"Unreliable renewables" I don't know why people love this phrase so much.
From what I can tell fossil fuels aren't reliable either because you have to import them. They also tend to fail in winter.
From what I can tell fossil fuels aren't reliable either because you have to import them. They also tend to fail in winter.
https://australiainstitute.org.au/post/breaking-it-down-vict...
On some days you have so much overproduction that electricity is practically free and on others the price will go insanely high.
We still need a reliable base load - and Nuclear is the only one of those that can be constructed pretty much everywhere. Hydro is good, but there are only so many rivers you can dam without damaging the ecosystem and there is a finite number of locations. Wave/tidal power is looking good, but it needs to be next to an ocean.
Maybe the 2020's is when we get a reliable and cost-effective way of storing electricity overproduction on a grid scale.
“In 2020, Germany imported all of the hard coal it consumed with 31.8 million tonnes. Its leading coal suppliers were Russia (45.4%), the United States (18.3%) and Australia (12.3%)”