By Vijay Jayaraj
Though touted as next generation energy sources, solar and wind technologies have been shoe-horned into electricity grids only through government fiat and subsidies. Their failure to be adopted freely by investors and consumers lies in the pathetic energy density of solar panels and wind turbines.
Energy density is defined as the amount of energy stored in a given unit of mass or volume — a metric that is critical in determining the viability of energy sources. It is typically measured in joules per kilogram (J/kg) for mass, or joules per cubic meter (J/m³) for volume. Often, the expression is in millions of joules, or megajoules (MJ).
Wood, which was widely used before the introduction of coal, has an energy density of just 16 MJ/kg. Society’s ready adoption of fossil fuels stems from their significantly higher concentrations of energy: Coal’s is approximately 24 MJ/kg; oil, 45 MJ/kg; and natural gas, 55 MJ/kg. In an entirely different league, nuclear fuel, depending on the type, has an energy density of about 4 million MJ/kg and will certainly be used extensively as society progresses throughout the 21st century and into the next.
The lithium-ion battery is considered important to compensating for the appallingly poor reliability of wind and solar. However, most commercial scale batteries have an energy density of less than 1 MJ/kg, orders of magnitude less than wood.
Hydrogen, a supposedly futuristic fuel, has just a third of wood’s energy density.
As one would expect, solar and wind fall short in comparisons of power density, which is a measure of how much energy is produced. In terms of land use, solar and wind put out 5-20 and 2-3 watts per square meter of land area where a natural gas power plant generates 1,000 watts.
The superior potency of fossil fuels enabled a quantum leap in human productivity, fundamentally altering the trajectory of civilization. This characteristic allowed for the creation of compact, portable, and highly efficient energy systems powering everything from small engines to massive manufacturing complexes. Industrial processes requiring intense heat or large amounts of power in a short time could be accommodated.
Transportation, manufacturing, agriculture — virtually every aspect of modern life — were transformed. Cities grew larger and more complex, global trade expanded exponentially, and technological innovation accelerated at an unprecedented pace. Ultimately, the ability to generate large amounts of electricity on demand, coupled with the development of extensive distribution networks, brought power to billions of people, dramatically improving living standards across the globe.
Fossil fuels have been particularly crucial for energy-intensive industries such as steel and cement production. These sectors require not only large amounts of heat but also specific chemical properties that fossil fuels provide.
Energy and power density don’t tell the whole story. Relative abundance and ease of extraction and processing are important factors that make fossil fuels preferable to other sources.
Another is the capacity factor of a power plant, or the ratio of its actual output to its potential output if it were to operate continuously at full nameplate capacity. Coal-fired plants approach 50% capacity factor, and natural gas combined-cycle plants exceed 55%. Nuclear plants achieve an astounding 93% average capacity factor.
However, the capacity factors for wind and solar are less than 35% and 25%, respectively, due to their dependence on weather conditions and the amount of sunlight. This means wind and solar are not able to be turned on anytime their energy is needed. Nor are they able to adjust output quickly to changes in demand. In other words, they produce energy when resources are available rather than when they are needed.
Fossil fuels are vital, not just for enabling developing countries to scale up rapidly, but also for rich nations that need to sustain economic growth and continue to provide energy at an affordable price to industries and homes. Even Tesla’s Elon Musk uses an oil-derived fuel — rocket-grade kerosene — for the SpaceX Falcon rocket.
Calls to abandon coal, oil and natural gas would have society regress by hundreds of years when it is human nature to move forward — even upward toward other worlds. It simply is not in our DNA to yield to such nonsense.
This commentary was first published at BizPac Review on July 16, 2024.
Vijay Jayaraj is a Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Arlington, Virginia. He holds a master’s degree in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia, U.K., and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, U.K.
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And the lefties in this world are decommissioning nuclear plants.
Well, not China:
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=61927
Economics decommission nuclear plants.
If that were the case, there would be no grid wind or solar at all.
So No, little monkey, it is POLITICS that stops nuclear plants.
Flew over Topaz Solar Farm traveling from San Diego to Santa Rosa. The whole area looks like a 4700 acre wasteland of nothing but Ultra low albedo panels…even at 36,000′ altitude. Acre upon acre (thousands of acres) of ultra dark ultra low density energy production where a single 2 unit nuclear facility could produce 17 times the amount of energy on just 12 acres.
Economics driven by over regulation, bespoke plant design and construction, and lawfare. If factory built SMRs were being used, and the NRC actually wanted more installations, the costs would be dramatically reduced.
If we could get the government out of the d*** way, we could have new, safe nuclear power coming online in 12 months or less, at a price below competitive. Prove me wrong.
absurd- Germany shut them down out of extreme leftist driven fear after the nuclear incident in Japan
That’s the excuse, the real reason is something else.
“Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?” – Maurice Strong, Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations LINK
Greenies love to regulate unfavored industries to death. They just keep piling on rules and taxes and mandates until it’s too expensive to continue. Then they claim it failed because of economics.
Yes, they do.
That’s why the SCOTUS ruling that “regulations from The Executive Branch that have the effect of Law” are welcome. In the US, only the Legislative Branch can pass Laws under the Constitution.
You have a typo. The regulations from the executive branch that have the effect of law are not welcome – except to the administration state (the swamp).
BS. Economics is not an explanation if there is still useful life of more than a year. The upfront sunk costs may have been huge but the cost of reliable power after that is very reasonable.
In some cases, they do, like Palisades and Kewaunee. Local politics did in Vermont Yankee, Oyster Creek and Indian Point. Crystal River and San Onofre were due to engineering screwups.
The fantasy of the linear no-threshold lie adds billions of $ to the construction costs, the insurance costs, and the operating costs.
And that gets multiplied by ALARA “As low as reasonably achievable.”
The NRC ranks each NPP in four quartiles. Any plant in the second lowest quartile gets a warning. Any plant in the Lowest Quartile gets a comprehensive inspection. That results in 1/4 of the US NPPs spending millions while being monitored by a team of NRC employees reviewing and evaluation all of their corrective action and the utility paying the NRC ~$1,000 per manhour. Rarely, do these issues get resolved in less than 90 days.
The Ontario Canada government thinks differently. “On July 7, 2023, the Ontario government announced it is working with Ontario Power Generation (OPG) to commence planning and licensing for three additional SMRs, for a total of four, at our Darlington nuclear site.”
If it were truly SMR, then all the licensing would have happened on the prototype model, which may or may not be saleable afterward. All subsequent production is already licensed, because they’re identical to the first.
Dollar for dollar when measured in useful generation over the 60 year lifespan of Nuclear vs Solar and Nuclear is by and large far more economical than Solar, and Wind for that matter.
I believe 50% is a rough thermal efficiency value, not “Capacity Factor” which is more like 90-95% for fired power plants vs 25-33% for wind/solar.
Also, one needs to look at LHV for fuel energy content as HHV is misleading. You cannot extract the energy from water vapor by essentially any power generation device, thus LHV is more realistic a measure of energy content.
..Story Tip..
Australian billionaire Andrew ‘Twiggy’ Forrest downsizes ‘green’ hydrogen.
Forrest’s company Fortescue announced yesterday its green hydrogen goals will not be met, the company is cutting 700 jobs and admitting it cannot get anywhere near its green hydrogen ambitions.
Fortescue will slow its push into green hydrogen in a blow to the Albanese government’s plan to make Australia a hydrogen superpower supported by more than $8billion of taxpayer-funded incentives.
Must be part of the progressive left governments plans for Australia to become a renewable energy superpower — lol!!
“”How the West’s big bet on hydrogen fell apart – The Telegraph“”
Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest has been on something of a journey in recent years…
A roller-coaster?
An exploratory trip around the “S” bend, more like it !!
Never to return….
He’s got his money and is pulling out before he loses it.
O/T New-new Labour…. New menu
“”Italy bans lab-grown meat in nod to farmers”” – BBC
There has always been an envy of Italian taste and style… until now
“”UK Becomes First European Country to Approve Lab-Grown Meat for Public Sale””
Hang on, what?
“”British regulators have given the approval to UK-based firm Meatly to begin selling its lab-grown meat as dog food to the public. The approval paves the way for taste-test trials with dogs to begin…””
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2024/07/17/uk-becomes-first-european-country-to-approve-lab-grown-meat-for-public-sale/
I wouldn’t do that to a dog.
Once it gets “branded” as “Dog Food” no-one will want to eat it as “People Food”
So you’re saying this is for the best?
Only if you’re willing to feed your dog something you yourself wouldn’t consider eating
Well, there is chopped liver.
Despite all its energy density, nuclear had to be
and
So it*s probably not a problem of energy density.
We get more useful energy out of renewables than fossil fuels
https://arstechnica.com/science/2024/05/we-get-more-useful-energy-out-of-renewables-than-fossil-fuels/
Forward to better forms of producing energy
How much bang for your buck?
Hydrogen – ~5.3 MJ/kg
Wood – 16 MJ/kg
Coal – 24 MJ/kg
Oil – 45 MJ/kg
Gas – 55 MJ/kg
Uranium – ~4,000,000 MJ/kg
Lithium ion battery – < 1 MJ/kg
Wind – 5 to 20 watts/metre^2
Solar – 2 to 3 watts/metre^2
Gas – a natural gas power plant generates 1,000 watts/metre^2.
Back to the neolithic age with ItsUsername
nothing can touch Uranium for energy density. It’s even more dense than the renewables elite’s brains, and that’s saying something right there!
Solar takes 80,000 acres (79,900) to produce 2256 MW of energy from 10am until 2pm and produces nothing from 4pm until 9am.
Nuclear achieves that same 2256MW on just 12 acres and does it 98% of the time day or night, calm or storm, wind or still.
Nothing, and I mean NOTHING, beats Nuclear power for capacity and capability
Energy vs land area used, as here, is probably the best way to frame most energy density arguments. The trouble is non-global-environmentalists (me?) who don’t care how much of the US SW is turned into panels and pinwheels as long as I don’t see them on my jog.
It is my contention the absurd upfront costs of building large nuclear reactors is 80% the result of overregulation. Somebody has to pay for all those manhours spent filling in those f***ing forms!
South Korea and Czechia have just set the bar on new nuclear power plants. A consortium of South Korean companies have won an order for two nuclear power plants in Czechia at price of $8.5 billion each. According to press reports, a number of European countries are interested in similar deals.
To channel the Great Yogi 80% of the cost is regulation, and the other half is graft.
Lost in the weeds somewhere is the actual cost of construction (of actually necessary and appropriate buildings and equipment). There is a great deal of construction cost involved building, demolishing, and rebuilding as the regulations (or the interpretations of the same regulations) change over the construction period. Once again, an argument for building uniform units that then get placed in a simple powerhouse that doesn’t need a NRC license. It would be just like any other powerhouse where the machines are bolted down to their place on the floor and hooked to their control and power connections.
I lean to ambient pressure liquid fuel salt reactors for the lack of explosion hazard and dead easy ultimate fail safe. If the reactor goes down and loses backup power, the “freeze plug” melts when it’s cooler stops working. The fuel drains by gravity into a wide shallow tank without a moderator. The tank is made with, lined with or both made and lined with, a neutron absorber. Note that any one feature; shallow, no moderator, or neutron absorber; would be adequate. But there’s no conflict between them and all three features improve convenience and safety for personnel during recovery and restart.
The H2 value seems low. A quick 1/2 cup in of coffee search gives a range of 120-140 MJ/Kg.
(There it is again… the MJ/Kg number depends on what you do with it)
Units highlight the material-vs-reaction problem. e.g. “Wind” is not an element (80pct Nitrogen) and Uranium is (hopefully) not blowing across the back yard.
Hydrogen has 141 MJ/kg HHV and 120 MJ/kg LHV. It is the MJ/L that are so low for hydrogen due to the very low density of H2. We do have to keep our facts straight!
And what are all of the energy inputs into making windmills and solar panels?!
You can’t manufacture anything or power modern civilization with erratic low density energy, period.
It looks like MyUsername is auditioning to replace Karine Jean Pierre.
“shoe-horned into electricity grids only through government fiat and subsidies.”
You are talking about Wind and Solar.. surely !!
They wouldn’t exist without government fiat and subsidies.
And no, we get very little “useful” electricity from wind and solar.
They are more a parasite on the grid.
Solar is totally lacking during the morning and evening peaks.
Wind is wildly erratic and requires 100% back-up by coal and gas.
Arse-technica talk through their arse.
And you sniff their farts. !
Solar springs forth as direct current, and must employ an inverter to become alternating current, that then needs to match to the grid frequency, already creating a Rube Goldberg monstrosity. Then the fact that it’s available only when resources are available, not when demand requires it, and it is indeed “…shoe-horned into electricity grids…”, sort of like the in-laws that need a place to stay “…just until they get back on their feet…”
Wind and solar are a totally retrograde energy supply non-technology…
A huge step BACKWARDS.
They are totally useless without massively expensive, huge and polluting, dangerous batteries…
…. or 100% back-up by reliable sources.
You could never exist on just wind and solar.
You can exist on 100% fossil fuels.. civilisation has done so for many decades, and could continue to do so for many more.
In fact, your whole puny brain-washed existence is totally dependant on fossil fuels and the myriad of products produced and delivered with them.
If you want or need to take a FORWARD step from coal and gas as electricity supply, the only choice is Nuclear.
In reality, China is boosting coal production over the intermediate term.
https://www.zerohedge.com/energy/chinas-coal-production-hits-six-month-high
“We get more useful energy out of renewables than fossil fuels”
Little or no solar energy is available during peak electricity consumption breakfast and dinner hours
Wind energy may or may not be available when most needed during those hours..
More than half of a day for solar, and up to a half of a day for wind, the cost of their electricity is infinite — no electricity is available.
Your quote above could only come from a deluded leftist fool on the subject of energy.
https://rmi.org/the-rise-of-batteries-in-six-charts-and-not-too-many-numbers/
Most Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) are actually used as a way to arbitrage price differences and are not actually in the back up business at all.
Battery Energy Storage Systems
EVs…
No electric utility HAS YET TO EVEN REVEAL PLANS FOR BATTERY CAPACITY in MWh THAT WOULD BACKUP SOLAR AND WIND FOR EVEN THE 12 HOURS require for a windless pr low wind night.
!00% backup will be needed for at least a week. Perhaps several weeks. That’s with 25% nuclear and wind, but no gas.
With no nuclear or hydro, backup would be required for months of power. As of today, 4 hours of battery backup is barely affordable.
Ruinables are for losers, like you.
Liar.
And Wind costs 3 times more than Nuclear while Solar costs more than 4 times more
Wind requires 3 times the nameplate capacity to equal Nuclear just from capacity factor alone then needs to be replaced every 20 years while Nuclear lasts up to 60 years with regular maintenance.
And Nuclear operates regardless of weather
Solar needs greater than 4 times capacity, needs replacing every 15 years (plus hail storms) and only functions 4 hours a day (not during peak usage times) requiring massive battery storage to hold the electricity until peak usage times
Nuclear functions regardless of solar availability even at night
What does it mean to be “useful” energy? Is there “useless” energy? I don’t know of any.
I would be curious to know which legislation was passed that required the use of nuclear power generation in the U.S.A. I know that there are several legislative and regulatory products that have significantly increased the cost of implementing nuclear fueled power generating systems.
I am not aware of any subsidies that were specific to the generation of electricity via nuclear fueled systems either. Do you have knowledge of them?
History will tell you that humans have always found more ways to consume energy than to produce it. Let me give you just two recent examples. The motor vehicle and the airplane.
And may it always be so.
The capacity factors stated for coal and gas power plants are too low. Capacity factors of 85% for coal and 90% for NGCC are more reasonable.
The percentages are based on actual use rather than maximum capability.
Gas capacity utilization is reduced by the use of gas for peaker plants. also a utility may require that wind and solar get used first.
Coal capacity utilization is mainly from restricting the use of coal in favor of natural gas and ruinables whenever possible to lower utility CO2 emissions. A coal plant could be idled in the spring and fall and used only in the winter and summer.
It’s also possible that a coal plant being closed permanently mid year could affect the accuracy of the annual utilization statistics.
As you note, capacity factors are based on actual output, which today is very much affected by politics in addition to economics. The result is that a coal plant in, say, China has a much higher capacity factor than an identical plant in the US. A better metric for technological comparisons of various plants is their respective availability factors.
Somehow, these “capacity factors” happen to be thermodynamic efficiencies.
Griffian thinking.
“””Despite all its energy density, nuclear had to be…””” – MyUsername
Above all reliable?
“”The heat source radioisotopic fuel is Plutonium-238 in the form of the oxide Pu02.””
Still working after 47 years.
https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/
Try getting solar panels working out there.
Looking at the figures for energy density, it looks as if using hydrogen to produce steel to make windmills to produce hydrogen by electrolysis which is used to produce steel, heat homes, drive vehicles and as a feedstock is something of a perpetual motion machine.
What is the metallurgical quality of steel produced using hydrogen?
How many tanker loads of hydrogen are needed to deliver the same quantity of energy to a service station as a tanker load of petrol?
How safe would hydrogen be for heating and cooking? IIRC a planned trial in housing in the UK could not be run because the ‘guinea pigs’ were not to keen on the safety aspects.
It’s a black hole perpetual motion machine. It will require far more energy to even build the system than it will ever produce, thus ALL energy produced goes into sustaining the “perpetual motion machine” and there is none left over for any useful work, thus rapidly bankrupting any society that attempts that suicide route. I know, I know, in the eyes/minds of Maurice Strong and all his disciples, that’s a feature, not a bug. If I were a conspiracy theorist, I might hazard a guess, that’s the whole point!!!
Vijay is a great writer and one of the few that covers Asia He’s located in India.
I don’t get the DNA comment at the end — can anyone explain the connection between DNA and leftist energy policies? The leftists have DNA too. Perhaps a mutation of some sort causes leftism?.
And he’s an associate at the CO2 Coalition…that get their money from Koch and their ilk. So as always here a complete neutral source, right?
You’ve already admitted your beliefs to be a busted flush – summers don’t get colder in a warming climate, right?
So it’s a wind up.
And the sources you regularly quote are also not neutral but you quote them anyway. Hypocrite.
And I get called out for it. Don’t like your own medicine?
Although I get the feeling for this site most news sites are left radical…Looks like your little world gets smaller each passing day.
That does not explain anything
It is an unrelated burst of verbal flatulence that completely ignores the subject
You could be a Democrat politician.
ILK ALERT!
RUN FOR COVER!
Ha! Winner!!! When any loser switches to ad hominem attacks, that signals they have given up on actually winning the argument.
I believe, perhaps in this case, that DNA is a Synonym for Human Nature
It is Human Nature to Not (want to) Regress to outdated technology
Like reverting to Flint Tools when Steel is far better
Yes folks are waking up to the energy density problem with fickles-
Battling Aussie farmer unleashes over huge 400ha solar farm (msn.com)
Everything is OK, except it is time to stop calling carbon based fuels fossil fuels. While biogenic carbon may be part of some of them, they do not own their existence to past life. They are not fossils, they are mineral fuels.
Can we call Joe Bribe’em a Fossil Fool?
Plus a billion
Be sure to word clearly, the energy density is a measure of a reaction involving the material not the material alone. eg the wood example. The 16MJ/kg assumes you’re burning it, reacting it with oxygen. If you were somehow able to create “wood fusion” in a cold bucket, then the number would be different.
Also “and Human DNA” can/should be removed from the title.
Unfortunately I think that is baked into the cake at this point. Fossil fuel production will inevitably decline to such a degree that modern civilization will collapse. It won’t happen in my lifetime, but probably within a century. The world 200 years from now will look a lot more like the world 200 years ago. IMHO of course, but unless we’re finding a new Ghawar every other year I don’t see any other outcome.
Oil Drum comments shut about 15 years ago now.
True. What’s also true is that conventional oil production has been effectively flat for the last 10 years. It’s also true that each conventional oil field has a finite amount of oil within it, and there are a finite number of conventional oil fields. Therefore, there is a finite amount of oil available. Eventually, conventional oil will run out, and there’s no replacing it. Natural gas plays are also going to run out, for the same reason, and that sooner rather than later.
While the oil fields may not ever run completely dry – McClintock Well No. 1 still apparently produces around half a barrel a day – you can’t run the modern world on such a small amount. I’m not talking about “Peak Oil”, I’m talking about “No Oil”.
“Fossil fuel production will inevitably decline to such a degree that modern civilization will collapse. It won’t happen in my lifetime, but probably within a century.”
Nobody will change anything to get around the problem in the next 100 years?
On a technical level, there’s coal-to-liquids, and thermal depolymerisation. Both are proven but plenty more expensive than simply drilling for oil, both in terms of money and energy needed. And even with the best of intentions, building enough of those facilities to replace conventional oil loss over the next 100 years? I don’t see it happening.
When will the people demanding more electrical generating devices realize that the cost of the fuel [source of energy] is only a minor cost of producing, generating, distributing, maintaining, controlling and inspecting these “Free Fuel” generators. Worse, more than one half of the price you are charged for the electricity delivered to your home is for Federal, State, County and Municipal TAXES. The next biggest cost is Employees. To have personal ready to assure that you have employees on the job site and controlling, maintaining, monitoring, inspecting the equipment and assuring compliance to government regulations 24/7/365 along with providing security. If it takes 10 people on site to preform all of these tasks then in reality you would need three times that number just to have workers on site 24 hours a day. You then need to increase that number by another 30 to 50 percent more to cover weekends, sickness, vacation, holidays, and Government required training.
With off shore wind the expended time to travel from land to the Wind Turbine and the need for more frequent inspections of the connecting cables. Numbers will need to include additional personnel. And the expense not spoken in any of these “WET” dreams is the massive increase in mean time between failure of every aspect of generating electricity at sea which is equivalent to a hole in the water that you pour money into. Ask anyone that lives on the ocean and owns an ocean going boat and regularly uses it.
Vijay, your capacity factors for coal and CCNG are artificially low because they are forced to operate as slaves to wind and solar, inefficiently ramping up and down per weather conditions. Without that constraint, the capacity factor for coal is ~85% and ~87% for natural gas.
Very nice. Wind and solar should not be taken seriously. They are not suitable for our needs they endanger the grid, they need constant backup, they are expensive, they are land hogs and they are not recyclable. Clearly they are not sustainable. You don’t need to know any more than this.
Note to Vijay.great stuff. It would have been helpful for comparison sake and clarity,to make the distinction between the energy density metric used for fuel j/weight and the metric used for energy storage systems/batteries j/volume and provided the conversions for us for quick and simple comparision.
Since non-fuel electrical energy generating tech due to their energy source being randomly intermitant ambient energy to covert to electricity or cooling and heatng, require the addition of energy density to make them viable for systems requiring consistent output of electricity.. These systems have no inherent energy density like fuel (fuel wouldn’t be fuel if it wasn’t storable in and of itself) or energy stroage systems. Solar sells, TEGs and Wind store nothing. Solar radition is not fuel nor is wind, can storge it without processing it and then jamming it into some energy dense storage system.
The big question about non-fuel energy generating systems (wind, solar, TEG etc), is will there ever be an energy dense, safe, efficient, affordable, and environmentally sound energy storage system/battery, that would enable wind, TEG or solar to compete with fuel of any kind (nuke,hydrocarbon wood etc) at grid level applications. Obviously we are all aware of many great solar applications on a nano scale.
There is gigantic global motivation to develop super energy dense batteries to run digital tech, robotics, botautomation of all sorts, military, space travel. There is a huge clamoring for this tech which does not yet exist to the point. There is no storage sysem that can enable non-fuel electfical generation to unseat fuel for grid level electrical generation without crashing free markets and harpooning local communities financial wellbeing through taxes and government debt.