MSE News: Legal battle launched over solar subsidy cuts

Pennylane

rogerblack wrote: »

I don't care at all if you waste your money (people have varying opinions on the economics of paying for solar panels you don't get much benefit from).

I care deeply if you waste mine.

You (or in your specific case, the RaR company enabled by you) are being paid partially from my electricity bill.

It may only be 3 or 4 pounds on my bill, but this is a significant slice of a weeks disposable income.

Roger - it really isn't worth getting your knickers in a twist over it you know!:p Life is like that ....... most of us pay our taxes and national insurance but many complain they don't get the rewards that other people get like schooling, child benefit, (when they have no kids themselves).

I didn't make the rules up you know.;)

zeupater

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Blossom, here's a nice link I found about the barrage, it's not the prettiest web site, but has a simple charm that sets out the key points,

http://www.reuk.co.uk/Severn-Barrage-Tidal-Power.htm

It's a pretty unique situation, as it has a truly enormous tidal range, combined with an equally massive catchment area, but 'luckily' has a narrow point (if you can call 10 miles narrow) where the largest of the proposals could be built. There are smaller versions, using lagoons, that could be constructed further up river, near the 2 Severn bridges.

It suggests that the barrage could supply 5% of the UK's electricity. The cost of £20bn is mid way between what I've read elsewhere £10bn to £32bn.

It's scary big, and scary expensive, and could suck funding away from other renewables, or proposed nuclear.

I think it's sheer scale frightens anyone from trying it yet. It won't be able to match generation to peak evening flow all days, but would be able to tackle this problem some days depending on tide times.

It could be the very 'balancer' of supply that renewables need to help make up for their achilles heel - variability / reliability of supply.

Environmentalists appear split in a habitat v's CO2 reduction dilemma.

Sorry to harp on, but the sheer scale of this project, and it's potential, and it's potential cost for that matter are simply staggering.

Mart.

Hi

Alternatively, to place it in a better context, the cost of the project is directly comparable to the HS2 rail project, but would have greater economic, social and environmental benefits.

Pulling the funding for HS2 and immediately reallocating the budget to a Severn barrage project need not effect the funding of any other renewables whatsoever, with the added benefit of having the direct and immediate impact which such a large heavy engineering project would have on the economy, this also having the advantage of reduced impact from both political and NIMBYism viewpoints as less people, constituencies and 'concerned groups' are effected thus reducing the likely planning timescales.

With a little innovation it would easily be possible to engineer a modularised solution and phase the build and in order to begin generation at an early stage through capture of tidal flow even before the full barrage is completed (unlike the benefit of a railway line from A to therefore economic benefit would be available at a much earlier stage.

Just my thoughts ....

HTH
Z

Pennylane

Cardew wrote: »

On an internet forum are people not allowed to express an opinion that to pay £500 for a Rent a Roof installation is unwise?

It is advice to other potential customers, so should that advice not be given for fear of offending you and others?


Does this statement mean that your R A R firm are going to reduce the agreed price to purchase your system?

" The price of solar panels has come down hugely and, I may decide to buy mine from my R-a-R firm eventually"

Look what's £500 and MY £500 at that? I've said it before it's a few trips round the supermarket, a few meals out with friends etc. If it was thousands and thousands then I would be grateful for your opinion and you might feel it your duty to pass on your opinion to other MSEers.

The line about the price of panels means this ...... they used to be VERY expensive to buy now they're not. The price is coming down all the time. HAD they been as reasonable as they are now, then a year ago I might have bought my own. But they weren't so we went the R-a-R way and we DO have the option to buy them if we like at any time in the future. Please be assured that I will check with you first if it's OK to spend my money like that:p Chill out Cardew!:)

zeupater

Pennylane wrote: »

Look what's £500 and MY £500 at that? I've said it before it's a few trips round the supermarket, a few meals out with friends etc. If it was thousands and thousands then I would be grateful for your opinion and you might feel it your duty to pass on your opinion to other MSEers.

The line about the price of panels means this ...... they used to be VERY expensive to buy now they're not. The price is coming down all the time. HAD they been as reasonable as they are now, then a year ago I might have bought my own. But they weren't so we went the R-a-R way and we DO have the option to buy them if we like at any time in the future. Please be assured that I will check with you first if it's OK to spend my money like that:p Chill out Cardew!:)

Hi Pennylane

What needs to be remembered is that many really haven't thought about the return on their £500 'investment', others have been told that for a £500 'investment' there would be a saving in the region of £270/year on their electricity bills .... all Cardew has done is try to ensure that people, including yourself, are informed, you obviously are and are happy with having spent the money, however one of the points that many seem to forget is that others keep joining the forum and ask the same questions without reading existing threads, therefore it is justified, correct and reasonable for a long-held view to be repeated for the benefit of the newcomers, especially so because it is both logical and correct.

I think that you have misunderstood or misrepresented the reasoning behind Cardews latest post. You recently posted .... "The price of solar panels has come down hugely and, I may decide to buy mine from my R-a-R firm eventually" .... Cardew has simply pointed out that the 'buy-out' price, being based on a pre-existing price sliding scale, will be more expensive than a brand-new system for many years to come and unless the R-a-R scheme operators seriously address their buy-out prices, the options available are to either pay well over the odds for a FiT system with less than 25 years to run, or wait out the 25 years .... again, a logical and, in my opinion, a correct position.

HTH
Z

Cardew

Pennylane wrote: »

Look what's £500 and MY £500 at that? I've said it before it's a few trips round the supermarket, a few meals out with friends etc. If it was thousands and thousands then I would be grateful for your opinion and you might feel it your duty to pass on your opinion to other MSEers.

The line about the price of panels means this ...... they used to be VERY expensive to buy now they're not. The price is coming down all the time. HAD they been as reasonable as they are now, then a year ago I might have bought my own. But they weren't so we went the R-a-R way and we DO have the option to buy them if we like at any time in the future. Please be assured that I will check with you first if it's OK to spend my money like that:p Chill out Cardew!:)

I haven’t criticised your decision to spend £500 of your money. Although if £500 is such a trifling amount to you(meals and supermarkets!) on wonders why you bothered to get a Rent a Roof installation with even more trifling savings; especially when the majority of companies offer to install them for free.

Your post epitomises the approach of so many people on MSE who take personal offence, and construe it as criticism, if a suggestion is made that isn’t in line with your chosen path.

This is a Money Saving Website and it is valid to opinion that anyone who pays anything, let alone £500, for a R A R system is misguided.

I am flattered that you will consult me before buying a system; just shows you can make sensible decisions.;)

Martyn1981

zeupater wrote: »

Hi

Alternatively, to place it in a better context, the cost of the project is directly comparable to the HS2 rail project, but would have greater economic, social and environmental benefits.

Just my thoughts ....

HTH
Z

Z, the barrage is a great idea isn't it. Like most people I've probably heard it mentioned for upwards of 30 years on and off.

As I said earlier, totally mind blowing in its sheer scale. My first thought when we hit recession 3 or 4 years ago was that the barrage would now be built as a job creation / money distribution part of an infrastructure plan. Guess we were a little more bust than we realised. I assume that a conglomerate could still take up the task, but depends what feed in tariff guaranties they would want.

Can't see how we can hope to meet all of our CO2 obligations without making some big decisions now. Just imagine having 5 to 10GW of extra capacity at evening peak, could supply the whole of the S. Wales coast (1m people ish) without even breaking a sweat.

Can't find the reference, may have been in New Scientist or somewhere else, but there may be conflicting grid infrastructure issues between the barrage and 1 or more of the proposed new nukes. Eg if both were built then the grid upgrades may not be enough so need to choose / plan.

Given the long length of time to do either, I'd rather we just got on with it, but then I don't have £5bn to £30bn to pay for a nuke or a barrage.

For load balancing, does this make sense, or complete nonsense - head started to hurt. If the tide is coming in on the west coast (Severn) then it must be going out on the east coast? So when the Severn reaches full capacity, but no head as water on both sides of barrage is equal, then on the east coast it should be the opposite, full storage and maximum head as the tide 'heads for France'.

Silly question really as I don't know what tidal opportunities are available on the east coast. But if there are, then time between generation goes from 12 hours, to 6 hours - I think.

Mart.

HalloweenJack

you allready have hinkley point in the area - grid is fine thank you very much (in fact its ideal as oldbury and berkeley are) now shut down , so there spare capacity!

zeupater

HalloweenJack wrote: »

you allready have hinkley point in the area - grid is fine thank you very much (in fact its ideal as oldbury and berkeley are) now shut down , so there spare capacity!

Hi

As you'd probably guess, I'm pro-barrage .... however, I'd really question the above ....

A pretty typical barrage proposal would be based on a nameplate capacity in the peak range of 8GW to 10GW .... compare this to Hinkey B at 870MW and there is a definate scale issue, add 400MW from Oldbury and another 221MW from Hinkley A and you still have a capacity requirement of almost 7x (10/(0.87+0.4+0.221)) that of the nuclear stations in the area. You can effectively discount the 276MW from Berkeley as it's been closed for almost 25 years ...

I've seen this as an argument before, especially when comparing the cost of the barrage with the Hinkley C EPR rated at 1.6GW. The issue is that you can decommission 1.5GW (0.87+0.4+0.221) of nuclear and build 1.6GW of new capacity with little modification to the grid, but you can't decommission 1.5GW of nuclear and build 10GW of capacity without major, and widespread, infrastructure expenditure.

HTH
Z

zeupater

Martyn1981 wrote: »

... For load balancing, does this make sense, or complete nonsense - head started to hurt. If the tide is coming in on the west coast (Severn) then it must be going out on the east coast? So when the Severn reaches full capacity, but no head as water on both sides of barrage is equal, then on the east coast it should be the opposite, full storage and maximum head as the tide 'heads for France'.

Silly question really as I don't know what tidal opportunities are available on the east coast. But if there are, then time between generation goes from 12 hours, to 6 hours - I think.

Mart.

Hi

The massive advantage which the Severn Estuary has is that it has an East/West orientation, is funnel shaped and continues as the Bristol Channel, which is also funnel shaped and then has unrestricted deep flow directly into the Atlantic with no further land to the West for between 2000 and 4000 miles, therefore a massive body of water for the moon & sun to pull on - an almost perfect combination which is evidenced by the following table of the global top 50 observed tidal ranges ..... (http://co-ops.nos.noaa.gov/faq2.html#26) .... the total volume of water moved by each tide is staggering which results in the likelihood that around 50% of the barrage generation potential for the entire UK being within the Severn scheme .... interesting information/read available on this Welsh Assembly report ... (http://www.assemblywales.org/10-011.pdf)


HTH
Z

Cardew

zeupater wrote: »

Hi

As you'd probably guess, I'm pro-barrage .... Z

I have a cunning plan - they could errect the barrage at Gloucester, it would be smaller, cheaper, less distribution problems and wouldn't disturb the habitat of the lesser spotted three toed natterjack toad,

Can't think of a downside;)