Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

EricMears

Cardew wrote: »

Now let be see does nuclear generate 24/7 in all weather??

Yes of course it does (apart from maintenance periods which could be a week or two at a time).

But, how many consumers use electricity at their peak rate 24/7 ?

zeupater

Cardew wrote: »

Excellent article! ....

:think: .... Really ?

.... guess this is irrelevant then ...

Does Christopher Booker exist? Or is he simply a device invented to waste as much of other people's time as possible? Might he in fact be a computer programme randomly generating nonsense in order to keep scientists, environmentalists and public health campaigners so busy refuting it that they can't get on with what they ought to be doing? I ask because it seems almost impossible that one man could make so many superhuman !!!!-ups .....

And who wrote that ?, none other than our old 'friend' Mr Monbiot ... http://www.theguardian.com/environment/georgemonbiot/2011/oct/13/christopher-booker

I suppose that it really comes down to self-publicists competing to sell their own column inches in a competitive market, but in this case I tend to sway more towards Monbiot's views from 5 years ago ... don't give much sway to that statement though as in my opinion they're both pretty poor at 'joined-up-thinking' ...

HTH
Z

zeupater

EricMears wrote: »

Yes of course it does (apart from maintenance periods which could be a week or two at a time).

But, how many consumers use electricity at their peak rate 24/7 ?

Hi

The majority of my energy comes from nuclear power, and the generator hasn't been taken off-line for re-fuelling or maintenance for quite some time ... it's much higher technology than Hinkley C will be too as the energy is delivered wirelessly ....

As for the question around whether solar works 24/7 .... well, considering that the nuclear source does, the planet spins and solar panels are now dotted all over it's surface then the logical answer is simple .... yes ... :cool: <shades on, it's bright outside>

Z ...

ed110220

Electricity generating plants have always been talked of in terms of capacity first, so to call this a trick is about as baseless as the claim that global warming was 'changed' to climate change. Even if plants have very different capacity factors, such as nuclear plants that run 24/7 apart from refueling and maintenance or a gas turbine plant that is only fired up for a few hours each year to meet emergency demand, they're still normally referred to by their capacity first and only later (if at all) annual generation.

But this is is the sort of yah boo barrel scraping you'd expect from Booker.

Martyn1981

zeupater wrote: »

And who wrote that ?, none other than our old 'friend' Mr Monbiot ...

It did occur to me that the reason Cardew thought it was a good article was simply because it redirects some of the heat away from Monbiots joke anti-PV piece.

Back to Booker, and remembering how the new team of C&K had descended into quoting denialists, it's interesting to note that re Booker:

He has taken a stance which runs counter to the scientific consensus on a number of issues, including global warming, the link between passive smoking and cancer, and the dangers posed by asbestos.

Interestingly he's also against Hinkley:

Hinkley: a truly major national scandal

Putting these two issues, climate denial and nuclear criticism together, leads me back to this comment from the recent PV article:

Despite the subsidies, which make it more than twice as expensive to the rest of us than power from fossil fuels,

The statement is roughly true, with domestic PV costing £68/MWh and spot prices having dropped (with gas prices) to around £35/MWh. However, two things are important,

first is context, the £68 for domestic PV compares well to £80 for on-shore wind and PV farms, £99 for nuclear, and £120 for off-shore wind,

secondly, the low cost of FF generation ignores externalities and international subsidies. Ignoring CO2 impacts, just the health costs of coal generation cost the UK about £60/MWh, practically making wind and PV free in comparison,

and the vast subsidies (mostly unpaid externalities such as carbon and health) for FF's dwarf anything ever paid for renewables:

Fossil fuels subsidised by $10m a minute, says IMF

The IMF calls the revelation “shocking” and says the figure is an “extremely robust” estimate of the true cost of fossil fuels. The $5.3tn subsidy estimated for 2015 is greater than the total health spending of all the world’s governments.

The vast sum is largely due to polluters not paying the costs imposed on governments by the burning of coal, oil and gas. These include the harm caused to local populations by air pollution as well as to people across the globe affected by the floods, droughts and storms being driven by climate change.

Another consequence would be that the need for subsidies for renewable energy – a relatively tiny $120bn a year – would also disappear, if fossil fuel prices reflected the full cost of their impacts.

But don't worry, the G7 is going to sort this out ....... in 9 years time:

G7 nations pledge to end fossil fuel subsidies by 2025

The G7 nations have for the first time set a deadline for the ending most fossil fuel subsidies, saying government support for coal, oil and gas should end by 2025.

The leaders of the UK, US, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the European Union encouraged all countries to join them in eliminating “inefficient fossil fuel subsidies” within a decade.

“Given the fact that energy production and use account for around two-thirds of global greenhouse gas emissions, we recognise the crucial role that the energy sector has to play in combatting climate change,” said the leaders’ declaration, issued at the end their summit in Japan. The pledge first entered into G7 (then known as G8) declarations in 2009 but has until now lacked a firm timeline.

Mart.

Martyn1981

Cardew wrote: »

Excellent article!

Cardew, did PV run over your dog?

Mart.

kevin6666

I thought the lack of sustainability or boom/bust approach of Solar PV Installers was interesting and does seem to be the case.

Also not sure if it's been mentioned here but Ofgem closed the EPC loophole of having it done the same day as the install is commissioned in the latest version of guidance published a while ago. It must now be after so that means the majority of people possibly considering a sub 10kW system will be on the low/0.87p tariff, which barring a bit of misselling should pretty much end FIT domestic PV installs. The FIT tariffs that are still lucrative, mid sized wind, standalone PV are over subscribed until mid 2017.

Martyn1981

kevin6666 wrote: »

Also not sure if it's been mentioned here but Ofgem closed the EPC loophole of having it done the same day as the install is commissioned in the latest version of guidance published a while ago. It must now be after so that means the majority of people possibly considering a sub 10kW system will be on the low/0.87p tariff, which barring a bit of misselling should pretty much end FIT domestic PV installs.

Care to explain/reference your statement as I understood the exact opposite, and that the EPC had to be done on or before the commissioning date (something I had to comply with back in 2012 for my PV extension)?

If I'm right, then you're talking ........

Mart.

kevin6666

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Care to explain/reference your statement as I understood the exact opposite, and that the EPC had to be done on or before the commissioning date (something I had to comply with back in 2012 for my PV extension)?

If I'm right, then you're talking ........

Mart.

Sorry captain aggressive but you're wrong.

Not fully up to date on extensions but you could use your benefits of your Solar PV Install to bump up your EPC rating and get the higher tariffs. That's no longer the case. Just checked the data and we have thousands alone in 2015 on H Tariff with an EPC after commissioning date.

EricMears

kevin6666 wrote: »

Sorry captain aggressive but you're wrong.

Not fully up to date on extensions but you could use your benefits of your Solar PV Install to bump up your EPC rating and get the higher tariffs. That's no longer the case. Just checked the data and we have thousands alone in 2015 on H Tariff with an EPC after commissioning date.

If you do the EPC survey AFTER SP commissioning then the panels would indeed bump up the rating. Surely the rule change was to ensure that couldn't happen by obliging the EPC to be calculated BEFORE the SPs were making any contribution.