[ExI] The silent PV revolution

[Alfio Puglisi]

On Thu, Mar 29, 2012 at 8:31 PM, Adrian Tymes <atymes at gmail.com> wrote:

> Even assuming that increase, and even assuming that an equal
> amount of fossil fuel energy production is taken offline to
> compensate, wouldn't a majority of Italy's energy production still
> come from fossil fuels?
>

Probably yes, since fossil fuels have now a share of around 75% of total
production, and they will continue to provide the bulk of it during the
night and when the weather isn't that good.
PV overproduction during the day could be usefully stored on hydro pumped
storage, in order to further reduce the fossil fuel load. But there is a
conflict of interest where the owners of such hydro plants also own
gas-peaking plants, which are increasingly sitting idle and can't be
amortized.
Even so, the change is momentous and is happening with blinding speed: just
two years ago, not many were convinced that PV had any significant role to
play at all. In two years from now, roles may be reversed.

Ciao,
Alfio






>
> On Thu, Mar 29, 2012 at 10:13 AM, Alfio Puglisi <alfio.puglisi at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > During the last few days, I have realized that something very
> interesting is
> > going to happen on electricity markets this summer: there is a
> > non-negligible chance that a major country is going to have so much
> > production from solar photovoltaics that it will have to *export*
> > a sizable fraction of it.
> >
> > The facts: Italy has a population of about 60 million, and peak
> electricity
> > usage that hovers around 50 GW on working days, and 40 GW on weekends.
> >
> > This February, mid-day PV production peaked at almost 10 GW. That's about
> > 330% more than last February. Generous feed-in tariffs have fueled this
> > crazy growth. Given the explosive results, tariffs are being slashed
> every
> > few months, but PV installations show no signs of slowing down.
> >
> > The graph of hour-by-hour prices in the electricity market
> > is mightily interesting: http://www.mercatoelettrico.org/It/  (top left
> > graph, red line is instantaneous price): two peaks at 9am and 8pm, while
> in
> > the rest of the day the market is flooded with PV-generated energy, which
> > keeps prices down. A few years ago the shape was totally different - a
> > high plateau during the entire day.
> >
> > in 2011, PV generation in August was 5x the one in February. If the trend
> > holds, Italy risks to have too much electricity for its internal market
> at
> > certain times (starting from noon at weekends, and working down from
> there),
> > and will have to export. That's quite a change, since Italy has been a
> > chronic energy importer for entire *decades*. Countless electrons inside
> the
> > power lines coming in from France, Switzerland and Slovenia will have to
> > suddenly move in a direction they have never witnessed before.
> >
> > Traditional energy giants are lobbying like hell the government to
> regulate
> > the market back into something more manageable (for them), but I think
> it's
> > too late. Gas-burning plants, designed to spin up during demand spikes,
> > are already  being priced out.
> >
> > Is there anyone out there closely following the same developments, or
> it's
> > just me having unhealthy interests? :-)
> >
> > Ciao,
> > Alfio
> >
> >
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