Storage Costs, Coal Versus Battery
On-Site Fuel Storage: Billions Better than Batteries
Coal offers on-site fuel storage for a fraction of the cost of battery storage. According to EIA data, the average coal plant has more than 60 days of fuel on-site, which means the average coal plant has 1,440 hours of storage on-site. This is an enormous amount of energy storage when we consider that many grid-scale batteries have just four hours of storage capacity.
If we compare the cost of the energy stored at a coal plant to the cost of storing the same amount of electricity with batteries, we quickly find that coal is delivering billions of dollars in benefits to the entire electric system for pennies on the dollar.
Let’s say we have a 1,000 MW coal plant with 60 days' worth of coal on-site (1,440 hours of storage). Based on EIA data, it costs about $25 in fuel costs to generate electricity using coal in a sub-critical coal plant, which means this plant could theoretically produce 1.44 million MWh of electricity during this 60-day period with a fuel cost of $36 million.¹ That sounds pretty steep until we compare it to battery storage.
Battery cost data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Assumptions to the Annual Energy Outlook shows a cost of $1,270 per kilowatt of four-hour battery storage. Dividing this value by four gives us a cost of $317 per kWh of storage capacity, which translates into $317,000 per MWh.
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Maine as Third World Country:
CMP Transmission Rate Skyrockets 19.6% Due to Wind Power
Click here to read how the Maine ratepayer has been sold down the river by the Angus King cabal.
Maine Center For Public Interest Reporting – Three Part Series: A CRITICAL LOOK AT MAINE’S WIND ACT
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(excerpts) From Part 1 – On Maine’s Wind Law “Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine if the law’s goals were met." . – Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, August 2010 https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/From Part 2 – On Wind and Oil Yet using wind energy doesn’t lower dependence on imported foreign oil. That’s because the majority of imported oil in Maine is used for heating and transportation. And switching our dependence from foreign oil to Maine-produced electricity isn’t likely to happen very soon, says Bartlett. “Right now, people can’t switch to electric cars and heating – if they did, we’d be in trouble.” So was one of the fundamental premises of the task force false, or at least misleading?" https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-swept-task-force-set-the-rules/From Part 3 – On Wind-Required New Transmission Lines Finally, the building of enormous, high-voltage transmission lines that the regional electricity system operator says are required to move substantial amounts of wind power to markets south of Maine was never even discussed by the task force – an omission that Mills said will come to haunt the state.“If you try to put 2,500 or 3,000 megawatts in northern or eastern Maine – oh, my god, try to build the transmission!” said Mills. “It’s not just the towers, it’s the lines – that’s when I begin to think that the goal is a little farfetched.” https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/flaws-in-bill-like-skating-with-dull-skates/
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Hannah Pingree on the Maine expedited wind law
Hannah Pingree - Director of Maine's Office of Innovation and the Future
"Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine."
https://pinetreewatch.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/
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