[QUOTE=NeilBlanchard;66413]For the days without wind and with clouds, they will still get some power from PV (it doesn't go to zero in cloudy conditions)...[\QUOTE]
Damn close. Get a photocell, and put an ammeter on it. And remember that the human eye has a very non-linear response to light.
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...and they still have the biogas plants and the hydro plant. They could also have wave and/or tidal power, and/or geothermal.
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Wave, tidal, & geothermal aren't really storable. Build say a 100 MWatt geothermal plant, and it's going to produce that 100 MWatts pretty much 24/7 - you can't produce 50 today, and then 150 tomorrow when the sun's not shining. If you do produce just 50 one day, that's money lost.
It all goes back to the amount & nature of the throttable generation you have on the system. If your hydro plant can vary its water flow (which is constrained by lots of things besides generation need), then you can put some solar or wind on, and operate in concert. If you have natural gas peaking plants, much of the operating cost is fuel, so you the system operator will be happy to throttle them back when cheaper solar or wind is available. But that generating capacity HAS to be there to match the solar & wind, or the system will crash.
The power grid doesn't operate on wishful thinking. It takes engineering.