Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

Martyn1981

I'm not sure if calling this good news is PC or not, but global warming could lead to a 10% increase in generation for the UK wind fleet.

Parts Of Europe Could Become Windier In A 1.5!!!730;C World

Martyn1981

Follow the money!

So, savings from addressing AGW will be greater than the cost, seems like an argument winner to me.

Hitting toughest climate target will save world $30tn in damages, analysis shows

"By the end of the century, we find the world will be about 3% wealthier if we actually achieve the 1.5C target relative to 2C target," said Marshall Burke, assistant professor at Stanford University in the US, who led the new work. "In dollar terms, this represents about $30tn in cumulative benefits."

The estimated cost of meeting the 1.5C target is about $0.5tn over the next 30 years, he said: "So our evidence suggest the benefits of meeting the targets vastly outweigh the costs."

I assume the $0.5tn is an annual cost, so $15tn in total v's $30tn in savings.

Also the article is well caveat-ed at the end, to explain that actual costs are hard to estimate, but it's crucial we try.

Prof Maximilian Auffhammer, at the University of California Berkeley, US, and not part of the research team said: "Translating the impacts of climate change into economic damages is challenging. Pinning down just how large the effects of climate will be on the long-term growth of GDP needs to be a high priority for future work."

"I think the authors of this study are doing the best job possible, by basing their estimates on a rigorous analysis and clearly stating their assumptions," said Prof Wolfram Schlenker, at Columbia University, US.

Martyn1981

Looks like renewables have, or are about to go cheaper than nat gas in the US, and that's before considering little things like CO2 emissions!

America Should Invest In Distributed Renewable Energy Instead Of Natural Gas Plants, Finds RMI Report

Half of all existing conventional electricity generating plants in the US will need to be replaced by 2030 as they reach the end of their useful life. The question is, what should they be replaced with? The Rocky Mountain Institute has studied this question and concluded that investing in distributed renewable energy makes the most economic sense.

RMI says, “US electricity generators may be committing their customers and investors to as much as $1 trillion in future investment and fuel costs through 2030 as they rush to build new gas-fired power plants. Yet advances in renewable energy and distributed energy resources (DERs) offer lower rates and emissions-free energy while delivering all the grid reliability services that new power plants can.”

If the proposed natural gas facilities get built, they will eat up $480 billion in fuel costs and pump 5 billion tons of carbon dioxide into the air through 2030. By 2050, total emissions will amount to 16 billion tons. Renewables, which have no fuel costs and no carbon emissions, should be a no-brainer. That they are not is an indication of how dysfunctional US energy policy is at the present time.

Coastalwatch

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Looks like renewables have, or are about to go cheaper than nat gas in the US, and that's before considering little things like CO2 emissions!

America Should Invest In Distributed Renewable Energy Instead Of Natural Gas Plants, Finds RMI Report

If the Fossil Fuel lobby group are anything as formidible as the NRA then I can't see the US adopting renewables any time soon!

Martyn1981

Coastalwatch wrote: »

If the Fossil Fuel lobby group are anything as formidible as the NRA then I can't see the US adopting renewables any time soon!

I think they are worse. The Koch brothers (pronounced coke) two of the richest guys in the world have been funding misinformation campaigns and anti-RE efforts for decades.

A new name was coined, I believe because of their creation of fake 'grass roots campaigns', with the excellent term of 'astro-turfing', where they would fund pop up campaigns against wind farms etc that appear to be concerned locals.

But ...... nobody can fight economics. You can argue against the added value of RE, and against subsidies, but it's almost impossible to fight against a cheaper product. And note that this is RE going head to head with nat-gas in the US, where there is an abundance of cheap frack gas. So if that can't win, then nothing can.

Martyn1981

I'm not sure what this means for UK renewables, but it could potentially be huge:-

UK nuclear plans 'risk collapse if Hitachi talks fail'

If I assume that the £80/MWh CfD mentioned is a 2012 baseline figure (as they tend to be), then that suggests that this nuclear package will need around £88/MWh (35yrs) to be built.

Now that off-shore wind costs have tumbled (£64/MWh for 2023 delivery and 15yr subsidy period), we could, might, just may see some sort of line being drawn in the sand since the economics today are staggeringly different to those in 2012 when the HPC deal was written up.

Could this lead to a massive push in RE rollout and pulling of the plug for some/most/all new nuclear ....... I don't know, but the RE position, backed by falling storage costs has gotten much stronger.

Martyn1981

Yet more subsidy free renewables for Europe as the PPA stepping stone provides a route to market.

Item from the weekly Carbon Commentary newsletter:-

1, Subsidy-free wind. France’s Engie and its consortium partners moved ahead with plans for 300 MW of subsidy-free wind across 9 parks in Spain. The crucial recent development was Engie’s commitment to buy a large part of the power from these wind farms at pre-determined prices (‘PPAs’ or Power Purchase Agreements). Engie says that this is the first renewables PPA in Spain. And, of course, the PPA was only possible because of its confidence that it had found major electricity consumers willing to commit to take the power from the farms. Subsidy free renewables are growing across Europe but only because final customers - often large industrial companies - are deciding in large numbers to contract to buy the electricity and therefore making it possible to finance construction.

michaels

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Yet more subsidy free renewables for Europe as the PPA stepping stone provides a route to market.

Item from the weekly Carbon Commentary newsletter:-

What does this mean for the economics of grid supplied electricity?


Consider an example where an aluminium smelter installs a set of wind turbines and consumes all its own output plus buys from the grid to top up to the required level of demand - great for the company but rubbish for the grid unless it operates very flexible unit pricing.....

Martyn1981

michaels wrote: »

What does this mean for the economics of grid supplied electricity?

Instead of the wind farm selling to the 'grid' at a wholesale price they contract to sell directly to a customer at a negotiated price, which will be higher than wholesale (good for the wind farm), but lower than retail (good for the customer).

Imagine a leccy generator, or your leccy supplier offering to sell you discounted leccy from a PV system built on your roof or land, or on their land nearby to you, at a cheaper price than typical retail rates.

It's very much the same model as small scale RE generators selling into the grid, just with pre-negotiated customers, rather than the usual auction market.

michaels wrote: »

Consider an example where an aluminium smelter installs a set of wind turbines and consumes all its own output plus buys from the grid to top up to the required level of demand - great for the company but rubbish for the grid unless it operates very flexible unit pricing.....

Nothing stopping the existing grid suppliers from building out renewables and selling onto the grid, or directly via PPA's. The object here is to reduce the amount of CO2 we produce, not to protect the older companies nor the older mechanisms. Things change over time, and the rollout of RE is a good thing.

silverwhistle

michaels wrote: »

What does this mean for the economics of grid supplied electricity?

At a simplistic level it's the difference between wholesale and retail. To take a more modern analogy how about on-line selling versus the high street. The situation is changing come what may.



I might normally buy 2 litres of milk at a time from the cheapo supermarket. Occasionally I might have to nip out for a pint from the local shop. The prices will reflect that.



Your aluminium factory will do everything in it's power to match demand to supply. Factories already make efforts to keep their costs and peak load down this with phased switching, power factor correction, interruptible supplies, upgrading to LED lighting etc.


There may be a role for government to play in addressing the security of supply aspect, so I understand there may be concerns with the current laissez-faire lot in power..