in anything that requires multiple governments to cooperate. 4th generation nuclear sounds like a real base load solution
We will be using dilithium crystals to generate power in the future.
Future power grids will depend on z combination of dispersed and centralized generating and storage systems. We're already on this path with PV systems which are both dispersed (e.g. rooftop) and centralized (PV farms); however, not all locations are practical for PV systems and there's the issue of night time generation. Future energy production will depend much more on solar (PV and wind), geothermal, hydroelectric, and tidal generation of electricity. Nuclear power will be a thing of the past and will be joined by burning fossil fuels. The key will be storage systems.
@@DynamicHaze It is the power produced that ultimately makes it dangerous.
Another great video! Proud to be a supporter!
Great stuff! As in most things the blend of the two makes sense, as you state. Economics, not politics should predominate the decision-making with security as the one exception. Economic decisions integrate more real world considerations than politics. You also mention cyberattacks. Physical attacks and other energy security considerations probably tilt the scales toward micro-grids as distributed systems are more robust against failure - as you also mentioned!
Good comment Edmond. I'll take your argument one step further. Engineering, not politics, should predominate the decision-making .....
@@solarute6066 Good point. With an engineering approach there's also room to include business continuity / continuity of operations considerations which are often ignored by purely economic considerations. As national critical assets (not to mention safety of life), power grids should have strict reliability requirements.
Here in the Western world, modern history favors political might over economical reason. Support of the Macro is the de-facto route that politicians seem to favor as it has a more conventional familiarity.
I think modular micro grids will ultimately win out. Costs will go down to build them and they can be unique to the use of each local area.
Hello, I am Mouad from Morocco. I follow your channel’s content and follow everything you provide. Just a note regarding the map of Morocco that you put several times incomplete and short without the southern desert of the Kingdom. I hope you will take this point into consideration in your future projects around Morocco. Looking forward to your next episode, please accept all my respect and appreciation
We should do both. Grids should be connected by default, but also independent by default. For example, when I buy a house, I'm going to put a large solar array on the roof and include a battery pack. I'd like to make the solar array big enough to handle the average load of the house, plus a little more, with a battery pack big enough to smooth things out and last through a couple days of bad production because of snow or clouds. So in general, I'll be producing more than I need at a higher up front cost. Some people will prefer to keep their up front costs low, and rely on the grid, or have a smaller solar and battery system, and so while the grid is running I can sell them my excess electricity at a fair price.
There is nothing stopping an independent microgrid from connecting to the larger grid, retaining the ability to disconnect, or simply not draw power (and possibly output power) to the larger grid if the larger grid has a problem. Ideally, every low density building is energy independent, and sends excess power to high density buildings that don't have the roof space to produce their own energy (they should still have solar on their roof, but on a tall building the roof area is proportionally less). Ideally most cities and towns are energy independent, and sell their excess to higher density cities. Ideally each region is energy independent, and the transfers energy to other regions to keep batteries balanced. For example, if a hurricane hits the Southeast and the winds are too high to safely operate wind turbines in the region, and the dense clouds drop solar output, the region could operate on battery power, but since the surrounding areas are getting high winds on the edges of the storm and overproducing wind relative to the average, they can send that excess in to the cities affected by the storm. This way, the batteries stay full, and if the grid is damaged by the storm, the batteries can last longer while repairs are made.
Redundancy has value in this kind of system. If my house works by itself, I can help my neighbors out and they can help me out, depending who needs it. If my city works by itself, I can help the next city over, and they can help me, depending on who needs it at that moment.
I think Moltex Energy - Stable Salt Reactor W is the only thing we'll need, or maybe nuclear fusion. Other SMRs are pretty good too.
I think Moltex's SSR-W reactor should be the replacement for coal in countries that already have PWRs. Though I believe that we need renewables to give us flexibility for our energy sources.
According to lazard even amortized nuclear plants cannot compete on cost with renewables plus grid scale storage.
How is that gonna be any better with new constructions?
@@Tobias-ld2pv The costs being suggested are 3.5 - 7 cents KWh
Renewables are great, it's just I'm not sure what storage can be used when the wind is really weak over Europe for a week or two, esp in winter. UK uses about 40 GW per hour. For 30 GW x 24 x 7 = 5040 GWh.
What storage can cover that?
The most cost effective and efficient power grid probably ought to be a combination of the following:
Micro Grid + local power generation at homes & businesses
Mid Level/regional Grids (intermediary between micro & macro)
Macro Grid (Distributed in the appropriate regions & funded by all producers/consumers)
Combining the three different types of grids would allow for a more sustainable and robust grid should power generation be affected locally or internationally by (insert various factors here - storm, war, trade dispute ect).
Always love your videos Matt.
Thanks Matt for this very important video. Personally I like the independence of a micro gird. In fact I like a micro grid down to the size of a building or house (i.e. create and use your own power and be power independent from the big brother grids, a very American independent idea, BTW I'm Canadian eh!). Passive Haus houses get close to that in our region of the world (ASHRAE CZ 5, 6, includes MA where you live). But Passive Haus on existing buildings is impossible (eg. how do you insulate under the foundation of an existing house or insulate a house constructed with brick veneer). At the moment nearly 100% of our building stock is not PH and with an average lifespan of over 100 years moving our building stock to PH isn't going to happen soon. Other PH ideas can be retrofitted easier like heat pumps (I like ground source although initially more expensive they will get us closer to 100% renewable power, require a lot less generation and transmission in the existing grid and is the only hope of being completely renewable off grid in a northern climate), air sealing and attic insulation. Since solar power above 40ish degrees latitude is challenging in the winter, solar alone isn't the answer for northern climates and extreme southern climates (like southern Chile) have a similar analogue . So solar and wind is required. Wind in the city is challenging (maybe small vertical axis wind turbines combined with solar and batteries get most of us northerners there economically) But what of those of us who live in a solar and wind challenged climate (is that England and Belgium?). They have to have renewables transmitted from away. So I conclude, you are right we need a combination and it is likely micro and regional macro grids.
Works fine for housing, but there’s plenty that it wouldn’t work for e.g., industry (makes up about 30% of energy consumption), powering electric trains etc.
I agree with everything you said but would like to add that being self sufficient kn installation as well as just owning the system is a big part. If you buy or build a tractor then you can dig your geothermal setup which is most of the cost for geothermal. Personally I believe 80% of our needed energy can be supplied be the ground and the sun with a few basic methods. I like the idea of a heat pump preheating water from an electric well getting filtered and then going through a solar water heater and then an electric tankless water heater. I feel this method will heat the water to about 150F and then if you need it hotter the tankless heater can boost it but it reduces the need for electric ti very little.
I currently live in Belgium in a Passive House with lots of solar and a 36kwh battery, but I really need a wind turbine for my winter power usage (can’t charge my electric car and heat my buffer vat with hot water with 2kwh sun we get on a sunny winter day)
I’m looking into a small wind turbine, But due to the laws of physics a bigger one that is shared within the community makes a lot more sense indeed.
I might set up a test case with a small vertical axis one on top of the shed, it that will never cover everything.
You seem to have a lot of the same ideas as I do, feel,free to hit me up if you have some more ideas for me ;)
In Australia there is a project by a company called Sun cable where they want to run a cable from WA to Singapore which is about 5000km away across an ocean, all I can think about is if a company sees that its feasible financially to run a cable that far then the Australian government must be incompetent or corrupt or both to not already have put mega solar farms in the deserts outside of all our major cities or at least announced it at COP26 instead of the embarrassing content less lip service they offered instead...Meanwhile the world burns and they keep stacking away the cash instead.
Global grid wont happen.. micro makes sense and reduces political risk.
Imo, both, micro won't be able to supply power to large industrial centers
Not to mention 50hz vs 60hz. A surprising number of commercial and consumer electronics utilize their local AC frequency for sync and other timing
if it has a south facing roof it ought to have solar panels with net metering,its not rocketship science
I think micro grids are simpler and more cost efficent and less intursive in the event of an outage.
About a month ago the channel Veritasium did a video explaining that electrical power is not due to flows of electrons through wires, but is due to traveling magnetic fields around the wire. I can't reconcile the explanation in that video with the undersea cables. It is right up there with the notion of electrons not actually being anywhere.
Having worked in the grid-scale renewable energy industry the past 15-years, I can assuredly say the power grid is quickly transitioning to: solar, wind, hydro, geothermal and small nuclear energy. Every grid operator knows that gas, oil and coal are quickly phasing out due primarily to high costs and also due to environmental concerns. Other techs like wave energy may be added to the mix but solar, wind, hydro and SMR's are looking to be the primary energy sources in the near future.
Personally I think both are very necessary.
Microgrids will reduce our reliance on large industrial size power plants while also providing energy independence.
While a macro grid would allow for economics of scale, boost the local economies of typically downtrodden nations, make international cooperation more essential and in my opinion safeguard against the inevitable rise in domestic power consumption which simply can't be done with micro grids.
I think we will inevitably see growth of both the international interconnectors AND micro grids that is already happening at an ever increasing pace. Despite the raw materials requirements & high costs associated with it, certain parts of the globe may not have much choice but to create a far greater degree of ⚡ generation integration between countries in our bid to fully decarbonise our energy, manufacturing & transportation systems. When it comes to preserving the habitability of our world, although it seems unimaginable given the historical approach to building all types of infrastructure, I think that cost alone may not continue to play the same vital underlying role it has traditionally & conventionally done. I think the costs/risk ratio associated with (not) going all in with renewables will outweigh costs of doing so; in an uninhabitable world, there is no business or profits.
Great content Matt,thanks for sharing 😁
I suspect solar will be largely obsolete within a few decades. There's a company in the UK that has built modified solar panels that generate electricity from the energy given off by radioisotopes. Put one of these modified solar panels and an isotope into a secure metal box and it will generate electricity for decades without maintenance. The prototypes already exist and the first mass production facility is due to be built this year. No more need for intermittent technologies or grid storage once this new technology becomes mainstream. The power cells are portable and modular so will support both macro and micro grids quite nicely. The company is called Infinite Power if you want to read about it.
Is that for real?
@@dantealexander9863 Yeah, the last I read is that they are getting the supply chain sorted in readiness for mass production. But their timetable has slipped and mass production won't start this year anymore.
We already have transcontinental grids for gas distribution - and we can see that puts the net receiver countries under huge political pressure from the producers whenever their goals diverge (to put it in polite terms)
@@rogerstarkey5390 yeah I don’t understand people’s point on this. Energy is valuable, if you have to buy it from someone else, of course they will have pressure on you, no matter how you get the power.
@@rogerstarkey5390 My point (which was perhaps not explicit enough) was in favour of local generation / storage / micro grids rather than just shifting to another environment that puts power on remote states for energy supply.
Several points to re-emphasize in favor of micro-grids-
1. Homeowners as sources of solar capital investment. Politically, it is an easier sell to raise utility rates to fund solar incentives than it is to fund a utility-run solar farm and energy storage system.
2. Resiliency. As the effects of climate change increase, the stresses on a centralized grid will as well (not to mention politically sourced grid hacks, grid failures in adapting to new energy sources, etc.). Micro-grids provides insurance against centralized grid failures.
3. Psychology. In general, people like to feel in control. Microgrids address this sentiment by allowing homeowners to go off-grid.
That said, there needs to be a blend of regional grids and microgrids, and investment in both to make everything more efficient and cost effective.
Here are some key insights:
- The Grid has losses, but so does batteries. Some Batteries has losses from 10-20%. Thats as much as a HVDC cable has over serveral thousand km.
- Batteries are good when PV shines consistent through the whole year (Battery does lots of full cycles, not much battery needed for self-sufficiency). In northern regions most of the Energy in the winter will come from Windturbines. If the grid is big enough, wind gehts uncorrelated, means there is always somewhere Windpower. Distributing Energy from Solar around the world would need a grid nearly completly arround the world. With Wind a few thousand km are enough.
- A (HVDC) cable reduces the needed storage on both ends!
conclusion: We need both, microgrids with some storage, but also a really powerfull macrogrid to reduce the needed storage.
It occurs to me that as EV's become the norm they will have the potential to be a natural storage system when all connected via the grid. The owner dials in his/her immediate needs. Any surplus over that would be available to the grid as required.
Whats really important on the high voltage DC Worldwide Macro grid is the fact that while the other side of the world in darkness it is being supplied from where the sun is shining, saving storage costs and balancing out other country supplies, accounting payments and costs. Conversion at the country to 3 phase AC only needs to take place when necessary and then go back to local supply as the sun comes up. Spare power can be stored in any country taht can take it and used later on the worldwide grid
I believe micro grids will be ever more impactful as we go toward 2030. The grid will remain important backbone. And over time, as we all have DC converters on homes, businesses and even wind / solar regional farms, we can then covert national grid to all DC. It would make the whole system more efficient as well.
I work in the industry. Institute for Sustainable Infrastructure in DC. @Matt - you are correct in the assumption that the future power grid or power supply system will be a mix of everything.
There are the first solar power plants that produce 1kWh for less than US $ 0.01. It makes sense that countries use the advantages of locations like North Africa in stable countries. Yet I am not sure if long power supply cables on the ocean floor make sense - haven't we learned anything from the North Stream II sabotage events?
Any infrastructure must become sustainable and resilient at the same time - while the term resilient has a new and expanded meaning.
This does not mean one should forget about the power generation in North Africa, Australia or Chile. One of the most important power supply solutions is to use the biggest and existing power supply system. Fuel!
Instead of running on fossil fuels, macro-, and microgrids have to run on E-Fuels. No joke!
I know it is a tempting and dirty issue. But this would make storing energy so much simpler and could include a long-term (6 to 18 months strategic) storage feasible without reinventing the wheel. This is NOT to be understood as a prolonging of the ICE car industry - it is meant as an important part of the solution for the existing car and truck pool. There are an estimate 1.4 billion ICE cars today. The shipping industry and aviation will always need fuel and I am not a big believer in sustainable electric aviation. Sustainably sourced and energy-dense batteries are stil far away.
Produce cheap energy in North Africa and all the other great locations and produce E-fuels in large-scale production facilities. There are obviously big advantages in the efficiency in hydrogen production and CO2 sequestration.
Microgrids are an important part (Nokia has done a lot of research in this field) - but they must run carbon-neutral. And there come E-fuels as a backup solution... seasonal or short-term.
Could you transfer power via satellites instead of via cable? So like starlink but for electircity?
That’s what I was thinking too
Centralization has one advantage: it is cheaper when all is going well. Localization has all the other advantages. It is more secure from natural and human catastrophe. It provides jobs. Supports the local economy. Is diversified in it solutions. Keeps the people focused on the local good.
The utility industry in the USA is actively fighting against anything but their continued dominance. This is being done both economically and politically.
finally content that doesnt come from startups. the answer though is simple, microgrids those get more sun and the colder regions will have to get their power from others
Hi Matt, the load factor of most power grids is not more than 35% because we're still managing peak loads through transmission lines. The very moment you build a hybrid systems with energy storage close to demand centers transmission line load factors go up as well. As you discussed before (Ambri.com) energy storage is the key solution to enable both micro-grids and using the current large scale transmission system much more efficient.
It’s going to be a combination of both. Micro grids will probably do a lot of the heavy lifting for residential and minor city demands, but macro grids will fill in the gaps for industrial and global applications. In emergency situations both can be utilized. Imagine your neighborhood loses power, but your neighbor has his own micro grid. He could probably power a home or two, but not the entire town. For that, his micro grid could serve a substation for the unencumbered macro grid several hundred miles away, therein powering everyone’s home while disaster relief does their thing.
HVDC, superconductors, improved HVAC (like, cooling/heating)... could handle all the US west of Dallas all the way up with solar in the SW, wind up the center, existing hydro in the PNW... Start this stuff by building grid segments of mixed generation sized and configured to replace all coal in an area, then work down some of the NG ... through time, connect them all and flow to the rest - eventually you don't have to do things everywhere because your over capacity starts meeting base levels in areas without the generation...
Matt doesn't dwell on the fact that 50% of HVAC can go to line losses and HVDC which is used to minimize line loss still has a substantial amount. When you are getting statistics from the power monopoly's just remember what M Twain had to say about statistics. "Statistics don't lie but liars can make statistics." It is in the interests of the power monopolies to pint themselves in the best light especially when there is nothing to prove them wrong. The power monopolies were subsidized into existence.....they didn't evolve because they were the most efficient way to make power.
The resiliency of microgirds shouldn’t be underestimated.
One more argument for microgrids: They can be updated more easily as technology evolves. OTOH, larger grid operators are more easily regulated so to provide uninterrupted, 60Hz, clean power to people too poor to afford a microgrid. One of the reasons my solar panels were as cheap as they were was that I am not burdened with the requirements governments place on the large grid operators. If my power goes out, I can depend on them. I can depend of them because they are regulated and audited to be dependable. Micro and macro grids are, therefore, in a bit of a dance where each partner brings something special to the arrangement.
You missed the huge Sun Cable project to take solar from Australia and transmit it to Singapore
Great video Matt
But isn't the eu already 1big power grid? I mean in belgium we constantly buy electricity from Germany if whe have a shortage, and than Germany buys from Denmark and Norway. And so on.
This is what I heard
we've already drilled to where it's too hot to drill past, but geothermal keeps getting missed.
you can drill anywhere.
perfect for base load in any grid, but can easily be deployed locally in the middle of industrial or residential areas.
we know how to drill.
we know steam generation.
all relatively cheap technology.
even geothermal is not new tech. iceland has done it for decades.
with deep drilling, it can now be done anywhere.
I think we need both. We need to go more macro and more micro. I know that sounds odd, I am just thinking a big MACRO could save cost and environment in the LONG term but it would take a generation or likely more to get done, but micro can get done so much faster and would be a great backup when the macro is scaled up. It's not just money or environment but TIME is a major factor in this.
3:19 had to rewind just to check this again. Unifying the US grid could reduce CO2 emissions for electricity by 80%. And save $47.2bn pa. Staggering.
I have my doubts about how much of these claims are true.
@@davidturner4076 yes, such claims should be backed by references.
The point about macrogrids saving money in the US at 3:40 isn't really about it being a micro grid or macro grid. It's about the sources of power generation.
What is a clear fact, power is better consumed close to the source of generation. This gives the least amount of loss. If there is less loss then less energy had to be generated, and in fact this saves money.
If you were to go on the notion of a distributed grid, and this would work really well in the southwest US, where you have solar panels on most homes, and all new homes, in the summer time when AC is running most the day, the power needed to run that AC is being generated right next to the consumption. CLEARLY in term of loss through transmission, this is a very effective model. If you added local utility generation to this, along with grid storage, solar panels being right in the area of consumption all of a sudden becomes not only viable, but very efficient. The amount of excess power being generated when homes aren't running an AC unit since they cycle on and off throughout the day means that power would be charging local grid storage, so it STILL isn't being transmitted over long distance. I don't think this would work well left to the homeowner though since each home is part of a distributed grid. The investment would be through business and local govt and the people who live in the home would be paying a small investment fee each month along with a very small cost/KWh. Those who consume less, pay less.
So, this is a microgrid, except that it would also be connected to a state or regional grid, making it a macrogrid. I can't think of a more efficient grid than something like this, and I would assume that would also mean you could cut down on the amount of transmission lines needed that carry power long distance, since each area of consumption is both a generator and consumer of power.
To this you would add a natural gas plant, which is much better than coal, as a backup. While this doesn't get you to zero emissions, it gets you very close, and most importantly it's VERY feasible and cost effective, and that matters.
Regarding your point about “Rich UK using poorer countries resources”. I read the XLINK proposal, and they worked with Morocco to find land that the local power companies didn’t want or need. I still don’t think this project will happen, but hopefully they will build a cable factory anyway.
I live in the UK. I have a Tesla Powerwall 2 connected to the grid and am on a Tesla tariff with my utility company. They take electricity between 16:00 and 19:00 and pay me for it. I pay them the same rate the rest of the day. In the summer, they obviously pay me for the solar I export to them at that rate too.
An interesting question might also be, why aren't we committing more industrial infrastructure dollars to the desert. Bring the most energy-intensive production to the most energy-rich locations, and then ship the finished product to the end user. Added benefit, you're placing the footprint of that industry on barren land rather than clearing forests to build factories.
The US should consider covering Interstate 40 from the East coast to the West coast with solar panels ~20 feet above the roadway. No farm land needs to be used/covered up.
The way to make large grids reliable is to give every constituent a piece of the action.
I think microgrids will play a big role in the energytransition, but to stabilize the energy supply, big and efficient solar and wind farms in Morocco will catch up if the energy would be used for the production of hydrogen. This energy carrier will provide a stabil energy supply at any time, it s sustainable to produce and it is easy to store. There is also no need to construct large cabels because hydrogen can be transported in liquid or gas state. I really think this will be the future.
I think 50-100 years from now, it will be common practice for new buildings to generate their own electrical needs via solar roofs or other emerging solar materials or paints. I think 100 years from now it will be no more exceptional for a building to generate all of its own electricity, than it is today for a building to have indoor plumbing.
Hey, I work in the solar industry. I think micro grids make sense for a few select locations (that change depending on what is implemented) but no doubt I think that there is still a lot of business and money to be made in the industry and I'm honestly surprised that more local and large governments don't utilize it more. There's been a lot of growth but Imho I think it could explode anytime. Lots of jobs to be made, lots of money and it's making a difference for the better. Thanks