Factorio Forums

I was searching for mod with more realistic electric power issues. Found only one (and it is called Realistic Power) where solar arrays produce less power and there are 2 types of accumulators. It is nice but I wanted to see more realistic things.

Main unrealistic things for me are:
1. Would be great to see conveyor belts consuming power. They don't now and it looks for me like cheating. I can make many kilometers of fast belts that consume nothing but do a lot of work.
2. Accumulators. They must deteriorate over cycles - that's the most real thing about accumulators and it will add another one huge consumer to the economy. For example, 300-500 cycles of lead-acid accumulators should lead to decrease of their capacity about 30-50%. So they store less and less power and at some point you will need to replace them.
3. Steam turbines and boilers. Electrical power from steam turbines can not start generation immediately. For example, when night comes and solar power decreases and at some point turns off steam turbines start generating power instantly, like a spike on the graph. Would be great if tubines and boilers needed some time (add some ramp like solar batteries have) to get to its maximum power output. It will add some interesting realistic effects on the power grid.

I would love to see a slower response from steam engines as well. It would give you a reason to build accumulators even when you do not use solar to handle that "peak" demand while steam engines spin up. The steam turbines should have an even slower demand response.

There are mods (not sure if they work with the latest version) that make transport belts require power, but as far as I know there is no (easy or performant) way to slow the demand response of steam engines and turbines.

For the Accumulators, a mod could keep a list of all accumulators and just randomly replace them with a less performant version version every X day night cycles. (would have to be more complex if you wanted to track true charge and discharge cycles per accumulator.)

Rockstar04 wrote:I would love to see a slower response from steam engines as well. It would give you a reason to build accumulators even when you do not use solar to handle that "peak" demand while steam engines spin up. The steam turbines should have an even slower demand response.

Exactly! My English is not so good to explain it. You wrote exactly what I thought about it. I work at a power plant and this super fast split-second demand response from steam engines and steam turbines in game confuses me a lot

Rockstar04 wrote: For the Accumulators, a mod could keep a list of all accumulators and just randomly replace them with a less performant version version every X day night cycles. (would have to be more complex if you wanted to track true charge and discharge cycles per accumulator.)

I would be happy even with this simple approach to the issue but it would be good to check if that accumulator discharged at least a little. I mean if there was a fact of any discharge.