tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7813749.post4484230640518343488..comments2024-03-24T12:52:31.153+05:30Comments on Shadow Warrior: Quick notes: Madhavan Nair, Media's war...Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7813749.post-35354462990256095312015-10-09T08:31:50.480+05:302015-10-09T08:31:50.480+05:30Groundloop water heating has been popularized in S...Groundloop water heating has been popularized in Scandinavia.<br /><br />We could probably come up with a less capable but cheaper version of Powerwall for sale in India, and perhaps it could at least help to provide more reliable power at least for businesses in 2nd/3rd-tier towns, etc. There is some rational zone where it can be useful. Rural electrification was one of Roosevelt's fundamental transformation of quality of life in America. The main utility of approaches like Powerwall, is that it takes people's lives out of the control of ever-unreliable political masters. India's political system may take a long time to reform, and may thus be unreliable for quite some time to come. Therefore these end-consumer-empowering solutions may be the best compromise available for the near/medium term, until a more mature political culture can evolve.sanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11939342428337531046noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7813749.post-91556722277770262772015-10-09T07:33:36.587+05:302015-10-09T07:33:36.587+05:30Powerwall makes sense only if you have solar. And ...Powerwall makes sense only if you have solar. And it is too expensive for homes.Paganhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04230663534687606842noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7813749.post-63574459010396848312015-10-09T07:24:19.394+05:302015-10-09T07:24:19.394+05:30Heating water is a form of energy storage... it la...Heating water is a form of energy storage... it lasts through cloudiness and even sunset. Since it is augmented by coal, reliability is not impacted. The only reason it hasn't caught on is that it is less viable in North America and Europe where most of the research happens. For tropical India, it can be a boon if we pursue it seriously.Paganhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04230663534687606842noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7813749.post-8488862795546020872015-10-08T22:23:29.081+05:302015-10-08T22:23:29.081+05:30It seems to me that solar is too unreliable to be ...It seems to me that solar is too unreliable to be used for industrial applications, eg. boosting powerplant efficiencies. If it's night, if it's cloudy, etc then your solar power isn't happening.<br /><br />Meanwhile, I'm having a change of heart on stuff like Powerwall, etc, because the more we can get energy-related consumer products into the hands of ordinary Indians, then the more we can bypass the moribund political system and its morass. If the political system was better, then we wouldn't need to resort to such band-aids, but because of the inherent predatory competition of Indian politics, large infrastructure inherently gets made a hostage of politics.sanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11939342428337531046noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7813749.post-9943442406184289242015-10-08T20:33:54.366+05:302015-10-08T20:33:54.366+05:30@San, electricity is what I am talking about -- so...@San, electricity is what I am talking about -- solar pre-heaters in thermal plants to bring down the usage of coal. Using parabolic reflectors would mean even more coal savings. <br /><br />This can be done in other plants too, where heating is involved.Paganhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04230663534687606842noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7813749.post-70399637158720857572015-10-08T10:49:44.745+05:302015-10-08T10:49:44.745+05:30Yeah, solar hot water heaters are supposed to be i...Yeah, solar hot water heaters are supposed to be in wide use in India. But electricity is what's most fungible.<br /><br />Anyway, beggars can't be choosers - the struggle to improve India's infrastructure has been dragging because the political competition in the country automatically results in any 'commons' (eg. infrastructure commons) being targeted by corrupt partisan political interests to turn it into a political football. These distributed-grid systems like Powerwall, etc may bypass the political sand-traps by directly empowering the people to get on with their basic lives. That way, even as long drawn-out cleansing of the dysfunctional political setup takes place, people can still at least experience some kind of economic improvement in their lives, without having to wait for it to happen after a political cleanup. People's lives can't be held in limbo forever, while political groups duke it out.sanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11939342428337531046noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7813749.post-56094757446824247102015-10-08T08:04:36.135+05:302015-10-08T08:04:36.135+05:30An unexpected benefit of Solar PV is that power-fa...An unexpected benefit of Solar PV is that power-factor-correction becomes relatively simple (from the solar-micro-inverter-modules supplying back to the grid), greatly improving power utilization. We might need smarter grids for that.<br /><br />The other solar -- Solar-thermal -- can go a long way in reducing coal (solar-augmented-thermal). Unlike solar-PV, this is highly cost-effective even today.Paganhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04230663534687606842noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7813749.post-51583053081999419152015-10-08T07:51:11.635+05:302015-10-08T07:51:11.635+05:30Yeah, I agree with you that solar is still way mor...Yeah, I agree with you that solar is still way more expensive than hydrocarbon power, but the political costs of hydrocarbons are continuing to increase as time goes by. It may be better for us to hedge our bets by at least maintaining some outward commitments to solar, which is after all a technology of the future which we ourselves may end up exporting.<br /><br />Musk's Powerwall thing has a lot of skeptics too, but he's pitched the idea to Modi on the grounds that a distributed grid may bypass the bottlenecks of centralized infrastructure which India traditionally has a poor track record on. Like it or not, we may have to factor in the costs of India's built-in political sand-traps which pose unique problems to common infrastructure. Because of the country's special political deficiencies, distributed infrastructure may be the most expedient way around these difficult political obstacles, even if it's not economically optimal. With India, the political factors can never be discounted in any calculation.sanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11939342428337531046noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7813749.post-20157567944319513082015-10-08T01:54:16.259+05:302015-10-08T01:54:16.259+05:30India has no power deficit. Coal based stations ar...India has no power deficit. Coal based stations are operating at less than 60% capacity, when they should at over 90%. In addition, 80,000 MW is under construction. Gas based plants have just recently started touching something in the range of 40%. There is no need to add any additional capacity for the next 10 years.<br /><br />India will pay for solar stupidity.non-carborundumhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04075792573799935238noreply@blogger.com