A couple of days ago, Elon Musk showed up in Berlin to accept a award from the Axel Springer folks, and he delivered a speech.
When Musk speaks....it's generally always in future-speak where he is giving you a vision of life and technology in ten to twenty years. So he gave a speech and talked for a bit about E-cars coming.
In this speech, he hinted to the Germans in the crowd that 70-to-80 percent of cars produced (meaning globally) will be electric....in ten years.
Then he lays out this topic which almost no German politician or journalist has openly discussed, the electricity required to support this type of grid. In bold, yet simple terms....Musk says the grid will have to double in terms of electrical power.
Whatever is used today....is 50-percent of what is required by 2030, if Musk is correct.
A shocker to the audience? One might suspect they are sitting there and asking the electrical engineers about this power consumption issue and wondering if a problem exists.
Musk's solution to the future electrical issue? He simply suggests that wind and solar power will have to be the solution, and that some massive battery collection will exist at that point to hold the power to when it needs to be used (obviously at night when the cars will be recharged).
Any of this massive battery-storage capability existing today? No.
Anything on the planning cycle? Mostly just as technology development projects.
Doubling up wind and solar to double of what it is today? It could happen in ten years if the national goal demanded this, but we haven't exactly seen that type of 'demand' advertised or recommended in Germany.
If you look over at wind-generators....in terms of placement, Germany probably peaked a couple of years ago, and with public groups against placement near urbanized locations, wind-power is a hard-sell.
Solar continues on a pace, but no one is really suggesting that it's on a massive growth pattern. In 2019, it was estimated that German solar power to the grid was around 5.1-percent. While it will grow each year....if you flipped the goal to a grid twice the size of what exists today....the solar folks would have to go on a major revision of plans for the next couple of years.
Musk's words are probably triggering some discussions on the E-car goal and the nuke/coal energy 'machine' going away in the next couple of years.
6 comments:
South Australia partnered with him and developed a giant battery system and have fixed their power issues. Used to always be brown outs during summer but no longer.
Western Australia has what....3,000-plus hours of sunshine per year? Germany? I doubt if they ever get up around 1,600 to 1,800 hours a year of sunshine per year. Some folks around Hamburg will tell you that they go sometimes up to two weeks without seeing the sun.
The 'eggs' are all in the wind-generator solution, and some hope that some mega battery system will be created (at a cost) in five to eight years.
South Australia. Western Australia tends to elect conservative governments who pander to the .9%gdp of their mining magnates and don't think of progressive solutions.
Te future is nuclear fusion
Claudio, you might be right, but it's still 20 years away from taking off.
I do think that Toyota is correct....sidestepping E-cars and going toward hydrogen vehicles. All these electrical requirement could be avoided if hydrogen were the 'pick'.
Nuclear would be the way to bridge the technologies.
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