Solar, Wind Renewable Energy

[Rianne]

Now this sounds promising! Nuclear fusion breakthrough.

https://www.theguardian.com/environ...-confirm-major-breakthrough-in-nuclear-fusion

 

[REWahoo]

Now this sounds promising! Nuclear fusion breakthrough.

Yes.

See this thread from Dec 13: https://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f27/fusion-energy-breakthrough-116232.html

 

[NW-Bound]

We had a thread about this fusion breakthrough recently.

If you read more about how they achieved it, which is indeed very hard, you will appreciate more how far this experiment is from true fusion energy production.

 

[JoeWras]

We had a thread about this fusion breakthrough recently.

Rianne had a breakthrough in time travel and was caught in a time loop for 5 weeks.

 

[Rianne]

Rianne had a breakthrough in time travel and was caught in a time loop for 5 weeks.

Ha! Goes to show how fast threads move in this forum. I’m the OP in this thread, but scan threads too quickly sometimes without signing in. Good to know somebody’s paying attention

 

[NW-Bound]

I wonder between commercial fusion for electricity and Mars colonization, which one will happen first.

No matter which outcome, we will not be alive to see it.

 

[Koolau]

The weather in CA has been terrible. Out of curiosity I looked at the PG&E electric outage map, and saw several areas without power for more than a week.

Then, I looked at their weather info, and saw that they did not have much sunshine either. It means that even if they had an off-grid solar system with battery storage like mine for a backup, if it did not get blown away by strong winds, it would produce such puny power that may be barely enough to keep a fridge working.

It's not easy to keep a small generator running for several days. It will take 4-5 gallons per day. You cannot store enough gasoline to keep it running for a week. And with flooded roads, it's not easy to go get fuel every day either.

Oh man, we all take a lot of things for granted.

How true. I've often thought about what a major interruption to the grid might do to us (or any 1st world country.) It would not be pretty. Just think back to the gas lines and that gives you a very small preview of what it could be like.

Think pandemic, plus gas lines, plus people freezing in their homes, plus Katrina, plus NE blackout of 1965, plus, plus... A major grid outage would seem like the apocalypse.

 

[Koolau]

Pre electrical grid: ammonia / water absorption cycle kerosene powered 'fridge plus 'free light' wind turbine & lead acid batteries. While listening, turn off the lights and read by the light of the valve radio.

Or just keep an extra small efficient electrically powered freezer, or in cold weather, keep the food frozen outside, hang the washed clothes outside to freeze dry.

Savvy folks with some land, tools and skills would better weather a major grid outage. But think of folks in high rises without land, skills, knowledge.

How long would generator back-up last at hospitals? Police/fire stations? Maybe 36 to 48 hours at most?

Let's face it, we are almost totally dependent upon the grid. It's protection and enhancement ought to be front and center when we begin spending all that infrastructure money. Maybe we ought to do that before we build more electric cars?

Oh, on a funny note (or not - depending upon your particular "funny bone" - I think this "grid" subject could use a bit of levity.)

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/...-out-sales-of-new-e-vs-by-2035-200704042.html

YMMV

 

[folivier]

Katrina was a wakeup call for me. Our town wasn't directly affected but our university was set up as a triage and evacuation center. That wasn't a problem since a lot of locals pitched in and helped, cooked food, donated supplies, etc.
What was bad is we lost electricity for a couple weeks and were on generator's and grocery deliveries ceased for almost 3 weeks.
FEMA takes a few weeks to get setup to help people so we only had what we had in our homes once grocery stores were wiped out.
We're now at our mountain cabin and have the same philosophy if we lose power or get snowed in. Plenty of food and stocking up on freeze dried long term storage food. Plenty firewood.
So learn to take care of yourself, if FEMA or other agencies come to help it won't be right away.

 

[Koolau]

Katrina was a wakeup call for me. Our town wasn't directly affected but our university was set up as a triage and evacuation center. That wasn't a problem since a lot of locals pitched in and helped, cooked food, donated supplies, etc.
What was bad is we lost electricity for a couple weeks and were on generator's and grocery deliveries ceased for almost 3 weeks.
FEMA takes a few weeks to get setup to help people so we only had what we had in our homes once grocery stores were wiped out.
We're now at our mountain cabin and have the same philosophy if we lose power or get snowed in. Plenty of food and stocking up on freeze dried long term storage food. Plenty firewood.
So learn to take care of yourself, if FEMA or other agencies come to help it won't be right away.

Good advice. Even in our high rise, since we are subject to hurricanes (oh, and power outages) we always have a good supply of food and water plus batteries and light sources, etc. We have enough to share as well. Heh, heh, major FEMA help is 2500 sea-miles away - IF they find out we need them.

 

[folivier]

" IF they find out we need them."

That's a good point. A friend found that out the hard way when a storm came through the Louisiana coast. Their area was flooded, all cars were damaged, phone lines were out, no communications whatsoever. He had a crewboat he contracted to my company and managed to contact us over the company radio after a couple days. We were able to report this to local authorities who had no idea of the problems.
The authorities have since upgraded their systems to account for this.

 

[Samsung4321]

How long would generator back-up last at hospitals? Police/fire stations? Maybe 36 to 48 hours at most?

Renewables can extend:

https://specsolar.com.au/case-studies/commercial-solar-power-case-study-malmsbury-fire-station/

https://www.rpc.com.au/information/faq/miscellaneous/fire-brigades.html

 

[NW-Bound]

Pre electrical grid: ammonia / water absorption cycle kerosene powered 'fridge plus 'free light' wind turbine & lead acid batteries. While listening, turn off the lights and read by the light of the valve radio.

Or just keep an extra small efficient electrically powered freezer, or in cold weather, keep the food frozen outside, hang the washed clothes outside to freeze dry.

The best source of light without electricity is a mantle light. As a kid, I saw them used, but forgot about them until now.

I remember that they burned kerosene. Kerosene is safer to store than gasoline, so that's a plus.

Forget about vacuum tube radios. They take a horrendous amount of electric power compared to transistor radios. A little modern radio can run off a small solar panel coupled with a lithium battery to store the juice for night listening.

 

[NW-Bound]

I looked at PG&E outage map again. As the weather forecasters said, the bad weather front shifted a bit south, and now there are more power outage spots at the latitude of San Francisco and Sacramento and down to Fresno, while people up north like Eureka and Redding are getting a reprieve.

Oh man. I feel for the people in these areas.

See outage map here: https://pgealerts.alerts.pge.com/outagecenter/

 

[dixonge]

I looked at PG&E outage map again. As the weather forecasters said, the bad weather front shifted a bit south, and now there are more power outage spots at the latitude of San Francisco and Sacramento and down to Fresno, while people up north like Eureka and Redding are getting a reprieve.

Oh man. I feel for the people in these areas.

See outage map here: https://pgealerts.alerts.pge.com/outagecenter/

This is "third world" country ****. Regular rolling power outages in the great USA. There are a lot of states that don't have to deal with that.

Some amazing stats and infographics on this post here:

https://paylesspower.com/blog/the-most-at-risk-states-for-power-outages/

 

[Samsung4321]

Forget about vacuum tube radios. They take a horrendous amount of electric power compared to transistor radios. A little modern radio can run off a small solar panel coupled with a lithium battery to store the juice for night listening.

No transistors pre grid.

Home made 'crystal sets', using a 'cats whisker' and piece of galena or, later, detector germanium diode, required no power to receive amplitude modulated medium wave radio signals.

https://www.nutsvolts.com/uploads/wygwam/NV_1020_Goodsell_Fig-1.jpg

A modern design:
https://antiquewireless.org/wp-content/uploads/41-designing_a_dx_crystal_set.pdf

Not so good for picking up global broadcasts at high frequency, 3-30MHz, hence the popularity of powered valve heterodyne radio sets.

 

[NW-Bound]

No transistors pre grid.

Right. I was talking about what to do in the present day during an outage. The transistor radio was not introduced till the 50s.

I am not sure when the USA got widely electrified, but it would be hard to run a vacuum tube radio on batteries. The batteries would not last long and it would be prohibitively expensive.

 

[Gumby]

About ten years ago, there was National Geographic movie called "American Blackout," which explored the consequences of a massive grid failure. It was thought provoking. I can't easily find it online to link it, but search for it and give it a watch. Among other things, you'll have a new appreciation for the manual can opener.

 

[ncbill]

The weather in CA has been terrible. Out of curiosity I looked at the PG&E electric outage map, and saw several areas without power for more than a week.

Then, I looked at their weather info, and saw that they did not have much sunshine either. It means that even if they had an off-grid solar system with battery storage like mine for a backup, if it did not get blown away by strong winds, it would produce such puny power that may be barely enough to keep a fridge working.

It's not easy to keep a small generator running for several days. It will take 4-5 gallons per day. You cannot store enough gasoline to keep it running for a week. And with flooded roads, it's not easy to go get fuel every day either.

Oh man, we all take a lot of things for granted.

Efficient, lister-style diesel generator.

Before solar was affordable one off-grid outdoor writer I read used the above.

Ran the generator an hour/day (burning about a quart of diesel) for all electric needs for that day...e.g. pump water to the cistern, vacuum, operate any power tools.

Used kerosene lamps for light.

Cheaper & safer today to use solar, batteries, and LED lighting.

But one could still recharge those batteries with such a generator (burning off-road diesel) if the sun don't shine.

 

[ls99]

Right. I was talking about what to do in the present day during an outage. The transistor radio was not introduced till the 50s.

I am not sure when the USA got widely electrified, but it would be hard to run a vacuum tube radio on batteries. The batteries would not last long and it would be prohibitively expensive.

In olden days there were battery operated valve, tube radios.
They used "A" and "B" batteries. A for filament, B for plate voltages.
There you have it, I scraped rust off of some brain cells.

 

[Samsung4321]

hard to run a vacuum tube radio on batteries. The batteries would not last long and it would be prohibitively expensive.

Typical household electrical power was 32VDC with lead acid 12 V batteries in series & parallel charged by wind turbine or single cylinder diesel engine and dynamo set. Radio typically 12VDC. Battery often transported between gen-set out-shed and living room radio about fortnightly.

More efficient mini valves made portable radios possible but used expensive zinc manganese carbon non-rechargable batteries.

Made obsolete in 1950's with low power light weight transistor radios.

 

[Out of Steam]

The best source of light without electricity is a mantle light. As a kid, I saw them used, but forgot about them until now.

I found one I had in the garage a few months ago, powered by propane canisters. I bought mantles, and used it on a cabin trip this fall.

It was quite enjoyable, providing both light and a little bit of heat.

 

[Samsung4321]

I am not sure when the USA got widely electrified

Perhaps:

'With the flip of a switch at a substation in Lingle, Wyo. on Dec. 5, 1937, a new age began for Wyoming farmers and ranchers who had been left in the dark far too long.'

https://www.wyohistory.org/encyclopedia/rural-electrification-changed-farm-life-forever-wyoming

In Aus, ground return 240VAC delivered to 'most' farms in late 1950's. More isolated stations ('ranches') installed off grid instantaneous on demand 240VAC alternator sets which started when an appliance switched on.

 

[NW-Bound]

I found one I had in the garage a few months ago, powered by propane canisters. I bought mantles, and used it on a cabin trip this fall.

It was quite enjoyable, providing both light and a little bit of heat.

We never had a kerosene mantle lantern in my childhood. The ones I saw were neighbors'. I recall that my father did not own one because he was afraid of fire or explosion. Apparently, he had seen or known of such an accident.

Recently, I remembered this type of lantern, and looked up info on it. Yes, its fuel reservoir needs to be pressurized with a small built-in handpump. The kerosene is heated and vaporized, and it's the burnt fuel vapor that heats up the mantle for it to emit light.

I then found out about the propane mantle lantern. It looks a lot simpler to operate, and is not as finicky. However, stockpiling portable propane canister is not as inexpensive as storing tens of gallons of kerosene.

 

[NW-Bound]

Perhaps:

'With the flip of a switch at a substation in Lingle, Wyo. on Dec. 5, 1937, a new age began for Wyoming farmers and ranchers who had been left in the dark far too long.'

https://www.wyohistory.org/encyclopedia/rural-electrification-changed-farm-life-forever-wyoming

In Aus, ground return 240VAC delivered to 'most' farms in late 1950's. More isolated stations ('ranches') installed off grid instantaneous on demand 240VAC alternator sets which started when an appliance switched on.

From the above link:

In addition to the $5 initiation fee to join the cooperative, members were charged a monthly rate of $3.50 for 40 kilowatt hours...

Electric refrigerators were much sought after, but used a lot more electricity than buyers expected. “People would purchase one, then their meter would run over the 40 kilowatt minimum,” Schott remembered. “First they would think something was wrong with the meter. When they learned the refrigerator was doing it, some of them broke down and cried.”

$5 in 1937 is worth $106 now. $3.5 is worth $74.

How much energy is 40 kWh? Each day, I used about that much when it's not too cold, nor too hot.