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DougB said:
Load shedding isn’t that feasible for consecutive days as few large industrial consumers would be willing to reduce consumption for long periods.
Click to expand...
Why not? If a huge amount of storage is avoided, that is a cost savings. Load shedding isn’t solely a cost avoidance — those shedding can be compensated as well.

Complex strategies can make sense - an electrified industrial process could revert back to its backup boiler when the spread made sense. Heck, I know of huge industrial plants that currently have the same so they can shut off their co-gen when electricity prices are too low. Different version of the same thing.
 
Appropos the greening of Alberta's grid:
Key results if successful:
  • 1,200 MW of very low carbon baseload electricity
  • 3 million tonnes of CO2 annually avoided
Question becomes: does it make sense to run schemes like that as backups, or are they only economical as 24/7 opertations

Capital Power and Enbridge Collaborate to Reduce CO2 Emissions in Alberta​

www.enbridge.com

Capital Power and Enbridge Collaborate to Reduce CO2 Emissions in Alberta

Open access carbon hub in Wabamun area of central Alberta would support Capital Power and other local companies CALGARY, AB, Nov. 29, 2021 /CNW/ - Capital Power Corporation (TSX: CPX) and Enbridge...
www.enbridge.com
 
darwink said:
Lot of time to solve issues. For a solar backed grid, every % eeked out in capacity factor for a winter day from the current ~5% reduces needed storage by a lot. As does multi-day optional load shedding.
Click to expand...
Technology can improve the nameplate capacity of solar power by increasing its efficiency. But it cannot increase the capacity factor, which is solely dependent on the amount of photons striking the panel, which in turn is determined by weather and latititude. For example, a new technology might increase the efficiency of a square metre of solar panel so that it's nameplate (theoretical) capacity rises from x to 1.25x. The capacity factor stays the same, but the entire output curve shifts up. Technology is unlikely to make the sun shine more intensely of for longer periods of time at a specific location (I'm dimissing crazy ideas like space mirrors reflecting sunlight).
 
Surrealplaces said:
For a good idea of general consumption and generation method, this site does a good of showing it. You can drill down to specific days of the year to see the changes in generation of different methods.

Green Alberta Energy | Statistics

Over 17 % of the installed Market Capacity of generation in Alberta is from Renewables.
www.greenalbertaenergy.ca

You can remove the other generation methods by clicking on them. This for example shows only solar power generation for the past week. On the 7th, it peaked at 254 MW generation, out of a Max Capacity of 336 MW (Matches the MC shown in your chart) But total Generation can be found in these day to day stats.

View attachment 362391
Click to expand...
Awesome site. I could spend all day on there lol.
 
I noticed that the city has introduced their new residential solar calculator

www.calgary.ca

Residential solar calculator

The Residential Solar Calculator is a tool intended to help Calgary homeowners determine the viability of adding solar photovoltaic (PV) panels as an alternative energy source.
www.calgary.ca www.calgary.ca

Which also includes a solar map of the entire city.

It occurred to me, what happens if residents really got on board with solar installations and then we get into situations where adjacent proposed developments would put the roofs into shadow? I know that sunlight isn't deemed any kind of a right in Calgary (which I disagree with), but now there could start to be big time economic factors on top of that. Thoughts?
 
JoeUrban said:
I noticed that the city has introduced their new residential solar calculator

www.calgary.ca

Residential solar calculator

The Residential Solar Calculator is a tool intended to help Calgary homeowners determine the viability of adding solar photovoltaic (PV) panels as an alternative energy source.
www.calgary.ca www.calgary.ca

Which also includes a solar map of the entire city.

It occurred to me, what happens if residents really got on board with solar installations and then we get into situations where adjacent proposed developments would put the roofs into shadow? I know that sunlight isn't deemed any kind of a right in Calgary (which I disagree with), but now there could start to be big time economic factors on top of that. Thoughts?
Click to expand...
This actually came into play in Edmonton when I lived there...

A building went up here: https://goo.gl/maps/m6xjkJhUkS8QRpEUA

It has solar on the south side of it and there was a proposal for the east side of this block that would render its solar pretty useless. Not sure where it went though. Not too bright (pun intended) of them to put solar on building where its so easy to potentially be blocked in the future.

Here's a Global story on it: https://globalnews.ca/news/3347122/...south-side-of-downtown-edmonton-office-tower/

"“Those solar panels will end up generating enough power for 80 per cent of the power needs of the building.”

That solar power would likely be reduced if a neighbouring tower project is constructed; Dub predicts by 20 per cent.

The architect admits he was disappointed with Edmonton city council’s decision in September 2015 to approve a Toronto developer’s request for three 40-storey towers next door on the old Healey Ford site.

Construction has not yet broke ground.

Chris Dulaba with Edmonton Callidus Developments said the Ontario land owner, Rise Real Estate, put its plans on hold while it monitors the Alberta market."

The Toronto developer's project was never built.
 
I was looking at airphotos inspired by CBBarnett's post about the pedestrian environment near Chinook Centre, and I noticed something...
April 2021
1664815231589.png



August 2021
1664815257302.png


It's about 5500 sq m of panels. According to press at the time, it's a pilot project intended to test two-way electricity flow on the specialized secondary network. (Don't ask me, I barely passed ENGG 325 back in the day.)

Production is 900 kWH per year, which is around 10% of the mall's annual use; I wouldn't be surprised if you could put 5x this much on the rest of the roof; The Bay in particular has so much uninterrupted space..
 
TC Energy to build its first solar energy project in Canada

"TC Energy Corporation (TSX, NYSE: TRP) (TC Energy) will begin pre-construction activities of the Saddlebrook Solar Project located near Aldersyde, Alberta. TC Energy is investing $146 million to build its first Canadian solar power project. It has the capacity to generate 81 megawatts, enough energy to power 20,000 homes annually."
 
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