Does anyone here have an ideological objection to Solar?

Martyn1981

Cardew wrote: »

Why would I, like yourself, just pluck some 'numbers' out of the ether and base a case on those invented figures.

The organisations that were planning solar farms at a much lower level of FIT subsidy had presumably 'done the numbers' in their business plan. Perhaps they should have employed you as a 'technical expert'(I use the term loosely) to advise them their business plans were flawed.

So yet again, as per the whole of this year, you decline to try to provider any real numbers to support your claim. You just keep repeating it as fact, without any substance or thought or logic at all.

You don't have to like or agree with any of my numbers, so challenge them, don't keep running away and hiding behind FIT rates.

So again you try to extrapolate relative costs between domestic and farm PV, by comparing FIT rates at one point in time. Your whole argument balancing on the fact that at the time farms were to be built the tariff ratio of 44.85p(domestic) to 33.8p(farm) existed. [not the 40p v's 20p fake numbers you've been touting for years]

This is probably the most hopeless method of comparing costs anyone could ever come up with. You've missed again that the domestic rate lead to installs taking place a year earlier when a 4kWp system cost £16,000, whereas when your farm point was reached a domestic install had fallen to £12,000 a ratio of 1.33:1 - sound familiar?

Give up on this hopeless argument and do some numbers. Once you do I promise you'll never try this argument again.

Or just read any report on PV (govt, environmental, accountancy) they'll all explain how the viability of point of domestic PV is better than the farm point - for obvious reasons.

Mart.

PS Not sure why you find energy storage so unthinkable. Come on Cardew catch up, have you not heard of Dinorwig mopping up excess power. Or Germany generating nearly 30GW of PV at times during the spring and summer this year? Big picture time boyo, big picture time. M.

Martyn1981

Cardew wrote: »

Whilst that undoubtedly is a factor:

1. We import Nuclear generated electricity from France - imported via the interconnector in Kent.

2. Most of the UK wind farms are in remote locations or out at sea.

3. The UK's nuclear power stations are not near 'where power is needed'.

4. Ditto hydro-electric schemes.

We don't live in France, the sea, nuclear power stations, or in flooded valleys!

PV gives us the option to localise generation, which these others don't. Quoting historical generation makes no point at all.

Mart.

EricMears

Cardew wrote: »

Whilst that undoubtedly is a factor:

1. We import Nuclear generated electricity from France - imported via the interconnector in Kent.

2. Most of the UK wind farms are in remote locations or out at sea.

3. The UK's nuclear power stations are not near 'where power is needed'.

4. Ditto hydro-electric schemes.

Quite so !

Hence all of those generating methods have an inbuilt flaw in that a proportion of the generation 'disappears' before it can be used.

Cardew

Martyn1981 wrote: »

PS Not sure why you find energy storage so unthinkable. Come on Cardew catch up, have you not heard of Dinorwig mopping up excess power. Or Germany generating nearly 30GW of PV at times during the spring and summer this year? Big picture time boyo, big picture time. M.

Yet again an example of your twisted logic.

Dinorwig was built 38 years ago at a cost then of £425,000,000. The cost today??

Let me get this straight! You are talking about storage of Solar PV electricity i.e.

And if we do invest in large scale storage, then we could role out even more PV and use it at peak times,

So we must consider the 'big picture'. Yet at the same time, you show, with all your invented 'numbers', that large scale solar farms are simply not viable.

Also that PV is best used for localised generation;

We don't live in France, the sea, nuclear power stations, or in flooded
valleys!

PV gives us the option to localise generation, which these
others don't.

So presumably we should build a huge duplicate Dinorwig at a cost of £1,000,000,000?? to store the most expensively produced electricity in UK, - a generation method that is best suited to localised generation.

Run that by me again please - but best wait to 1st April.

Cardew

ILoveSolarMe wrote: »

Yes, they were slow to reduce FiT tariffs inline with price drops, but that isn't a problem with FiTs, just with the Department running it.

I see you have joined the Martyn School of logic.

ed110220

doughnutmachine wrote: »

i just think one of the ways fits can be judged a success is how many "traditional" power stations are not built/ dismantled. like it or not solar power has not caused one power station to be dismantled...

if we lived somewhere warm like spain it's likely that solar would reduce the amount of "traditional" power stations required during the long hot summer when people have the aircon on. it just seems more sense to me for the uk to invest in wave/ hydro power, energy sources that are more productive when the uk needs energy.

i'm not against solar, its just i think the uk could have got more value for money by encouraging other green methods.

I think you miss the point of how solar PV reduces carbon dioxide emissions by fossil fuel power stations not (at least until there is a great deal of solar generation) by causing fossil fuel power stations to be closed or not built, but by reducing their fuel consumption.

Maybe a good analogy would be a house with thermostatically controlled gas central heating and another source of heating such as a wood burning stove. Every time you light the wood burning stove you would displace some gas consumption and thereby save gas, even if you could not entirely replace your central heating system entirely.

Hydroelectric power has the problem of limited suitable sites and I don't think the UK has many left... if we did they would probably have been used long ago as hydroelectric power is very mature technology and has been in widespread use at least since the 1930s.

Wave power is still in its infancy it seems and may not turn out to be very practical because of problems with waves damaging the equipment.

doughnutmachine

Martyn1981 wrote: »

But these are the points I've been addressing. Do you get more bang for the buck? It's easy to state it, but can it be supported? That's why I simply can't see any benefit of farm scale over domestic.

Hope you don't think I'm just trying to disagree with you, all I'm really asking is for you to support your claims. The main one is, do you think PV funding detracts from any other renewables, if so show me, if not, then why worry since it's now coming through as one of the most viable technologies (did you compare those two FIT tables?)?

Mart.

but using your figures of 1400/kW for domestic and 1000/kW for commercial shows you get more value for money with the larger schemes?

i agree that small solar does act as a billboard for green energy and raises awareness of reducing energy use though.

doughnutmachine

EricMears wrote: »

Quite so !

Hence all of those generating methods have an inbuilt flaw in that a proportion of the generation 'disappears' before it can be used.

since the sun is always shining somewhere in the world we could have huge solar powerstations over the equator. Then connect each country to them. ok, grid losses would be high, but solar prices are dropping fast, so sooner or later it will become economic.

doughnutmachine

ed110220 wrote: »

I think you miss the point of how solar PV reduces carbon dioxide emissions by fossil fuel power stations not (at least until there is a great deal of solar generation) by causing fossil fuel power stations to be closed or not built, but by reducing their fuel consumption.

Maybe a good analogy would be a house with thermostatically controlled gas central heating and another source of heating such as a wood burning stove. Every time you light the wood burning stove you would displace some gas consumption and thereby save gas, even if you could not entirely replace your central heating system entirely.

Hydroelectric power has the problem of limited suitable sites and I don't think the UK has many left... if we did they would probably have been used long ago as hydroelectric power is very mature technology and has been in widespread use at least since the 1930s.

Wave power is still in its infancy it seems and may not turn out to be very practical because of problems with waves damaging the equipment.

yeah, i take your points on board. but i'd argue the analogy is a bit more like the log stove comes on by itself in the summer, then goes off in the autumn when it gets cold.

i agree there are few large valleys for hydro schemes left. however there must a be a lot of smaller potential schemes, all with the ability to provide power when it is required.

i would just rather fits supported more UK viable power schemes.

Martyn1981

Cardew wrote: »

So presumably we should build a huge duplicate Dinorwig at a cost of £1,000,000,000?? to store the most expensively produced electricity in UK, - a generation method that is best suited to localised generation.

Run that by me again please - but best wait to 1st April.

Since you are too scared to provide numbers to support your speculations that PV farms are cheaper than domestic PV, perhaps you will explain the above boldened statement?

Is PV the most expensive electricity? Can you back that up? How do the FITs tariffs you like to speculate via support your claims?

How does nuclear, with 50 years of subsidy support in the UK compare to current domestic PV? That's right, how does a mature industry with giant powerstations, compare today, against domestic scale PV that is still in it's infancy?

I had a go here:

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Hiya Zeup, appreciate you weren't trying to go down this route, but thought I'd mention something that occurred to me a week or so ago, that I've been pondering:

PV costs v's new nuclear.

but I know how much you hate to support your speculations with annoying substance!

Also interesting to see that Graham isn't a fan of large subsidies, but is a fan of nuclear ...... hang on ..... run that by me again?

grahamc2003 wrote: »

There aren't many things I can produce where someone else has the obligation to buy it - why others can't see that this all by itself is an incredible 'subsidy' beyond the financial escapes me.

So, I'll ask again;

1. Do you claim that a PV farm can produce electricity at a lower cost than domestic, when including all fixed and variable costs?

2. Is a PV farm more viable than domestic PV ie when you have subtracted costs from income?

After all it's your argument (not mine), you've been touting farm over domestic for a year now, time to put some meat on those speculative bones isn't it?

Mart.