Windmills Overload East Europe’s Grid, Risking Blackout
Germany is dumping electricity on its unwilling neighbors and by wintertime the feud should come to a head.
Central and Eastern European countries are moving to disconnect their
power lines from Germany’s during the windiest days. That’s when they
get flooded with energy, echoing struggles seen from China to Texas over
accommodating the world’s 200,000 windmills.
Renewable energy around the world is causing problems because unlike oil
it can’t be stored, so when generated it must be consumed or risk
causing a grid collapse. At times, the glut can be so great that
utilities pay consumers to take the power and get rid of it.
Oh that we might have Germany's problem :: too much electricity.
An acquaintance of mine has been developing an electricity storage
technology which can scale and has a low environmental footprint. I
called him last month to find out how things are going.
I had thought he was going to tell me about progress on a
megawatt-hour prototype. No, he's talking to, you guessed it, the
Germans, and they're asking him to design for them a Gigawatt-hour
system. Meanwhile, his American prospects haven't materialized.
The Germans will meet the renewable energy challenge. They will be
selling American storage technology to electricity grid operators around
the world. (Renewables aren't the only context for grid-scale
storage.)
Meanwhile the dominant energy storage technology comes straight from the stone age: digging up
black rocks and burning them. But how long will this last? Hmmm...
Chinese saying: There are two kinds of businessman, good and bad. Good businessman selling; bad businessman buying.
The Chinese learned to sell solar technology to the Germans. So perhaps they could learn another lesson from the Germans: Stop buying black rocks from third world countries like the USA, Indonesia and Australia, and start selling
a total renewable energy package, complete with grid-scale storage.
Third world Americans will be good customers. They are whining:
"renewable energy around the world is causing problems because unlike
oil
it can’t be stored..." so they won't be coming up with products anytime soon.
Unlike oil, the wind is free... and the winds will blow long after the oil is gone.
It used to be "Buy American." Now it's "Buy America." The place is
[energetically] bankrupt and up for sale to the highest bidder.