Making electricity demand match the supply

So one of the problems with renewable energy like solar power or wind power is that it's unpredictable and isn't generated when you want it to be generated. This is a big problem which many people aren't necessarily aware of. There's no good way to store that energy and use it later. Sure, you could use it to charge giant batteries, but that's expensive too and not very efficient. If energy is being generated that's not going to any productive use, any honest accounting should view that as a waste.

But if it's hard to get renewable energy to reliably generate when you want to use it, what about finding ways to make the demand respond to the supply instead of the other way around? This article is about that:

Making electricity demand match the supply

Quote:

The grid control room at Østkraft, on the Danish island of Bornholm, is a mix of old and new. On one side of the room, huge computer monitors detail the flow of electricity throughout the system. On the other, printed circuit diagrams hang on '60s-era control boards with dancing needles. Lounging at a desk in a grey jumpsuit and thick eyeglasses, engineer Erik Malmkvist jams to early '90s dance music, while explaining that his job is to do as little as possible. “When I shall do anything, it costs us money," he says. Malmkvist works for Østkraft, the utility on the Danish island of Bornholm. He's one of the engineers responsible for keeping the island's grid in balance. Doing as little as possible has gotten more difficult in recent years though, as Bornholm has stepped up its share of renewable energy. It’s much easier to balance a system that relies on coal than on fluctuating power sources, like wind and solar. Malmkvist grabs a graph printing out of one of the analog machines on the wall. “You can see here the wind, it goes up and down all the time," he says. Bornholm gets half of its power from wind and solar. But of course,that power supply is intermittent, and doesn’t always match the times of day when people are using the most electricity. Malmkvist grabs another printout. “All days look alike," he says. "You can see, people get up in the morning, about half past 5, and then they go to eat, then don’t do anything anymore.” Right now, when demand spikes and the wind isn’t blowing, utilities like Østkraft ramp up production at their coal or gas plants, but Denmark is planning to be fossil-fuel free in its power sector by 2030, which means soon, that won’t be an option. The main Østkraft power plant on the island of Bornholm, powered by coal, biomass and biogas. So, instead of making supply meet demand, Østkraft is testing what it would take to make demand meet supply. “Demand response has nothing at all to do with energy savings. It has to do with using the energy when it's there,” says Maja Bendtsen, who works for the utility and is in charge of a project called EcoGrid EU.

Is this the answer? Or part of the answer?
Personally I think that nuclear is the way to go, but politically it's a tough go.

via International Skeptics Forum http://ift.tt/1LSs52H