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Comment by PragmaticPulp | Hacker News Reader

Note there are three tabs in this graphic: Day-ahead, 15 minute, and real-time.

Day-ahead contracts are high because uncertainty is also high.

15 minute and real-time prices are an order of magnitude lower, despite the sun being down and electric heaters presumably consuming a lot of electricity.

Energy companies need to decide how much of their capacity they want to lock in at the high $900 rate for tomorrow, and how much they want to risk on the shorter interval contracts.

This does not mean that every MWh of electricity costs $900. It does mean power companies are doing a lot of risk management calculations right now, though.

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Yes, daily averages vary wildly in industrialised countries with real time electricity pricing.

In much of Europe, residential, and office will pay $0.3-0.5 during normal use in winter, but dramatically less in off-peak hour in countries with "smart meters."

This way you get seemingly sensible $0.1-$0.2 per kWh averages, but drop your jaw when you see your electricity bill.

Just like a car load of hard disks driven 2000 miles has greater bandwidth than transmitting that same data over the internet, I wonder if you could arbitrage Texas electric costs by driving a semi-truck full of Tesla Powerwall batteries from Florida.

Congratz, you just invented the possibly least energy efficient way to construct interconnected grids.

But in all seriousness, this is why the entire world interconnects their grids as much as possible: arbitraging energy needs (/ cost).

It's much more energy-efficient than building pylons and distribution lines, if you only need it once in a lifetime to deal with a hundred-year weather event, and outside that you have a use for the Powerwalls and the truck.

It's not implausible something like this could be economically worthwhile, though as sokoloff points out it's not close to being there at current prices. Trucks full of portable generators and diesel fuel are also a potential competitor.

"if you only need it once in a lifetime to deal with a hundred-year weather event" - I have two problems with that: 1. IIUC global warming means events like this become more likely. So for our parent generations this might be a once a lifetime event, but for us and future generations that thinking could be dangerously wrong. 2. You're seeming to assume the only reason for an interconnected grid might be cold weather (at least that's what you're implying). I believe additional resilience and a more open market are also benefits.

I'm not arguing that Texas having an interconnector to the other US grids would be bad. I don't have the expertise on climate, power distribution or future energy need projections to have a strong opinion on that - though I can see it would have certain benefits.

Just saying that it's fallacious to argue that relying on an emergency solution instead of improved infrastructure to handle extreme cases is per se more expensive, without considering how often the extreme cases are hit.

People keep saying that this is somehow a "once in a lifetime" event in Texas, even though the last one was in 2011.

Plus, being interconnected gives you the opportunity not just to prevent grid failure, but to sell and buy electricity to arbitrage the price, which will be increasingly important in the future due to renewable energy intermittency.

Loaded 3 wide, 2 high, 90 deep for space constraints, you'd be well over the gross weight limit.

Loaded to the weight limit, you can ballpark 48K pounds or 174 Powerwall 2s. Those would hold just under 2.5MWh, or just over $2K of electricity at $900/MWh.

If you figure the truck costs you $1.50/mile on the low side, it would cost you at least $1500 to drive Pensacola to Houston and back.

Probably not a retirement plan to (Power)bank on.

You’d probably be better bringing a diesel generator and a big tank of fuel.

In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if that isn’t being done by the authorities to help make up the shortfall

> 15 minute and real-time prices are an order of magnitude lower, despite the sun being down and electric heaters presumably consuming a lot of electricity.

Not everywhere. I'm seeing prices exceeding $900 when I select real-time. Perhaps I'm reading it wrong but take a look at so cal.

That is what I am seeing in San Diego right now on the real time price.

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