Week 7-8

Question 1

Battery

Answer 1

devices that use an electro-chemical control method to store electricity/ potential E

Question 2

Portable/motive storage

Answer 2

Are used in primary and rechargeable consumer devices, auxiliary power units APUs), military applications, and transport use (EVs)

Question 3

Stationary storage

Answer 3

Can be broken down into two categories:
• Customer sited storage: for emergency power, power conditioning (smoothing power), and off grid, remote storage
• Grid storage: supporting function of electricity grid, mostly via pumped hydro storage used to meet peak power and provide ancillary services

Question 4

Grid storage

Answer 4

supporting function of electricity grid, mostly via pumped hydro storage used to meet peak power and provide ancillary services

Question 5

Pumped hydro

Answer 5

o Gravitational potential energy
o Type of mechanical storage. Water can be pumped to a higher elevation, and stored in some reservoir for later use. When energy is required, the water can be run through a turbine to generate electricity.

Question 6

Fuel cell

Answer 6

Device that converts the chemical energy from a fuel into electricity through a chemical reaction with oxygen or another oxidizing agent

Question 7

Energy density

Answer 7

Ability to store energy per unit of volume

Question 8

Volume energy density

Answer 8

Ability to store energy per-unit of volume (also volumetric energy)

Question 9

Specific energy

Answer 9

Amount of energy stored per unit of mass, relevant as material is cost driver. More energy per unit of mass is a form of an efficiency improvement in material usage.
Concept as a function of power

Question 10

Power density

Answer 10

Ability to store power per-unit of volume

Concept as a function of power

Question 11

Lifetime

Answer 11

also called cycle life, total number of charge and discharge cycles that can be expected

Question 12

Cycle

Answer 12

cycles of charge and discharge; count how many times each process occurred for a storage device.

Question 13

Cycle cost

Answer 13

Cost of a battery cycle for an EV.
o EVs are typically 4 tikes cheaper as ICE vehicles, but less so when you factor in cycle costs. Cycle costs change with electricity prices and battery costs.

Question 14

LCOS

Answer 14

=Levelized Cost of Storage (LCOS): LCOE for stored electricity
o Capital costs: storage devices is amortized over over useful life of device, taking into account usage patterns
o OM costs: only fixed OM matter; variable OM are subsumed into cycle cost
o Fuel costs: input energy, and embedded cost. This input energy might change by location and time of day

Question 15

Time Shifting

Answer 15

Moving chunks of energy from the time in which they were generated to another time when they are more valuable. Done via load shifting, day-night arbitrage.

Question 16

Firming

Answer 16

overcoming the constraint of intermittent energy options by storing this energy such that it is dispatchable

Question 17

Distributed Generation

Answer 17

relatively new method of producing electricity on the customer’s side rather than producer’s sides of electricity system.
o Advantage: I am foregoing to use the utility (TD and G.)
o Disadvantage: because of Res, intermittency problem, I cannot rely on the rest of system

Question 18

Experience Curve

Answer 18

Concept that describes the ratio (progress ratio or learning rate) by how prices for a technology decline depending on its cumulative production or sales. Like a learning curve.
• X-axis: cumulative production/sales
• Y-axis: cost/unit
• Slope: negative and stable, has nothing to do with time
• Should use costs, as this reflects scale and technology improvements, but often prices are better accessible
• Time = points on the line. The more the points are spread apart from each other (größere Lücken), the quicker the price comes down

Question 19

Progress Ratio

Answer 19

PR = 1-LR
o A high LR and lower PR describes a steeper EC

o Nature of technology dictates PR
o Speed of industry growth does not matter for PR

What drives the progress ratio?
o Scale increases
o Technology improves
o Input prices change

Question 20

Learning Ratio

Answer 20

% drop in the cost to produce the technology for each doubling of cumulative production

Question 21

Market shakeout

Answer 21

end of price umbrella when prices fall faster than costs to adjust high prices to actually lower cost levels (happens when prices are used instead of costs)

Question 22

Price umbrella

Answer 22

can happen because of excess D, or when producer of new product uses market power to hold the price at a higher level than necessary

Question 23

Parity

Answer 23

Point at which DG (PV) is competitive with conventional grid-supplied electricity

Question 24

Learning Investments

Answer 24

additional costs which will bring a technology to the break-even point (the costs the market currently considers cost efficient)

Question 25

Learning

Answer 25

occurs as 1) scale increases, 2) technology improves, 3) input prices change

Question 26

Cumulative production

Answer 26

Total production of a specific technology produced worldwide until year t

Question 27

Disruption

Answer 27

disturbance or problems that interrupt an event, an activity or a process in a system

Question 28

Normalization

Answer 28

refers to weather normalization of energy: changes in wheather that caused either excessive or reduced demand for electricity, and therefore created cost adjustments that would need to be compensated

Question 29

Insolation

Answer 29

amount of sun available for capture at any point on the surface of the planet

Question 30

Soft costs

Answer 30

costs for permitting, labor, sales costs, billing etc.

Question 31

Bankability

Answer 31

attribute of a PV project having sufficient collateral, future CF and high probability of success to be acceptable to institutional lenders for financing (not from course)

Question 32

MACRS

Answer 32

Modified Accelerated Cost Recovery System is a depreciation method that is used only for income tax purposes (not from course)

Question 33

Leveraged Partnership Flip

Answer 33

similar to the all equity partnership flip but also includes debt financing that is senior to the equity investment. The tax-based investor contributes virtually all of the equity and receives a proportional allocation of both cash and tax benefits. (not from course)

Question 34

Pecuniary Costs and Benefits

Answer 34

costs and benefits that operate through prices rather than through real resource effects (not from course)

Question 35

Value of Solar Tariff

Answer 35

Alternative to net metering. Utilities should pay a transparent and market-based price for solar energy

Question 36

Substitutability

Answer 36

refers to auto industry’s ability to substitute EVs and PHEVs instead of ICEs ´, which have been the norm since Ford. The idea is that biofuels could also be a potential substitute, since they use the same supply chain, but feedstock is a limiting factor.

Question 37

Behavioral Issues

Answer 37

Irrational concerns about EVs and PHEVs not being able to meet needs of consumers are a major factor in breaking into mass market.

Question 38

Hazmat issues

Answer 38

hazardous substances or material, most chemical substances that may pose a health risk to life when exposed are deemed hazardous substance