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His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.

Tuna-Fish posted:

You can assume almost indefinitely. Gas storage is really cheap compared to the capex of the electrolysis plant and whatever generator it's being fed into. And storage is fast enough to build that if you don't have enough of it, you can almost build it as it fills up. It's a good assumption that if someone is building a 200MW lysis plant, they are also buying or leasing enough storage that it practically never fills up, just because that maximises the return on the very expensive capital cost of the plant.

I'm not going to assume that because if that was true we wouldn't have an energy crisis if we could just build infinity energy storage cheaply.

And I know hydrogen has it's own issues compared to natural gas. So there's definitely a limit but they're not saying it.

The released specs said nothing about the electrolysis production rate, only the max capacity of the plant when it has fuel to burn.

Tuna-Fish posted:

No, over time the surpluses will rise. Wind and solar are by far the cheapest ways to produce electricity. The only problem is that they produce it on their own schedule, not when it's needed. (And, they are both heavily self-correlated over all of Europe.) As more is built up so that it can serve the grid when output is low, the peak outputs will necessarily far outstrip demand.

The rate of building renewable capacity has been stalling out in europe, meanwhile nuclear capacity is going downwards and for each plant that goes out of commission, that's thousands of new wind mills needed to replace them (depending on size), and they aren't being built nearly fast enough to replace those. We're going to lose 19GW of nuclear capacity in europe by 2030, they aren't replacing that at anywhere near the rate needed with renewables.

Building solar in europe is basically a crime against the planet since installed solar in europe has a capacity factor of 11%.

His Divine Shadow fucked around with this message at 04:53 on Sep 29, 2022

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A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

His Divine Shadow posted:

I'm not going to assume that because if that was true we wouldn't have an energy crisis if we could just build infinity energy storage cheaply.
You're ignoring the cost of transforming the energy into a form that can be stored that way. You need the whole package to be profitable in the current market, not just the actual storage itself.

His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.
Well it's an issue too for sure but I did not see it as a big one. The same area is host to a lot of Finlands wind power parks (As an aside, resistance to building more is mounting here too), they might build our first off-shore park in my childhood home municipality so I guess the idea is to run it when surplus power is cheap. Less protests against off-shore anyway and better capacity.

But how much storage can they build, for what cost? I've seen no figures of that, all I know is the plant is rated at 200MW electricity production so it'd be like a nat.gas 200MW plant.

How is the hydrogen going to be stored, just in above ground tanks? Hydrogen storage isn't as easy as storing nat.gas. That's why they're talking about solutions like using natural deep caves to store the stuff. That's what the new hybrit plant is planning on doing, using underground steel lined caverns to store a few days worth of production at a time. Seems to me if building above ground storage was as easy as hinted at they wouldn't be resorting to such solutions.

But I admit I am just guessing. Difficult to find hard numbers and reliable sources, google hydrogen storage and you just get a lot of pop-sci techno-optimist wanking most of the time without any numbers.

His Divine Shadow fucked around with this message at 06:20 on Sep 29, 2022

His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.
Oh I just found some more info. They're building a methanation facility it says. So they're gonna store it as methane, not hydrogen.

Well that makes it a lot easier to store, but energy efficiency goes down even more. Mentions the plant will need 750MW of power to run at full capacity. 750MW to make 200MW, that should be 26.6% efficient overall. Honestly better than I thought.

His Divine Shadow fucked around with this message at 06:46 on Sep 29, 2022

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

His Divine Shadow posted:

Oh I just found some more info. They're building a methanation facility it says. So they're gonna store it as methane, not hydrogen.

Well that makes it a lot easier to store, but energy efficiency goes down even more. Mentions the plant will need 750MW of power to run at full capacity. 750MW to make 200MW, that should be 26.6% efficient overall. Honestly better than I thought.
You should take care to not mix up power and energy like this. If the plant is designed to prioritize being able to rapidly convert electricity to methane when prices are low, then it is natural to make the electricity --> gas part of the plant more powerful. The actual energy efficiency should a decent bit higher.

His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.
Fair point, didn't consider that.

His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.
I am looking for actual numbers on electrolysis:
https://www.fortum.com/about-us/blog-podcast/forthedoers-blog/hydrogen-economy-coming-sooner-or-later

quote:

Combined heat and power production improves efficiency
When producing hydrogen with electrolysis, the efficiency is currently 60-70 per cent, i.e. about one third of the electricity used goes to waste as heat. When hydrogen is used to produce electricity again, using a gas turbine or a fuel cell, the efficiency is 40-55 per cent. Thus the overall efficiency from electricity to hydrogen and back to electricity is 24-38 per cent.

However, the efficiency can be improved by recovering the heat generated in electrolysis. The waste heat recovered at combined heat and power plants can be used in district heating networks. In this case, the overall efficiency from electricity to hydrogen to energy can be as much as 60-80 per cent. Apart from producing power and heat, hydrogen will be used in the transport sector in the future.

If one can expect an overall efficiency of 38% at best, when omitting the methanation step, I don't think I could be that far off? Unless this information is incorrect. It does mention other ways of improving the energy efficiency, but I believe we're interesed in the electricity side here.

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

His Divine Shadow posted:

I am looking for actual numbers on electrolysis:
https://www.fortum.com/about-us/blog-podcast/forthedoers-blog/hydrogen-economy-coming-sooner-or-later

If one can expect an overall efficiency of 38% at best, when omitting the methanation step, I don't think I could be that far off? Unless this information is incorrect. It does mention other ways of improving the energy efficiency, but I believe we're interesed in the electricity side here.
Unless I am misunderstanding something, 38% is quite a bit better than 27%.

His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.
I guess that's a subjective thing as to what we both meant and expected. I did assume you talked about efficiencies in the 40-50% range.

At any rate the 38% efficiency quoted is without the intermediate step of methane conversion, so it should be lower than 38% since that will add more losses.

EDIT:
Well looks like I was wrong, I found this article, in english:
https://www.epressi.com/tiedotteet/...d-finland..html

quote:

-Up to 200 MW Green hydrogen/e-methane plant will be located at Karhusaari in Kristinestad, in the province of Ostrobothnia, Finland
-The new production facility starts producing green hydrogen and synthetic methane mainly for use in heavy traffic

So it's not a 200MW gas to electric plant, which is what the local paper made it seem like. This is quite different. It makes the whole project a lot smaller than imagined too.

His Divine Shadow fucked around with this message at 08:22 on Sep 29, 2022

His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.
So German chancellor Scholz decided to push through with a controversial sale of stakes in a harbor in Hamburg to the Chinese and now he's planning some kinda solo tour to China and he's fighting his own party over it. The european comission also told them not to do it.

Why is he so gung-ho about this?

https://www.politico.eu/article/olaf-scholz-ignores-government-over-china-port-deal-cosco-shipping/

quote:

Olaf Scholz backs China, ignores government warnings in Hamburg port deal, report says
Despite calls to scrap planned Chinese investment in Hamburg, the city’s ex-mayor wants it to go ahead.

When it comes to the future of Hamburg's port, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is accused of siding with China over his own government.

An investigation by German regional public broadcasters reported Wednesday that Scholz's chancellery is pushing to approve efforts by Chinese state-owned shipping giant Cosco to buy a foothold in a container port in Hamburg, ignoring warnings from six federal ministries, including the Greens' Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck, amid fears of risky economic over-dependence on Beijing.

Just as Germany is finally grasping the consequences of energy dependency on Russia, more attention is now also shifting to the depths of its interlocked trade relationship with China that gives Beijing massive leverage over Berlin.

Under the terms of the Cosco deal, first agreed in September 2021 and subject to regulatory approval, the company would secure a minority 35 percent stake in the container terminal at Tollerort, one of three such sites inside the sprawling Hamburg complex.

The acquisition is part of a broader strategic gambit by Beijing to gain control over infrastructure critical to its globe-spanning Belt and Road trade initiative, a network of transport connections intended to link China's factories with rich Western markets.

Cosco already owns stakes in Europe's two largest ports at Rotterdam and Antwerp, while it also controls the port of Piraeus in Athens and is behind a scheme to expand an inland rail terminal at Duisburg where the Ruhr and the Rhine rivers meet and which is a focal point for overland freight arriving from China's industrial hubs.

A stake in Hamburg, Europe's third largest port, is just another piece in that puzzle for Beijing, and many don't like it. The logic of encouraging Chinese investment is that those ports would then be favored by Chinese shippers that take their business there. That sparks a race among Northern European ports to come to arrangements with the Chinese.

Habeck, whose economy ministry is overseeing a review of the deal under an investment screening process, has repeatedly said Germany is rethinking its overall trade policy with China.

"I'm leaning towards the fact that we don't allow that," Habeck told Reuters in September about the Cosco deal.

According to the report out Thursday, Habeck's ministry has been trying to get the issue on the agenda of a federal Cabinet meeting in order to formally oppose Cosco's port acquisition.

However, Scholz' chancellery has instead demanded that the ministries draft a compromise that can be approved as the clock ticks down to an end-of-October legal deadline for the government to make a call.

"If the government does not pass a resolution to prohibit the transaction before the end of the deadline, the transaction is legally deemed cleared," said Kai Neuhaus, a Brussels-based lawyer and expert in investment audits of the law firm CMS.

That would give Scholz a piece of good news to present during his planned trip to Beijing scheduled for November 3 and 4.

A government spokeswoman said the chancellery does not comment on ongoing investment review proceedings, citing business and trade secrets.

Port call
Scholz ran Hamburg, one of Germany's richest states, as mayor for seven years until 2018, during which local trade with China boomed. About 30 percent of the container goods handled in Hamburg come from or are sent to China, according to port operator Hamburger Hafen und Logistik (HHLA).

Locally, Scholz' Social Democrats are in favor of getting the Cosco deal done, arguing it will lead to extra investment in the terminal and create jobs.

"This is in the tradition of church tower, or provincial, politics, doing a favor for the city-state of Hamburg above the national interest," said Reinhard Bütikofer, a prominent Green MEP who has long been hawkish on China.

He said the issue was about national security, and called efforts to stymie discussion of the deal within the Cabinet "extraordinary."

But Hans-Jörg Heims, a HHLA spokesman, said that the issue had been unduly politicized, emphasizing that China wasn't buying a stake in the port itself but rather investing in a part of a company that ran the terminal.

Cosco would have no access, for example, to internal IT systems and won't own land, Heims said, and would only have one of three managing directors.

"They're pursuing token politics," he said of opponents to the deal. "I am just concerned about the hundreds of jobs that depend on this."

No veto
Still, there remain serious concerns over the degree to which China's state-backed companies are involved in critical German infrastructure with the port just one part of a discussion that also includes critical telecoms infrastructure.

Earlier this week, Bruno Kahl, the head of the BND, Germany’s foreign security service, warned against the country becoming "painfully dependent" on China during a Bundestag committee debate on foreign investment.

"We are very, very critical about the participation of China in critical infrastructure," said Kahl during the session.

Despite these concerns, Heims from the HHLA said the federal defense and transport ministries had not decided to veto the investment. The transport ministry said it would not comment on the issue, while the defense ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The European Commission, which POLITICO has previously reported is also skeptical of the deal, said it would not "comment on individual transactions for confidentiality reasons."

One pressing argument in favor of the deal is that without Chinese investment, Hamburg will be at a disadvantage against its larger, already partly Chinese-owned North Sea neighbors when it comes to attracting business in future.

"Our competitors Rotterdam and Antwerp will be very pleased if this deal falls through," Heims said.

Hans von der Burchard contributed reporting.

Tesseraction
Apr 5, 2009

Don't worry, he has a plan to pacify the furious: https://twitter.com/AFP/status/1585210243042185217

VictualSquid
Feb 29, 2012

Gently enveloping the target with indiscriminate love.
It will "create jobs" what more can you demand of politics?

Tesseraction posted:

Don't worry, he has a plan to pacify the furious: https://twitter.com/AFP/status/1585210243042185217

Do you have more on this? They massively waffling and unclear between them wanting legalizing or decriminalizing last I heard.

VictualSquid fucked around with this message at 12:28 on Oct 26, 2022

Blut
Sep 11, 2009

if someone is in the bottom 10%~ of a guillotine

His Divine Shadow posted:

So German chancellor Scholz decided to push through with a controversial sale of stakes in a harbor in Hamburg to the Chinese and now he's planning some kinda solo tour to China and he's fighting his own party over it. The european comission also told them not to do it.

Why is he so gung-ho about this?

https://www.politico.eu/article/olaf-scholz-ignores-government-over-china-port-deal-cosco-shipping/

Distinct echoes of Gerhard Schröder's building of "economic ties" with Russia while in office. Which turned out so well for Europe, Germany and the world...

I wonder what the odds are on Scholz accepting a €500k a year role with a Chinese firm once he retires from office.

Tesseraction
Apr 5, 2009

VictualSquid posted:

It will "create jobs" what more can you demand of politics?

Do you have more on this? They massively waffling and unclear between them wanting legalizing or decriminalizing last I heard.

It was tabled this morning apparently https://www.dw.com/en/germany-health-minister-lauterbach-presents-plan-on-cannabis-legalization/a-63558414

Sereri
Sep 30, 2008

awwwrigami

His Divine Shadow posted:


Why is he so gung-ho about this?

He's been so insistent about it and ignored everyone that I wonder if the Pipi-Kasette is real

Blut posted:

I wonder what the odds are on Scholz accepting a €500k a year role with a Chinese firm once he retires from office.

Or that. Probably that.

Pope Hilarius II
Nov 10, 2008

Sereri posted:

He's been so insistent about it and ignored everyone that I wonder if the Pipi-Kasette is real

Is this a joke or are there also rumours about a Scholz, ah, Pissaufnahme?

Badger of Basra
Jul 26, 2007

Do they really call it the pipi kassette

Torrannor
Apr 27, 2013

---FAGNER---
TEAM-MATE
He was a longtime Hamburg politician, it's probably some corruption with getting some old pals sweet kickbacks or something like that. That said, the government limited the stake the Chinese can buy to 24.9% of the asset in question, meaning they cannot influence managerial decisions. So it's perhaps not a big deal? I'm not very knowledgeable in this matters, if somebody who's more of an expert could explain the significance of the sale to me, I would appreciate it.

i say swears online
Mar 4, 2005

is there any reason corruption is the obvious #1 reason or is this more comparable to the hundred-plus other port deals the PRC has concluded in the last decade

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

i say swears online posted:

is there any reason corruption is the obvious #1 reason or is this more comparable to the hundred-plus other port deals the PRC has concluded in the last decade
I mean, you can't outright reject the possibility that corruption was also involved there.

Perestroika
Apr 8, 2010

i say swears online posted:

is there any reason corruption is the obvious #1 reason or is this more comparable to the hundred-plus other port deals the PRC has concluded in the last decade

By and large it does seem like a fairly regular deal of the sort that the PRC does all the time, it's just that with the whole Ukraine invasion happening people in Europe are realizing that perhaps it might not be a good idea to hand influence over major infrastructure over to countries who may well end up becoming more hostile in the foreseeable future. The more suspicious part is Scholz in particular putting a lot of his weight behind pushing this deal through over the objections of just about everybody else in his own government.

i say swears online
Mar 4, 2005

A Buttery Pastry posted:

I mean, you can't outright reject the possibility that corruption was also involved there.

i assume people will get some sweet consulting gigs out of it, but it seems insane to me to infer it was the primary driver

Perestroika posted:

By and large it does seem like a fairly regular deal of the sort that the PRC does all the time, it's just that with the whole Ukraine invasion happening people in Europe are realizing that perhaps it might not be a good idea to hand influence over major infrastructure over to countries who may well end up becoming more hostile in the foreseeable future.

Infrastructure that can be readily nationalized in the event of conflict. With a country that has strongly signalled over the past year that its main goal is business as usual. I feel like this diversifies away from Russia and other bad actors.

mobby_6kl
Aug 9, 2009

by Fluffdaddy

i say swears online posted:

i assume people will get some sweet consulting gigs out of it, but it seems insane to me to infer it was the primary driver

Infrastructure that can be readily nationalized in the event of conflict. With a country that has strongly signalled over the past year that its main goal is business as usual. I feel like this diversifies away from Russia and other bad actors.
Maybe it's just stupidity or willful blindness of the kind that lead us to the situation with russia now.

It's business as usual with russia too; if we abandoned sanctions, Vova would be very happy to sell us gas again right now. China has actually been parroting russia's rhetoric about security concerns and evil NATO, they want our money but XI's been making it clear they're on the other side of this. Diversifying away from russai towards China is an pretty big self-own.

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

i say swears online posted:

i assume people will get some sweet consulting gigs out of it, but it seems insane to me to infer it was the primary driver
If someone personally benefits like that, I have no idea how you don't call that corruption as the primary driver. Even if that corruption is more institutionalized/layered than "here's a briefcase of money".

i say swears online posted:

Infrastructure that can be readily nationalized in the event of conflict. With a country that has strongly signalled over the past year that its main goal is business as usual. I feel like this diversifies away from Russia and other bad actors.
That is certainly a reason to not worry as much, though could a sufficient level of ownership across Europe not allow an effective blockade of sorts by just sabotaging poo poo in the event of conflict?

i say swears online
Mar 4, 2005

I think I'd be more worried if the social democrat chancellor was selling off state-owned operations. It's interesting the FDP is against since this seems to be a market-value purchase of publicly-traded shares, if I have it clear.

Al-Saqr
Nov 11, 2007

One Day I Will Return To Your Side.
Maybe for once Germany wants to join the winning team.

Tesseraction
Apr 5, 2009

Al-Saqr posted:

Maybe for once Germany wants to join the winning team.

Joke like this much further and you'll find a horse's wienerschnitzel on your pillow.

His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.
Moving on to the next issue,
https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/10/10/europe-energy-crisis-russia-ukraine-war-ones-and-tooze/

This guy predicts that europes energy problems will continue beyond this winter. Something I've been fearing too, coming round ot the idea of the 2020s being a decade of energy shortages until things might turn around. Personal fear is Europe might be permanently crippled coming into the 2030s from a decade of economic malaise.

Antifa Poltergeist
Jun 3, 2004

"We're not laughing with you, we're laughing at you"



Maybe europeans should act responsably and stop consuming beyond their means,get some discipline and self control on those heating moochers.Maybe we can buy more solar panels, boy i hope we dont antagonise where those are made!

His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.
Solar panels are utterly worthless in europe with a measly capacity factor of 11% so that's not a problem since it's not part of any solution to europes future energy mix.

Tesseraction
Apr 5, 2009

If only we could harness the power of spite we'd be in surplus to eternity.

Guavanaut
Nov 27, 2009

Looking At Them Tittys
1969 - 1998



Toilet Rascal

Antifa Poltergeist posted:

boy i hope we dont antagonise where those are made!
Yes do not antagonize the Dutch :geert:

e: ^^ Unless we figure out how to do that, then always antagonize Geert.

Blut
Sep 11, 2009

if someone is in the bottom 10%~ of a guillotine

Antifa Poltergeist posted:

Maybe europeans should act responsably and stop consuming beyond their means,get some discipline and self control on those heating moochers.Maybe we can buy more solar panels, boy i hope we dont antagonise where those are made!



Don't be lumping good Southern Europeans in with this, they're living within their heating means. Its time for the Germans to get some karmic EU imposed austerity.

An insane mind
Aug 11, 2018

Guavanaut posted:

Yes do not antagonize the Dutch :geert:

e: ^^ Unless we figure out how to do that, then always antagonize Geert.

Always antagonize the Dutch, we suck. Although I love kroketten and stroopwafels.

i say swears online
Mar 4, 2005

Blut posted:

Don't be lumping good Southern Europeans in with this, they're living within their heating means. Its time for the Germans to get some karmic EU imposed austerity.

His Divine Shadow posted:

Solar panels are utterly worthless in europe with a measly capacity factor of 11% so that's not a problem since it's not part of any solution to europes future energy mix.

are solar panels "utterly worthless" in spain

mobby_6kl
Aug 9, 2009

by Fluffdaddy

i say swears online posted:

are solar panels "utterly worthless" in spain

Not "utterly" but not great, orange is solar, teal-ish below it is wind. Maroon is gas.

His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.
The further south you get the better, so it's OK at the southernmost parts of europe. But for most of europe which lies further north, it's not a good use of finite resources.

Pope Hilarius II
Nov 10, 2008

Wind energy seems like a much better idea for most of North- and Northwestern Europe anyway.

Guavanaut posted:

Yes do not antagonize the Dutch :geert:

e: ^^ Unless we figure out how to do that, then always antagonize Geert.

Geert Wilders is not the force in Dutch politics he once was, the main guy on the fascist right is now Thierry Baudet, who is as close to a mask-off Nazi as possible short of wearing swastika armbands.

Guavanaut
Nov 27, 2009

Looking At Them Tittys
1969 - 1998



Toilet Rascal
The Netherlands seems to be making a lot of solar PV and adjacent stuff now though, which even if solar isn't the one true power solution is at least a lot more useful than Dutch Alex Jones.

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An insane mind
Aug 11, 2018

Pope Hilarius II posted:

Wind energy seems like a much better idea for most of North- and Northwestern Europe anyway.

Geert Wilders is not the force in Dutch politics he once was, the main guy on the fascist right is now Thierry Baudet, who is as close to a mask-off Nazi as possible short of wearing swastika armbands.

My neighbour was trying to peddle me Baudet's new book today. About corona and the globalist cabal. It's the first time I ever actually told a neighbour to gently caress right off with that poo poo. He told me I was compromised by fake news and that he will be glad to see me in jail.

I didn't even know I did something illegal.

e: What surprises me most is that this guy is basically an environmentalist who...doesn't seem racist and has these giant Love will win and Care for others stickers.

An insane mind fucked around with this message at 21:52 on Oct 27, 2022

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