Tony Seba - Disruptive Tech - Synthesis of Solar, Storage, EVs & AEVs

[jai mitchell]

AEVs are autonomous electric vehicles.  Self-driving Uber type ride-share technology called Transportation as a Service (TaaS).

This is a wonderful lecture to see what has happened in the past with these kinds of disruptive technologies where asset utilization goes from 4% to 40% while operational costs drop 10X below the costs of incumbent technologies.  Then he shows how these emergent technologies are actually doing this right now and that they have a synthesis of support for each other creating a massive disruption to ALL fossil fuel infrastructure - in other words, it is ALL stranded costs, today.

Since this addresses multiple technologies and current threads are only looking at specific tech, I though this new thread could address they synthesis of these technologies and their impacts on the economy (massive increases in household personal consumption spending) and the fossil fuel industry (i.e. petroleum refinery margins when global gasoline consumption drops by 30% in the next 10 years).



Published on Jun 9, 2017
Stanford University futurist Tony Seba spent the last decades studying technological disruptions. He argues that the Electric Vehicle, battery storage, and solar power, along with autonomous vehicles, are a perfect example of a 10x exponential process which will wipe fossil fuels off the market in about a decade.
TonySeba.com – RethinkX.com

He is the author of several books, including most recently “Clean Disruption of Energy and Transportation: How Silicon Valley Will Make Oil, Nuclear, Natural Gas, Coal, Electric Utilities and Conventional Cars Obsolete by 2030”, and “Solar Trillions: 7 Market and Investment Opportunities in the Emerging Clean-Energy Economy”

Tony Seba spoke in Boulder, Colorado, where he was awarded the 2017 Sunshine Award by Clean Energy Action (cleanenergyaction.org).

Filmed and edited pro bono by Martin Voelker with the Colorado Renewable Energy Society (cres-energy.org)

[Tom_Mazanec]

Can solar increase emissions? A debate erupts
https://www.eenews.net/stories/1061015535

A recent newspaper article and claims from conservative groups are stirring up a debate about whether greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution can rise because of large amounts of solar on the grid.

At issue is a group of combustion turbine power plants in a county at the North Carolina-Virginia border that Duke Energy Corp. only operates during certain times of the day. The so-called peaker plants adjust their power output during the day as electric demand changes.

This means the units could be running at a higher output during extremely hot or cold days. But for the most part, they are being used in conjunction with solar, an intermittent resource.

[interstitial]

install battery back up and shut peaker plants down. Nothing to debate this is another attempt to derail renewables.

[KiwiGriff]

Seba has an incredible record of correct assumption over the last decade and  valuable insight into our future.
I do not believe you are informed as to the topics of this thread  if you have not kept up as to where  his thinking is leading us .

 

[Jim Hunt]

AEVs are autonomous electric vehicles.  Self-driving Uber type ride-share technology called Transportation as a Service (TaaS).

In the trade over here in Europe we call it Mobility as a Service (MaaS for short)

https://V2G.co.uk/2017/09/an-electric-car-club-for-camelford/

Since AEVs aren't with us just yet, do "EV clubs" qualify for the TaaS label?

Our ancient artist's impression:

[KiwiGriff]

New presentation from Tony Seba
The Great Transformation [Part 1] - Patterns of Change, Key Technologies & #PhaseChangeDisruption

[El Cid]

This guy is clever, no doubt. Yet, I watched the 2017 lecture that promised all-electric, selfdriving fleets by now and stranded oil assets. Guess what, the opposite happened...

[NeilT]

Yes, looking at the S curve with hindsight is a lot more precise than the other way around.

The bigger question is what is developing now that is invisible that will become obvious 50 years from now.

That is where the real money and insight is.

AIaaS?

[Jim Hunt]

You're confident that hi tech society will still be around in 50 years?

If climate change doesn't disrupt us, rogue AI will!

[NeilT]

50 years, yes.  100 years? All bets are off.

[El Cid]

install battery back up and shut peaker plants down. Nothing to debate this is another attempt to derail renewables.

Oh yeah, easy-peasy:

In 2021, the global energy storage market maintained a high growth rate. Newly installed capacity was 29.6 GWh, up 72.4% year on year, said TrendForce. Going forward, the global energy storage market is set for rapid expansion, reaching 362 GWh by 2025.

Total global electricity production is cca 28000 TWh, so we are now able to store electricity enough for almost 7 minutes. By 2025 it will (maybe, hopefully) 1,5 hours. Those peaker plants will be needed for a very long while yet

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/06/17/global-energy-storage-market-set-for-rapid-expansion-by-2025/

https://yearbook.enerdata.net/electricity/world-electricity-production-statistics.html

[interstitial]

install battery back up and shut peaker plants down. Nothing to debate this is another attempt to derail renewables.

Oh yeah, easy-peasy:

In 2021, the global energy storage market maintained a high growth rate. Newly installed capacity was 29.6 GWh, up 72.4% year on year, said TrendForce. Going forward, the global energy storage market is set for rapid expansion, reaching 362 GWh by 2025.

Total global electricity production is cca 28000 TWh, so we are now able to store electricity enough for almost 7 minutes. By 2025 it will (maybe, hopefully) 1,5 hours. Those peaker plants will be needed for a very long while yet

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/06/17/global-energy-storage-market-set-for-rapid-expansion-by-2025/

https://yearbook.enerdata.net/electricity/world-electricity-production-statistics.html

never claimed it would be easy. But there is a solution.

[etienne]

Load management is also a solution. The problem is that there are times during the year where there is just not enough wind and sun during a longer time than what is acceptable for load management. When with Bob Wallace, we made an analysis of the ERCOT data, I found, if I remember well, that end August and beginning of September was a major problem. You already loose daytime to produce solar, there is not so much wind, and it is still too hot to turn off the AC.

[KiwiGriff]

Why do these discussions ignore Hydro and Geothermal .
Both renewable sources of energy .

[NeilT]

Hydro from rivers in the UK is a constantly ignored source.  The UK has literally thousands of Mills and water structures to support them, from the pre steam days.  Unless it can be one huge project it is ignored.

When at the University of London I managed to talk to one of the staff working on geothermal.  The way they are doing it means limited time to get returns and constant moves of the fracture zones.  Unless you have a geologically active zone, the current process of extracting energy is self limiting.  In Basel they caused earthquakes in a geologically stable zone and abandoned the attempt.

[El Cid]

The problem with the theory of sudden transformation by merging solar, batteries, EVs etc is that there is not enough cobalt, lithium, etc in the world to produce enough batteries to replace all ICE cars and then we did not even start calculating the battery need to balance the grid. It's not feasible with current technologies. Maybe with different, better batteries, or most likely with green hydrogen it will be possible, but until then we will see lots of natgas and oil used (at least for 2 more decades)

[El Cid]

Why do these discussions ignore Hydro and Geothermal .
Both renewable sources of energy .

We do have some operating geothermal projects here, each providing heating for 20-30 000 people - but not electricity. If you have very hot water (above 120-130 C if I remember well) then you can use a true cascade system: first producing electricity then using the colder but still hot (90-100 C) water for heating and then using the returning water for heating greenhouses. Unfortunately, we have 100-105C water here mostly so it's heating (and in some cases 2nd use for greenhouses) only. Still, that saves a lot of natgas as well...

[KiwiGriff]

NZ gets 20% of its electricity from geothermal another 60% from hydro.
I know you don't all have the fortune to live in a  wet,  rugged  active volcanic zone.
You are also not 4,163 km  from your nearest significant neighbour .
The ability to have Interconnections are also often absent in this discussion  . Icelandic geothermal, north sea wind, Portugal solar, Norway hydro...


 







 

[etienne]

New Zeland is also a low population density country, so you have more space per capita for renewables.

[Jim Hunt]

Why do these discussions ignore Hydro and Geothermal .

And wave and tidal?

Unless it can be one huge project it is ignored.

Tell me about it!

https://V2G.co.uk/2018/01/uk-spends-30-million-on-v2g-technology/

"Clear world leader"?

[NeilT]

The problem with the theory of sudden transformation by merging solar, batteries, EVs etc is that there is not enough cobalt, lithium, etc in the world to produce enough batteries to replace all ICE cars and then we did not even start calculating the battery need to balance the grid. It's not feasible with current technologies. Maybe with different, better batteries, or most likely with green hydrogen it will be possible, but until then we will see lots of natgas and oil used (at least for 2 more decades)

I suggest reviewing this video before hanging your hat on that.



As for Cobalt, LFp is taking over the mainstream and cobalt will be for the highest energy cases.

Also Cobalt will be near 100% recycled when these batteries are no longer viable.

Most of these resource statements are not true.  Lithium especially.  Now if you said refined lithium, yes, true.  But refining is a simple matter of creating capacity and wholly different from lack of resource.

[kassy]

The problem with the theory of sudden transformation by merging solar, batteries, EVs etc is that there is not enough cobalt, lithium, etc in the world to produce enough batteries to replace all ICE cars and then we did not even start calculating the battery need to balance the grid. It's not feasible with current technologies. Maybe with different, better batteries, or most likely with green hydrogen it will be possible, but until then we will see lots of natgas and oil used (at least for 2 more decades)

But people are also researching all kind of different options for batteries so different solutions will come along. Of course it will take time. EV only in EU only starts from 2035. There will be lots of off shore wind added in the coastal areas by then.

A lot of the transformation is done too haphazardly. People build solar farms that then cannot be hooked up too the grid etc.

It would be interesting to choose a number of cities in different environments where we do the whole transition a.s.a.p. just to see what we can learn. Some small towns, some bigger cities. Some NW near the coast, some in Spain, some in the middle of Germany , some even further to the east.

For each of these the basis would be getting solar on all surfaces where it gives a good yield.
Then there are a number of ways to store excess summer energy to research which includes several types of battery options which do not use metals.

Of course the buildings should all be insulated well too in the process.

At least this way we gain more practical knowledge plus they can also be used for training new people in the various techniques. Ideally you could also add other improvements. Catch water for dry times and grow trees and plants for shading etc.

Sunny day charging should be almost free on sunny days which would make EVs there more attractive. So maybe add in a program to get to 100% EVs too.

[El Cid]

Numbers NeilT:

there are 1,4 billion cars globally. One EV battery contains 40-60 kg lithium (i am not even going to talk about cobalt and nickel, that's even worse). If all cars were EVs we would need cca 60 million tonnes of lithium. Global known reserves of lithium: 14 million tonnes. These are just cars, then we would need trucks and batteries to balance the grid. The maths don't work out - not even remotely close.

kassy,

yes, there will likely be further developements in battery technology in 5-10-20 years but this guy is talking about an imminent revolution which is not going to happen because we do not have stuff for it NOW.

[BeeKnees]

Numbers NeilT:

there are 1,4 billion cars globally. One EV battery contains 40-60 kg lithium (i am not even going to talk about cobalt and nickel, that's even worse). If all cars were EVs we would need cca 60 million tonnes of lithium. Global known reserves of lithium: 14 million tonnes. These are just cars, then we would need trucks and batteries to balance the grid. The maths don't work out - not even remotely close.

kassy,

yes, there will likely be further developements in battery technology in 5-10-20 years but this guy is talking about an imminent revolution which is not going to happen because we do not have stuff for it NOW.

The amount of lithium is about 8-12kg in a car, from 40-60kg of Li2CO3

[crandles]

"Reserves" are just what has been assessed.

https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/lithium-reserves-by-country
suggests Chilli has 9.2m tons Australia 5.7m tons Argentina 2.2m tons China 1.5m tons of reserves

If we were really short pushing up the price, some of the 180b tons in seawater might become economically viable

https://www.science.org/content/article/seawater-could-provide-nearly-unlimited-amounts-critical-battery-material#:~:text=The%20world's%20oceans%20contain%20an,selectively%20extract%20lithium%20from%20seawater.

But for the next few years I expect reserves to increase as more potential sites are assessed.

[NeilT]

Unlike layered cathode materials (e.g. LCO), LFP is a polyanion compound made up of more than one charged anion like PO43- . With the atoms arranged in a crystalline structure, they establish a 3D network for transport of lithium ions that differ from the 2D layered ones made from lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxide (NMC). While LFP batteries have lower energy density than NMC-based batteries, they have a longer lifetime, are safer and use cheap and abundant materials.

https://www.addionics.com/post/step-aside-nickel-and-cobalt-lfp-is-on-the-market-and-is-here-to-stay

What Cobalt, What Nickel?

Lithium makes up about 0.002 percent of Earth’s crust

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/search-new-geologic-sources-lithium-could-power-clean-future#:~:text=Lithium%20makes%20up%20about%200.002,t%20particularly%20rare%2C%20Stillings%20says.

What is 0.002% of the Earth's crust?

474 Quadrillion tonnes.

The key, she adds, is knowing where it is concentrated enough to mine economically.
To answer that question, researchers are studying how and where the forces of wind, water, heat and time combine to create rich deposits of the metal. Such places include the flat desert basins of the “lithium triangle” of Chile, Argentina and Bolivia; volcanic rocks called pegmatites in Australia, the United States and Canada; and lithium-bearing clays in the United States.

Hopefully my extract of the Michael Liebreich keynote speech from the Hydrogen world congress will update and play.

[Edit] picture in picture works.

[Sigmetnow]

there are 1,4 billion cars globally. …
 If all cars were EVs …

Not gonna happen.  There will not be a 1-for-1 replacement.  The adoption of ridesharing (Uber, Lyft, etc. have already overtaken taxis and limousines) and robotaxis will greatly reduce individual vehicle ownership — much cheaper and more convenient to tap on your phone and request a ride rather than pay for your own car, fuel/electricity, parking, taxes, insurance, etc.  Robotaxis will be cheaper than a subsidized subway or bus ticket.

[KiwiGriff]

Wave and tidal?
I have spent the last 45 years mucking around in boats.
The salt water environment  is too hash the weather too unpredictable to make tidal and wave cost competitive.
  Pity it is only a few kilometers between and west and east coast where I live in  NZ the tides are four hours apart.

2nd part of Tony's lecture .

 

[El Cid]

there are 1,4 billion cars globally. …
 If all cars were EVs …

Not gonna happen.  There will not be a 1-for-1 replacement.  The adoption of ridesharing (Uber, Lyft, etc. have already overtaken taxis and limousines) and robotaxis will greatly reduce individual vehicle ownership — much cheaper and more convenient to tap on your phone and request a ride rather than pay for your own car, fuel/electricity, parking, taxes, insurance, etc.  Robotaxis will be cheaper than a subsidized subway or bus ticket.

I totally agree, been saying this for years. Unfortunately it is going to happen much slower than I had hoped. It is not going to happen in the next few years. Yet Tony Seba is talking about an imminent revolution based on a convergence of technological changes. Slef driving cars is one of those changes. Despite our best hopes, the technology is not ready NOW. May happen 10-15 yrs.

[El Cid]

The amount of lithium is about 8-12kg in a car, from 40-60kg of Li2CO3

You are right! Most sources do say these batteries contain 40-60 kg lithium but in reality that is lithium carbonate if I understand it well.

Which still means that 1,4 billion cars would need all the reserves in the world (and what about those gridbalancing batteries and trucks, etc.?).

And yes, we will eventually find new reserves at higher prices. But that means that economically it is going to be less viable.

[etienne]

The second part of the presentation is also interesting, but I wonder if he has blinkers, or if he avoids carefully some subjects. For example when he says that transport as a service will be cheaper than the cost of gasoline, he doesn't tell us what the cost of gasoline will be. I also don't believe that his 10'000 $ EV will hold together for 500'000 miles, it doesn't match my experience with cheap cars.
Cost and efficiency of TAAS will also be quite different in NY city and in the North Dakota countryside. This won't make the prediction charts wrong, but means that the picture won't be the same everywhere.

[BeeKnees]

The amount of lithium is about 8-12kg in a car, from 40-60kg of Li2CO3

You are right! Most sources do say these batteries contain 40-60 kg lithium but in reality that is lithium carbonate if I understand it well.

Which still means that 1,4 billion cars would need all the reserves in the world (and what about those gridbalancing batteries and trucks, etc.?).

And yes, we will eventually find new reserves at higher prices. But that means that economically it is going to be less viable.

I think most of this will end up being sodium based batteries.  They are now not far behind lithium with regard to density and weight isnt an issue for static batteries.  It's easy to forget that not everything needs to be lithium.   

[NeilT]

If you think of what fails most on cars, engine, gearbox, brakes and suspension, what will be the situation with an EV.

True, truly cheap electric motors do fail faster, but they are cheap. Perhaps batteries on the cheap will be the engine failure replacement.

Then it depends on recycling and economies of scale.  Once all cars are EV, there will be no place for massive battery manufacture in the way it is today.  Prices will fall. Quality will be reasonable.

[KiwiGriff]

If you think of what fails most on cars, engine, gearbox, brakes and suspension

The down side of ev's  will be electronic failure.  Charging inverters and engine management controllers go out and it may be not cost efficient to replace on a older car.
 

[NeilT]

If you think of what fails most on cars, engine, gearbox, brakes and suspension

The down side of ev's  will be electronic failure.  Charging inverters and engine management controllers go out and it may be not cost efficient to replace on a older car.

Indeed, but what are the warranty options for FF?  3-5 years, 100,000 miles. After that, on your own.  Dodgy software with no updates.

It is no wonder that UK fleet take vehicles for 3 years.  No MOT, all in warranty, peak resale value for the use they get.

EV is going to break that apart.  Cheap EV is going to hammer it even more.  Ride hailing on demand for businesses with unlimited rides within a month is going to totally destroy it.

When Autonomous ride hailing for businesses hits the market the whole fleet business is going to be turned on its head.  Fleet, in the UK, is 50% of passenger vehicles sales each year.

Watch this space.

[kassy]

For anyone who wants to deep dive into cars there are several threads for that.

Battery tech will evolve but that will take some time just like everything else.
If he predicted it would happen fast then that was a bit optimistic.

For storing solar from buildings there are many other battery options including some which only use water.

But working out how we do that all efficiently will take time.

[KiwiGriff]

Part 3.
 The Great Transformation [Part 3] - The #Disruption of #Energy

[KiwiGriff]

Part 3   is close to home
It was cheaper for me to build a solar/storage  system than run a cable 350 meters up the drive and connect to the grid.
Not every one would be happy with my minimalist life style. The maritime climate here in the far north of NZ helps.
As costs fall the option of disconnecting  will open to more people.
 
 

[etienne]

Part 3 is not clear regarding energy transition. He talks about actual demand, but we are going all electric (heat pumps,  cars, industry...), I don't believe that the superpower (extra electricity available because of over built capacity in order to meet the needs on low capacity days) he talks about will be enough and adequate to power the transition, and it is not always available, so it can mainly be used for long time storage (hydrogen would say Freegrass) or activities compatible with load management.

The risk with the energy transition is the creation of an high demand when renewables are not available, you need to heat your house more when there is no sun outside. Another risk with the concept of local production with local batteries is that they are mostly powered by solar panels, so they might all be empty if there is a longer time without much sun. It is a similar problem that exist with the rainwater-tanks, peak water demand is when people's rainwater-tanks are empty, which unfortunately is when there was no rain for a longer time. There is no doubts that he shows the right way, but it won't be an easy ride like he suggests.

He also never talks about the surfaces that are required to install so many panels. I found other numbers when I calculated the required battery capacity, but it was a long time ago, maybe the situation has changed. Maybe he added a load-management factor on his consumption's numbers.

What is sure is that I might be better off with PV panels than with thermal panels. I didn't take the decision yet, still waiting for the offers, suppliers are very slow.

Right now in Luxembourg, the companies installing PV power, heat pumps and thermal panels are overloaded and have very long delays. That is now the bottleneck.

[KiwiGriff]

etienne
If you are talking about a storage hot water system.
Solar panels, controller and a dc immersion heater is already cheaper than any similar  output  thermal solar system for a given solar isolation.
 

[GrauerMausling]

 I think there is no way that only batteries can supply the backup with 100% renewables. But I also don't see any reasons to even try. In my opinion, hydrogen used in gas power plants is a good option.
Batteries are perfect for the short time storage, e.g. night times in summer when there is plenty of PV during the day but not so much wind during the night.

But for longer times, e.g. in winter when there is no wind, I don't see batteries as an option. I think that hydrogen produced during the summer is the best option.

As far as I understand the potential, for Germany that is, it seems that there is plenty of space to install PV. But there is only limited potential for Wind. So for me it seems reasonable to use the overcapacity of PV to produce H2 in summer and use it in Winter on those days when the wind is not blowing. For the 'normal' winter day we should be able to install enough wind power to supply the county.

[El Cid]

So for me it seems reasonable to use the overcapacity of PV to produce H2 in summer and use it in Winter on those days when the wind is not blowing. For the 'normal' winter day we should be able to install enough wind power to supply the county.

In Europe, where you need to store electricity for many months not just for a few days, batteries are definitely not going to be enough...but H2 should, I agree. Still, it will take at least 20 years to install all the necessary infrastructure

[GrauerMausling]

Why do you need to store energy for serval month? Wind and PV are quite complementary. In summer there is PV and in winter there is wind. If you look at the charts, you will find that there is no big difference for the renewables between summer and winter. So the storage is only required for a couple of days. But even a couple of days seems to be tricky with batteries, this is why I think that hydrogen is required.

[crandles]

Several months is the situation with barely enough PV for annual demand and no wind and going off grid. That is crazy expensive on batteries, it get cheaper if you overbuild the PV which reduces the battery requirement.

Tony Seba is focussing on total system cost and assuming? the cost can be spread fairly in some way I haven't seen him address. If it was one organisation paying for it, this would be fair enough but it isn't.

He isn't discussing the marginal investment in the system. Once there is some superpower every supplier fights to be one that gets paid and this pushes the price down to practically nil. It becomes not worth investing in suppling to such a market. There may be ways around this, but if there are, why are we not hearing about this from Tony Seba?

[Sigmetnow]

… cheaper if you overbuild the PV which reduces the battery requirement.
…
Tony Seba is focussing on total system cost and assuming? the cost can be spread fairly in some way I haven't seen him address. If it was one organisation paying for it, this would be fair enough but it isn't.

 
Thanks for bringing this up.  Tony mentions that, as with most disruptions, solar/wind/battery systems won’t be a one-for-one replacement of legacy coal/gas plants.  I see the benefit of investing in overbuilding, early on, as being at an individual system (“plant”) level design, because S/W/B will be so much cheaper than other capacity, and there will be a broader market for the excess capacity.

As future systems are built — and system costs reduce further — overbuilding by design could be paid for by viewing it as a cost of “insurance” for the grid;  a safety factor (like hurricane-resistant roof construction) expected to be included with any new generation system, even if it is hardly ever needed.

⬇️ Graphs from the video.  More PV means fewer Batteries needed.  35 to 90 hours of battery storage should be sufficient even for the northeast US.

[KiwiGriff]

Part four.


Over building has the advantage that solar is generating  when its light .
Cloudy means a lot less output but it is not 0 as long as there is daylight.
Solar and wind output is predictable.
Weather forecasts  are reasonably accurate for three days five is about the limit.
interconnections also negate the variance in weather  . More money will be invested in regions were you get better return North sea wind or lower latitudes for solar .




 
 

[NeilT]

Over building also means you have spare in the good times for things like Hydrogen and Hydrogen derived products.

I'm a fan of over building.

[kassy]

Plus you can store heated water below the ground (for local heating) or play with things like the Finnish sand magnet.

We should really overbuild in a few model cities and then try all these types of alternatives.

[oren]

Before overbuilding we should build to 100%, to start with. I am not aware of places (at least there aren't many of them) where solar + wind electricity production exceeds total consumption.

[NeilT]

None that I'm aware of oren.  However the UK does intend to build 100% carbon neutral and excess wind and solar for 2050 which they intend to export.

That is if it isn't changed/cancelled with the new "budget first" view of the government.