The disaster no major U.S. city is prepared for — a combined power outage with a heat wave
The disaster no major U.S. city is prepared for — a combined power outage with a heat wave
Experts warn this type of catastrophe -- a power outage combined with a heat wave -- could yield a major death toll.
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True no cities are prepared for this, but this is exactly the kind of thing distributed solar helps handle well - heat waves are almost always paired with sunshine. The more distributed solar you get on the grid, the less of an issue this becomes.
Yes, I know you still have power challenges at sunset while its still hot outside, but fortunately that's also when things tend to start cooling off, and you lose one major contributor to heat stress - solar radiation.
It's not a perfect system, batteries could of course help, but it's a major step in the right direction.
That’s what neighborhood backup batteries are for. Drop some sodium ion battery installations in each district, smooth out the grid and keep it up and running.
With the current economic model I suspect that to be unaffordable by most of the world governments. The cost of ownership, the initial demand on production, temporary workers, etc.
It may be more realistic to retrofit existing infrastructure such as vacant office buildings into a space capable of comfortably providing for people that rely on electricity to survive.