Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

Martyn1981

An article with some numbers regarding the push for more off-shore wind. I have some thoughts (........ NO there's a surprise!) but will insert them around article extracts.

Powering all UK homes via offshore wind by 2030 'will need £50bn'

Boris Johnson’s bold new vision for offshore wind to power every home in the UK by 2030 would require almost £50bn in investment and the equivalent of one turbine to be installed every weekday for the whole of the next decade.

Yes, but. The £50bn is the investment cost of the developers, not a subsidy. Hopefully now that CfD's have dropped below £50/MWh (the latest are £46/MWh in today's monies), they will receive less, possibly no net subsidies across the 15yr contract. It will depend on the average price they receive which in turn depend on prices when they are generating, which may be depressed, but also off-shore wind prices may fall too.
The 'one turbine per day' figure seems reasonable is based on 8MW WT's. Less as WT's of 10MW, 12MW and upwards are deployed. If a wind farm has 100-200 WT's (just as an example) then we will need about 10 such farms being deployed on a rolling basis, at all times, taking around 5yrs to complete, which seems reasonable.

The wind energy industry has become one of the country’s most prized industrial success stories. In the past 10 years the capacity of the UK’s offshore turbines has grown from 1GW to almost 10GW at the start of 2020, and building costs have been driven down by almost two-thirds.

Hence the need to triple what we did, but that's OK, the industry has sped up, with falling costs and a reduction in the number of WT's  as they get bigger (bases take a lot of work), this all sounds fine. But we need investor's and an industry willing to build these .......

Keith Anderson, the chief executive of Scottish Power, one of the largest investors in Britain’s renewable energy industry, said there is “no shortage of capital or investor appetite in offshore wind” but the pace and scale of the industry’s growth will depend on the government’s ability to grant new seabed licences and project contracts at record speed.

The government plans to attract investment from the private sector through a major contract auction next spring, which will also include support for onshore wind and solar power projects for the first time in four years. This upcoming auction alone could secure more than £20bn of investment and create 12,000 jobs, mainly in the construction sector, according to RenewableUK.

“I am absolutely confident that the industry can achieve this,” said Anderson. “My only nervousness is that people will start to see the 40GW as a cap. We should achieve that, and power past it. We are going to need far more clean electricity.”

....... so looking good.   

NigeWick

Martyn1981 said:

I'd heard of insects being farmed for human food, at least a protein paste or similar, but hadn't crossed my mind about animal feed. 

I bought some chocolate flavoured Cricket protein bars. Tasted fine but too expensive at that time.

Pile_o_stone

Alternatively we just stop eating living things?

ASavvyBuyer

The pathway to net zero heating in the UK by the UK Energy Research Centre

michaels

ASavvyBuyer said:

The pathway to net zero heating in the UK by the UK Energy Research Centre

So I need to replace my gas boiler but even with a 10k green home grant I can't make the numbers make sense for a heat pump.  the relative prices of gas and electricity is a key issue.  Are we under-pricing gas with regards to its climate impact or what else explains why heat pumps just don't make sense?

EVandPV

michaels said:

ASavvyBuyer said:

The pathway to net zero heating in the UK by the UK Energy Research Centre

So I need to replace my gas boiler but even with a 10k green home grant I can't make the numbers make sense for a heat pump.  the relative prices of gas and electricity is a key issue.  Are we under-pricing gas with regards to its climate impact or what else explains why heat pumps just don't make sense?

It's like you say, the price of leccy v gas. That's what puts me off, and probably most others who need it to make economic sense.
When gas is 2.4p and the average leccy is around 15p, there's just no contest unfortunately.
I'd have a heat pump in a flash if the running costs were on a par.

Martyn1981

If anyone is interested in Highview and LAES (I've been carping on for years), then a Youtube channel I enjoy 'Undecided' has done a good vid on it and how progress is now being made with several installations taking place.

Liquid Air Battery Explained - Rival to Lithium Ion Batteries?

Martyn1981

I thought this had been mentioned, but can't find it, so just in case:

National Grid builds wind connector pipeline

National Grid Ventures has reclassified two interconnector projects off east England as multi-purpose interconnectors that will each deliver power from multiple offshore wind farms.

The projects off Suffolk, currently known as Nautilus and EuroLink, which would link the UK to mainland Europe, will now be used as part of the new connection plan that will connect wind projects into neighbouring countries.

By combining offshore wind farms with an interconnector, MPIs would reduce the amount of onshore infrastructure needed, compared to the current approach in which interconnectors and wind farms are developed and connected separately, said the commercial development arm of National Grid.

EricMears

It would certainly seem to make a lot of sense to have any 'inter-country' connectors passing through offshore wind farms and connected thereto.  WTs could then supply either end (or both) and the cable would also function as a 'normal' interconnectors.

ed110220

EVandPV said:

michaels said:

ASavvyBuyer said:

The pathway to net zero heating in the UK by the UK Energy Research Centre

So I need to replace my gas boiler but even with a 10k green home grant I can't make the numbers make sense for a heat pump.  the relative prices of gas and electricity is a key issue.  Are we under-pricing gas with regards to its climate impact or what else explains why heat pumps just don't make sense?

It's like you say, the price of leccy v gas. That's what puts me off, and probably most others who need it to make economic sense.
When gas is 2.4p and the average leccy is around 15p, there's just no contest unfortunately.
I'd have a heat pump in a flash if the running costs were on a par.

I get your point, but a small niggle would be that if you were using electricity for heating, you'd want to be on a cheap electricity tariff, not an "average" one. Eg mine is 12.054p/kWh with Green Energy's Oak tariff. That's very slightly more than 5x more than gas at 2.4p/kwh. Some ASHPs have SCOPs of about 5 (I'm not sure how realistic this is in actual use) and of course a gas boiler is not 100% efficient as some heat is lost in the flue gases, so the price difference may be less than you think.