Solar ... In the news

Qyburn

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JKenH

I tried to include the quotes which would cause least offence bu not surprisingly someone manages to find some. 

It doesn’t matter what you think of the Telegraph, the real takeaway from the article is that, whatever the reason, we are having to burn coal in the middle of summer. That would be happening whether the Telegraph reported it, or not.

thevilla

JKenH said:

I tried to include the quotes which would cause least offence bu not surprisingly someone manages to find some. 

It doesn’t matter what you think of the Telegraph, the real takeaway from the article is that, whatever the reason, we are having to burn coal in the middle of summer. That would be happening whether the Telegraph reported it, or not.

Surely if you post an article you invite comment?

I suspect the fact we have coal in reserve necessitates it's use even if only to test it will work when needed.  It is being paid to act as generator of last resort so it needs to work.

The Telegraph took the opportunity to take a pop at renewables. Perhaps the headline should have been "Reduced Govt support has left us low on solar energy so expensive coal is pushing up bills".  ( I'll never make editor).😁

Raxiel

The Guardian covered the same story about Ratcliffe-on-Soar being brought online, although they didn't blame it on PV: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jun/12/uk-heatwave-prompts-order-to-fire-up-coal-plant-to-meet-aircon-demand

As it happens, yesterday was also the first time (beyond quick tests) I ran the AC I picked up over winter, and it was very welcome. I was still able to export even with it on full blast so Ratcliffe isn't my fault!

silverwhistle

It's not the news about coal, it's the slant The Telegraph puts on it, as more than one poster has noted. I'm surprised the original quoter didn't make the same observation.

I've a hot tank, done a washing load, cooked lunch and am now exporting like mad, so picking on absence on PV is curious, and perhaps they could have had a more neutral approach or even come to the conclusion that having more PV in a changing world might be a good idea?

Might as well go and plug the car's granny charger in to top right up if my contribution is not helping enough..

JKenH

Sorry but it is the news about coal that’s the headline. Anything else is just noise. We kept the coal plants open to get through last winter’s energy crisis. 

Did anyone imagine on a sunny day in June we would need them? No. So whoever’s in charge of the grid must have got their sums wrong. Or are we entering a new era where everything is working as it should and we should expect an energy crisis in June? 

Slating the Telegraph is just an attempt to deflect attention from the underlying problem. 

michaels

JKenH said:

Sorry but it is the news about coal that’s the headline. Anything else is just noise. We kept the coal plants open to get through last winter’s energy crisis. 

Did anyone imagine on a sunny day in June we would need them? No. So whoever’s in charge of the grid must have got their sums wrong. Or are we entering a new era where everything is working as it should and we should expect an energy crisis in June? 

Slating the Telegraph is just an attempt to deflect attention from the underlying problem. 

Quite agree, if only we had no solar PV at all the generation situation would be so much better....

Martyn1981

Seems like a desperate attempt by the Telegraph to have a go at PV, no idea why it wants to do that, just glad to see that most people didn't fall for it. But still, such a shame that the 2015(ish) policies to damage PV and onshore wind deployment, now mean we have to burn a bit of coal, and of course consume more expensive gas than otherwise. Can only cross my fingers and hope that the MPs do finally get around to reversing those policies, even if strong elements of the Tory party continue to object.

With the best planning in the world, things go wrong, so to see (as the Guardian reported) that the Norway HVDC had a fault, meaning it's lost half power (~750MW), that would require other generators to be used, or brought up to standby. Maybe the HVDC fault was then the cause for losing the Heysham 2 reactor (or not). But the reactor should be back on tomorrow.

I wonder if this lesson, like the geo-political crisis caused by Russia, will help to teach the more stubborn folk, why we need more RE, and why we need it sooner. I'd mention more HVDC links too, but that's progressing well.

Hopefully PV will continue to shine, and help with the problem, that it is falsely being blamed for.

paul991

sometimes we forget that energy just want to make the biggest profit not source renewables ,Have seen times on national grid live when the uk is exporting power and burning coal

JKenH

Martyn1981 said:

Seems like a desperate attempt by the Telegraph to have a go at PV, no idea why it wants to do that, just glad to see that most people didn't fall for it. But still, such a shame that the 2015(ish) policies to damage PV and onshore wind deployment, now mean we have to burn a bit of coal, and of course consume more expensive gas than otherwise. Can only cross my fingers and hope that the MPs do finally get around to reversing those policies, even if strong elements of the Tory party continue to object.

With the best planning in the world, things go wrong, so to see (as the Guardian reported) that the Norway HVDC had a fault, meaning it's lost half power (~750MW), that would require other generators to be used, or brought up to standby. Maybe the HVDC fault was then the cause for losing the Heysham 2 reactor (or not). But the reactor should be back on tomorrow.

I wonder if this lesson, like the geo-political crisis caused by Russia, will help to teach the more stubborn folk, why we need more RE, and why we need it sooner. I'd mention more HVDC links too, but that's progressing well.

Hopefully PV will continue to shine, and help with the problem, that it is falsely being blamed for.

Another attempt to divert attention from the fundamental issue by dwelling on the Telegraph. It’s inconsequential whether people “fall for it” or not. It has no bearing on the fact that we have a fundamental issue in that we struggle to respond to demand or supply problems (summer or winter) without using coal. 

More wind and solar roll out in the last decade (without storage) would only have aggravated the problem. If we had doubled our electricity generation from renewables then we would have reduced our FF generation by a commensurate amount and high demand on a poor renewables day would have presented a bigger problem. 

What we actually need is more generating capacity that is able to flexibly respond to an unexpected hiccup in supply or demand. Remarkably despite all attempts to wean ourselves off it, it is coal we turn to because it does the job. It just isn’t possible to ramp up wind and solar on demand to respond to a crisis so being more dependent on them will only add to the problem. 

As you say, with the best will in the world things go wrong so let’s plan some practical back up than can be switched on as needed.