mattj256 wrote:JasonC wrote:But then the normal accumulators would only charge if your solar panels could power your entire power grid plus extra, otherwise they'd never charge.
How does this work in the game right now? If I create a factory with only solar panels and accumulators and there isn't enough power for everything, what happens? (I did a few searches online but couldn't find an answer.)
Right now the rule is really simple: You have your total generation capacity from all you generators (solar and steam). First all your objects are powered. Then if there's any generation capacity left over, the remaining goes to charging accumulator (up to 300 kW per accumulator for charging). So accumulators will only charge if you can generate more power than you need. They'll never take power away from your other stuff, and they'll never charge if you can't generate enough power to power your factory. As for where the power comes from: Solar will always take priority. Any power needs that can't be met by the solar capacity will be made up for by steam.
And if you're using more power than you can produce and the accumulators have charge, they'll discharge to make up for it while they can (each providing up to 300 kW until empty).
So if you create a factory with only solar panels and accumulators and there isn't enough power for everything, the accumulators never charge. The power goes to your factory first, only the extra goes to accumulators.
The best way is to try it. Start a game in sandbox mode or use some spare solar panels. Set up a separate power network with a solar panel or two, an accumulator, and like a mine or something. Then click one of the electric poles and you can view the power consumption graph. Then observe.
My intention is that normal accumulators are for storing solar power. If you want to run mostly off of steam then you would need to incorporate the emergency backup accumulators into your design.
What do you propose should happen if you can generate 50 MW steam, 10 MW solar, and your factory needs 50 MW, and your accumulators want 10 MW for their max charge rate? Where does your factory get the 50 MW while the accumulators are charging during the day? And by contrast, where would your factory get that power during the day if you didn't have any accumulators?
Hint: As you think about the answer to that question, you will find that it doesn't change anything if the accumulators charge off solar vs. steam.
Also if you're proposing to have a separate set of solar panels dedicating to charging accumulators, why would you want that? If your accumulators are charged already or your solar panels generate more than the accumulators max input, why would you
not want to use the extra solar capacity to power the rest of the factory (thus saving you steam generation)? That's what happens now.
JasonC wrote:They also wouldn't be able to charge at night, ever, even if you're way under your steam generator capacity.
What you're writing is exactly what I had in mind. Emergency backup accumulators can charge at night and regular accumulators can't. Regular accumulators are for storing solar power, not steam power.
Yeah but that's my point: It doesn't matter.
This won't change the total power generated by steam.
Think about this: If "regular" accumulators can only charge during the day,
unless you have enough solar panels to power your factory with left overs, they're charging off of steam anyways.
You see it doesn't matter
when accumulators charge. They'll need the same amount of kWh whether it's during the day or during the night. And so you'll have to generate that. And if you force them to charge during the day they're taking that power from solar and
that solar power isn't going to the rest of the factory and so steam has to make up for it, so it just means that
while you'd be running steam generators less at night, you'd be running them more during the day and it'd cancel out, because during the day you're taking solar power that would normally make up for steam and using it to charge accumulators instead.
Do you understand?
Here's an example with numbers if not. Let's say you have:
- 60 MW steam generation capacity.
- 10 MW solar generation capacity.
- 20 accumulators = 6 MW consumption for max charge rate.
- 50 MW factory needs.
Now here is what happens if the accumulators charge during the day, as in your example case:
- During the day, while charging:
- 70 MW total generation capacity.
- 50 MW used by factory.
- 6 MW used to charge accumulators.
- That's 56 MW total, so 10 MW solar and 46 MW steam (so your steam isn't running full blast).
- At night, already charged:
- 60 MW total generation capacity.
- 50 MW used by factory.
- That's 50 MW steam.
But here is what happens if the accumulators charge at night:
- During the day:
- 70 MW total generation capacity.
- 50 MW used by factory.
- So 10 MW solar and 40 MW steam.
- At night, while charging:
- 60 MW total generation capacity.
- 50 MW used by factory.
- 6 MW used to charge accumulators.
- That's 56 MW steam.
So in the charge-by-day case you're running steam at 46 MW day and 50 MW night. In the charge-by-night case you're running steam at 40 MW day and 56 MW night. It's the same amount of steam and the same amount of net pollution gain over time, no matter when the accumulators charge. This happens because pollution dissipates slowly enough that it's really just a long, low-pass filter over pollution generation rates, and
moving some night time pollution output to the daytime instead still accumulates the same amount of pollution per day.
Yet another way to think about this is
you don't gain any generation capacity by using accumulators, you simply take extra power from one point in time and move it to a later point in time, but it's stoll the same amount of total power.
What you propose won't reduce pollution. There are other better ways to reduce pollution. In particular:
My baseline assumptions are (1) I want to generate as little pollution as possible, which means steam should run as little as possible, and (2) the goal is to have the whole factory run off of solar anyway.
Your assumption that less steam = less pollution is correct, but your premise that controlling accumulator charging priorities will let steam run less is false. Your steam generators may get a break at night but that's cancelled out because they have to work harder during the day when accumulators are putting a strain on the grid while charging.
JasonC wrote:No matter how many layers about layers of prioritized accumulators you have, you'll still be generating the same amount of solar : steam power averaged over time. So it doesn't really change anything to have "emergency accumulators" in the first place.
If the problem is that my electric network isn't supplying enough power or isn't supplying enough power from solar then nothing needs to change in the game mechanics. I would just need to build more power generation and/or power storage.
That's precisely the problem.
The problem I'm trying to solve here is that it's too hard to set up a factory that runs efficiently, meaning that solar power is saved and stored and steam power is only used when there is no other choice.
This is already how the game works.
Overall I think you've got to wrap your head around the key point that accumulators don't charge for free. If you charge them during the day, you're using solar power that otherwise would go to offset steam power, so the steam generators work harder anyways. Nothing changes.
If you use the 0.13 changes to dedicate a solar array to charging accumulators without tying that solar array into the main grid, you'll end up generating even
more pollution, because extra solar generation capacity will just be unused instead of going to offset steam. The way the game currently works accomplishes exactly what your goal is. You just need to build more solar panels if you want to use less steam.
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