Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

Martyn1981

Coastalwatch said:

Martyn1981 said:

Big grids will need big batts ...... and an auction for large scale battery capacity in China has attracted incredibly low prices, some as low as $51/kWh.

This article comes from Renew Economy (Aus) and goes on to explain the ramifications of these falling costs on other types of / and duration storage technologies, and also gas generation.

“Watershed moment:” Big battery storage prices hit record low in huge China auction

The latest auction in China offered 25 gigawatt hours of capacity for lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries over a range of storage periods – 1 hour, 2 hour and 4 hours – and the results (the first time they have been broken down on storage duration) have stunned even seasoned onlookers.

The knockout price was a bid of $US51.59/kWh for a four hour battery (the average was $US59c/kWh), which Energy Storage News says represents a 30 per cent drop from 2024 levels, and others side was a 15 per cent fall from recent record lows.

Marek Kubik, co-founder of US-based battery storage supplier Fluence, and now a director at the Saudi-based halo project Neom, also described the auction results as a new milestone, noting that the prices reflected a full energy storage system, and not just cell prices. They do not, however, include civil construction costs.

Thanks for posting this Mart, those prices are very impressive, however I am a little confused as it states 

The knockout price was a bid of $US51.59/kWh for a four hour battery while the average was $US59c!

So presumably $US59 and not $US0.59 as I first read $US59c?

Yep, mistakes and confusion as the source for the article talks about cents per Wh (not dollars per kWh), and their figure is $0.059/Wh. That translates to $59/kWh, not the confused hybrid mess of $US59c/kWh. Also the $US51.59/kWh figure appears to be a faulty amalgam of the $0.059 and $0.051 per Wh results.

Here's the PV Magazine Energy Storage News article:

China Energy Engineering launches record 25 GWh storage tender as prices hit historic low

• Package 3 (4-hour systems): 2.5 GW/10 GWh, with the most competitive range of CNY 0.37–0.495/Wh ($0.051–$0.068), averaging CNY 0.4249/Wh ($0.059). The lowest bid of CNY 0.37/Wh ($0.051) represents a 30% drop from 2024 levels, setting a new industry record.

NigeWick

Martyn1981 said:

Big grids will need big batts ...... and an auction for large scale battery capacity in China has attracted incredibly low prices, some as low as $51/kWh.

I recently read that a Chinese company (CATL? I sit to be corrected) is about to produce batteries (not packs) at US$10 per kWh. At that price, renewables and batteries must be the cheapest form of electricity.

Netexporter

NigeWick said:

Martyn1981 said:

Big grids will need big batts ...... and an auction for large scale battery capacity in China has attracted incredibly low prices, some as low as $51/kWh.

I recently read that a Chinese company (CATL? I sit to be corrected) is about to produce batteries (not packs) at US$10 per kWh. At that price, renewables and batteries must be the cheapest form of electricity.

And they are sodium-ion cells, so can work down to minus 40 degrees, without needing heating..

QrizB

That's quite impressive.

US$59 is about £43, so my hypothetical  "container ship full of batteries" with 16GWh of storage would be £690M:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/78489255/#Comment_78489255

You could put half a dozen of them at the major container ports around the UK and all of a sudden we've got 100GWh of distributed storage ...

ed110220

QrizB said:

That's quite impressive.

US$59 is about £43, so my hypothetical  "container ship full of batteries" with 16GWh of storage would be £690M:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/78489255/#Comment_78489255

You could put half a dozen of them at the major container ports around the UK and all of a sudden we've got 100GWh of distributed storage ...

Great news, but one possible concern I have is that cheap PV and now cheap batteries are going to give a big advantage to places with excellent solar resources year-round and disadvantage places like N Europe where winter days are short and tend towards cloudiness.

Places that are basically sunny every day will only need enough batteries to get them through the night and with cheap batteries will have cheap electricity year round. I can see energy intensive industries moving to places like that - say the Pilbara region of Australia. N Europe has a rougher deal as wind is a lot more variable than solar in the best locations and will take a lot more than ~12h of batteries.

Martyn1981

NigeWick said:

Martyn1981 said:

Big grids will need big batts ...... and an auction for large scale battery capacity in China has attracted incredibly low prices, some as low as $51/kWh.

I recently read that a Chinese company (CATL? I sit to be corrected) is about to produce batteries (not packs) at US$10 per kWh. At that price, renewables and batteries must be the cheapest form of electricity.

Glad you mentioned this, as it's something I've been pondering this week after reading about a large(r) scale deployment of CAES (compressed air energy storage) in Germany.

CAES is a technology, like flow batts, where you avoid the cost of duplicating the power when you want to increase the energy size. So, unlike batts where if you want twice as much energy, you typically have to have twice as much power and material, which can double the cost.

But flow batts, CAES and others, keep the power the same, but increase the storage/energy side, which is very, very cheap, such as the flow batt fluids and storage tanks, or simply pumping (free) air into a larger hole, typically a salt cavern.

But ....... 'normal' batts, such as LFP or sodium ion are now getting so cheap that they are already competing for  MDES (medium duration energy storage) roles in the 4-10hr range, which used to be outside of their economic role as SDES (short duration energy storage) in the 1-4hr range.

If additional battery capacity, outside of the other components, gets down to $10 or $20 per kWh, then it may even start to compete for LDES roles, typically 10hr+.

Only thinking out loud, but perhaps CAES (and others) are still better, as you don't need to mine/build the sheer scale of LDES batts, v's the use of an even larger underground salt cavern and 'thin air'?

Underground salt caves could become massive batteries storing weeks of clean energy

We're currently a lot better at producing clean energy than storing it to use later. That poses a challenge in regions that have long stretches with low wind and sunlight, stressing power grids fed by renewable sources. Augwind Energy believes it might have a found a solution thousands of feet below the ground.

The company has developed a long-duration energy storage (LDES) system called AirBattery that relies on compressed air held in underground salt caverns – hundreds of which are found in South Germany. AirBattery is said to reliably store energy for weeks while requiring a lot less land, water, and capital than more common pumped hydro storage systems.

QrizB

ed110220 said:

QrizB said:

That's quite impressive.

US$59 is about £43, so my hypothetical  "container ship full of batteries" with 16GWh of storage would be £690M:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/78489255/#Comment_78489255

You could put half a dozen of them at the major container ports around the UK and all of a sudden we've got 100GWh of distributed storage ...

Great news, but one possible concern I have is that cheap PV and now cheap batteries are going to give a big advantage to places with excellent solar resources year-round and disadvantage places like N Europe where winter days are short and tend towards cloudiness.
Places that are basically sunny every day will only need enough batteries to get them through the night and with cheap batteries will have cheap electricity year round. I can see energy intensive industries moving to places like that - say the Pilbara region of Australia. N Europe has a rougher deal as wind is a lot more variable than solar in the best locations and will take a lot more than ~12h of batteries.

Western Europe has enjoyed plenty of geographical advantages over the past millennium; if the next century belongs to the Tropics, where you get 12h of daylight all year around, it seems only fair!

Netexporter

The government not being interested in reliable solar and wind from Morocco is a bit odd, especially as the cables would have been made in Scotland and would provide ongoing jobs, owing the a deficit of HVDC cable-making capacity, worldwide.

ed110220

QrizB said:

ed110220 said:

QrizB said:

That's quite impressive.

US$59 is about £43, so my hypothetical  "container ship full of batteries" with 16GWh of storage would be £690M:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/78489255/#Comment_78489255

You could put half a dozen of them at the major container ports around the UK and all of a sudden we've got 100GWh of distributed storage ...

Great news, but one possible concern I have is that cheap PV and now cheap batteries are going to give a big advantage to places with excellent solar resources year-round and disadvantage places like N Europe where winter days are short and tend towards cloudiness.
Places that are basically sunny every day will only need enough batteries to get them through the night and with cheap batteries will have cheap electricity year round. I can see energy intensive industries moving to places like that - say the Pilbara region of Australia. N Europe has a rougher deal as wind is a lot more variable than solar in the best locations and will take a lot more than ~12h of batteries.

Western Europe has enjoyed plenty of geographical advantages over the past millennium; if the next century belongs to the Tropics, where you get 12h of daylight all year around, it seems only fair!

Oh yes, I'm not complaining that it's unfair! Just something that might be worth considering. 

Martyn1981

ed110220 said:

QrizB said:

ed110220 said:

QrizB said:

That's quite impressive.

US$59 is about £43, so my hypothetical  "container ship full of batteries" with 16GWh of storage would be £690M:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/78489255/#Comment_78489255

You could put half a dozen of them at the major container ports around the UK and all of a sudden we've got 100GWh of distributed storage ...

Great news, but one possible concern I have is that cheap PV and now cheap batteries are going to give a big advantage to places with excellent solar resources year-round and disadvantage places like N Europe where winter days are short and tend towards cloudiness.
Places that are basically sunny every day will only need enough batteries to get them through the night and with cheap batteries will have cheap electricity year round. I can see energy intensive industries moving to places like that - say the Pilbara region of Australia. N Europe has a rougher deal as wind is a lot more variable than solar in the best locations and will take a lot more than ~12h of batteries.

Western Europe has enjoyed plenty of geographical advantages over the past millennium; if the next century belongs to the Tropics, where you get 12h of daylight all year around, it seems only fair!

Oh yes, I'm not complaining that it's unfair! Just something that might be worth considering. 

Doubt I could find it now, but there were some articles/reports about 5yrs ago speculating on whether African nations could become the new industrial powerhouses.

As you suggested, the future economics could swing, and aside from the material components, most of the cost of production is labour, energy and land. All of these could be very cheap in parts of Africa especially energy thanks to cheap PV. And since then, I'd suggest that PV costs have fallen even further and faster than optimistic predictions.