The notion that the variability of wind and solar is problematic is a “myth”, according to one of the world’s most important renewables advocates.
Francesco La Camera, director-general of the International Renewable Energy Agency (Irena), tells Recharge that there will soon be so many methods available to store renewable energy and help balance the grid that intermittency will not be an issue.
These include “ever more competitive” batteries; build-anywhere long-duration intermittent-energy storage (Baldies) technologies such as liquid-air and hot-rock thermal; district heating and cooling; electric-vehicle charging, green hydrogen, demand response, concentrating solar power with molten-salt storage, smart grids and interconnection.
