Dark Doldrums Overshadow Europe’s Energy Markets | Periods of low sun and wind, a weather pattern known as a Dunkelflaute, can increase electricity prices and stoke political tensions.
Dark Doldrums Overshadow Europe’s Energy Markets | Periods of low sun and wind, a weather pattern known as a Dunkelflaute, can increase electricity prices and stoke political tensions.
Designing for this is going to be absolutely key. It means some mix of clean non-emitting generation, such as geothermal or nuclear, and long-duration storage, such as flow batteries or hydrogen.
In a way, EUs fit-for-55 already lays out a plan for this. By demanding solar panels on all civic buildings in the union, solar production from the Mediterranean countries will provide an electricity boost during these spells.
For the northern countries and eastern countries, the demand for renewable energy sources in the district heating will push prices and incentivies development and other heating sources, like thermal storage, or other storage solutions, like hydrogen. In the short term, even batteries storing nuclear and hydro power from night to day time will make a huge difference.
But in the end: we need more storage!
It seems that weather patterns lasting longer is part of the new climate pattern.
Dunkelflaute sounds like a ridiculous pastry. Agree with summary that storage is key in a clean generation system, but that is obvious. Also NYT is shit.