this post was submitted on 11 Aug 2024
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Mildly Interesting

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It's still not earning you money to spend electricity because you still have to pay the transfer fee which is around 6 cents / kWh but it's pretty damn cheap nevertheless, mostly because of the excess in wind energy.

Last winter because of a mistake it dropped down to negative 50 cents / kWh for few hours, averaging negative 20 cents for the entire day. People were literally earning money by spending electricity. Some were running electric heaters outside in the middle of the winter.

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[–] endofline@lemmy.ca -4 points 1 month ago (5 children)

Yes, solar energy is tempting but the "advertised prices" and "cost savings" are mostly overstretched. Right now a lot of "renewable energy" sources are subsidized in Europe for only political reasons. Subsidies for solar installations are now gone but still you don't have to have costs of utilization. You will have them in 15 - 25 years for sure and then you will be able to make a proper assessment. Regarding Texas, I think solar energy could be profitable but for sure in Alaska it won't be. Still you need to do correct calculations and check what's the outcome of that installation would be. EU "green energy" savings analysis is just misleading. Germany, the main political proponent of the green deal is the best case for this. Energy prices are only going up and up after ditching atom energy. Russian "green" gas won't save them

[–] Sconrad122@lemmy.world 5 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Right now a lot of "renewable energy" sources are subsidized in Europe for only political reasons.

I can assure you the same is true for fossil fuels in Texas right now, so I don't see how this is a strike on renewable energy

[–] endofline@lemmy.ca -3 points 1 month ago (3 children)

I heard only shale gas but good to know about oil. As far as I know, USA is not one of the main oil exporters, mostly middle east countries, especially of Arab peninsula. Venezuela, Iran, too but they are under sanctions. American oil / gas, please, correct me if I am wrong serves mostly as strategic reserves so it may be that USA that it's better for Texas to use solar energy. However, most of calculations don't track the whole lifecycle of solar panels and their environment conditions - I mean whole energy produced for the solar panels lifespan (15 - 25 years) minus the costs of production and utilization. The analysis needs to be done per each case not mandated for all because it doesn't make sense with the total costs adjusted like in Poland. I know many owners of solar panels in Poland and it's not that 'rosy' with the solar energy savings

[–] skibidi@lemmy.world 1 points 1 month ago

The US is the world's largest oil producer. The US, however, does not export the most crude oil, but instead exports large quantities of refined products (gasoline, diesel, etc.).

The US was the largest exporter of liquefied natural gas in 2023.

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