Why the US isn't ready for clean energy
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- čas přidán 20. 09. 2021
- Making clean energy isn’t enough: We also have to move it.
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In the near future, the energy made in the US is going to be much greener. The country’s current goal is for solar plants alone to make nearly half of US electricity by 2050. But we can’t just build solar plants where coal and gas plants used to be. They have to be built where it's… sunny. And wind turbines have to be built where it’s windy. The problem is, that’s not always where the people who need the power are.
The distance from energy source to energy need is about to get a lot bigger. And the US is going to need more high-voltage transmission lines. A lot more. As soon as possible. While solar plants can be built relatively fast, high-voltage transmission projects can take up to 10 years. So experts say we need to start proactively building them, right now.
This is the second of five videos we're releasing on climate coverage this week. You can watch the first video on extreme heat 🌡 and what cities are doing to combat that here: • How America's hottest ...
And the third video on prescribed burns 🔥 for forests here: • How decades of stoppin...
Sources and further reading:
Much of the map data in the piece comes from the Net-Zero America study out of Princeton University: netzeroamerica.princeton.edu/
This map from the US Energy Information Association is a good way to see what power plants and high-voltage power lines are near you (if you’re in the US): www.eia.gov/state/maps.php
Vermont Public Radio reported on the energy bottleneck we talk about in the very beginning of the video: www.vpr.org/vpr-news/2020-12-...
And here’s more about that denied power plant from local Vermont TV station WCAX: www.wcax.com/content/news/Reg...
This other great study is what calculated how much renewable energy potential there is in just those 15 middle states: acore.org/wp-content/uploads/...
More about the 2018 Camp Fire in California and the investigation that determined it was started by electrical transmission lines: www.cnbc.com/2019/05/15/offic...
And if you want to get really into the details of how these lines work, I found the Edison Tech Center really helpful: edisontechcenter.org/wires.html
Vox.com is a news website that helps you cut through the noise and understand what's really driving the events in the headlines. Check out www.vox.com.
Watch our full video catalog: goo.gl/IZONyE
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Thanks for watching. This is the second of five videos we're putting out about climate coverage this week. You can watch the first one here, on extreme heat and what cities can do to combat it: czcams.com/video/ZQ6fSHr5TJg/video.html
Love the vids! Keep em comin!
Could you please tell me who is presenting/hosting the video ? She is awesome!
Make a video about Azerbaijan
Why can we not use mica to insulate the high power voltage lines, they are good conductors of heat but not electricity. So we would not need to build power lines higher and farther apart.
@@shohelwahid4113 We always include credits at the end of each video, but this video was produced by Madeline Marshall!
Canadian living north of Vermont here: The reason you import energy from Quebec is that our energy is super cheap and only comes from renewables as we rely on hydro energy at 100%. We have been producing extra power for years already and sell our extra to the US ever since.
Cool
Thanks neighbor
Did you vote for tredau
😎👍
@@karankapoor2701 ?
Excellent presentation. I wish all Americans could see this, understand it and have the will to take appropriate action. It is SO SAD that we are so divided and so poorly trained to think critically to make informed decisions that are in the best interest of all of us.
Us Gov only know about global power hegemony
I would say that’s it’s better to go nuclear and invest more in nuclear fission and fusion because nuclear power is cleaner, cheaper, more reliable, and leaves less of a carbon footprint compared to wind and solar.
Nuclear is cleanest form of electricity
TMcBlast CZcamsr but then you have the whole issue of the nuclear waste that comes with nuclear plants and they fact we don't even have places to store our current nuclear waste
@@woodduck2178 Not only that the fact that humans will have to run it is a huge problem I've seen too many plant accidents the vast majority that could have been prevented were due to humans being either cheap, lazy, or poorly trained I don't trust humans with nuclear energy.
It is actually what we have in Northern Europe, an energy exchange called Nord Pool.
The countries are connected to each other through high voltage power lines and it works really well. So it doesn't matter what the origin of the energy is (wind, solar, nuclear, gas or hydro), it is all put on the market and sold to the lowest price at the moment.
Denmark and Germany are some times hitting more than a 100% power from wind, so it is good that the excess power go to good use.
No it's sold at the highest price. Btw Denmark are connected to Swedish and German power grid, no access = RIP Denmark, you can´t rely on just wind or solar...you need nuclear power plants or hydro power plants to feed stability to the grid...
@@THUGOODhow do you know how the renewables affect the prices? Do you have any useful sources I can refer to?
We have an interconnected grid in the USA as well. However the population densities and landmass sizes are a pretty big consideration when comparing Northern Europe and the USA. Sweden, Germany and Denmark combined have a land area that is about 1/10 of the USA. 9.8mil km vs. 1.1mil km. The population of the USA is about 3 times Sweden Germany and Denmark. In the USA about 40% of the population lives along the major coastlines in cities like New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Chicago while most of the renewable power generation occurs in the Midwest and Central USA.
Actually I think Texas is unique. I remember being told years ago Texas grid lines can be severed at the states border and the state will
Still function I believe. I think that’s good to prefer for resilience. We need states making laws and ideas not federal government. We’re turning into Japan. Remember Japan got big and successful cause the government gave massive loans to a few industries and made a few big
Companies. The U.S.
Today has a few big companies. Japan got big and was taking Over the world and worried america and then in 1989 their stock market crashed and hasn’t reached that peak inflation adjusted since. Basically the U.S. seems to be picking winners and losers, but at
Some point in the future with massive debt or slowed innovation or whatever we maybe like Japan and have a long drag of slow growth.
As usual, the US is way far behind.
"We will need about $320 Billion in investments." To put that in perspective, that is half the united states' military budget EVERY YEAR. Take it how you want, but I believe $320 billion is cheap with that considered.
Plus, you know, those jobs can't be outsourced to China. It means decent blue-collar middle-class jobs for regular people who aren't programmers or influencers.
@@texaswunderkind I mean there might be some programming jobs too as designing those systems will need large and complicated simulation software's (source I am a electric engineering student, with transmission as a major), but that was just a clarification. Yes most of the jobs will be decent middle class jobs. And these systems will need to be maintained too, which creates even more jobs.
And the amount spent on health is about four trillion a year. The point is that this is new spending. So it isn't cheap as cost will be recovered through higher electricity bills.
@@abcdef8915 agreed, but it doesn't have to be that way
@@Paonporteur that's true but there is some upfront cost and it isn't small.
Fun fact: Bulington, Vermont became the first US city to run on 100% renewable energy in 2014
100% renewable energy is unrealistic for the entire country.
Vermont is one of the least populated states, only Wyoming has less people.
@@uvuvwevwevweonyetenyevweug3450 Shouldn't you be making comedy videos about your hard name instead of complaining about energy?
@@uvuvwevwevweonyetenyevweug3450 And I care about human progress, the economy and not being Woke.
@@tibodeclercq2131 This is nothing to do with "movements", this is about whole world as one. Man these last years we (entire world) seen super wildfires, super sand storms, non stop rains, driest seasons, super floats, land slides, hottest summers, coldest winters(EVEN TEXAS). We did really something wrong to our little planet and it's not good.
@@someguyfromarcticfreezer6854 I know, I am from Belgium and we got unprecedented floods last month and it also happened in our neighboring countries (Germany & Netherlands). But I do believe in human progress, we keep inventing methods to deal with natural disasters. I am a student in engineering, I'm one of thousands who design buildings to be safe from wheather extremes and fires. Survival rates of natural disaters keep rising.
US should just look upnorth for a great model. Quebec is the #1 standard when it comes to efficient and stable grid. The use of 735kV lines makes it able to transport 4 times the amount of power of a 315kV line, while having less loss in power. There is also a lot of effort put into stabilising the grid in case something goes wrong at a plant.
How many more savings if every house is fed 240 VAC instead of 120 VAC?
Their grid is built for extreme cold and extreme heat scenarios.
@@zjean3417 Yup! And since the freezing rain crisis in 1998 where most of southern high voltage lines were crushed by the weight of ice, we improved the way we build high voltage lines so it won't happen anymore.
Plus, we're very good as well in moving electricity on long distances. Our electricity is produced thousands of kilometers north of the US/Can frontier where most of the population lives.
@@patrickhenry1249 yes and No. American 240 volts comes from two 120 volt lines 180 degrees out of phase with each other, for those using split phase power, which is most regular houses. Those using three phase power get 208 volts between the 120 volt lines. However line losses, voltage drop calculations, and wire size is based on that 120 volts phase to ground. Europe, and most of the rest of the world uses 220-240 volts phase to ground, which usually comes out to 400 volts phase to phase for three phase systems. But either way, because they have 240 volts phase to ground, that leads to lower line losses and smaller wire sizes. Of course we also have the 277/480 volt system used for commercial and industrial buildings, and occasionally a 347/600 system because the 120/240 or 120/208 system isn't that practical for larger buildings. But even with growing electrical demands in regular households, particularity with Electric vehicles coming out in numbers, especially if you dont use any gas appliances at all, the limits of the 120/240 system can be problematic.
@@dougerrohmer The energy savings arent so big, but the savings in construction costs from just needing smaller wire are quite substantial. Im looking at some rather costly electrical upgrades in the near future for my own home and property, and it kinda makes me with that the US ditched 120/240 back when it was still practical to do so and just adopted the 277/480 system already used in the US by commercial and industrial buildings.
I really encourage people to look at the good of nuclear power. From disasters like chernoble and the Tsunami in Japan it’s easy to be scared, but that was a really long time ago and technology has made reactors so much safer
We still don't have a safe way to store nuclear waste. We've just been burying them deep underground and hoping that it works good enough. They should find a way to get rid of the waste safely before bringing it back to the masses.
I agree but I think we should use fusion reactors instead of fission. It’s makes 4 times the energy that a fission reactor does and it doesn’t make radiation that last 20,000 years. It’s way better. It’s good for the environment and more energy. It’s a win win
@@gabrielaluna8484 If only fusion reactors existed... but they won't for another 50 years, or so I hear.
disasters also on happened twice or 3 times in its entire history
And still they are easy targets (although thats more relevant for the EU right now) and are now far less economic than renewable energy sources.
Can we also talk about how important nuclear energy will be in this transition; and how solar panels are 10-15% efficient and have to be changed every 20-30 years which means lots of rare metals leaking into vulnerable communities and the environment. The future is mass transit, walkable cities and nuclear
Yes
Underrated comment
Nailed it!
Solar can be distributed on everyone's homes, so you can power your neighbor. No need for long transmission lines. This is a distributed energy grid, where people generate electricity and make money themselves, not huge companies. This is a very good solution, but will obviously be only part of the overall solution.
Solar panels can be recycled, although they are not currently recycled efficiently. The big reason for this is that most solar panels have been installed in the past 10 years, so we haven't really seen a lot of solar panels needing to be recycled yet. In the future when we have a lot of these, and it will be cheaper to recycle and reuse the materials then to mine new material, then solar panels will absolutely be recycled. The same is true for batteries, although Redwood materials is starting to do that at scale now.
Will also add that nuclear power plants take a long time to make, so this should NOT be our only solution. Also Solar is currently cheaper, so will scale up faster.
Maybe small modular reactors that are built in a factory. Every city could have one or two and it would saving transporting electricity long distances.
As a renown philosopher once said, "YOU MUST CONSTRUCT ADDITIONAL PYLONS"
Nice one , very philosophical 👍
Solar goes on your house, Build the refinery (solar) next to the base (house)
This definitely caught me off guard.
@CZcams Official Starcraft 2 Protoss race.
You might also "REQUIRE MORE VESPENE GAS".
Renewable energy is now cheaper than most fossil fuel energy. The fossil fuel industry is doing everything they can to slow down renewable energy distribution and adoption so they don't lose out on their investments.
You are totally wrong, fossil fuels are still a gigantic part of humanity, not just energy generation but also the raw materials, manufacturing, transport, agriculture...... we can't just switch directly to renewable because we'll also need fossil fuels to build the grid, make cables, mine materials for steel, copper.......
Who needs fossil fuel industry when u have good ol' republicans at home. They can't just get enough of their coal and oil addiction.
@@GAMEOVER-yy6zj so you were able to fit a republican rant - good for you - unfortunately the sentences before and after made no sense
@@carholic-sz3qv then ask yourself this question. What is more important, fossil fuels for the things or clean energy to reduce CO2 emissions and reducing the earths' s temperature? Dont get me wrong maybe your right its still a gigantic part of humanity, but at some point clean energy is the future to go if you wanna live on this planet
Pardon me but I've read that the inicial investments of Solar Energy are usually too high for some countries.
Am I missing something?
I work for Hitachi Energy as an electrical engineer, look into HVDC transmission lines, that's what I'm currently working on 😊
I am a substation engineer. There are some HVDC, but this would definitely help transmitting from the Midwest renewables to the east or west coasts. We need to build more HVDC lines. I know China has an 1100KV HVDC line going like 3000 miles
I'm surprised they didn't talk about the economics of buying and selling electricity. The best way to get electricity from renewable energy from the producing areas to where people live is by making it as cheap and easy to exchange as possible. That's how solar electricity from Arizona can provide power to Illinois when it's not windy and vice versa when it's cloudy in Arizona. However that means states can't make money when they export the electricity, which hurts their economy. Pretty big factor in why the US isn't ready for clean energy.
If there’s no transmission capacity, pricing doesn’t matter.
@@rdspam And all that additional transmission capacity won't matter if states aren't willing to exchange electricity for free.
The US has largest nuclear fleet in the world and has led the world in clean energy since the 70's as a result.
Our electricity system is useless for reducing Carbon,we need s high tax on Carbon,deploying renewables does nothing and furthers coal use in China.
Clean energy is a myth. Using local energy is less damaging. The problem is that we're not lacking solutions. We're lacking ETHICS.
Why take the half-step towards sustainability by using electric cars when we can go all the way and use hybrid buses, and electric trains? I understand that even if excellent public transportation is created, some people need cars, but better public transit would help reduce car usage.
yes you're right, but that wasnt the focus here. you could read "cars" as these hybrid buses etc. vox has talked more abt public transport in other vids
That's required a lot more electricity hence more power plants and we come back the problem mentioned in this video.
And cycling and walking
Either way moat electricity worldwide including the States is generated by burning fuel/coal... But theres a lot of clean energy, like Florida is powered a lot by solar energy and nuclear energy both being extremely clean.
i can’t help feeling that getting Americans to give up cars would require Taking it from ‘ The cold dead hands’ *insert American exceptionalism excuse for why Americans need massive cars and simply can’t change, even if the planet burns* 😎😬
Just Imagine if the US had used the money that was spent on "War on Terrorism" for this
Green USA
What about those poor defense contractors and greedy generals? Are they just supposed to live off of a few million dollars? This is America, shame on you for even mentioning that.
We would've finished already, and the companies manufacturing that next-gen grid equipment for domestic buildouts would now be exporting it far and wide.
Most if not all power companies are private. Other than some regulatory measures, the government stays out of it. Americans fund grid upgrades through power bills, not taxes. Plus, do you really think if we did pay more taxes for this, it would actually go towards these projects and not corrupt officials?
Exactly
Really educational thank you!
I'd love to see a video on how localized energy storage would impact this problem. If most consumers are generating and storing their own power, the grid will be handling a lot less of it
localized energy (solar/wind) is about 2 to 8 times as expensive to implement than grid scale solar/wind. It does reduce the transmission issue but still need an interconnected grid. I think best answer is do it all and make it all happen sooner.
@@BrentTJo That’s not necessarily true. The price per KW for a solar farm (in the hundreds of watts) in Canada is around 1400 USD whereas the price per KW on a local scale is around 2000 USD at most, before incentives. I don’t know about the US, but I doubt it’s even close to 8 times expensive. Where did you get that figure?
We've been doing local energy storage on the Princeton University campus since 2005. Stop by and see it. It's much cheaper than batteries and takes less space and no exotic materials.
I love how you mentioned the fact that our electricity usage will go up, I haven't heard anyone mention that.
Energy use by humans has been increasing for the last 4,000 years, and you weren't aware?
@@paulbedichek2679 I was aware, but when you here about closing coal power plants, what will we replace with those?
@@jamesshaw3500 you just asked the golden question. So far they are using natural gas. But that's only a temporary measure. We really need something more long term. Yes solar,wind,hydro and storage are good but none meet the actual numbers. Only one source can help get us there nuclear has to be considered and included.
That is extremely common knowledge every one has known for centuries that energy use per person always increases.
@@jamesshaw3500 They replace coal with natural gas in there US in China they don't close coal they just build more, even in the US we are burning much more coal with a democrat in power than we ever did under Trump.
If we need a greener future, most politicians need to be replaced.
Where do those politicians come from? They come from us, out society produced them, maybe we’re the ones to blame. As George Carlin said, garbage in, garbage out.
That's not an 'if', the science is settled. We need a greener present, asap. And I agree, most politicons are in the pockets of the rich companies perpetuating the climate disaster. Not only do we need new politicians, we need a new politics and new political system. Liberalism and conservatism are not the solutions to climate change and they never will be.
You could have posted this without the first phrase.
Also the system that produces them.
What a great idea. You should talk about this in your 8th grade social studies report.
As a Lithuanian i hope you guys manage to overcome any issues that impede the progress for renewable green energy. Here in Lithuania we already made huge progress on green energy before whole Paris Conference and we now on track to meat all of our and EU goals by 2030 and 2050.
Lithuania is pretty cool
Plus their not bowing down the CCP, y’all have actual spines
@@tony_5156 well said
@@quote010 is cheaper than electrical heaters....
@@quote010 If you find a way to not depend on fossil fuels in a week, let us know.
@@ricardosilva4940 modern heat pumps are in most cases cheaper than natural gas because they produce on average 3 to 4 times as much heat as they require electricity. And while additional insulation is often a good investment even with gas heating, the combination of insulation and heat pump saves you far more money because the efficiency increases drastically, so the costs of installing it is easily matched in heat cost savings.
But there is also biomass heating (wood, straw, etc.) which may not be as great as heat pumps, but still offer cost savings in some cases. And if you add the emvironmental damage that natural gases cause (heating the planet and having a devastating effect on nature), you'd always have savings.
In my country South Africa, a reasonably large country, we have a very well interconnected national grid with high voltage power lines as most of our electricity historically came from one province (to the far east of the country), where all the coal mines are. These lines span and supply far major cities like Cape Town 2000km to the west. Our national grid lines also travel as far north as Central Africa as we are the largest producer and supplier of electricity on the continent.
We have technology from decades back called high voltage direct current lines which bring electricity to our central capital Pretoria from our hydropower station at the top of Mozambique.
I guess we are fortunate to have the existing high capacity national grid infrastructure to assist us in the roll out of our new renewable energy plants.
Who are you talking to?
And we need to store it! Do a video on that. It’s super cool
I'm in a brand new building in Burlington VT and we have a ton of solar on the roof. We don't have to pay for heat or electricity.
Net Zero Energy buildings like you're describing are great (I used to work in one too) and definitely will be a big part of decarbonizing the built environment in the future. But you see, not all of the energy generated on site by these buildings is being simultaneously used by the building. A decent amount is sent back into the grid. As this video mentioned, the grid has a max capacity of energy that it can handle and when the power plants are generating this + commercial solar is adding more into it, there's a big problem of what to do with the excess power. Net zero energy buildings will have to come up with onsite energy storage options soon to help the grid cope.
@@rounakchatterjee299 Storage is definitely part of the mix. Another is limiting export from these systems as needed. My little residential solar (12KW) is capable of receiving a signal from the grid to switch to zero export. It would be better to capture the power for later use than to curtail production, but we have the tech to do solar curtailment and it's much cheaper than batteries.
Repent to Jesus Christ!!!!!!!
"You Must Construct Additional Pylons!" - it all makes sense now..
Unexpected StarCraft reference for sure...
CZcams has a bot problem and they do nothing 😒
@@versedbridge4007 I relish reporting these accounts and posts.
Not in my back yard. Plus the further you send power, the more you lose over the distance. Some estimates say you lose half the power every 350 miles.
@Patricia 18 y.o - check my vidéó green energy is mostly a fraud. Windmills require enormous carbon footprint for there production, assembly. Solar requires huge amounts of minerals that are mined mostly in poor countries and cause huge pollution. Lithium batteries likewise. A single lithium car battery requires hundreds of tons of rock to be removed. Very bad for the environment. Please stop relying on feel good behavior that is not good for the environment.
I used to be against all of this electrification. The more I watch videos like these and the older I get the accepting I am. We have to be cleaner for our future to be brighter.
US when upgrading insfrastructure : "320 Billions ? No cant do"
US when War and oil involved : "Here 2 Trilions Dollar, go Nuts !"
Unless said infrastructure is urban highways that require you forcibly demolish hundreds of homes and turn cities into a wasteland.
They need to call it the war on climate change and say these projects are for the army.
the only point made here is that oil is profitable
Having electricity generation without enough capacity on the grid to hold that electricity is like having too many cars and not enough roads.
Building roads just induces more traffic.
People don’t have to use cars for transit but electricity has to use power lines
@@zUJ7EjVD How are you phrasing it better?
Except when you build more roads, it only induces more traffic due to more people driving and increased complexity, hence why you will never have enough roads. An unwinnable game.
@@moosesandmeese969 the only winning move is not to play.
Thanks for this video. Bushfires are a large problem in Australia and so is how we can create a safe clean future power grid. This factor was something I had never encountered.
Bush fires happen in aus because our eco system is designed to burn, that's how it stays healthy. The eucalyptus tree actually produces an oil that is released which is extremely flammable. Many of our trees require small bushfire before seeds open.
Your video left out an important part: 60hz AC. For instance, Québec has its own 60hz, that is not sychronized with that of north east grid (which includes parts of Ontario). So any export of power from Québec has to go through an AC to DC to AC converters to ensure the 60hz that gets into the north east is synchonized to the north east grid's 60hz. When these "grid crossing" facilities are built, they are built with specific capacity (and in many cases one capacity in one direction and smaller capacity in order direction as a backup).
So if you want solar panels in Arizona to power a NYC subway train during the day and wind farm off Long Island to power Phoenix at night, you need to consider how many grid "borders" (requiring 60hz synchronization) will be needed and adjust the conversion capacity in each direction accordingly.
Québec built a DC power line from the LG2 area of its James Bay complex to Massachussets. There is still a conversion from AC to DC, but it is done at LG2 directly from turbine outputs, so this skips the turbine to high power AC transmission line stage. And it is converted to AC in Massachussets to the north each 60hz synch. The DC line is labeled at 450kv, but it is +450 and -450, so essentially 900kV and ony 2 wires, so less width in corridor is needed compared to 3 phase line.
Modern 4th generation Nuclear power is the future of energy and the world
Imagine talking about cutting carbon emissions and not including nuclear power
Where do we store the waste? Your place?
@@psikot Deep Under ground
We will need much much more nuclear power to get away from fossil fuels. No doubt in my mind
@@oranjeboven9622 Where? and how does it get there?
@@psikot Everyone stores it undergroud, but your place can be put into consideration. Get your basement ready Scott!
in brazil we have lots of those in transmission... we are changing very fast also to renewable energies
Love how one of the cleanest source of energy Nuclear is not considered green. While Solar Power which requires lots of resources in order to produce Solar Panels and the waste these panels produce at the EOL is considered green.
Repent to Jesus Christ!
“Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is-his good, pleasing and perfect will.”
Romans 12:2 NIV
N
Sometimes, people tend to confuse "green" and "renewable". While nuclear is indeed green, it is not renewable. Still, it is incredibly potent. Being able to produce lots of power from a very small mass.
Ikr
Nuclear is the best option
@@dbclass4075 Are solar panels renewable? Media and NGOs need to stop defaming Nuclear as unsafe and unclean source of energy as compact nuclear reactors are the future of our energy and not solar. Unless we can find a way to organically manufacturer Solar panels like uses Plant's Photosynthesis to harvest Solar Energy.
Sometimes it feels like America's got the roads, power and hydro infrastructure of a former soviet state.
No. Their infrastructure is much better.
Seen East Germany lately?
@@psikot East Germany isn't one of the 'post-soviet states' (the 15 countries that made up the USSR) but I take your point
Clearly you havn't been to the US to see for yourself it's far from that despite some places having broken roads
Same goes for parts of Europe, the thing is that infrastructure is often just build and then kept in service far longer than it was planned with minimal maintenance and in the end entire part of infrastructure have to be rebuild. And USA have another issue added, they are industrialized for quite some time by now and many parts of infra are just too old by now. There was report few years ago about thousands of bridges that are in bad condition, all across USA. Another problem is funding of whole infrastructure.
Storage is not well represented here. There's a tradeoff between storage & many transmission lines. Storage can make a transmission line more efficient as most transmission lines are not fully utilized 24x7. By transmitting energy when the lines are underutilized, retaining energy in storage facilities & discharging these local storage units at times when the transmission lines are "full", we can reduce the incremental need for new transmission lines. Also, as others point out, the tradeoff between centralized & distributed generation is not well explained.
Storage by lithium ion batteries is so small it doesn't\'t deserve to be mentioned, people use the stored solar power in coal and gas, nuclear energy is the only cost effective clean energy storage.
What we really need are HTSC (high temperature super conducting) HVDC (high voltage direct current) power lines snaking around the country moving huge amounts of power around. These would be compact and in the ground because high temperature superconductors are awesome that way. This would have the added advantage of it is easy enough to build in redundant loops so that it would be a very resilient grid. When building at such scale to power the whole country, this is especially important. When getting to these high power levels, these sorts of superconductors can carry over 150x the power of copper and not need any cooling. While the issue is flipped to keeping the superconductors cold so they are operational, the energy loss as you scale to higher power levels grows slowly as in the cable with all of the insulation around it slowly gets a little thicker while the amount of power you can shove over the line grows dramatically and so quickly gets into the realm of economical when talking about huge amount of power. Especially with HVDC you don't have to worry about skinning and you only need two conductors in a coaxial configuration and the job is done. There is not even any external EMF in the coaxial configuration for the tin foil hat people to complain about. You could bring a sensitive meter along to prove this point.
Another elephant in the room is green energy storage. I think what we really need is to build a new 100 GW scale pumped hydro storage between the two Great Lakes of the largest height difference. The reason for pumped is we are already basically turning off Niagra Falls at night in a one way system, so the only way to scale further is to do pumped hydro storage between massive lakes, basically a giant gravity battery. The Bonneville Power Project could also be beefed up in the Northwest to be more of a peaker power system than a base-load while also basically eliminating the need for overflow channels when it is really rainy. I mean stuff chemical batteries everywhere gets to be a big problem, but we already have ways to make big solutions, granted we can move the power around to do it. At this battery buffers can alleviate the need for new power lines some by having a more continuous load over an existing power line as opposed to have it handle moment by moment load shifts and be designed for the peek power to flow through it, so chemical batteries are still quite useful even with massive scale gravity storage.
Now that the US is out of Afghanistan, there should be no excuse to not be able to fund good domestic projects, especially green renewables.
i’m sure people will find plenty of excuses
Afghanistan is a small portion of the total military budget of over $700 billion a year. Take off 300 billion for just 1 year and we'd be able to be at 80% renewable energy in the next 10 years instead of 30
Oh you sweet summer child, the "funding" is arbitrary.
The gov't can print money for whatever they want. They don't work on a budget based in income and bills like people do.
There's billion of dollars for war because they want there to be billions of dollars for war. There's no money for the sort of thing you're talking about because they don't feel like printing money for that.
Ending a war doesn't free up money because the money allocated for war just stops being created.
Greener grid now!
@@JonathanAlmgren I know some people will disagree with me on this but we need to cut some of the fundings for military and other not rlly beneficial for humanity. I mean, yes it’s safer to keep a good and steady military in your country but that just further “tells” countries around/in the world that you have a military ready to attack you. I know giving up on the military is a HUGE risk but it’s potentially good. Not all humans are good but the majority is and we should stop having this “back door” just in case your “friendship” becomes bitter, there’s always a better solution than taking the back door (aka using the military). It’s not always easy, but if no one else does it then you’ll have to take the first step or else no one will
always helps us to view in different but important perspective.
I think the solution is to also look at smaller energy producers. If you put solar on most rooftops and add some energystorage to the houses you could already generate a lot of power and make the grid more stable
Your idea is probably overall more inefficient with current technology. It costs more in the short term and long run, hence it is not being done at scale. Main benefit would be that a home owner could be self-sufficient in regards to their power needs, but it's a luxury that's hard to justify for society with the current tech available and the higher cost of implementing your idea. May be possible in the future, but not at this time.
But if they made it a requirement form landlords to provide solar energy then maybe it could work
Incredible that nuclear power wasn’t mentioned anywhere here. It’s becoming apparent that if we want to actually meet our energy goals we must use local nuclear energy. These transmission lines simply won’t be able to be built everywhere they need to be.
*THANK YOU* was looking for this comment.
The BIG problem of renewables are that right now, energy can't be stored at high quantities and that all energy that is generated must be consumed at the same time.
Today we can't accomplish this with 100% renewables, because we can't assure a continuity of sun or wind (water more or less yes thanks to dams). Therefore right know we need powerplants with some sort of stored combustible, and the greener of all of them is Nuclear plants.
If the fear is for the residues, we can take example of France, who reuses uranium in a way that the radiation left is at its minimum.
Kurszgesagt vídeo about energy sources ^
well, nuclear power is NOT renewable energy OR a green energy source. The waste is being dumped into the oceans and dumpsters because we have yet to figure out a way to either reuse its waste or make it non-radioactive. It might not spill out CO2 but it doesn't meant its 100% clean.
What we should focus is Hydrogen power. Hydrogen can be done with renewable energy and to then get hydrogen power you only need oxygen and the only waste of making energy is /pure water/. It is still very expensive but with more research the prices will lower just like it did to everything else.
@@fernandabrandao7846 Nuclear power can be stored underground in a container.
Which is what we do.
And yes, it's 100% clean you conspiracy theorist
Plus hydrogen is highly flammable
Nuclear power is extremely safe due to the incidents at chernobyl and others, making them more regulated and more looked into
Fusion
Absolutely this is important, but I feel this model focuses primarily on centralized power generation. Maybe with a decentralized system (each house/building having solar panels) you can't solve all power generation needs, but maybe its 50% or 25%, that's a major reduction in the amount of power needed to be generated by central plants, and thus a major reduction in transmission needs. Even 5% would still be a huge deal.
Its my next major life goal, to get my house 100% solar powered. Oh that and a mechanical battery storage system tethered to tie all together.
@@firemyst9064 get your HOA (of you have one) to do geothermal! Lol
@@firemyst9064 I already have solar and 2 TPW. if you live at a location with tons of sunshine like Southern Cal it's the way to go. I'm 44% overproducing and waiting for the Cybertruck.
@@lesp315 even in non-super sunny locations it can make a big difference. Granted, it's quite expensive still, so I understand people's hesitancy if they won't be guaranteed to make their money back. But, Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, other Midwest places can definitely support solar. They might not get to the level of selling power back very much. But it will definitely do a lot.
@@IanZainea1990 I'm only going by numbers. My system will pay for itself in 10 years. If I sell my house before I can get about 80K more for it. So, for me it's win/win. I have 7.56kW System with 24 Solar Panels and 2 Powerwalls
It was $33,500 before incentives.
We've started to use T-Pylons here in the UK which are less of an eyesore on the landscape and take up less land. These might be worth looking at to implement your new grid infrastructure. You also need some form of green energy storage otherwise, when it's windy in Illinois in the middle of the night, what do you do with the extra electricity? I guess the other option is to have smart charging at home for EV's so they can utilise any additional electricity being generated as it will be cheap (a win/win).
i live in DC so this was super cool and interesting to me, thanks for the vid!
This is the first time I see this important detail of power generation/distribution being mentioned. Thank you and congrats!
Meanwhile in China and Brazil:
"Building a 1000km transmission line? Sure."
With the corrupt systems in both countries I would take that with a grain of salt
China has actually built over 3000km power line
Tf is Brazil building 🤣🤣🤣
China has built multiple 1000HVDC or even 1100kV lines :P 375V is 50s technology
@@nickloughren1919 Yet thay have built enormous projects like Itaipú and Three gorges.
In Brazil the states are not authonomous as in US, here we have the National Operator who manages all generation and distribution power from the plants, and the power grids are connected all around the country (exept for a tiny portion of the most northern state with a few people that just receive energy from the neghbor country cause is not viable to construct a grid to connect them to the national grid).
In California our power distribution (and the costs of previous regulatory errors) are already much higher than current generation costs.
Perhaps the distribution costs need to be bundled into the cost of buying power from the remote plant.
you must construct additional pylons!!!
Haaaahaha flashback
Well, if the US wasn't meddling around the world and enriching war mongers maybe there would have been some money to build the pylons
Yes and they are beautiful to see every day! I want one in my backyard for the common good and environmental beautification. Maybe even two!
@Sam Bourgeois Aiur. It's Aiur.
Pylons? Like in Terraria?
I live in Asia, induction cooktop is common and is so good, it makes me feel like I'm living in the future. It's 1000x better than traditional gas stove or electric stove.
The main benefit of induction (for me) compared to a gas stove: clean cupboards.
I always thought that the sticky dirt that collects on upper cupboards comes from the grease and food that you prepare, but it turns out its actually from the natural gas itself.
Repent to Jesus Christ!!!!
I think its strange how videos like these always forget that nuclear power exists, and is the MOST carbon and emissions friendly method of generating power.
But what do you do with all the waste? Leave the problem for our children's children to solve? I'm sure they'll appreciate that.
They hate nuclear bc it makes renewables useless
Good presentation and very accurate on what needs to be done. However a much easier and better long term solution without mountains of toxic solar panels sitting around after 20+years is to build nuclear and work on a long term waste repository
Thank you for making this and informing me on an important part of the renewable energy process I had no clue about
Maybe “local energy” needs to be a thing… with battery storage tech. Like putting solar panels on buildings to power those buildings and their neighbors.
The only problem I see is that this shifts the cost to the individual rather than large entities. At the moment, I’m not aware of any locations in the US that offer financial incentives to individuals to partially cover the costs to install solar/wind.
this, exactly.
power companies could lead the way to 'lease' solar panels and battery storage. but since they are the only game in town, why fix something that's making them rich? it's better to be the source and charge per KW rather than change. I'm surprised they couldn't figure out a business model that would put them in the forefront of the energy movement, and keep the power plants going... I hope to have solar and a battery soon.
That is what I was thinking. Decentralized Energy could compensate for the power needed from Power Plants as they do already.
Not as efficient in costs, and doesn't guarantee users over time, because when you need to substitute these apparels, they cost
We need to make large systems green, so that the market, as it is becoming, becomes green
I love this piece. Here in Indonesia, the generation and distribution of electricity are still playing catch-up with the ever-growing demand of modernization and economic development. In fact, the supply of electricity is one of the issues which hampers the nation's development. That policies here are implemented based on the political will of the government doesn't help either.
Indonesia has a chance to revolutionize clean energy as no one else can,ThorCon is working with them they want evidenced based regulations, and would build a full scale version of their plant and run it without Nuclear fuel to get the bugs out then proceed once they have run tests, they can build these fast enough to power the world Carbon free in ten years. Thery can't do it in the US because of our regulations. So far we hear nothing from Indonesian government even though they have had years to decide, they could have worlds cheapest electricity and it would be clean, this would make every citizen far more wealthy than they are now.
The biggest problem is we the people fully support the demand for energy. We pay our bills, generating the proper funding. The demand is not the problem. Nor a shortage of paying customers.
The problem is the top think they can become rich, take all the funding. Like it's mailbox money for them. Draining the bank accounts of the energy sector. Leaving us with a bankrupted system.
A supply shortage. Raising inflation.
Like some how the energy sector needs tax giveaways to bail them out. Who's the welfare queens?.
Like solar doesn't need one penny in tax giveaways. It's a sector with paying customers. With a awesome demand. Nothing complicated here.
Down is up.
Indonesia has big potential for geothermal energy due to the geology wonder why it's still lacking effort to tap on it.
I'm from Warsaw Poland and we had a lot of transmission lines here on the outskirts, even one in neighbourhood but they put them under the ground so now it's safer here.
This is the moment where nuclear steps in. Emission free, can be placed where needed to replace big fossil installations in plug&play manner, stable electricty source. And if we start investing in it, it might even stop being obnoxiously expensive - just like solar and wind got cheaper with scale.
On the other hand, if you subtract the transmission investment cost (that is not that necessary as it is for wind and solar) from the nuclear, its price tag hurts less.
Nuclear power actually gets more expensive at scale, so it's actually better to downsize nuclear plants.
But building nuclear takes time. And if there is infra for transmission, nuclear plants can be built away from population (where there is more political resistance).
@@KRYMauL Scale in terms of generation capacity of one unit. Not in total number of plants as fixed cost will get divided over number of units built.
Totally agree, and new (Gen IV) nuclear can be built smaller, cheaper and faster. It is coming.
@@sublimefermion2205 My point was that nuclear power plants need to be smaller to be safer i.e. they produce less power but there's more of them.
2:11 you forgot this thing called trains, there even more eco friendly and are essentially the a greener future.
Trains are horrible for the environment. Da fuh you smokin?
@@abimbolaaku2709 huh?
What do you mean?
@@SalvadorCiaro Perhaps he might be thinking of diesel-electric locomotives USA uses for their freight rail transport. Apart from inner city metro, there are no electric trains in USA.
@@abimbolaaku2709 Depends on which train we are referring to. Diesel-electric, maybe. Pure electric, not really.
@@abimbolaaku2709 ever heard of mag-lev trains?
Very important! This is something we are facing a lot now in the Netherlands that our electricity net can't handle the rate that we are electrifying and producing renewable energy. Expanding the infrastructure is a step in the right direction, but other innovations like cable pooling, energy hubs and smart grids will likely also help in the future!
Amazing, and this research and eventually call of actions could be applied to any country in America (the continent) we need better distribution lines!
This is why I'm happy to have several transmission corridors running through my city and province in Ontario
Descentralized energy production like solar roofs can also help to minimise the need for such many big power lines.
This is false
Peak energy demand is typically winter months around 6pm when the output of solar on your roof is close to zero
So having solar on roofs doesn't reduce the need for transmission lines one bit
Agreed decentralized is the way to go. Hurricanes, fires, cold snaps bring down systems region-wide. Mandate vehicle-to-grid too.
@@kaya051285 you are the one that's wrong. Solar with battery storage can be designed to meet Peak energy demand needs.
@@kaya051285 Depend, you can locally store that energy (eg. batteries). It's not a new concept or solution. For example, Tesla already sells power wall that does that. There are also brands.
Very cool, Thanks for sharing
It would be good to have analysis of distributed power generation vs transmission lines. In sunny places like California households could have solar power and batteries and not rely on the grid at all. Could individual power for homeowners be cheaper if we trade off against the cost of the grid?
Nuclear is the Chad equivalent of energy
Nah, it´s very very expensive and not that safe
@@blablub2402 read other comments about nuclear
@@blablub2402 You've looked at modern nuclear tech it and you're sure it's not safe?
Too slow and resource intensive. Nuclear doesn't couldn't even start reducing emmisions for a decade or two, and the expense per unit of power is several times that of renewables.
@@blablub2402 Nuclear is the safest and cleanest power source in existence. You may want to do some research.
5:36 Only 320 billion dollars needed in 10 years?
*The military's annual budget is double that... Huh*
@@user-rs3lm1ci6n Yes, 11% for military, 70% for entitlements (second highest in the world).
@@user-rs3lm1ci6n So you can live well at the expense of others. The military is there so we get the lion's share of exploitable countries. Without them you would have to live a much reduced lifestyle. 11% is nothing compared to other countries, we don't even make the top 20. Dropping it in half would have no measurable effect on anything. Healthcare for all would require 40 times this amount.
@@user-rs3lm1ci6n Just trying to guess what you would do with the tiny amount of extra cash. Is that so hard to figure out? Seems you totally missed the point anyway.
Curious to know if high-voltage electricity cables can also be laid in airtight pipelines like natual gas?
Not exactly. The wire has to be insulated. Underground transmission lines are insulated wires in PVC conduit and then encased in concrete. The problem is the wires create a lot of heat that needs to dissipate into the ground. Air or a vaccume impedeads the transfer of heat and the aluminum wires would melt. The limiting issue for underground is heat. Heat dissapation will cause the wire size and numbers of wires to increase. Eventually the earth itself becomes too hot to dissipate the heat and a cable failure results.
SF6 gas is used in substations to insulate gas breakers and extinguish electrical arcs in switches.
I'm more of a fan of localized power generation and storage. Continuing to have massive conglomerates run our grid is outdated thinking, IMO.
Anyone seen the documentary about Enron? Of course it was corruption and a very isolated incident, but they were also busted for bribing individuals working in the power grid to shutdown or transfer power in/out of powerstations at the wrong time. You know, because it would make more money.
But then again your local solar array is not going to power the industrial area of town in a major city, so in all likelihood you’ll need a hybrid model
Sadly, the more local renewable power generation is, the less reliable it is. A single wind turbine produces power in an erratic manner. You can't power a neighborhood with that. A fleet of thousands of wind turbines, spread across the state, will have much smoother variations (although it may still have low-production periods that can last for weeks depending on the weather). Like it or not, the more low-carbon energy production gets, the more interdependent it becomes. Unless, of course, you're prepared to get your AC/heating/lights shut off when you need them most.
If you absolutely want your low-carbon electricity to be produced locally then you'll need more classic modes of production like hydro plants (already at capacity in most states) or NPPs.
@@axel6269 I think each region should probably look into the solutions that best fit their needs and that it just won't be one type of production, like you said.
There is a lot of focus on renewable energy but Nuclear is also carbon free. I feel like there was a missed opportunity around talking about how Nuclear fits into this. Better yet, I would love a video on why there is such a focus on wind and solar as a clean energy and nuclear isn't often considered.
Because wind and solar are trendy and have developed a powerful lobby? Maybe that's just a cynical take. Every time I watch one of these videos the comments are full of "what about nuclear" and people pointing out that wind, solar and hydro aren't as impact-free as they're made out to be. But those questions always seem to be ignored by the policy makers and media giants. If there is an argument against focusing our energy investments in nuclear that isn't driven by unfounded Cold War era hysteria, I'd like to hear it.
@@AChungusAmongUs As someone who's about to enter the nuclear industry from uni, I can say the the average person is friendly towards nuclear. Practically no one I've ever met has been hostile towards it (perhaps out of politeness). The difference is purely image. Wind/solar have "common knowledge" and institutional support (and lobbying) to back it up, while nuclear has an up-hill battle to even be talked about in circles and spaces that actually have any impact on public policy.
I think that might be because of fear of nuclear catastrophies and the Problem what to do with nuclear waste. Atleast it's like that in Germany, where we sadly don't have enough empty land to store it far away from everyone, and noone wants nuclear waste buried near their house.
@@zraven2931 What I find even more surprising is that your neighbor France is Pro nuclear, they don't seem to be having any problems, could you explain why?
@@cameosix7077 that's europe for you
Currently in the Netherlands, we are facing this exact problem. Thousands of households put solar panels on their roofs, but on sunny days, the safety system turns them off, because the grid can't handle all of the electricity. The result: all those people thought they could save on their energy bills and help against climate change, but instead they pay to use coal energy on a sunny day. It's ridiculous.
Depends if their Converter has the possibility to operate in Island Operation.
cant they... not connect it to the grid? and have this private one of their house, panels and a battery? that switches between being connected to the main grid when battery empty no sun and not connected, only using my panels for the coffee machine? do you know Why theyre connected to the grid?
@@kilmameri Due to government subsidies, middle class homes also have access to solar panels, but batteries are expensive and not good enough to completely solve the problem. It would just be better to build better, future proof infrastructure. That's as far as I know at least. This isn't an issue that individual households should solve anyway.
Buildings need to start installing more storage... but this of course requires better and cheaper storage options. Which is where vehicle-to-property could help.
@@kilmameri like mentioned in my comment, it is called island operation and their must be a physical separation from the grid
I never thought about it, its a very good point!
Thank you! Very helpful to my current course project!
Are clothes dryers with heat pumps more energy efficient and last just as long as commercial dryers without heat pumps?
3 words: Fossil Fuel "Contributions."
Politicians bought and paid for. The system will continue to make money and pollute.
When we talk about Big Solar. The world will be a better place.
The larger the distance you have to cover on the grid, the more energy gets lost.
Local Solar is the answer.
@@psikot Good luck in New York and Chicago
@@psikot HVDC is the answer
@@psikot Not even close. It takes a ton of panels to make electricity and it only works for a few hours on it's best day.
Yeah we need more microgrids, not just because of that reason but because it’s safer and we don’t want another Texas winter 2020. Having huge grids is hella risky. Can’t have just microgrids but we need to move towards a hybrid of the current grid system and microgrids!
It is literally my job to see how new generation in Texas will affect our grid. This video was very spot on. Money is the biggest reason why we dont build for the future.
I really appreciate this.
5:56 that is the problem with literally everything in the US. a certain party does not want us to progress into the future and save ourselves so they'll make it impossible to get anywhere, just so they can blame the other party for the fact nothing got done. this game has been going on for several decades now and we're all losing.
You see through the whole thing, sad but true
Not just the states tbh
It really isn't though. If the government shows up at your door, offers you fifty cents on the dollar for your property because they want to stick a footing for some new high voltage transmission equipment in what is now your back yard are you going to say "Oh boy green energy! Take it all for fifty cents on the dollar!" Probably not. If the government says well, we need a bit more than a trillion dollars to make this happen and your taxes will need to go up meaningfully to finance that project are you going to say "Oh boy green energy take my money!" Probably not.
Bigger than anything it's that "the people" don't want to pay for progress. They got it in their heads that progress is supposed to be a free lunch. Lots of these things could have been done long ago were it not for the masses and their disinterest in paying for things.
@@BTrain-is8ch i hope by "the masses" you also mean rich people and corporations. they've shown equal reluctance to pay for things, but unlike the rest of us, they've made a way not to. them not doing their part has more to do with it than everyone else.
@@geekdiggy It includes everyone that whines about not having X then when the time to open up their wallets to get X comes they go quiet.
Remember that storm they had in Texas earlier this year? A poll after the fact asked whether people supported making improvements to their grid to avoid that outcome again. Massive support. The same poll asked whether they'd be willing to spend $5/month to get those improvements. Massive opposition.
Remember Medicare for All? Plenty of polls have shown majority support for Medicare for all as a concept. Followed by plenty of polls showing majority opposition if it comes with tax hikes.
It's not the rich and corporations. It's regular old people. Regular old people have come to believe in free lunches. Then the same regular old people act surprised when the rich and corporations feel exactly the same way they do about taxation. That's not sustainable. That's not how it works in countries that are ahead of us or better off on these matters.
As for your last point I think you should check out the CBO's data on the distribution of tax burden in the US. I don't know how you define "rich" but the top 20% of tax units in the US nearly fund the federal government by themselves and the top 1% of tax units account for around a quarter of the federal government's revenue. The bottom 60% accounts for near as makes no difference nothing.
If the US is going to get some of these improvements the bottom 80% are going to need to step up financially like they do in the countries they point to as examples. The distribution of tax burden in the US is too progressive for a country that wants nationalized healthcare, nationalized education, new infrastructure, etc.
A big step people forget in decarbonizing involves actually lowering our energy usage. Present habits are unsustainable, and we really need to find ways to bring down our excessive habits
Exactly - we shouldn't try to invent way to supply our current, absurd energy usage. The only way forward is to reduce the amount of energy used - ban AC, limit amount energy every consument can use monthly etc. Building large solar or wind farm and enormous power lines will only deteriorate the environment further. Future is small and local energy generation and seriously reduced energy consumption.
Seez the guy viewing this on his computer, tablet or smartphone none of which existed 50 years ago! Power consumption is going to continue to increase. If you look at power consumption 50 years ago vs today you find that while the population has almost doubled, power consumption hasn't due to increases in efficiency of power usage. It will continue into the future because cost of use of products that consume power will be important selling points to the end users.
@@justanordinaryaccount9910 lol “Ban AC”
Get ready to starve on that hill. Because that isn’t going anywhere.
does the model take geo-localized on-demand storage into account as supplement to grid expansion? if 75% of new grid-scale projects include storage sinks then how many fewer transmission projects need to happen? and/or can HVDC be extended into the future as the longer-term cost effective solution while storage sinks are the immediate time-sensitive solution?
Very well done!
Expanding the grid represents a computationally difficult and possibly impossible to solve stability problem. True, with a greater grid coverage, the renewable energy sources that are not load following can be relocated to where needed and when lacking can be compensated for by areas where they are available but ultimately it will take load following power generation such as molten salt reactors or hydroelectric or copious energy storage to make a large reliance on non load following power generation such as solar and wind successful.
Storage is a key part of the equation that not many people talk about. You're absolutely right.
In Québec we done this and run on clean energy from hydro power from the 60's we began building our infrastructure in those time . Nothing is impossible escpecialy for the US wich are suposedly the strongest nation on earth .
@@yannick-tripleocarina6960 Never mind that hydroelectric dams are now being dismantled as the costs of dredging the reservoirs for continued use was never taken into account in the business model and the environmental damage to the river's ecosystem is far worse than ever expected.
It should be noted that despite there being no bauxite mine in Canada, Aluminium is smelted in Quebec due to the plentiful hydroelectric power and rail transportation to the north east of the US. Also, if you've ever spent time in Jonquiere, you'll know that the aluminium smelters reeks when the winds blow towards you so no one really wants such facilities close to them hence having them in remote locations in Canada made perfect sense to the American multinational corporations.
This seems exactly backwards, and I'm extremely skeptical of a map of 'Solar Potential' sites in America that rates Minnesota higher than Arizona. The Princeton study applies some kind of 'constraint' to where these items can be sited, but I cannot find their definition of 'constrained site'.
It's backwards because rooftop solar is by far the smartest play for generation (doesn't displace ecosystem, shades the building to keep it cooler, very near point of use), and micro-grids are absolutely what I see experts saying we should be developing, not beefing up long-range transmission lines.
This video is probably sponsored by Sempra or something. Traditional power companies love the idea of centralized generation, massive transmission, and beholden consumers.
Renewable energy offers a completely separate path of local ownership, local control, local benefits. We should take that opportunity, which means rooftop solar and municipal/cooperative wind turbines. Even if your village's wind turbine isn't in an 'ideal' location, you still get it's power dumped into your town. If you combine this with micro-gridding, a regional catastrophe (like a hurricane) becomes a lot less damaging to people as power can be restored in more places early in recovery.
That map makes no sense at all. Basically nothing in Nevada, Arizona, and Utah? Something very wrong there.
Heat and solar are two separate things. Look at Alaska and 6 months of daylight up to 21 hours a day.
@@bait-cz5uj Not sure what your point is? Arizona has many, many cloudless days with the sun high overhead. It's got to be a good place for solar energy. This princeton map shows cloudy Minnesota as a better place for solar and wind than sunny Arizona, and I don't understand what criteria they used for that.
@@kurtxwatson "a better place for solar and wind" and "a better place for solar" are not the same thing, and you likely need to look at why they rated differently instead of just looking at the rating alone. Who knows, maybe you are right, but right now, you dont appear to have the data to support that.
@@xBINARYGODx I don't have the data either, but I remember something about solar panels being more efficient when they are cooler.
Important and we'll explained. Thx 😀👍
So exited for this!
I always like looking at the tall electric towers when driving a long distance.
Yeah I find them quite stylish
Fill every roof with solar panels before starting to think about transmitting all the power needed from far away. Local generation is a big part of the solution together with storage like electric cars and house batteries.
Unfortunately they aren’t cheap to install. You can’t push the responsibility onto consumers. Unless we somehow get public housing that’s not really a solution.
I agree. Is Vox in the pocket of PG&E? I am surprised this wasn't even mentioned in the video.
@@holly1858 Local storage is great if we have public housing which we don’t. You don’t get to push the responsibility onto the consumer.
Extraordinary more expensive.
@@plip_plop You see you take the fossil fuel subsidies and move them over to solar and battery's. Or just cut the overblown massively wasteful and fraudulent military budget by half and you can solve every single issue the us have ever had and still have money over.
love the video. I am in western NY and bad weather is a problem for the grid that goes down quite a bit. The current grid system needs to be updated and switch to smart grid . even UHVDC can be used . china did it. 1.1 mega volts DC .we are at the point of needing grid storage . not only do we need to mover the power we need to store it as well . it is the power demand that is a problem . the time we need power is not always when it is made .having the need for Peaker plants on standby .
Gonna need a lot of storage too.
It would seem more logical to keep the solar and wind closer to the use point, i.e. on your roof or, for wind, in your state. That, combined with large local battery storage, should be able to keep the need for enormous/dangerous power lines to a minimum.
exactly, without storage/buffers we don't have a very sustainable future for our grid.
can’t build batteries without rare earth metals from the congo and other colonized regions that are already suffering from current demand. decarbonizing requires using less energy in addition to using renewable energy
@@geoffdparsons Most home off grid batteries are lead acid or gel batteries, no lithium or cobalt
@@geoffdparsons Don’t forget the most important, nuclear energy
@@geoffdparsons My understanding is that we are already moving away from rare earth metals in battery production, at least for EV's. Totally agree that decreasing our carbon footprint should include ways to decrease energy use.
Basically, it's the same problems with famines. We can't move enough food from places that has a surplus to places that are in desperate needs.
I mean we technically could, but no one wants to eat food that are flash frozen and chalked full of preservatives that destroy all the flavour.
No it isn't, famine in the modern world is largely created by a lack of local food production and a lack of mechanization in said food production which is caused by economic imperialism that prevents developing countries from developing their own local industry and securing their food supply.
Correct me if I'm wrong. There is a certain percentage of feeding PV and wind power into whole grid (15-20%?) due to its low quality of electricity which is unfriendly to the grid. So how we get greener by PV and wind?
as a lineman i dont really wanna focus on highlands and many others dont either they dont pay you enough for that type of work
The transmission problem becomes a lot smaller if everyone has rooftop solar instead of relying mainly on solar farms.
Uhm wrong, solar panels/roof and storage batteries are still very expensive and alot of people actually lives in apartments in cities, the grid supplies energy to the very energy intensive industries too.
@@carholic-sz3qv agreed. And it still needs to be pumped around as needed. Does not matter if a whole city has roof top of they are under clouds. Not to mention the cost of decentralizing even more with roof top the with plants. The problem is the same but worse.
New infrastructure means construction, it's not just another transfer payment. I don't believe there is enough hard currency to do such a thing.
Also don't think your politicians care about this thing
materials
@Vox I'm sure you can pass this idea onto the right people, I was thinking of something that should be easier to get that 1% to agree to. A mix between SMALL towers and underground.
Everywhere you would've put a large tower, put a small tower and thread the cable underground to the next tower, slap a mesh cage or something around the tower to prevent wildlife and passerbys from accidentally touching the cables that are coming out of the ground. Small towers are less of an eyesore and underground cabling further reduces the unsightly part of it, using small towers instead of underground exchanges make maintenance/replacement easier as you only need to pull the cable out (obviously with whatever safety measure are deemed necessary).
I live in southern Michigan, PG&E is actively seeking solar sites in my county
Wouldnt it be great if we had cross-country high-speed rails? Run new transmission lines along-size it, and use it for power? Nahhhh... let's not do that.
Great idea.
Renewable energy is now cheaper than most fossil fuel energy. The fossil fuel industry is doing everything they can to slow down renewable energy distribution and adoption so they don't lose out on their investments.
The problem with upscaling the capacity is that there still will be a maximum capacity ,just a higher one. Instead, we could solve our energy storage problem ánd transportation problem by making use of hydrogen cells. This will take away the unreliability of certain sustainable energy sources by storing then when they do produce and make use of it when required. This of course causes for a loss in efficiency as compared to using solely electric, though upscaling the whole business or even exporting it to other countries/states would be made possible.
Make sure there is a slight overproduction compared to consumption. And take away the unreliability with storage (eg. oil terminal/tanks etc). Also note hydrogen has an energy density of approximately 120 MJ/kg, almost three times more than diesel or gasoline. Downside of course is when used on small scale, cars etc, it only has a 60% efficiency, whereas larger facilities would operate at a much higher efficiency of course.
That graph of cable cross-section vs. voltage looked really funny to me. If you control for a power line's capacity they're actually inversely related!
Power is the product of voltage and current. Current is determined more by the load of the circuit than anything else, so the only variable we can control here is voltage. This can be accomplished by selecting transformers with higher step-up ratios. In a perfect world the transmission line would be lossless, but in reality it loses power due to the resistance of the cables, and that power loss is directly proportional to the resistance of the cable and proportional to the load current SQUARED.
This means if you need a cable to carry double the power you can either halve its resistance by doubling its cross-sectional area or you can halve the power loss due to transmission by increasing the transmission voltage by about 41%. If you're constrained by material you may not even have a choice, increasing the transmission voltage may be the only option. This is the route China has taken with its ultra high voltage transmission lines.
The problem with increasing transmission line voltage is in the maintenance and safety of the line; like you say in the video, you need to keep the area underneath and around the transmission lines free of vegetation to prevent wildfires. Naturally this area gets larger with a higher voltage line. Any equipment that has to switch at high voltage will also need to be designed for the higher voltages, which is a fixed expense.
That looked odd to me too, but I’m wondering if maybe the cable diameter needs to be larger so the local electric field density is spread out over more area and doesn’t exceed breakdown? I know in chip layout we have to avoid sharp corners, since field density builds up there, and that’s the point of failure.
@@catc8927 I don't know if there is such an effect due to the electric field, I found an effect known as Corona Loss that occurs when parallel power lines are too close together but that can be solved by increasing the distance between conductors.
@@catc8927 Apparently Corona Discharge is the exact phenomenon you described, just at tens of kilovolts and on the scale of meters instead of in an IC. So corona discharge has to be factored into selecting cable diameter. Well spotted!
I dont really understand the relation cost/benefit in this kind of operation.
But here, in brazil, 2 or 3 years ago, was completed the construction of 2 UHDVC lines, of 2,5k km, linking a new Hidroeletric plant in the north, to the big citties in the southeast. And there other older(2011) HDCV that link other H.P. in north to the SE
In Germany those high voltage grids were built underground. Under the surface between the cities and windturbine parks.
I love Vox videos like this! Thank you!