Automobile Manufacturing, all the new EV's, how is the tooling made?

[laminar-flow]

Looks quite inexpensive to me.

Cost of Wind vs. Fossil Fuels - MEIC

 

[Trueturning]

If you look back historically, the cost of electricity has been going down when factoring in inflation. Remember, very little electricity is made with oil. Basically less than one percent in the US.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

Notice that wind is now greater than hydro. Impressive.

Any news on the Flying Tesla?

Oil right yet it is a backup for when there are shortages. If it is super high then spot purchase are sky high during a emergency. Now fossil fuels include coal, and gas also. Coal still generates a tremendous amount of electricity.

 

[laminar-flow]

Coal is 21.8, all renewables are 20.1.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

 

[Trueturning]

Coal is 21.8, all renewables are 20.1.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

Interesting breakdown;

https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/electricity/images/outlet-graph-large.jpg

Full article here; Electricity in the U.S. - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

 

[CITIZEN F16]

Looks quite inexpensive to me.

Cost of Wind vs. Fossil Fuels - MEIC

I would need to see a cost breakdown with real math. I have seen too much misinformation from both sides on the green energy debate. I have actually toured wind farms, mind you it was a dozen years ago or so. I was the most annoying person on the tour, like I was when I toured Boulder Dam asking a mess of technical questions. On the wind farms the issue was the braking systems to keep the blades from spinning too fast. That was where a lot of the maintenance costs were.

 

[laminar-flow]

Same issue with hydro. I asked a small dam operator what happens when a tree takes down the outgoing power line. This hydro plant had three separate systems to close the wickets, close the penstock valve, and some other valve to keep the turbine from going high C. Scary. Same with wind turbines. The load comes off the generator and ...

So a big block of steel is forged and machined to make these dies. I thought I saw some pockets on the sides of one in the video that looked like it was cast. Maybe they machine off unwanted steel to lighten the die? Must be really expensive. Also, I imagine they are weldable to do repairs. What alloy is typically used?

 

[CarbideBob]

So a big block of steel is forged and machined to make these dies.

Big dies are crazy and not many in the US can do them anymore.
Think about loading a 60 to 80,000 pound block of steel onto your mill table. And how do you flip it gently? That is scary.
As far as I know there is no current US source for these, they seem to all come from overseas in Europe.
What do you do with the 20 tons or more of chips? Who shovels that out?
Bob

 

[Big B]

Isn't wind still one of the most expensive if not the most expensive ways of generating power due to maintenance costs? Isn't hydro the cheapest?

Because hydro has no maintenance costs?

 

[Greg White]

So the large stamping dies I see on the big presses and the giga thing, are they cast steel? I'd like to see a video on how those are made.

When I was a Die maker the Dies were cast iron,fenders hoods,doors,bumpers,real steel bumpers, the plastic "bumpers'
are called facias now, big molds and most molds I touched were
P20,
Gw

 

[barbter]

On the wind farms the issue was the braking systems to keep the blades from spinning too fast. That was where a lot of the maintenance costs were.

And oil changes of gearboxes on the early generation ones.
I had an old mate who used to be high up in R&D at the UKs Central Electricity Generating Board. He said they were pushing like crazy for hydro development, because the UK was surrounded by water and tides, and the vast majority of "ugliness" could be hidden sub-sea.
Top brass didn't want to know as windmills were already declared "the future".
He also said that the UK had a conservative estimate (no pun) of 580+ years of coal in the ground, before Thatcher crushed the mines.
Still, can't have the hoi-polloi ever bringing down a Government again - oh the thought....

 

[SVFeingold]

Well...it's probably a good idea to leave the coal in the ground, aside from the uses it has in non-power generation applications. Which are limited and one day those too will find alternate methods. Burning coal has been a legitimate ecological and humanitarian disaster. Untold millions of deaths every year - probably into the hundreds of millions over its entire history. Of course we didn't have much choice for most of that history, and it's enabled the cushy lives and technology we enjoy today. But as soon as we have the ability to switch off of coal - we should.

 

[Thunderjet]

Untold millions of deaths every year - probably into the hundreds of millions over its entire history.

So all of the heating and cooling and medicinal development, along with the medical facilities and the laboratory facilities were "responsible for untold millions of deaths"?

You need a new way to do you math dude.

 

[laminar-flow]

High food chain fish and some shellfish are sources of mercury which comes from burning fossil fuels that contain mercury with coal being high on the list. I had a small piece of tuna tonight.

Yes, how does one flip over a piece of steel the size of a king bed? So these are CNC machined to shape today, but how were they made before CNC?

 

[SVFeingold]

So all of the heating and cooling and medicinal development, along with the medical facilities and the laboratory facilities were "responsible for untold millions of deaths"?

What a bizarre hot take. Yes, coal has been very useful and responsible for ushering in much of the modern world. Which is exactly what I said.

It's also responsible for all those millions of deaths, which still exist due to the downsides of coal despite other lives elsewhere being saved and enabled by the upsides of coal. They don't cancel out.

The upsides have everything to do with its utility for generating power. The downsides have nothing to do with generating power and everything to do with this particular method of generating power. Yes, burning coal is absurdly harmful in myriad ways, and it's responsible for many premature deaths on account of releasing gargantuan amounts of particulates, heavy metals, radioactive material, and combustion byproducts directly into the atmosphere. Which matters because now we can get the upside without the downside.

Let me verbatim copy/paste my last post since once wasn't enough: "Of course we didn't have much choice for most of that history, and it's enabled the cushy lives and technology we enjoy today. But as soon as we have the ability to switch off of coal - we should." You can argue that the tradeoff was probably worth it, and I would agree, but you can do that and and acknowledge that it's objectively the most harmful power generation method by far. There are now better options for that in developed countries that we should be (and are) moving towards, however slowly. There's a reason China's government is investing heavily into nuclear energy and renewables, and it's not because they're woke tree-huggers.

 

[Greg White]

Big dies are crazy and not many in the US can do them anymore.
Think about loading a 60 to 80,000 pound block of steel onto your mill table. And how do you flip it gently? That is scary.
As far as I know there is no current US source for these, they seem to all come from overseas in Europe.
What do you do with the 20 tons or more of chips? Who shovels that out?
Bob

The die shop machines had chip agures,feeding to a main agure in the floor,which fed a dumpster underground, the labors switched this dumpster every couple hours.overhead cranes everywhere,

the die shoes ,had cast in lifting bars, they rolled over easy like,,using two cranes if desired

 

[gustafson]

I would need to see a cost breakdown with real math. I have seen too much misinformation from both sides on the green energy debate. I have actually toured wind farms, mind you it was a dozen years ago or so. I was the most annoying person on the tour, like I was when I toured Boulder Dam asking a mess of technical questions. On the wind farms the issue was the braking systems to keep the blades from spinning too fast. That was where a lot of the maintenance costs were.

That is real math

a dozen years ago?

meaningless

wind is now cheaper than coal, note the link is from Montana, which is a known leftist state...

 

[gustafson]

Isn't wind still one of the most expensive if not the most expensive ways of generating power due to maintenance costs? Isn't hydro the cheapest?

No

I will probably buy that wind has the highest maintenance costs as a percentage of total costs, but the whole no cost of fuel thing makes it cheaper


Installed cost is cheaper too, not having to build a big ass dam and all

And we are kinda out of rivers to dam up

 

[CITIZEN F16]

Looks quite inexpensive to me.

Cost of Wind vs. Fossil Fuels - MEIC

Last I checked wind power generators get federal tax credits and they all seem to factor that into what they call generating costs. Also transmission costs are higher as wind farms are typically much further from areas they serve than other power generators. True that wind generated power is more efficient than it used to be, but I highly doubt it is down to 3 cents per kwh.

 

[Ries]

Last I checked wind power generators get federal tax credits and they all seem to factor that into what they call generating costs. Also transmission costs are higher as wind farms are typically much further from areas they serve than other power generators. True that wind generated power is more efficient than it used to be, but I highly doubt it is down to 3 cents per kwh.

All power generation in the US gets federal credits.
And deciphering who gets how much is something that many many high paid lawyers and lobbyists made sure you cant do easily.

Its funny, all the wind generators I have seen lately are actually CLOSER to the areas they serve than dams and coal plants.
Just east of LA, for example, on the hills outside of Palm Springs, there are rows of em. Its probably 3 times as far, at the least, to Hoover dam.
Same thing up by Seattle- an hour or so east of town, just over the pass in Ellensburg, the wind generators are thick in the hills. Its another hour's drive at least to the big dams on the Columbia.
In the actual scheme of transmission lines, both of those sources, as well as the big solar farms in both locations, are really pretty close to the big population centers.
The offshore wind generators they are building off the NY-Rhode Island- Ma coasts are likewise quite close to the consumers.

So I would say you are shooting from the hip, there pardner.

 

[CITIZEN F16]

All power generation in the US gets federal credits.
And deciphering who gets how much is something that many many high paid lawyers and lobbyists made sure you cant do easily.

Its funny, all the wind generators I have seen lately are actually CLOSER to the areas they serve than dams and coal plants.
Just east of LA, for example, on the hills outside of Palm Springs, there are rows of em. Its probably 3 times as far, at the least, to Hoover dam.
Same thing up by Seattle- an hour or so east of town, just over the pass in Ellensburg, the wind generators are thick in the hills. Its another hour's drive at least to the big dams on the Columbia.
In the actual scheme of transmission lines, both of those sources, as well as the big solar farms in both locations, are really pretty close to the big population centers.
The offshore wind generators they are building off the NY-Rhode Island- Ma coasts are likewise quite close to the consumers.

So I would say you are shooting from the hip, there pardner.

As the annoying person on the windmill farm tour and on a tour of Boulder Dam, I was told the generation cost of the windmill farm was 12 cents per KWH, and the hydro plant locals were paying 6.8 cents per KWH all charges included delivered. That was a decade or so ago, as far as green power goes, hydro kicks butt. It is all on the maintenance costs. It is easy and cheap to control the turbine speed with hydro electric, to deliver 60hz power with wind power, that is expensive. The turbines are all in a very open room that climbing a story of stairs gets to a platform to work on them. I am sure working on a windmill is harder and more costly. Go ahead and explain where I am wrong, I am all ears.