[lazide]

I agree, thanks for writing that up.

Do you think it will require the phase out of things like Natural Gas peaker plants to make longer term storage more worthwhile?

Off grid, the most economic setup right now in California is essentially solar + batteries with battery storage sized up to about a day/24 hrs of load, with a propane fueled generator + propane backup heaters for ‘emergencies’ like long winter storms.

Generators get exercised regularly to ensure functionality, but otherwise don’t get run unless needed, which is rare. Maybe 16-24 hrs a season. They also charge the batteries when their full load isn’t needed elsewhere, which cuts run time.

Natural Gas would of course be the replacement for propane in a grid situation, where it was available.

The paperwork and permitting in general is a sign of the future for sure. sigh

[epistasis]

Last I heard, lithium ion is cheaper than the OpEx for the average existing natural gas peaker, but I haven't checked in a year or two. With the fluctuating cost of gas, and the recent small rise in battery cost from supply constraints, I could see that flipping back and forth. And there will be a long delay between having a new cost king and a switchover due to utilities being able to charge rate payers for stranded capital, and also the generally slow utility process for developing new resources, which is often on a five year time scale, using decisions made on five year old data.

That's pretty exciting with regards to off-grid use, I don't know much about it. 24 hours of fossil gas use per season is just absolutely tiny, one could definitely even imagine synthetic fuel production from electricity and air being enough to generate that. Thanks for the info!