[cupofpython]

Awesome response. I've come across the molten salt option but havent researched in depth. I saw it referenced as something a lot of scientists are hyping up, but I am not sure what kind of engineering challenges exist for implementation and maintenance.

Second paragraph is a bit too information dense, I had trouble following some of it. Renewable energy deficiencies will be localized, so i understand how wires help here. A larger connected area produces more stability, makes sense. Agreed with the carbon reduction priority to tackle coal and oil first. Surplus renewable power acting as a subsidy checks out, but that is skirting around the energy storage problem imo. Sounds like you are saying "instead of storing renewable energy, get more than you need and sell it back to the grid and then use those funds to buy the energy back later". This would certainly work for local consumers, but doesnt do too much to help the power grid itself manage what to do with the surplus energy. Sell it to neighboring power grids? Ties in to the first point about connecting a larger area - but what are the limits here? Can we physically connect the sunny side of earth to the dark side? (ignoring that it seems logistically/legally prohibitive)

the question really comes down to what should we be spending money on to get "better storage"? What are the best solutions for long-term local storage?

[Schroedingersat]

> the question really comes down to what should we be spending money on to get "better storage"? What are the best solutions for long-term local storage?

The solution I'm proposing is basically 'the best place to spend your money on storage is to not spend it on storage yet'

If the goal is to reduce emissions asap, then focusing on the strategy that removes x% of 100% of the emissions rather than 100% of y% of the emissions makes sense unless there are enough resources/money that y% is more than x%. And storage is currently expensive enough that you need many times as much money for this to be true to 99.9% confidence.

Getting a wind + solar system that has at least y watts at least eg. 90% of the time is remarkably affordable already and still going down.

In excellent climates new solar costs less per MWh than fuel for a gas turbine (and is not far off fuel for a nuclear reactor). Wind is not much more. Distribution, dealing with less than ideal sites and oversupply increase the cost, but an ideal mix has very little storage (4-12 hours) which can be delivered by lithium batteries.

By relying on the existing fossil fuel/hydro/nuclear/whatever to pick up the last 10% for now, you can replace more coal/oil more quickly than other strategies. During this build all storage technologies where they make the most sense so that when that last 10% is needed, prices will have dropped. I'm fairly sure some mix of green hydrogen and green ammonia burning in those same turbines will be one of the winners (ammonia in particular has negligible marginal cost of capacity allowing for a strategic reserve, and will be needed to replace fossil fuel derived fertilizer anyway).

In the unlikely case that there's an overnight $2 trillion investment in new wind/solar/powerlines and production capacity to match in the US then choosing a dispatchable power source from some or all of: expensive green hydrogen, expensive abundant existing batteries, expensive pumped hydro, and expensive nuclear or immediately going all in on commercialising every vaguely promising electrolyser tech becomes the priority.

[cupofpython]

Completely agree with the hybrid approach wrt reducing emissions. I am talking more towards work that would be done concurrently with that.

> During this build all storage technologies where they make the most sense so that when that last 10% is needed, prices will have dropped

this is kind of the point of what I'm getting at. Without any investment, none of the storage technologies are going to make much progress. If not financial investment, then at least a time investment from research/science teams. then again, maybe opportunism/free market will take care of this and we can assume any progress that can be made will be made by people trying to make a name for themselves or be first to market. I'm still curious to size up what that progress might look like for discussion/entertainment purposes in any case

Good storage solutions would immediately pay dividends through arbitrage, which would keep electric prices stable, and then anywhere renewable energy generation is more than demand and storage is sufficient, that stable price point could come down below the cost of using coal/oil as well as any other continuous production method. We would be able to consolidate power generation over time, not just space, and realize gains from that. As in, use massive bursts of energy production to top off storage and use them to exactly meet demand. Maybe this opens the door for more alternative energy production methods as well (that are better suited for burst than steady)