Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

Martyn1981

Poor coal, it can't trust anyone these days.

A Utility In The Middle Of Coal Country Opts For Renewable Energy

Indiana is coal country. According to the Energy Information Agency, in 2018, 70% of the electricity in the state came from coal-fired generating stations. Vectren is the largest utility company in the southern part of the state, which snuggles up to other states like Kentucky and Ohio where coal has been king for nearly a century.

Given that background, imagine how startling it is that Vectren announced this week it plans to slash the use of coal-generated electricity in its system from 78% to just 12% over the next few years and dramatically increase the amount of electricity it gets from renewable sources. The company says the move will significantly decrease carbon emissions and save rate payers more than $300 million.

According to E&E News, Vectren’s latest 20-year integrated resource plan, which will be filed with state regulators shortly, will call for shuttering most of its coal-fired generation by 2023 and add more than 1,000 megawatts of wind energy and solar. Grid-scale battery storage will also be included to improve the dispatchability of the renewable electricity.

There’s even more good news. Vectren says it has decided against building a new natural gas-fired generating station that would have cost $900 million. As coal goes, so will natural gas. One of the economic factors that favors renewables is the ability to plan what the cost of electricity will be decades from now. Natural gas may be cheap now, but experience suggests it can rise dramatically in price if market conditions change. In the world of electricity generation, predictability is almost as important as getting the lowest possible price.

Coastalwatch

Martyn1981 said:

Poor coal, it can't trust anyone these days.

A Utility In The Middle Of Coal Country Opts For Renewable Energy

That's quite something Mart, which leads almost seamlessly into the announcemment below!

Good to see Bill Gates putting something back into society, especially with a clean and healthy future as the driver.

Advanced macro grid initiative announced in US

Bill Gates and Breakthrough Energy see enhanced transmission as facilitating electrification and grid reliability. Increasing transmission development at the “seams” between regions could save consumers more than $47 billion and return more than $2.50 on every dollar invested.

Breakthrough Energy, an organization that Bill Gates formed in 2015 to expand clean energy investment and innovation, will provide substantial funding for the initiative.

“To respond to the challenge of climate change, we need ambitious investments in our electrical grid. Solar, wind and other renewable energy sources are booming, moving us toward a carbon-free future,” said Gina McCarthy, president and CEO of the Natural Resources Defense Council. “But we need a way to connect all this clean energy to our homes. Modernizing our outdated transmission network will create jobs, grow our economy – and allow responsibly sited, cleaner energy to thrive.”

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2020/06/17/advanced-macro-grid-initiative-announced-in-us/

Martyn1981

For those that have put up with my waffle for years, LAES and Highview may ring bells as I've gone on about them so much. So here's the good news, they are now going full scale* in the UK with one of their larger and longer term storage facilities having previously deployed smaller proof of concept facilities.
*Even this 250MWh facility is just the start, as the units are modular, so they can be scaled up to a GWh+ by simply duplicating the build on site.

World’s biggest liquid air battery starts construction in UK

Construction is beginning on the world’s largest liquid air battery, which will store renewable electricity and reduce carbon emissions from fossil-fuel power plants.

The project near Manchester, UK, will use spare green energy to compress air into a liquid and store it. When demand is higher, the liquid air is released back into a gas, powering a turbine that puts the green energy back into the grid.
A big expansion of wind and solar energy is vital to tackle the climate emergency but they are not always available. Storage is therefore key and the new project will be the largest in the world outside of pumped hydro schemes, which require a mountain reservoir to store water.

The new liquid air battery, being developed by Highview Power, is due to be operational in 2022 and will be able to power up to 200,000 homes for five hours, and store power for many weeks. Chemical batteries are also needed for the transition to a zero-carbon world and are plummeting in price, but can only store relatively small amounts of electricity for short periods.

michaels

I was wondering if strategically placed medium scale storage could pay for itself doubly, not only by providing storage but also by reinforcing the grid in a more cost effective way than laying loads of new cables.

markin

Martyn1981 said:

Coastalwatch said:

gefnew said:

Hi
Just spotted this on the news about edf and sizewell power plant.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-suffolk-52813171

Apparently the cost is about £18 billion, but in any case less than the £21.5 -£22.5 billion that Hinckley point is expected to complete at. There has been no timescale mentioned in the recent press release although output of 3.2 GW is stated. EDF are planning to finance it mostly through pension schemes!

It does rather beg the question How many wind farms could be built for such a sum, what might the output be and cost per kWh of energy once built?

Simple question, multiple answers:
1. Very, very rough figure would be around 1GW of capacity per £1bn. But that figure may be out of date, PV is cheaper, on-shore wind cheaper, and off-shore wind more ...... but ..... off-shore wind tumbling these past few years at each auction. Then take capacity factor into account, v's ~92% for HPC or SC, so £18bn probably buys you more than 18GW of on-shore wind, @25-30%cf, so absolute guess, with multiple opportunities for mistake, you get say 20GW @ 28% = 5.6GW average, v's SC at 3.2GW@92% = 2.94GW average.
As off-shore wind costs fall, their higher cf (pushing 50%) makes a massive difference, so even half the capacity (off on-shore win) would still net a similar 5GW average.
PV cheaper, perhaps 35GW for £18bn (total guess), so average gen of about 3.6GW (11%cf).
Also need to consider maintenance, fuel, security etc.. That's where PV wins big.

2. The sum, in this case, is private money, so whilst crucial for comparison, it's irrelevant to bills, as they will reflect the agreed CfD price, not the build cost. With average wholesale costs in the £40-£50/MWh range, it's the difference between that figure and the CfD strike prices that is crucial. Off-shore wind was the monster, with early CfD's as high as £173/MWh in today's money, but these have fallen fast, and the latest contracts are for £46 & £48 /MWh, potentially net subsidy free. On-shore wind and PV are in the £80's & £90's, but these contracts were issued about 5yrs ago, since when costs all over the World have continued to fall, but the UK Gov excluded them from CfD auctions, so hopefully when they are re-introduced next year, we will see up to date bids, probably in the £40's.

With HPC at £104.50/MWh, we can expect it to receive around £50bn in subsidies over its 35yr subsidy period (15yrs for RE).
We will have to wait and see what CfD can (or can't) be agreed for SC. The last figure I saw was ~£80/MWh (not today's monies), but only if the UK Gov put £5bn directly into the build costs, so we can probably expect something around £90/MWh(?)

3. We do need to consider storage costs for RE, but the same can be applied to nuclear, especially since it will be arriving after significant RE has been commissioned, so it could, technically(?) be considered the excess generation needing storage when supply exceeds demand.

4. Crucial cost, that made the news a year or so back, was that of FF generation emissions during nuclear construction. If nuclear takes 10yrs (or more to build), and RE takes 1-5yrs (depending on technology), then nuclear carries an additional cost of 5-9yrs CO2 emissions when compared to RE.

5. Back up costs - we are of course told (though not so often these days) that for every GW of RE generation you build, you need another GW of FF capacity to back it up. But this has proven false, and storage can take much of this strain, deployed as it becomes economically needed. However, whilst the grid can cope with losing a string of PV, or a wind turbine, or even a whole RE farm, what it can't cope with so easily is losing a nuclear power plant, or even just one reactor at 1.6GW, without warning, so nuclear does require back up such as FF capacity paid to be on standby.

6. Other costs, and I'm sure to miss many, but RE and nuclear are required to cover end of life costs, which are known/predictable for RE, but not for nuclear, which will have to place a required amount per annum in a fund to grow to cover decommissioning, fingers crossed. Insurance for nuclear will come from the UK Gov, as no company can insure nuclear. In the event of a serious 'incident', or decommissiong costs exceed the savings fund, then UK Gov will step in to make up the shortfall.

I'm sure there is much more, but thought a few numbers and points may be useful. The cost figures for CfD's come from this register.

My first thought was if the campaigners don't want it they have around 5 years to raise funds and build a 'battery' to replace it so that everyone says 'oh we don't need it, lets scrap it'.  But how far would £20 billion get them? Best possibly price, best available Tec, flow battery? Or cracking H with extra wind and solar?

I really think storage is going to be a bigger problem, interconnections will help a little.

__________________

Watching this video really just depressed me at how far the is still to go! As well as Tesla signing a new 3 year deal with Panasonic rather that using the 1 million battery.

National Grid ESO's Green Energy Success Story | FULLY CHARGED

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONp8dismI-Q

 

markin

Martyn1981 said:

For those that have put up with my waffle for years, LAES and Highview may ring bells as I've gone on about them so much. So here's the good news, they are now going full scale* in the UK with one of their larger and longer term storage facilities having previously deployed smaller proof of concept facilities.
*Even this 250MWh facility is just the start, as the units are modular, so they can be scaled up to a GWh+ by simply duplicating the build on site.

World’s biggest liquid air battery starts construction in UK

Construction is beginning on the world’s largest liquid air battery, which will store renewable electricity and reduce carbon emissions from fossil-fuel power plants.

The project near Manchester, UK, will use spare green energy to compress air into a liquid and store it. When demand is higher, the liquid air is released back into a gas, powering a turbine that puts the green energy back into the grid.
A big expansion of wind and solar energy is vital to tackle the climate emergency but they are not always available. Storage is therefore key and the new project will be the largest in the world outside of pumped hydro schemes, which require a mountain reservoir to store water.

The new liquid air battery, being developed by Highview Power, is due to be operational in 2022 and will be able to power up to 200,000 homes for five hours, and store power for many weeks. Chemical batteries are also needed for the transition to a zero-carbon world and are plummeting in price, but can only store relatively small amounts of electricity for short periods.

So 340M per GW for 5hr, Just over 1B to replace SC for 5hrs, so 5B for 24h of storage? £20B for 4 days, get building them now.

markin

silverwhistle said:

Elsewhere on this board there have been discussions on investments and people wanting to put their money where their mouths are. It got me wondering whether as electricity users we will all have to pay the premium for nuclear power even if we are on 'green' tariffs. Will C*rd*w come on here fulminating about the surcharge and the poorest consumers having to pay the subsidy?

7GW out of 30-40GW is not likely to bump up the price much is it?

Martyn1981

markin said:

silverwhistle said:

Elsewhere on this board there have been discussions on investments and people wanting to put their money where their mouths are. It got me wondering whether as electricity users we will all have to pay the premium for nuclear power even if we are on 'green' tariffs. Will C*rd*w come on here fulminating about the surcharge and the poorest consumers having to pay the subsidy?

7GW out of 30-40GW is not likely to bump up the price much is it?

The subsidy for HPC alone (approx 2.944GW (cf 92%)) works out at approx £20 per household per year for 35yrs, based on 35% of leccy being for domestic use. If we assume households pay for 100%, as that consumed by the other sectors will end up in costs/charges eventually, then it becomes ~£55 per household per year.

silverwhistle

What! Even poor households? ;-)

ABrass

markin said:

Martyn1981 said:

For those that have put up with my waffle for years, LAES and Highview may ring bells as I've gone on about them so much. So here's the good news, they are now going full scale* in the UK with one of their larger and longer term storage facilities having previously deployed smaller proof of concept facilities.
*Even this 250MWh facility is just the start, as the units are modular, so they can be scaled up to a GWh+ by simply duplicating the build on site.

World’s biggest liquid air battery starts construction in UK

Construction is beginning on the world’s largest liquid air battery, which will store renewable electricity and reduce carbon emissions from fossil-fuel power plants.

The project near Manchester, UK, will use spare green energy to compress air into a liquid and store it. When demand is higher, the liquid air is released back into a gas, powering a turbine that puts the green energy back into the grid.
A big expansion of wind and solar energy is vital to tackle the climate emergency but they are not always available. Storage is therefore key and the new project will be the largest in the world outside of pumped hydro schemes, which require a mountain reservoir to store water.

The new liquid air battery, being developed by Highview Power, is due to be operational in 2022 and will be able to power up to 200,000 homes for five hours, and store power for many weeks. Chemical batteries are also needed for the transition to a zero-carbon world and are plummeting in price, but can only store relatively small amounts of electricity for short periods.

So 340M per GW for 5hr, Just over 1B to replace SC for 5hrs, so 5B for 24h of storage? £20B for 4 days, get building them now.

You've got the wrong units. That's a 250MWh storage system. Given its rated for 5 hours it's only a 50MW system.

But you're also assuming a linear price scaling mechanism, which has never been true in the history of anything, especially not when you're talking about the first of its kind to be built at any industrial scale. Doubling the size of the tanks to turn it from 5 hours to 10 probably would be a small fraction of the cost. Assuming anyone wanted that, which they don't.

Also, it'll probably be charging from HPC overnight some of the time. HPC can't be turned off when no one wants the power, or turned up when we do want it, so that nuclear energy will be shoved into the grid irrespective of anything else. LAES and chemical batteries will absorb that wasted power and keep it for another hour.