Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

Martyn1981

Good news on the battery side of the storage revolution too, though the 'as early as 2030' statements did take the edge off my excitement a bit:

Batteries Are Breaking Through

A new Rocky Mountain Institute report released the end of October, Breakthrough Batteries Powering the Era of Clean Electrification, continues to confirm that clean electrification of transport technology is advancing at an impressive rate.

For years, cleantech enthusiasts have been saying that battery storage would swiftly drop in price just as solar, wind, computers, flat-screen TVs, and other technologies did before it. A Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) press release relates that, indeed, “exploding investment in battery technologies is revolutionizing the sector much faster than expected and setting in motion a seismic shift in how we will power our lives and organize energy systems as early as 2030.”

As with other renewable movements, increasing holistic approaches from public and private sectors are evolving and necessary. With the growth in the business, Forbes points out that RMI anticipates “self-reinforcing feedback loops.” Thus, the conversation between public policy, manufacturing, research and development, and economies of scale will find success. “Those loops will drive battery performance higher while pushing costs as low as $87/kWh by 2025. (Bloomberg put the current cost at $187/kWh earlier this year.)”

“These changes are already contributing to cancellations of planned natural-gas power generation,” states the report. “The need for these new natural-gas plants can be offset through clean-energy portfolios (CEPs) of energy storage, efficiency, renewable energy, and demand response.”

The projection is that existing natural-gas plants will cease to be competitive. In this country, RMI predicts that will happen as soon as 2021. This will help solar and wind to achieve market share targets quicker, and retire fossil fuels sooner.

Martyn1981

Some extracts from this weeks Carbon Commentary newsletter:

2, Sustainable Aviation Fuel. At the moment there is only one significant source of non-fossil aviation fuel in the world, a refinery in California. SkyNRG of the Netherlands will build a new plant in the north of the country to supply Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) by 2022. The raw materials will come from waste vegetable oils and a new green hydrogen refinery to be built near Groningen. (The huge Groningen gas field is being gradually abandoned because of severe earthquakes and hydrogen activity in the Netherlands is focused on this region). Shell said this week that it would participate in the new SAF plant, although it is not clear that cash is changing hands. SkyNRG is partly financing the refinery by pre-selling carbon offsets to companies such as PwC.

3, Hydrogen central heating boilers. Countries that widely use gas central heating systems in homes, of which the UK is a prime example, face an urgent need either to electrify heat or to replace natural gas with hydrogen. The UK’s association of gas and electricity network operators called this week for all new domestic boilers to be able to work on either hydrogen or natural gas. Boilers that can switched between fuels are not yet fully available but UK market leader Worcester Bosch said earlier this year that ‘Despite some inevitable challenges, there can be no doubt that hydrogen has real potential for the future of the UK’s heating sector’ and indicated that the technological problems arising from the invisibility of hydrogen flames and their higher speed are solvable.

silverwhistle

joefizz wrote: »

.Going back to Tuesday and rationing, heres something not a lot of people would consider but for those of us with EVs and home battery systems charged from the grid, spare a thought to charging this tuesday/wednesday as its highly likely that whatever charge you put in will be coal powered... not very environmentally friendly...

I don't have a an EV or a battery (although a mailshot for the latter arrived only this morning!) but the behaviour modification you talk about has already started. I've just signed up for a time of day tariff which will be implemented when I get a smart meter. As a single person household with PV I reckon I can use the system to avoid the peak charges which today will reach 28.48p and yesterday 30.68p per kWh. Before on an Ebico standing charge free tariff with a very high unit rate all the time which previously worked for me as a low user before they increased rates yet again. From memory think I need an average price of 16.2 ppu to make it work.


The circumstances you describe will presumably map into wholesale prices and I won't be putting the washing machine on (unless the sun miraculously decides to come out..).



Lots of these micro decisions will reduce the need for capital investment, it's always at the margins and peaks where costs are high in any area of the economy one cares to mention.



As for the inter-connector issue: it's the sort of major cost which we've met before from remote nuclear power stations. But as wind farms become more widespread how much completely new major network will need to be built? For example the Rampion wind farm off Brighton (currently down because of inter-connector issues!) has plans for major expansion, and I'd very much hope that the existing link was built with such in mind. I imagine the turbines of any extension would be nigh on twice the size of the existing 3.45Mw ones, which illustrates the way costs will come down.


But as you say, interesting times..

Martyn1981

silverwhistle wrote: »

As for the inter-connector issue: it's the sort of major cost which we've met before from remote nuclear power stations. But as wind farms become more widespread how much completely new major network will need to be built? For example the Rampion wind farm off Brighton (currently down because of inter-connector issues!) has plans for major expansion, and I'd very much hope that the existing link was built with such in mind. I imagine the turbines of any extension would be nigh on twice the size of the existing 3.45Mw ones, which illustrates the way costs will come down.


But as you say, interesting times..

Thanks for jogging my memory on yet another important point I forgot to mention. In the past some critics of RE (not on this site), especially low/tumbling off-shore wind prices in Europe liked to point out that they were not comparable to the UK, as UK CfD's also include the cost of grid extension/connection/expansion to link up the UK off-shore wind farm.

But, now I'd suggest that that argument has blown up in their faces, since we are seeing wholesale leccy comparable CfD's EVEN when the additional work/cost is included in the cost of build out and therefore the associated CfD bid price.

This is probably a very important point, and given that we were discussing RE issues wider, including grid changes, I really shouldn't have omitted it. :doh:

markin

We need about 5 more don't we? At £1.2B a pop.


Western Link project


"As of 22 November 2019, we have completed the final commissioning activities, and by reaching this milestone both SP Transmission and National Grid Electricity Transmission have now formally taken full ownership of the Link.

We have been working hard with our contractor, a Consortium of Siemens and Prysmian, to deliver this highly innovative £1.2bn project. Taking into account the amount of renewable energy both connected and planned to be connected in Scotland, the Western Link will deliver long term benefits in excess of the original needs case to our customers. The link will ensure renewable energy generated in Scotland is transmitted to England and Wales, whilst simultaneously supporting the UK Government’s ambitions of achieving the decarbonisation of our economy, and ultimately net zero carbon emissions.

We will continue to work hard to ensure its long term success and will look to build upon the vital experience we have gained to make certain that the Link reliably continues to play a significant role in the wider UK transmission system, in addition to the 6.6GW Anglo-Scottish boundary transfer capability installed under the RIIO-T1 price control.

This website will close down at the end of the year as part of overall project closure, when the project communications channels will also be closed."


...............................................................


16/02/2012 ScottishPower and National Grid Award Contracts to Deliver Major Electricity Grid Upgrade
"The £2.6 billion investment will deliver:

• Creation of up to 1,500 new jobs in the ScottishPower Transmission licence area
• Connection of offshore and onshore wind generation in Scotland of around 11 GW (enough to power over 6 million homes)
• Over £2 billion in reduced carbon emissions (equivalent to 45 million tonnes of CO2)
• Increase in export capacity from Scotland to England from 3.3 GW to close to 7GW by 2021
• Reduce constraint costs to the UK consumer by £1.7 billion
• Renewal and replacement of over 15% of our existing substation assets
• Replacement of around 800 km of overhead line
• Modernise the network to ensure that the excellent security of supply and reliability presently enjoyed in the SPT area is maintained."

https://www.scottishpower.com/news/pages/scottishpower_and_national_grid_award_contracts_to_deliver_major_electricity_grid_upgrade.aspx

markin

FWG Merger With EESTOR

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxBdESxAl8g


EEStor Corporation Enters into Letter of Intent to Acquire FWG Ltd.
https://eestorcorp.com/2019/11/13/eestor-corporation-enters-into-letter-of-intent-to-acquire-fwg-ltd/

Martyn1981

This makes for tough reading, but there are some highlights. But the main takeaway is that we need to do more mitigation now, or risk having to spend far more by 2030, or even fail completely to halt global warming.

I appreciate that I pushback hard against AGW deniers and denial, and those that excuse the actions of the FF industries, and also those that snipe at the mitigation spending we need, but economically, there are only two options, spend some money today, or spend far more money tomorrow, and the 'tomorrow' option also means far more environmental damage. We have to invest in a better World eventually, so we might as well do it today.

UN calls for push to cut greenhouse gas levels to avoid climate chaos

Countries must make an unprecedented effort to cut their levels of greenhouse gases in the next decade to avoid climate chaos, the UN has warned, as it emerged that emissions hit a new high last year.

Carbon dioxide emissions in 2018, also accounting for deforestation, rose to more than 55 gigatonnes, and have risen on average by 1.5% a year for the past decade, according to the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) annual emissions gap report.

Global emissions must fall by 7.6% every year from now until 2030 to stay within the 1.5C ceiling on temperature rises that scientists say is necessary to avoid disastrous consequences. The only time in recent history when emissions have fallen in any country at a similar rate came during the collapse of the Soviet Union. During the financial crisis and recession, emissions in the US and Japan fell briefly by about 6% but soon rebounded.

However, technologies such as renewable energy and electric vehicles are now available, and increasingly cheap, which could enable deep cuts in carbon without jeopardising economic growth.

John Christensen of the Technical University of Denmark, a co-author of the report, told the Guardian the cuts in emissions now required were “unprecedented”.

Postponing action could no longer be an option, said Inger Andersen, executive director of UNEP. “Our collective failure to act early and hard on climate change means we must now deliver deep cuts to emissions [of] over 7% each year, if we break it down evenly over the next decade. This shows that countries simply cannot wait.”

Without such urgent action the world’s fate would be sealed within the next few years as carbon would rise to such a level as to make dangerous levels of warming inevitable, she said. “We need quick wins to reduce emissions as much as possible in 2020, then stronger [commitments under the Paris agreement] to kickstart the major transformations of economies and societies. We need to catch up on the years in which we procrastinated.”

Current pledges under the Paris agreement are deemed inadequate; if countries stick to them next year, they would have to reduce emissions to zero from 2030 to avoid raising temperatures by more than 1.5C. For that reason, Andersen urged nations not to wait to enshrine new commitments, but to take immediate action.

UNEP has been reporting on the “emissions gap” between countries’ pledges and the cuts needed since the Paris agreement was signed in 2015, but rising emissions in the meantime have made the situation even more urgent. Last year’s landmark scientific assessment by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change revealed the ravages that would result from a 1.5C rise above pre-industrial levels, including the near-total extinction of coral reefs, and extreme weather around the world.

The current pledges made by countries under the Paris agreement would cause temperature rises of about 3.2C this century, according to scientific estimates.

Martyn1981

Orsted plans 'world first' 5GW offshore wind energy island

Orsted has unveiled plans for a 5GW offshore wind hub connecting Denmark, Poland, Sweden and Germany, supporting large-scale production of green hydrogen and creating what it called "the world's first energy island" on Bornholm in the Baltic Sea.

The global offshore wind pacesetter wants to kick-start the massive cluster with a 1GW wind farm in the Rønne Banke zone southwest of Bornholm, one of the areas already earmarked by Denmark for possible future development.

The initial 1GW could later be expanded to 3-5GW, with interconnection extended to Sweden and Germany, said Orsted, which offered no specific timeline for the Bornholm vision, but said it could help Denmark meet 2030 emissions goals.

Martin Neubert, CEO of Orsted Offshore, said: “Offshore wind clusters with transmission to several countries are a necessity if we’re to realise offshore wind’s enormous potential in making Europe green.

“Before constructing large artificial sand islands in the North Sea, we suggest combining existing deployment plans for transmission and designated offshore wind areas with an existing granite island, namely Bornholm.”

joefizz

silverwhistle wrote: »

I don't have a an EV or a battery (although a mailshot for the latter arrived only this morning!) but the behaviour modification you talk about has already started. I've just signed up for a time of day tariff which will be implemented when I get a smart meter. As a single person household with PV I reckon I can use the system to avoid the peak charges which today will reach 28.48p and yesterday 30.68p per kWh. Before on an Ebico standing charge free tariff with a very high unit rate all the time which previously worked for me as a low user before they increased rates yet again. From memory think I need an average price of 16.2 ppu to make it work.

Ive just mentioned this over on the other thread. There was a uk wide trial about 5 or so years ago where they introduced I think it was 4 time zones instead of just the two on economy 7. It was to get people away from peak 4-7pm when pumped storage had to be used and in winter coal fired stations kept running day and night just to service this time period. ('better' to keep them ticking over and then ramp up rather than start from scratch each day - apparently).
The trials were incredibly basic by todays standards as the smart meters were IIRC from the local test things like the owl monitors we have now, nowhere near what smart meters are now and what they are going to be.


Its a slow iterative process but the aim is to get pretty much instantaneous cost increases/decreases (or at least much smaller time shifts) so cost can be used as a way of managing load.


I remember when I first started working for BT back in 1992 the internet of things was supposed to solve all these problems. Fridges, freezers, dishwashers etc would communicate with the electricity network and like they are doing with electric cars now, book in a time slot with the local grid to manage all this stuff as demand varies. It is slightly closer now ;-) I dont think Ive bought an large appliance in the last 10 years or so that doesnt have a time shift capability built in already.

silverwhistle

Well, I worked for the leccy board after university in the late 1970s and worked briefly on the monthly metering section involving maximum demand metering. You could tell the more efficient firms as they always kept their MD down, through phased switching or PF correction etc.



There's an issue with private customers in how they respond to price stimuli, so although most people reading this thread will be capable of responding appropriately it does perhaps indicate that more some more automated methods will be needed. Either way there'll be complaints on intrusion or cost, as I recall from my working experience..