RvTV95XBeo

Hot take, I don't mind it - my drawer of questionably compliant OEM cables is overflowing. Less plastic waste is a win, as long as everyone sticks to USB-C.

Is your favorite color purple?

A capacitor has ~1% of the storage capacity of a battery of similar power rating.

Saying its storage performance is better because its holds a larger % of that capacity at low temperatures is nonsense because its storage performance objectively sucks (and not what it's designed to be good at)

It's like saying a Tesla is better than a 747 because it can go from 0-60 faster. A technically true statement but a meaningless performance comparison.

30-50% of my energy is the EV. About 20% is 120V plug loads (computers, fridges, home server), ~5-10% lighting, ~15% large equipment (dryer, electric range, electric water heater), and the remainder (15-30% seasonally) is HVAC (heat pump)

Any gas appliances would bring a lot of those numbers down

American House with an EV, all electric, and no solar, I use about 1200 kWh/mo (1.2 MWh/mo) on average. This could only carry me through about 3y. Even if I had access to good public infrastructure I think best I could do is 6y (again, all-electric home).

But I digress. Lithium ion as purely load shifting is a pretty reasonable, I'd argue critical, solution for covering day/night loads, but starts to fall apart completely when it comes to seasonal (summer/winter) loads.

But what makes this plant interesting is the addition of super capacitors. The combo battery/SC plant is less about day/night load shifting and more about providing stability to a shifting grid. As supply and demand grow increasingly decoupled, and we try and shift away from expensive peaker plants always on standby, systems like this can dramatically help smooth grid performance.

~90 MW of peaker capacity is small potatoes currently, but this is a big step towards a more reliable grid future.

Supercapacitors provide ultrafast response times – specified at 0.001 seconds – and maintain over 85% capacity at –40°C, significantly outperforming lithium-ion batteries in extreme cold.

Outperform how? At being a capacitor? That's their whole point.

On the energy side, 85% of 29 MW-min is 0.41 MWh. Even if the batteries lose 99% of their capacity at -40 °F, last I checked .42 MWh > 0.41 MWh.

These are two different tools for two different purposes, I'm not sure how you compare their "performance" under this metric.

If your tight on money, building a system will always come out on top in the long term, specifically in terms of upgrade paths to keep up with the times.

If you're actually strapped for cash, buying a used system will always come on top. If you're patient, watch goodwill and other spots for home-built systems that have new enough components to have an upgrade path in the future.

I'll run a backup and restore when moving to a new device, because why not. But regular backups? Meh, the ether can have my messages if my phone dies.

That said, depending on how this new system is rolled out, I may subscribe just to support the Signal foundation.

A couple of people mentioned sparkling water, and I want to join the train.

I got an off-brand sodastream. That and some Aarke flavor drops (https://aarke.us/collections/flavor-drops), and I have an infinite supply of la croix-esq bubble water.

I keep 2 bottles of (fridge-filtered) tap water in the fridge at all times and when I get the "I'm bored and don't know what else I want" pangs, I go there first.

I also generally try drinking more water, especially at the start of a meal, to push back against the tendency to over eat.

Finally there's the "just buy healthier snacks" but I struggle with that one the most

What I'm shocked about is there's a $14M black market for rhino horns and they're principled enough to not just sell dried glue shavings and call it rhino horn.

The news is he was responding to a question about his favorite flavor of ice cream.

(I get that corporate environments are often off the table for this).

FYI in case anyone needs to hear this, but Firefox can be installed as a user in windows if you just decline the admin prompt when installing.