@kravietz @themactep Pretty sure nobody reasonable claims we can (at the moment) run purely on solar? Sounds a bit like a strawman argument. Either way current consumption levels are impossible to sustain especially at scale, even if we radically increase nuclear share (which im not fundametaly against, but the radical centralisation is also a problem in such a scenario). Every solution has its pros and cons.
@harce @themactep@fosstodon.org
> centralisation
Economy of scale 🤷 We want state-run NHS and public transport because they're the cheapest to run at scale, so why at the same time insist on decentralised energy production, if it's the least effective and most expensive?
@kravietz @harce @themactep because resiliency. If you want economies of scale, go nuclear. If you're going wind+solar, it makes sense to have them run by local communities or even at a lower level.
You want a state-run health system for negotiating power and coordination, since there is a metric shit-ton to coordinate in a health system. Electric grid, while complicated, is a way less complicated problem, easier to have local energy producers.
@rysiek @harce @themactep@fosstodon.org
> you're going wind+solar
It doesn't work this way with wind and solar - because they are highly variable, you need either a massive (PWh) battery storage (non-existent), or massive hydro dams or massive country-wide smart grid (non-existent) or power-to-gas grid (non-existent).
Each of these is a single, massive, coordinated investment that cannot be done "local communities".
@kravietz @rysiek @harce @themactep
the local Electricity Board was organised per region, it was SEB (Southern Electricity Board) in Reading and Eastern Electricity Board in Ipswich (and some bits of London).
The old territories still exist in the areas of Distribution Network Operators who own the infrastructure such as service cables, smaller substations (these things end up as a de facto monopoly as it makes 0 sense to have companies duplicating infrastructure in the same area)
@kravietz @vfrmedia @harce @themactep you are aware that "public" doesn't necessarily mean "state-run". It can (and often should) be local government. As I have pointed out multiple times already.
@rysiek @kravietz @harce @themactep
in UK local Councils and other organisations such as London Transport did often use to generate electricity until about the 1930s-1940s; but they couldn't agree on common technical standards such as voltage, frequency, whether to use AC or DC or how to interconnect supplies for resilience.
So in the end central govt merged these organisations into the regional Electricity Boards and eventually (by late 1960s) standardised on 240V 50Hz power..
@kravietz @rysiek @harce @themactep
in UK until about 1990 we had nationalised Electricity Boards, the Central Electricity Generating board and the National Grid (which linked all these together).
Other than some strikes and power cuts in the 1970s these worked - electricity was affordable, the lights stayed on and not having 100% profit motive meant there was money to invest in research and training. These were privatised for relatively short term gains around late 80s/early 90s..