Unless the government in its infinite wisdom decides to exterminate all sparrows or so and causes a countrywide famine, I guess...
Some of the limitations are pretend, but some are very real. European countries in general want their grid to be stable and reliable, and the surges and dips of power that come from "too much sun" or "too much wind", or lack of either, are going against it.
On the other hand, India, mentioned in the article, has so many blackouts already that it can cope with some extra instability. Of course, the unreliability of the grid contributes to the reluctance of foreign investors to build industrial plants in India, which is a major downside, but hey, they can alter their grid faster.
That entire framing of "renewables == unstable grid" is the false premise this entire article rests on. It's just out-of-date, proven to be wrong by decades of experience FUD.
"Too much" solar and wind are not, and have never been, a problem for a grid.
The issue isn't that the grid can't handle large amount of renewables, it's that renewables aren't consistent.
Large thermal plants provide inertia that renewables simply can't provide. A lot of the work around incorporating renewables into grids is around the provision of synthetic inertia and how to manage sudden drops in supply.
Battery storage is one solution. Better demand response solutions backed by energy markets that incentivise the participation of large numbers of energy users is another.
Grids that have a high level of interconnection with other grids also reduces the impact of inconsistent supply, but not every grid has enough inter-connections for that to be a viable full solution. (See ERCOT in Texas, AEMO in Australia, Eirgrid in Ireland for examples)
Here in Ireland, we frequently run the grid up to 80% renewables, but the grid operator only does that because they have the mechanisms in places to handle sudden drops in supply.
Most of this has been dealt with in the meantime, but such problems really do occur, but they're utterly blown out of proportion by the anti-renewables lobby.
> He said Germany could solve the problem by allowing its grid operators to turn off renewable sources at times of excess production, which is not currently possible under German law.
This is not a technical problem, but a legal one. And even the legal issue has at least 3 technical solutions, they're just negotiating over who should bear the cost of working around the legal situation.
Unless the government in its infinite wisdom decides to exterminate all sparrows or so and causes a countrywide famine, I guess...
Some of the limitations are pretend, but some are very real. European countries in general want their grid to be stable and reliable, and the surges and dips of power that come from "too much sun" or "too much wind", or lack of either, are going against it.
On the other hand, India, mentioned in the article, has so many blackouts already that it can cope with some extra instability. Of course, the unreliability of the grid contributes to the reluctance of foreign investors to build industrial plants in India, which is a major downside, but hey, they can alter their grid faster.