Spain Provides 53% Of Power With Wind
I’m a big proponent of non carbon emitting electricity generation, and a firm believer in using nuke power for base-load. One of the main reasons for that is that I don’t think that any reasonably grid could handle the ups and downs of going to a full grid of more traditional green power. Spain is working hard to change my mind. It looks like the windy weekend allowed them to provide 53% of their power from wind, pushing excess into reverse hydro and selling to their neighbors. Those numbers are impressive for a grid that wasn’t really designed for that kind of behavior. I still don’t believe in base-load wind, but this certainly makes it look like it can be a bigger chunk of the pie than I have been thinking before.
For the record, people in the industry refer to what you called “reverse hydro” as ‘pumped-storage hydroelectric’ or ‘pumped hydro’ for short.
Getting 53% of their power from wind is remarkable — great!
(But are they recycling?)