Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

pile-o-stone

Solarchaser wrote: »

Though you could argue stating interconnectors 5 times every other post could be considered as 3, so I'd maybe give you that.

The old "even a broken clock is right twice a day" or once a day if you are ms. Abbot, though I assume she meant a digital clock.... we hope

I don't think the ability to read documents available in the public domain should be confused with having prescience abilities to see the future. Connecting countries within Europe has been an established policy for many years.

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/electricity/transmission-networks/electricity-interconnectors

"Britain’s electricity market currently has 4GW of interconnector capacity:

2GW to France (IFA)
1GW to the Netherlands (BritNed)
500MW to Northern Ireland (Moyle)
500MW to the Republic of Ireland (East West).

Below is a list of existing and future interconnectors.

As with other major infrastructure projects future interconnectors face a range of challenges that can impact on timing of delivery. The estimated delivery dates shown below reflects our understanding of developers existing delivery plans for future interconnectors."

(See table in the article as I can't post it in here without it messing up!)

Proposed future UK connections:



They're not a new idea either - The first HVDC Cross-Channel scheme was built by ASEA and went into service in 1961.

What they will allow is for the UK to make maximum use of it's fantastic geographical location for wind power generation so that we can install more turbine generation than the UK actually needs and export this excess to the rest of Europe. It's the renewables version of North Sea oil, except it won't run out.

Martyn1981

pile-o-stone wrote: »

What they will allow is for the UK to make maximum use of it's fantastic geographical location for wind power generation so that we can install more turbine generation than the UK actually needs and export this excess to the rest of Europe. It's the renewables version of North Sea oil, except it won't run out.

Looks like Icelink ain't going to happen then. I think the cost was around £80/MWh, with only about £20 representing the cost of Iceland leccy (24/7 RE), the rest being the mighty HVDC needed.


With enough interconnectors and cheap enough off-shore wind (one down already perhaps ) we become comparable to Saudi Arabia:

The UK is the Saudi Arabia of wind energy

So, as the chart above shows, the UK’s annual average offshore wind resource is somewhere between 1.5 times larger, and 11 times larger, than 2011 Saudi Arabian energy production. And the great thing is that the wind won’t run out. It will vary, at all scales from seconds to decades, but it won’t run out as long as the sun keeps shining.

[P-o-S Andrew posts as AZPS on Nav. M.]

JKenH

Mart, if you are happy to delete the last paragraph, the one starting “ My biggest fear... “

I will be happy to delete my response and follow up posts.

If you want to place it on the “circular” thread and indeed carry on the discussion I shall raise no objection. I have no objection to your holding your anti FF view or expressing it and I am sure you will accept my right to challenge it ...just not on the green and ethical energy thread or as we refer to it the RE thread. If that is acceptable I will actively push to keep the RE thread on track and non political and non religious against all comers.

Ken

Martyn1981

Nice bit of local (for me) news:

Funding boost for renewable energy housing scheme

Plans to develop more than 200 low carbon homes in the east of the city have been awarded Welsh Government grant funding.

The Cardiff Living development will deliver 214 properties on the former site of Eastern high school off Newport Road and will receive £3.9m as part of the Innovative Housing Programme - the£90m, three-year programme to support new ways of designing and delivering housing to increase housing supply, meet carbon reduction targets, tackle fuel poverty and address demographic change.

Through the Cardiff Living scheme, a partnership between Cardiff Council and Wates Residential, new council homes and homes for sale on the open market are being built at sites across the city to meet housing demand. The programme will deliver 1,500 new homes for Cardiff, 600 of which will be council homes.

pile-o-stone

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-49871275

"Developments that tackle climate change could avoid having to get planning permission, under proposals being considered by the Scottish government.

Local renewable energy and electric vehicle charging are projects that may get the immediate go-ahead.

The draft proposals are being considered as part of a bid to implement a shake-up of planning laws."

These initiatives from the Welsh (see Mart's post above) and Scottish parliaments just underline the glaring mistake Tony Blair made in not going for full devolution and allowing the English to have their own parliament too.

While the Welsh Assembly and Scottish Parliament surge forward with their green initiatives, the English are held ransom by a Westminster parliament bogged down with Brexit.

Martyn1981

If you are a fan of Rachel Maddow, likes what I am, and her detailed explanations and in depth reports on events, then here's a fun, and timely article on her book Corruption In the Oil And Gas Industry.

Obviously it tickled me (given recent events/denials etc), but mostly it's quite sad as it details how nations that find themselves rich in FF's don't seem to do too well internally due to the corrupting power of the money.

No big conclusions from me here, it's just sad, but then it occurred to me (bit slow I admit) how much leveling we can and should see with the rollout of RE, after all you can't tax the sun ...... <cough Spain did cough>

Rachel Maddow On Corruption In the Oil And Gas Industry | All In | MSNBC


And yes, I do of course appreciate that RE won't bring peace to the World, and cure all ills, but perhaps a little equality can be added to the growing list ..... cleaner, greener, cheaper ..... fairer .... and so on.

Doh! Forgot to mention, that they also mention the looming 'impact' on FF companies when we finally start to reduce consumption, and that it might be more of a cliff edge than a slow and steady decline.

GreatApe

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Looks like Icelink ain't going to happen then. I think the cost was around £80/MWh, with only about £20 representing the cost of Iceland leccy (24/7 RE), the rest being the mighty HVDC needed.

With enough interconnectors and cheap enough off-shore wind (one down already perhaps ) we become comparable to Saudi Arabia]

Saudi produces oil for $10 and sells it for $60 and it's government owned

If you can find a market for £46/MWh offshore wind energy and a market that is willing to pay £300/MWh for that intermittent energy then sure yes we can be like Saudi....

But if your market is generating wind for £46 and selling it for £25 over interconntors..... Then your feeding your next door neighbours out of your own pocket

Also Saudi has the capacity to export around 500 GW of oil
The UK will have about 2.8 GW links to Norway who are 100% hydropower and don't need net imports. About 7 GW links to France who are 100% net nuclear/hydro who don't need net imports and a few GW here and there to other EU nations who also have wind power roughly when we do

So no... The UK isn't the Saudi of wind power
Even if wind power got down to £25/MWh we wouldn't be making money exporting it
We would be exporting at cost
And even then we would have maybe maybe 1% of the capacity to export as Saudi does

Marks out of ten......meh...about a three

Martyn1981

Always good to laugh at yourself, so I'll admit my first thought here was that the company could go carbon neutral sooner than 2040, come on guys, then I realised they meant the supply side (not internal consumption). So :T

German Utility RWE Commits To Carbon Neutrality By 2040

German electric utility giant RWE has announced its intention this week to become carbon neutral by 2040 and to transition into one of the world’s leading renewable energy companies.

RWE has already managed to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions by one-third between 2012 and 2018, representing a decline of 60 million metric tons, and is now targeting a further reduction of 70% by 2030 on its way to becoming carbon neutral by 2040. To accomplish its newly-announced goals, the company will decommission its last coal-fired power station in the United Kingdom — further reducing coal’s ability to generate in the UK — while the company will steadily seek to decommission its German coal-fired power plants as well. In the Netherlands, the government has already determined coal will be ended by 2030, and RWE is already in the process of converting its coal-fired plants in Eemshaven and Amer to fire biomass.

“This presents RWE with a huge task,” explained Rolf Martin !!!!!!z, CEO of RWE AG. “But we have a very clear idea of how to achieve our goal: We will phase out fossil energy sources both consistently and responsibly. We will make huge investments in wind and solar power as well as in high-capacity storage technologies. The new RWE is and will remain one of the major players in the electricity generation business.”

GreatApe

pile-o-stone wrote: »

I don't think the ability to read documents available in the public domain should be confused with having prescience abilities to see the future. Connecting countries within Europe has been an established policy for many years.

"Britain’s electricity market currently has 4GW of interconnector capacity:

2GW to France (IFA)
1GW to the Netherlands (BritNed)
500MW to Northern Ireland (Moyle)
500MW to the Republic of Ireland (East West).

Below is a list of existing and future interconnectors.

As with other major infrastructure projects future interconnectors face a range of challenges that can impact on timing of delivery. The estimated delivery dates shown below reflects our understanding of developers existing delivery plans for future interconnectors."

(See table in the article as I can't post it in here without it messing up!)

Proposed future UK connections:

They're not a new idea either - The first HVDC Cross-Channel scheme was built by ASEA and went into service in 1961.

What they will allow is for the UK to make maximum use of it's fantastic geographical location for wind power generation so that we can install more turbine generation than the UK actually needs and export this excess to the rest of Europe. It's the renewables version of North Sea oil, except it won't run out.

Nobody said interconntors were new

I said why has it taken so long to build them when they would clearly have been green and cost competitive

The 2GW French interconntor started up about 33 years ago the next one starts next year
Why such a huge gap? The technology existed the costs were okay

Two additional links of 2GW each to France should have been built say in 1988 and 1990

Those two links would have offset by now over 800 TWh of coal and gas production

Some people glue Chinese solar panels on their roofs and jump up and down about their 4MWh annual production. Two additional links to France in the late 1980s would have saved 200 million X that figure

1961Nick

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Obviously it tickled me (given recent events/denials etc), but mostly it's quite sad as it details how nations that find themselves rich in FF's don't seem to do too well internally due to the corrupting power of the money.

Why pick on FF for the book? Surely the title should have been along the lines of 'Money & power corrupts - regardless of it's source'.