Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

zeupater

joefizz wrote: »

... 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.

Hi

Shouldn't investing in that additional functionality be considered a waste of money if a battery system is in place to seamlessly handle the time shifting issue around peak periods ?? ... a periodic (10-12 year??) £500-£800 per household project to roll-out & replace smart-meters on top of added costs to provide automated controllability to household appliances seems to be of little real economic benefit compared to domestic storage at a realistic £/kWh (say ~£150) ....

HTH
Z

1961Nick

zeupater wrote: »

Hi

Shouldn't investing in that additional functionality be considered a waste of money if a battery system is in place to seamlessly handle the time shifting issue around peak periods ?? ... a periodic (10-12 year??) £500-£800 per household project to roll-out & replace smart-meters on top of added costs to provide automated controllability to household appliances seems to be of little real economic benefit compared to domestic storage at a realistic £/kWh (say ~£150) ....

HTH
Z

I think there's room for both storage & time shifting. Time sensitive tasks use battery storage & everything else is done when demand is low. This will keep the storage requirement to a minimum & also reduce round trip battery losses.

zeupater

1961Nick wrote: »

I think there's room for both storage & time shifting. Time sensitive tasks use battery storage & everything else is done when demand is low. This will keep the storage requirement to a minimum & also reduce round trip battery losses.

Hi

Agreed ... but the issue is that time shifting needn't rely on centralised control through the (extremely costly!) smart meter DCC network ... I'd rather retain full control of heavy loads on a local basis with a basic, low cost, automation or simple delay timer solution (only where necessary!) as I actually know what I want & when I want it, whereas others operating centralised automation/control can only perform a guess, resulting in the obvious plethora of serious errors over time!! ...

HTH
Z

joefizz

silverwhistle wrote: »

Either way there'll be complaints on intrusion or cost, as I recall from my working experience..

Yeah, heard the big brother thing quite a lot...
To get round it you would really need to re-nationalise and then give everyone free broadband ;-)

joefizz

zeupater wrote: »

Hi

Shouldn't investing in that additional functionality be considered a waste of money if a battery system is in place to seamlessly handle the time shifting issue around peak periods ?? ... a periodic (10-12 year??) £500-£800 per household project to roll-out & replace smart-meters on top of added costs to provide automated controllability to household appliances seems to be of little real economic benefit compared to domestic storage at a realistic £/kWh (say ~£150) ....

HTH
Z

It depends on whats implemented. I mentioned over on the battery thread about installing batteries at the local substation which could be implemented going forward for estates/blocks of housing etc. The comms would then be between the substation and the appliances without the need for central control.
It also depends on the way the suppliers implement it, so if you sign up with your battery/car then its more than likely to be peak shaving rather than total replacement. (I updated the firmware in my sofar the other week and it had a new peak shaving mode, read into that what you will).
Batteries take many different forms so whilst the household variety can be used for all the purposes you mention (plus security of supply - more applicable to the likes of myself who run a business from home or for remote locations - as in maybe half mile or more from the substation) localised sources will run differently.


The time shifting for a chest freezer might be of the order of say 4 hours or whatever the limit is for that appliance, for a front loading freezer a lot less (or not at all - my nephews and nieces think my fridge and freezers are televisions!)
This is where the internet of things aspect comes in. If you are like me and run your washing machine/dishwasher once every couple of days, it will automatically schedule it for you during off peak. If like my sisters family of 5 then its more than likely that usage will shedule peak shaving or the like once or twice a day.


A lot of it will be to do with distributed management, using local solar, wind and batteries to manage the local networks before the substations rather than larger STOR for the next level up. IIRC current stor licenses are for above 2MW (dont know if thats delivered or installed) and the home battery/vehicle trials are dependent on the total number of participants exceeding this level (well exceeding it given variances in cars connected at one time or other).


It wont be about big numbers, it will be about managing the small numbers to even it out.
When I first started studying this stuff at uni the big thing was either the ad break in coronation street or half time in the FA cup final. Throw some more buckets of coal on just before the break/whistle and get ready for all those kettles turning on.
Now with less people watching fixed tv and whilst liverpool v man u will get a large audience norwich v southampton wont have the same effect. Norwich v southamption will have a similar effect in norwich and southampton though, so although it may not be peak uk, it will be peak near there (or at least cause a localised spike in supply).
Conversely when the sun goes behind a cloud in a certain area or comes out the localised battery supplies can react differently.
The batteries wont go from empty to full and vice versa but as most of us are finding either multiple times a day, not at all or variations on it.
As far as security of supply goes it again depends on where the majority of the faults lie. You arent going to help out with individual line faults but if the upline goes then the software can priortise vulnerable households or time switch during winter for heating pumps/low energy lighting/fridges freezers only that sort of thing.


Batteries are for smoothing out the demand, not fulfilling it. They will peak shave or do enough in relatively short terms to allow other generation to kick in/ramp up. That alone will probably save enough stress on the networks to be worthwhile.

Exiled_Tyke

zeupater wrote: »

Hi

Shouldn't investing in that additional functionality be considered a waste of money if a battery system is in place to seamlessly handle the time shifting issue around peak periods ?? ... a periodic (10-12 year??) £500-£800 per household project to roll-out & replace smart-meters on top of added costs to provide automated controllability to household appliances seems to be of little real economic benefit compared to domestic storage at a realistic £/kWh (say ~£150) ....

HTH
Z

I pretty much agree with the comments already made on this matter. I have a battery and make as much use of time delay functions (where I have them) as I did before I got the battery. (My washing machine is old but it would be useful to have a new one with this function). The reasons:

1. Putting 'heavy' appliances on at peak sun times reduces rapid drain on the battery which is more damaging.
2. Minimise round trip losses.
3. Ensure I'm not using two high power appliances at the same time which will go over the output rate of the battery and lead to unnecessary import.
4. On very sunny days, using appliances early in the day to allows the battery to be more fully charged for the evening and minimises the risk of it fully discharging before the following morning. (e.g. If we're having a big meal with ovens on etc..)

The by-product though is that it all supports the grid in minimising peak time import.

That said for the last week the battery has been redundant with not enough generation to cover the house base load never mind charge the battery.

Martyn1981

Exiled_Tyke wrote: »

The by-product though is that it all supports the grid in minimising peak time import.

Yeah, and lots of good news, opportunities, ideas, development etc for this function.

In fact 30m BEV's providing 2kW each would cover all peak demand, not just the extra, and that (BEV car) figure goes down as we add commercial vehicles at end of day use, domestic batts, DNO & NG based batts, RE farm batts, and of course in the longer term, larger/longer term storage such as H2 etc..

The task might seem big, but I think it looks relatively 'easy' given that it will roll out and expand naturally in line with RE expansion, and the falling costs of both RE and storage. Add in the savings from frequency control, end of peaker plants, and peak demand high(est) prices, and it looks like it could be an economical solution too.

I think this decade proved RE, and the next will do the same for larger scale storage. We might even find ourselves wondering what all the fuss was about.

Martyn1981

This is really important, especially as we now seem to be well behind the curve. Keep those fingers crossed.

European parliament split on declaring climate emergency

The European parliament is split over whether to declare a global climate emergency before next week’s crucial UN summit.

If passed, the climate emergency resolution – to be voted on on Thursday – would throw down the gauntlet to incoming European Union leaders. The European commission’s president-elect, Ursula von der Leyen, is expected to take office on 1 December, having promised “a European green deal” in her first 100 days.

The draft resolution states there is “an environment and climate emergency in Europe and globally” and declares the EU will “take action accordingly”.

“It is a message to European citizens, to young people, to say that Europe is the very first continent to declare a climate emergency and to act accordingly,” said Pascal Canfin, a French MEP who chairs the European parliament’s environment committee and co-authored the resolution.

The text also references the US president Donald Trump’s decision to begin formal withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement earlier this month.

“We need to send a signal that after Trump’s decision, Europe is more than ever committed to deliver,” said Canfin, an ally of the French president, Emmanuel Macron.

The parliament’s political forces are also divided over how quickly Europe should cut emissions to reach a target of net zero emissions by 2050.

In a separate vote on Thursday, the European parliament is expected to approve a resolution stating that current EU climate targets are “not in line” with the 2015 Paris climate agreement, which calls for keeping global heating “well below” 2C above pre-industrial levels while aiming for only a 1.5C rise.

The EPP supports an emissions reduction of “at least 50%” by 2030 (compared with 1990 levels), while Liberals and Socialists would go to 55%. The Greens argue that anything less than 65% is inadequate.

“We have to realise that to meet the Paris agreement there are … very, very strict limits of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that we can release into the atmosphere from now for the next hundreds of years. And if we choose to release that much during this next decade then we can’t keep the temperature below 2C,” said the Swedish Green MEP Pär Holmgren.

Holmgren, a meteorologist and well-known TV weatherman until elected to the European parliament this year, advised the Thunberg family on climate science long before Greta began her school strike.

zeupater

Exiled_Tyke wrote: »

I pretty much agree with the comments already made on this matter. I have a battery and make as much use of time delay functions (where I have them) as I did before I got the battery. (My washing machine is old but it would be useful to have a new one with this function). The reasons:

1. Putting 'heavy' appliances on at peak sun times reduces rapid drain on the battery which is more damaging.
2. Minimise round trip losses.
3. Ensure I'm not using two high power appliances at the same time which will go over the output rate of the battery and lead to unnecessary import.
4. On very sunny days, using appliances early in the day to allows the battery to be more fully charged for the evening and minimises the risk of it fully discharging before the following morning. (e.g. If we're having a big meal with ovens on etc..)

The by-product though is that it all supports the grid in minimising peak time import.

That said for the last week the battery has been redundant with not enough generation to cover the house base load never mind charge the battery.

Hi

What needs to be considered is that the 'additional functionality' in question would be that afforded directly by the smart meter to specific major load appliances, either on a priority switched basis or through HAN IOT device control, which of course would gift manufacturers the ability to build smart functionality into appliances that really don't need to be smart ... unless the target market comprises those too dumb or lazy to use a basic manual switch or timer that is!! ...

The question really revolves around the returnable value from spending/investing £500-£800 per household on what is basically a repositioned 1990's solution to remote meter reading when a similar sum could provision each household with the ability to adequately shift excess load away from peak demand periods ... it's not that everyone needs to be off-grid or even running the batteries for hours on end, just that sufficient supply is available from storage to smooth demand variance ... £150/kWh for somewhere around 4kWh of storage with ~2kW of provision looks to be a logical alternative to something that was conceptually outdated a decade or more ago ....

HTH
Z

silverwhistle

zeupater wrote: »

t, as I actually know what I want & when I want it, whereas others operating centralised automation/control can only perform a guess, resulting in the obvious plethora of serious errors over time!! ...

Well, my point exactly, but not everybody does..