Green Power Claims

[MAGTiger]

When will we get to the point of truth about renewable energy? I read in the local newspaper last weekend that a Biomass plant in Wisconsin costing $250,000,000 will produce 55MW and supply "electricity" for 40,000 "typical" homes. Ok, that's 1375 watts each. The same paper published that a local wind project would produce 165MW and supply electricity for 45,000 homes. The vast number of readers are no doubt ignorant of these riduclous claims. I write to the author of these stories in the paper whenever he writes them but I think we need a national standard, possibly developed by IEEE to set a basis for measuring the energy conversion value of these projects. Otherwise, it's all snake oil. And intelligent decisions can't be made.
Why would anyone invest in wind when biomass electricity supplies 3 times as many homes per MW!

Neil

 

[BigInch]

That's why its the way it is. Nobody out there has any idea what a MW is, so they try to dumb the actual capacity figure down to the number of homes statistic. Most Joeplumbers can wrap their heads around some small number of homes, 8 or 10 in the neighboorhood or so. Extending that analogy accurately past 15 or 20 I think would be quite a step, yet I think they might be able to imagine what 40,000 homes look like, at least in terms of a small city or something, but MW.. no hope.

I think it would be a whole lot better to start telling them how much they would have to pay for that amount of electricity, if it all went through their meter in one month.

 

[IRstuff]

That actually would make it worse. Our local utility has about 5 tiers of pricing, coupled with numerous add-ons and scale factors. A simple, net, unit pricing is nearly impossible to figure out from my bill.

TTFN

FAQ731-376

 

[BigInch]

Well... we'll just have to take the weighted average.

I am curious about the rate structure though. Could you post it? or link to it. Here we have the possibility to choose day or night. Currently 0.13 Eu/kWh 10am-10pm day and 0.06 at night, or you can select one rate (near average) for 24 hours.
Day_night and One_rate. The Day_night options requires meter replacement.

I'm going to check into getting another line/meter and running the pumps on the One_rate during the day, then switching to the Day_night meter at night, but something tells me that that would be impossible.

 

[IRstuff]

The example page is not exactly readable, but if you zoom the picture up, you can sse that (11) shows a 5-tier pricing structure. Note, however, that the stuff in (9) shows that the tiered structure is applied to two separate accounts, delivery and generation. This is further dicotimized by the fact that the residential customers have a different bill than business customers.

http://www.sce.com/newbill/residential3.htm

Here's a simplified version of the tiers:

http://www.sce.com/CustomerService/billing/tiered-rates/

Business rates are further divided into usage classes:

http://www.sce.com/CustomerService/rates/business/

TTFN

FAQ731-376

 

[cranky108]

Five pricing tiers, and day/night metering, sounds like our income tax schedules.

And the things we do to avoid taxes. And what you will be doing to avoid utility rates.

I do understand the meter charge, and the cost of electricty, and demand (Flat fee, cost of fuel, and cost of equipment). But why must we make it so difficult with all the additional schemes, and rates?

 

[BigInch]

So you think you're actually getting something other than screwed.

 

[dcasto]

IRstuff's is for southern California wher the government has mandated they switch to alternative energy. They also have huge numbers of electric cars. Not one of those electric car users realize that when they charge their car that the energy cost is in the last tier!!! They are paying $6/gallon equivalent for their transportation fuel and the pollutants for that car are in someone else's backyard, but they feel good about it.

 

[IRstuff]

Huge numbers? Really? It's an absolute rarity to even see SmartCar, which isn't even electric. I see maybe one a week, tops.

As for full-blown electric cars, nary a one. I'm not sure where you're getting your statistics, but there are nearly zero charging stations in Southern California, and that puts most of the 40-mile-range cars in a world of hurt as far as commuting is concerned. My own commute sits at about 42 miles round-trip, and I certainly wouldn't want to risk running out of juice in the middle of my commute. My previous commute was about 54 miles round-trip, well out of range, unless there was a charging station at work, which there isn't.

TTFN

FAQ731-376

 

[MAGTiger]

I doubt there are more than a handfull of true electric (plug in ) cars in California. But I do look forward with glee to the day when the number of electric cars plugged in at 5:00 causes rolling blackouts.


Neil

 

[cranky108]

Can you put solar panels on that electric car?

Screwed from electric rates? I only get my electricty from a non-profit electric company.

 

[dcasto]

my use of huge is relative to the rest of the US.

Oct. 23 (Bloomberg) -- California’s push to lead U.S. sales of electric cars may result in higher power rates for consumers in the state, as a growing number of rechargeable vehicles forces utilities to pay for grid upgrades.

The autos’ effect on electricity fees is being reviewed by California’s Public Utilities Commission this month as the most populous U.S. state will require Toyota Motor Corp., General Motors Co., Honda Motor Co., Ford Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co. to sell more plug-in vehicles from late 2011.

Power companies including Southern California Edison, the state’s largest, have to install new transformers and meters to handle greater demand and prevent blackouts when autos are being charged at outlets. Utility rates will rise to cover the costs, said Travis Miller, a Morningstar Inc. analyst in Chicago.

“If you look at the kind of money that will be needed for a full smart grid and support for electric vehicles, then you are talking about a substantial amount,” Miller said in a phone interview. The spending may total “multiple billions” of dollars over a decade or more, he said.

From model years 2012 through 2014, the largest carmakers by volume in California must sell about 60,000 plug-in hybrids and electric cars combined, according to the state Air Resources Board. President Barack Obama is aiming for 1 million plug-in cars on U.S. roads by 2015 to curb tailpipe emissions and cut dependence on foreign oil.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=avRy8RxhwZwg

 

[MAGTiger]

I wonder how much connected load 60,000 plug-in hybrids equates to?
Hmmmm.... maybe, one biomass plant.

Neil

 

[davidbeach]

Just because the car might be plugged in at 5:30 doesn't mean that charging has to start then. The charging could wait until the rates go down at night.

 

[IRstuff]

Residential rates, at least from Edison, are not dependent on time of day, only commercial rates are.

Assuming energy equivalent of 0.3 kWh/mi, the energy consumed for an average of 40 mi commutes for 60,000 cars comes to about 710 MW*hr. Spread out over 12 hrs, that's only about 60 MW of load



TTFN

FAQ731-376

 

[mauricestoker]

I thought Fred Flintstone solved this issue long ago. Those fat little feet ran all day on bronto burgers, long before they changed to oil.

 

[IRstuff]

But, his commute was a lot shorter...

Nowadays, even if you could manage 20 mph, it would take you an hour to get to work.




....oh, it does take that long, now...

TTFN

FAQ731-376

 

[cranky108]

Have they included in there calculations, the reduced demand because of green lights (light bulbs, not stop lights)?

And what would be the expected maximum charging rate for each car? If it is a 120 V plug in, the maximum would about 12 A * 120V = 1440 VA each * 60000 = 86.4 MVA.

If every consumer, who could no longer buy an edison bulb, instead purchased a 20 W green bulb (example, I don't know of any bulbs this size) (60W-20W) = 40 W saved each, * number of customers (2 Million) = 2000000 *40 W = 80 MW saved.

The problem with any of this math, is that the load is probally growing anyway, and the electric grid expantion has to happen anyway.

So all this is pure spectulation. One large plant either entering or leaving your area could account for the same growth, or reduction in usage.