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I'm a retired water engineer and pumped storage for electricity generation has been around for about a century. During that time it was used to help even out daytime and night-time electricity demands so that power stations could run more efficiently on a steady output. In the UK there are a few big schemes (Dinorwic in Wales, Falls of Cruachan in Scotland are fabulous examples). However, there are obvious limits! No good expecting to use it in flat territory - you need mountainous country to make the technique feasible and the suitable siting of a large enough elevated reservoir will often be difficult to find, never mind the construction costs. Such mountainous regions also tend to be located well away from population centres, so you've got the two way transmission costs. Using it to overcome the intermittency of renewables suffers these same limitations. Large wind farms are best sited offshore and large scale solar needs flat territory, so there will be few places in the world where renewables and pumped storage can be located alongside each other.
I'm a retired water engineer and pumped storage for electricity generation has been around for about a century. During that time it was used to help even out daytime and night-time electricity demands so that power stations could run more efficiently on a steady output. In the UK there are a few big schemes (Dinorwic in Wales, Falls of Cruachan in Scotland are fabulous examples). However, there are obvious limits! No good expecting to use it in flat territory - you need mountainous country to make the technique feasible and the suitable siting of a large enough elevated reservoir will often be difficult to find, never mind the construction costs. Such mountainous regions also tend to be located well away from population centres, so you've got the two way transmission costs. Using it to overcome the intermittency of renewables suffers these same limitations. Large wind farms are best sited offshore and large scale solar needs flat territory, so there will be few places in the world where renewables and pumped storage can be located alongside each other.
And yet Ontario is doing far better than Germany in reducing emissions.