Greening The Grid: What Would It Take? (VIDEO)

The Western United States is rich in renewable energy - both sun and wind. Harnessing this energy could help the nation reduce its carbon footprint and air pollution. The question is how to deliver this energy production to the densely population areas where it can be readily consumed. Modernizing and expanding the Western electric grid could require building 4,000 to 8,000 new miles of power lines by 2015, which would cost billions of dollars. Not rewiring the grid for renewable energy, however, would have an even greater cost.

Assignment Earth reports on greening the grid:

WATCH:

Related:
GREENING THE GOVERNMENT
Green Investing Slows, Perhaps Marking Shift To New Biofuels

Comments

[sheila]

you all might be interested to hear the US government's take on whether or not we need wilderness-killing power infrastructure:

"A more realistic scenario involves distributing these same PV systems throughout the 50 states. Currently available sites"such as vacant land, parking lots, and rooftops"could be used. The land requirement to produce 800 gigawatts would average out to be about 17 x 17 miles per state. Alternatively, PV systems built in the "brownfields""the estimated 5 million acres of abandoned industrial sites in our nation's cities"could supply 90% of America's current electricity. These hypothetical cases emphasize that PV is not "area-impaired" in delivering electricity."

http://www1.eere.energy.gov/solar/myths.html

got that? 90% of America's electricity could be generated with only 10% efficient PV (like early thin film) from BROWNFIELDS RIGHT IN OUR CITIES. there is NO reason to kill off our open spaces for Industrial Wind and Solar in remote regions. NONE.

[research]

They have pastures and soccer fields under our Power lines.

It's ugly, but functional.

[Organic-Guy]

Centralized power plants will have to be the next old technology on the chopping block. some situations may require them but they will become a thing of the past. Not only does most of the power get lost on long transmission lines, they are dangerous to human health and a blight on the landscape. They cost too much too.

[texfly]

Only 10-15% is lost on long transmssion lines and buried HVDC may be lower ... no reactive losses. Distributed sounds nice but is inpractical for large cities and apartment dwellers, No matter what you say we'll still need large installations to generate the power we need. They may be distributed in areas where the optimal renewable energy sources exist.

[research]

For much of the world, rooftop solar will generate more power than needed. Without increasing grid load.

[BMissy]

Air Air Air No fossil fuel...Just Air!
No pollutants.
India is now using this car..Tata Motors.
China is in contract talks for manufacture.

Please help with the economic and global problems created by oil company greed and the resulting pollution caused by the use of this resource. A far better solution than an electric Hybrid is available.

There is a car that is getting ready for mass production. It runs on AIR. That's correct, AIR! This car needs to be brought to America. It is manufactured by MDI in France. It is referred to as the Air Car.

http://zeropollutionmotors.us/?page_id=46

Zero Carbon

[KillTheMessenger]

Your air car is charged by compressors which run on electricity which is generated by coal fired power plants. No carbon? Only if you shut your eyes and sing "Lalalalalala I can't hear you....".

[BMissy]

You dont know what u r talking about. Do the research!

[BMissy]

A 3 minute "fill up" of compressed air tanks does use electricity. Coal fired Plant?...depends on the source of the electricity. (Not from my solar powered home..or wind powered home). A 3 minute use of electricity compared to driving a car that uses fossil fuels (part time, sometimes, all the time). Small downside for a huge upside.

[nellyb stl]

I agree Americans need to be constantly reminded HOW to save energy; the schools are starting to teach the kids who are instructing the parents, but it should start with the utility companies who have the money to hire the entrepreneurs and in conjunction with the government come up with the best plan(s). What happened to the program to give us money back for buying a hybrid vehicle? I think incentives like this can make an immediate effect. If anyone has driven thru southern coal country and seen the top of beautiful mountains shorn off will agree that solar windmills are beautiful in comparison. Putting people back to work to build a new power grid is a win-win, but also using the ingenuity of the ulitity companies already in business should be part of the solution.

[RationalDubSteppa]

Boy o boy!! I'm just elated that we have a president elect that actually understands science and respects scientist unlike the current crop of space god believing fanatics that think "god" is coming back in 10 years to fix everything!

[Tinkeraw]

I have an article about a town, San ta Colo ma de Gram enet (Spain) where they have put solar panels over the town's 4 square kilometer cemetery. The panels are placed at a low angle to remain unobtrusive. So far the panels cover only 5% of the cemetery's surface and collect enough energy to power 60 local homes. Their philosophy is that this is the best tribute they can pay to their ancestors, whatever the religion, to generate clean energy for new generations.

I love the thinking outside the box. I truly believe this is the type of thinking that we need to adapt to be successful in tranferring to a more green lifestyle.

[andresfusion]

Putting to work the cemetery seems like a great idea.

[Greenguy25]

THE GREEN ENERGY REVOLUTION HAS STARTED, and you can either join the party or sit back and share your meaningless thoughts on how it will never work with the other naysayers.

Face the facts, our energy grid is older than dirt, and if you think investing hugh sums of money now is a waste, then consider what the next generation will pay. At some point this needs to be done, so why not incorporate it into a full out overhall of the energy production and delivery system at one time.

http://www.mygreenscene.com

[andresfusion]

Nuclear power anyone? Clean, safe and its baseload(24/7 energy production). France gets 85% of its electricity from nuclear, as a consequence they have the best air quality in europe and have the cheapest energy bill in europe as well.

Nuclear power can be built almost anywhere and its not depended in specific areas, also it does not spoil the landscape with miles and miles of windmills.

Obama knows this that's why he nominated his energy secretary:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10787_3-9888608-60.html?tag=nefd.lede

Also look at this:
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_2bSu8n8ZbFI/STVEji0uSSI/AAAAAAAAAUE/XYXpEf46zN4/s1600-h/1600_Wind_Turbines.jpg

if we assume that each wind turbine produces 2MW then the wind turbines will produce less than a new nuclear plant.( Yes that is the empire state building).

If you like to know more stop by pro-nuclear democrats blog its very insightful.
http://pronucleardemocrats.blogspot.com/2008/12/what-million-barrels-of-oil-looks-like.html

[KillTheMessenger]

France also reprocesses their nuclear fuel. Since that seems to be impossible to achieve politically in the US, any further comparison is useless.

Nobody said that a single wind turbine has to offset a whole power plant. Where did you come up with that straw man? We will have to build millions of solar installations and tens of thousand of wind turbines to offset the hundreds of nuclear power plants that we are short for carbon offset. The side effect of that is employment. It takes very few people to build and even fewer people to operate nuclear plants, therefor the economic stimulus from nuclear is practically zero. In comparison renewable energy is not only cleaner but it also creates jobs. And that is far more important than you seem to realize.

[andresfusion]

Where did I say a single wind turbine had to offset a whole power plant? I'm just pointing out how inadequate it is to rely on wind or solar to offset carbon.

I dont think you realize how many people it takes to built a nuclear much less operate it. Having said that, it might be true that wasting all that space with renewable might mean more people to maintain it since we need to mine all the iron for the thousands of wind turbines and all the forest we need to clear for the new transmission lines; this might give work to a few people, however, we (the general pubic) are going to pay for it with our increased energy bill, manufacturing will have to be reduced its labor force to keep up with its energy costs. Already high energy costs for families will be even more expensive but yes a few more people will have to keep maintenance to our intermittent waste of money.

[cosmic]

what are you? some kind of liaison for the nuclear power industry? get a life

[andresfusion]

No...... just someone you apparently can't stand because I happen to have a different opinion of how to solve our energy crisis.

[research]

More nuclear power means more mushrooms clouds.

No the reactors won't blow up.

Nuke energy requires more nuke engineers and companies, more opportunities to divert fuels, and if you want more than 13 years of the worlds energy, You need Breeder reactors, only one of which is working and has a high accident rate.

The breeder fuel cycle requires extensive large plutonium processing factories, Perfect for making Bomb grade material.

More nuclear power = More Mushrooms clouds.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/users/profile/research

[andresfusion]

Hello research is being a while! Its heart warming to know your still using erroneous information:

your comment about 13 years is NOT true take a look:

¨http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium#Occurrence¨¨
Uranium is 40 times more common than silver and more common than many other commonly used metals in the earth's crust. ¨¨According to the below with recycling and reprocessing we have thousands of years of Uranium already available.¨¨

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium#Resources_and_reserves

And thorium reactors are already in production........

Also stop the fear mongering, nuclear reactors do not use highly enriched fuel as to be a concern for weapons.

[Tinkeraw]

Three Mile Island. China Syndrome. Nuclear waste.

[andresfusion]

Here let me complete your thoughts: No-one was hurt in the Three Mile Island incident, China syndrome is a poorly done movie and nuclear waste is very very small and could be recycled.

[Arthur954]

Yes sir, France is nuclear and very happy with it. They even export A LOT of electricity to Spain, where the socialist government is anti - nuclear. Now there are even portable nuclear reactors, made in USA --- check them out :
http://www.hyperionpowergeneration.com/

[JScott]

Please underground the lines and use existing right of ways whenever possible.
There have already been battles about this in Calif.-utilities wanted to put a line thru a state park wilderness area in San Diego county but changed the route after intense opposition.

[Dystopic]

I have been advocating that for years. Having the power grid under ground would make it immune from weather and more importantly - from an EMF / HERF attack.

[jpperry]

I believe this should be a top priority. Electricity is too important. Even cars are going electric.

[alvdh1]

It is another attempt to centralize power which is the least suited for wind and solar. The country is brimming over with rooftops dying for solar and wind energy installations. The smart grid needs to be designed for distributed energy projects, not large scale concentrated power projects. The more we decentralize the energy, the more reliable the delivery system will be without the headache of large power outages that occur, for example, during ice storms. Producing power where it is used will always be the most efficient and reliable.

I will, however, agree that large wind farms capable of eliminating coal fired power plants is more desirable than not having them.

[research]

Yup.

There is enough rooftop area between homes and businesses to generate all the power we need from solar (in the appropriate areas.)

Distributed Power REDUCES Grid load.

[KillTheMessenger]

My rooftop is not dying for wind energy. There is almost no wind where I live. Wind energy only works in certain sites and it only works when done on a massive scale. Which means large scale investments.

Now, if you are unhappy with the way these projects are financed and in the end owned, I would suggest you pool your money with people like you who also want a share of the pie and you buy into a wind energy project.

With solar it's a little bit different but in the end one can not expect to generate the majority of ones energy on ones own roof. The average American needs over 10kW. At 25W/m^2, a family of four would need 40kW/25W/m^2=1600m^2 of solar panels. That's the size of a typical single family home lot (the suitable roof area would probably not be much more than 100m^2).

Having said that, while the average family does not have enough collection area available to themselves, they do occupy nearly enough space in total to cover their energy needs (not wants) with solar alone without having to destroy pristine areas. If you look at industrial roofs, parking lots and other pubic areas and you assume that our family can reduce their consumption by a factor of two, we can generate a large fraction of its energy needs with solar. And we will. In approx. 30-40 years. But I doubt much of this generation capacity will be privately owned.

[Oonagh]

Amazingly very little wind is required to move the "mills" They are all over Europe and are a great supplement to the main source... It will take many sources to get free of foreign oil...

[sheila]

can you please provide a credible citation for that 10kw per average family residence figure? i ask because most residences are zeroing out their bills using 3 or 4 kw systems in CA, where houses are generally big. we are not trying to fuel our cars and workplaces from our roofs, just electricity, and 3 to 4 kw is usually plenty.

you should look at palm desert, which has undertaken a citywide 30% reduction in use program and has funded $5 million in privately owned PV systems, with more on the way. they are also working on a feed in tariff like Germany, Japan, Spain, and 40 other countries have. Germany has 58% the solar resources of the US and only 36% of our population and they are installing 2,000 MW of residential rooftop solar - all privately owned - in 2009 alone (so is spain).

the only reason it would not be privately owned, or that we will need to kill our open spaces is if Big Energy monopolists prevent a level playing field for ratepayer generators. instead of resigning ourselves to that, shouldn't we be preventing it?

[Big0725]

I live in Miami. Got any hard and accurate facts on how long my roof will last with solar panels in, say, a Cat. 2 hurricane?

[redhot200822]

I live in Florida and I'm familiar with the building codes. If the panels are installed correctly, they will survive up to around 120 mph.

That said, you would still want to do the analysis on whether you should install the panels ....... trees, orientation, etc.

[orangepetal]

that is a problem...

[redhot200822]

Just what exactly is a smart grid? I'm not joking. I would really like to know.

KilltheMessenger - I'm in the solar biz. I only do off-grid for telecom and security. I have enjoyed your posts. You are one of the few who actually knows what the hell he's talking about. Do you have any thoughts on this smart grid stuff?

[KillTheMessenger]

My understanding is that stronger and more extensive grids can mitigate some of the intermittency of renewable energy sources by load sharing and reduce the requirements for storage. In addition "smart grids" can adjust demand. The idea is that the gird senses local and global load conditions and can ask or even direct consumers to reduce or reschedule their demand. Imagine you have a street with homes on a hot day. Each AC system has a thermostat that turns the AC unit on when the temperature in each home reaches the preset limit. Since the temperature profiles of homes are mostly independent, the units will turn on more or less randomly and there can be times when most or all units are off or on. If the gird could synchronize these units so that they are never all on at the same time, I2R losses can be reduced by a couple of percent. The same can be done with industrial lighting, computers (future machines will allow intelligent power management) and local energy storage and co-generation units. Technologically the power grid will be used as a slow data network to send these commands to the load units.

[mjt218]

Forget residential needs . . . the majority of the needs of power in America are commercial and industrial users (not to mention a great deal of the employers in this country). It would be exceedingly difficult and inefficient to provide local point of use electrical power generation for any plant or manufacturer consuming a few MW's of power. Large scale power generation is a necessary part of the equation.

[redhot200822]

Agreed. Residential doesn't make sense for most people.

[alvdh1]

There are only about 100,000 scientists who would beg to differ with you. Before you you make such outlandish proclomations, I suggest you start with reading the 2008 Freeing the Grid Report and then come back here to defend the notion that residential and small commercial applications of wind and solar do not make sense.

[KillTheMessenger]

8000 miles of transmission line might sound like much but it's close to nothing. The continental US has already 200,000 miles of transmission lines in service. So this upgrade is a mere 4% of existing infrastructure.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:UnitedStatesPowerGrid.jpg

[newshawk14]

I agree, the only way of staving this off is for gains in energy efficiency to exceed increases in
load. Even then it might not be possible, if the site locations for wind and solar, don't have
the capacity to distribute the energy.

[KillTheMessenger]

America consumes over 10kW per person (that's electricity, heat, transportation all in). If we want to solve this problem we need to reduce our demand to approx. 5-6kW per capita. Even then, because we will have to replace oil and natural gas and coal with renewable energy, we will need more power transmission infrastructure, not to mention energy storage (in the long term).

[anandakos]

KTM,

Yes, 8,000 miles is a small fraction of the existing grid, but these HVDC transmission systems are BIG!!!! They have to be to keep high amperage megavolt lines from arcing to the towers and/or the ground. You seriously do not want to be stupid near one of these things transmitting power.

I expect that once they get to the New Mexico-Texas border they're going to have a hard time putting together right of way. They really can't share with existing systems because the old towers would make great lighting rods for the HVDC. ZAP!

[KillTheMessenger]

A million volts is not as much as it sounds. The technology is well understood and the towers look no different than other high voltage transmission lines. Of course, if you don't mind paying ten times less we can put it underground for you... but at ten million dollars a mile or so few people will mind the eyesore.

I don't think that right of way is a big deal. That's what eminent domain is for. That's how we built the old systems and that's how we will build the new ones, too.

Would I like to avoid these things? Sure. Can I? Yes, I can. But I am afraid not every American can be convinced to live as frugal a life in terms of energy consumption as I do. And therefor the rest of you will need these power lines.