Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

silverwhistle

michaels said:

I thought this was great news, 80% non-carbon leccy over the Easter period which demonstrates that the grid can already cope with very high proportions of RE.

Yes, I took advantage on Agile of charging my car on (I think) Sunday afternoon at 1.1p a unit. With the help of my solar panels it worked out even cheaper. But as most people here know you have to accept that sometimes the variable rates can be more expensive, like today. But a bit of behavioural change as I'm single is easy enough to achieve, but probably not a tariff that lends itself to teenagers or the "I can't be 'avin' with that" brigade!

Martyn1981

Here's an article on the energy, pollution, noise etc of different forms of transport in Europe. Electric cars do well, especially if there are 4 or more passengers, otherwise it's high speed rail.

What’s Greener In Europe — A Train, A Plane, Or A Car? What’s Dirtiest?

Recently, the European Environment Information and Observation Network (Eionet), a network of the European Environment Agency (EEA) and its 38 member and cooperating countries, decided to look more closely at emissions by transportation sector, on an absolute and relative basis, and examine the environmental effect of trains versus planes for regional European trips.

As it turns out, there is nothing surprising about which mode of transport is greenest — a good ole electric train. “Aviation’s emission impacts are much higher on a passenger-kilometre basis.” There was one potential surprise, though. Flying is reportedly not the worst (aka dirtiest) option. “Travel by a petrol or diesel-powered car, especially if traveling alone, can be more harmful.” (Yikes!)

Interestingly, the researchers also find that an electric car is even slightly better than high-speed rail if 4 people are in the car. If it’s only one person driving, taking a train is much better, but driving an electric car still solidly beats air travel.

If the electric car is charging 100% on renewable energy (as some networks offer), then the equation surely looks a bit better for electric cars.

Of course, telecommuting or vacationing at home beat them all!

Coastalwatch

If it gets the go ahead this will be only the second site of this scale in the UK so it may well be that BP are putting their money where their mouth in seeking to become a renewable energy provider in future. What better use for a disused oil terminal could there be. Lets hope Lightsource bp and the local community can agree on the best way forward to ensure this can come to fruition in a timely manner.

Lightsource bp sets sights on Welsh 350MW mega-solar site

Solar development giant Lightsource bp has unveiled proposals for a 350MW site in North Anglesey, Wales.

The company is proposing to fund, develop and build the Môn solar farm, which will be split across three parcels of land in the north east of the island, including on industrial areas around the former Rhosgoch Oil Terminal.

Most of the open grassland on the site will be suitable for continued grazing of small livestock, and a bespoke Biodiversity Management Plan will be put together to enhance the site as much as possible for local wildlife.

https://www.solarpowerportal.co.uk/news/lightsource_bp_sets_sites_on_welsh_350mw_mega_solar_site

Coastalwatch

I don't know if we're ever likely to see prices this low in the UK, but at less than 1p/kWh the price of renewable energy still appears to be firmly downward. Given that annual output/kWh in Saudi is approx twice that of here in the UK then presumably £0.02/kWh could eventually be achieved here. Maybe someone will advise that it already has!

Saudi Arabia’s second PV tender draws world record low bid of $.0104/kW

The record low price was offered for the 600 MW Al-Faisaliah PV IP project, which competed in the second round of the country’s procurement scheme for renewable energies.

The crown prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammad bin Salman bin Abdulaziz, revealed today that power purchase agreements for seven large-scale solar power projects in various regions of the Kingdom were signed by the government and several undisclosed developers.

“The output capacity of these projects, in addition to the projects of Sakaka and Dumat Al-Jandal, will amount to more than 3,600 MW,” he said in a statement, adding that one of the projects – the 600 MW Al-Faisaliah PV IP project – will sell power at a world record low price of $0.0104/kWh. The project was selected by the Ministry of Energy in Round 2 of the procurement scheme that is being held under the umbrella of the country's National Renewable Energy Program (NREP).

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2021/04/08/saudi-arabias-second-pv-tender-draws-world-record-low-bid-of-0104-kw/

Martyn1981

Coastalwatch said:

I don't know if we're ever likely to see prices this low in the UK, but at less than 1p/kWh the price of renewable energy still appears to be firmly downward. Given that annual output/kWh in Saudi is approx twice that of here in the UK then presumably £0.02/kWh could eventually be achieved here. Maybe someone will advise that it already has!

Saudi Arabia’s second PV tender draws world record low bid of $.0104/kW

The record low price was offered for the 600 MW Al-Faisaliah PV IP project, which competed in the second round of the country’s procurement scheme for renewable energies.

The crown prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammad bin Salman bin Abdulaziz, revealed today that power purchase agreements for seven large-scale solar power projects in various regions of the Kingdom were signed by the government and several undisclosed developers.

“The output capacity of these projects, in addition to the projects of Sakaka and Dumat Al-Jandal, will amount to more than 3,600 MW,” he said in a statement, adding that one of the projects – the 600 MW Al-Faisaliah PV IP project – will sell power at a world record low price of $0.0104/kWh. The project was selected by the Ministry of Energy in Round 2 of the procurement scheme that is being held under the umbrella of the country's National Renewable Energy Program (NREP).

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2021/04/08/saudi-arabias-second-pv-tender-draws-world-record-low-bid-of-0104-kw/

I think some people might suggest I'm a bit of a fan of PV    but that price is simply mind blowing, it's as if the generation cost of the leccy is becoming trivial, almost irrelevant. Wow.

Regarding the UK, and I'm only spitballing here, but I suppose we have to take scale of deployment (of a single project) into account, land values, reduced annual generation of course, then there is probably a value to be applied to Saudi sunshine for being highly dependable on a daily basis, and far less seasonal variation. Perhaps those other factors will have an impact on the price that the leccy will be contracted at, but of course, reliable generation would be worth more, not less, so I think I've thought myself into a corner ..... I thunk?

What were those recent cost predictions that I think Tony Seba mentioned, was it a 70% reduction in PV generation costs this decade?

Coastalwatch

Meanwhile here in the UK projects aren't quite on the same scale but worth noting all the same. Even if it is but a mere fraction of that quietly abandoned by the government in 2018.

Army hails first solar installation as part of Project

PROMETHEUS

The British Army has hailed the installation of a 2.3MW photovoltaic solar farm at its Defence School of Transport (DST), Leconfield.

Delivered by Centrica Business Solutions, it is the first of four pilot sites being installed as part of Project PROMETHEUS, which collectively are designed to deliver £1 million in efficiency savings.

The Leconfield installation is the Army’s first solar site, it said. It follows the government abandoning plans to install 1GW of solar on its estate in 2018, following cuts to subsidies it enacted. It was shuttered when just 100MW of solar had been installed across two airfields owned by the Ministry of Defence.

https://www.solarpowerportal.co.uk/news/army_hails_first_solar_installation_as_part_of_project_promethus

Coastalwatch

Martyn1981 said:

I think some people might suggest I'm a bit of a fan of PV    but that price is simply mind blowing, it's as if the generation cost of the leccy is becoming trivial, almost irrelevant. Wow.

Regarding the UK, and I'm only spitballing here, but I suppose we have to take scale of deployment (of a single project) into account, land values, reduced annual generation of course, then there is probably a value to be applied to Saudi sunshine for being highly dependable on a daily basis, and far less seasonal variation. Perhaps those other factors will have an impact on the price that the leccy will be contracted at, but of course, reliable generation would be worth more, not less, so I think I've thought myself into a corner ..... I thunk?

What were those recent cost predictions that I think Tony Seba mentioned, was it a 70% reduction in PV generation costs this decade?

Thanks for pointing those out Mart. Have to agree there are far more things to take into account than just my simplified example. Added to those I somehow doubt there is much call for public enquiries or other such planning issues over there either. So, more than happy to concede that £0.02/kWh was being rather optimistic. Might it be more realistic then to suggest £0.03/kWh as being achievable.

If that's the case, perhaps now might be as good a time as any to get those extra panels installed you'd previously mentioned!

Martyn1981

Coastalwatch said:

Martyn1981 said:

I think some people might suggest I'm a bit of a fan of PV    but that price is simply mind blowing, it's as if the generation cost of the leccy is becoming trivial, almost irrelevant. Wow.

Regarding the UK, and I'm only spitballing here, but I suppose we have to take scale of deployment (of a single project) into account, land values, reduced annual generation of course, then there is probably a value to be applied to Saudi sunshine for being highly dependable on a daily basis, and far less seasonal variation. Perhaps those other factors will have an impact on the price that the leccy will be contracted at, but of course, reliable generation would be worth more, not less, so I think I've thought myself into a corner ..... I thunk?

What were those recent cost predictions that I think Tony Seba mentioned, was it a 70% reduction in PV generation costs this decade?

Thanks for pointing those out Mart. Have to agree there are far more things to take into account than just my simplified example. Added to those I somehow doubt there is much call for public enquiries or other such planning issues over there either. So, more than happy to concede that £0.02/kWh was being rather optimistic. Might it be more realistic then to suggest £0.03/kWh as being achievable.

If that's the case, perhaps now might be as good a time as any to get those extra panels installed you'd previously mentioned!

I'm finding this a fascinating question. I'm way out of my depth, this is definitely one for Z, so WWZD?

Step one, he would probably test to the extreme, so let's assume that the Saudi land costs are zero, and therefore all their generation costs + profit are equal to $10.04/MWh. If the land costs are more than zero (fair to assume) then they can cover the equipment, build and profit for less than $10.40/MWh.

From there assuming half the generation in the UK, we get a maz cost of ~$20/MWh for the equipment, build and profit (though labour costs may be more). Also, UK CfD contracts include the cost of the infrastructure connection, so possibly this is covered outside the Saudi price, though it too may be included.

I'm not even going to hazard a guess at the UK cost of land and connection fees, but jumping to the end, would this point towards a price of less than $30/MWh, and even more headroom for £30/MWh?

We know that PV is highly predictable (yes it's variable, like wind, but still predictable), so when storage is added in, especially if co-located to take advantage of wind gen, which with its winter and dawn/dusk bias, presumably make for great bedfellows, then even in the UK, PV will be a fantastic source of cheap generation.

Still just pondering out loud, so take none of this as accurate, but the many studies/reports looking to a 100% RE generation future, often called WWS (wind, water, sun), or Tony Seba's variation WSB (wind, solar and batteries), seem to suggest a roughly 70% contribution from solar for the World, but on a country by country basis, the UK has a massive wind bias, of ~70%.

And now in full waffle mode, we also need to consider demand side solar. Its costs won't fall quite as much as the PV makes up less of the total cost than supply side PV farms. But it too is falling in cost. In Australia the cost of home generation is now roughly on par with the transmission & distribution costs of leccy, so even if grid scale generation was free, it might still be cheaper to generate your own leccy at home, and at work. I've dug out my old spreadsheets where I tried to guesstimate what the UK cost of domestic generation was. At £4k for 4kWp I make it 6p/kWh at a borrowing rate of 2%, or 5.5p/kWh at a rate of 1%*. Not bad.

*This is based on a 25yr repayment mortgage model, so as to remove any questions about cost of capital, even if self funded from an instant access account paying interest (if funded at zero interest, then the cost is 5p/kWh). I also added £1k to the outstanding debt at the end of month 144 to represent a replacement inverter being installed. I don't account for panel degradation, as that will probably be less than inflation, so simpler to net it off.

michaels

Sorry if it is in the mesages above but did anyone look on pvgis to confirm the 2x factor for Saudi generation compared to the uk, bviously they will habe higher temps that at least in the panels available here reduces output relative to insolation.

I guess the issue with new solar is that it basically produces at the same time of day as existing solar so at some point additional solar supply will push the price of all generation in that time window down.  It is not for nothing that the govt has to use CFD to attract suppliers which puts a floor on the return they receive.

(Controversial bit. Whilst the CFD also puts a cap on supply costs, a glut of cheap solar at certain times of the day/year pushing down the spot price may cause generation that can supply 24/7 to be withdrawn from the supply mix because it is uneconomical, reducing capacity at the time solar is not available and pushing up overall prices during these periods)

Coastalwatch

Martyn1981 said:

Coastalwatch said:

Martyn1981 said:

I think some people might suggest I'm a bit of a fan of PV    but that price is simply mind blowing, it's as if the generation cost of the leccy is becoming trivial, almost irrelevant. Wow.

Regarding the UK, and I'm only spitballing here, but I suppose we have to take scale of deployment (of a single project) into account, land values, reduced annual generation of course, then there is probably a value to be applied to Saudi sunshine for being highly dependable on a daily basis, and far less seasonal variation. Perhaps those other factors will have an impact on the price that the leccy will be contracted at, but of course, reliable generation would be worth more, not less, so I think I've thought myself into a corner ..... I thunk?

What were those recent cost predictions that I think Tony Seba mentioned, was it a 70% reduction in PV generation costs this decade?

Thanks for pointing those out Mart. Have to agree there are far more things to take into account than just my simplified example. Added to those I somehow doubt there is much call for public enquiries or other such planning issues over there either. So, more than happy to concede that £0.02/kWh was being rather optimistic. Might it be more realistic then to suggest £0.03/kWh as being achievable.

If that's the case, perhaps now might be as good a time as any to get those extra panels installed you'd previously mentioned!

I'm finding this a fascinating question. I'm way out of my depth, this is definitely one for Z, so WWZD?

Step one, he would probably test to the extreme, so let's assume that the Saudi land costs are zero, and therefore all their generation costs + profit are equal to $10.04/MWh. If the land costs are more than zero (fair to assume) then they can cover the equipment, build and profit for less than $10.40/MWh.

From there assuming half the generation in the UK, we get a maz cost of ~$20/MWh for the equipment, build and profit (though labour costs may be more). Also, UK CfD contracts include the cost of the infrastructure connection, so possibly this is covered outside the Saudi price, though it too may be included.

I'm not even going to hazard a guess at the UK cost of land and connection fees, but jumping to the end, would this point towards a price of less than $30/MWh, and even more headroom for £30/MWh?

We know that PV is highly predictable (yes it's variable, like wind, but still predictable), so when storage is added in, especially if co-located to take advantage of wind gen, which with its winter and dawn/dusk bias, presumably make for great bedfellows, then even in the UK, PV will be a fantastic source of cheap generation.

Still just pondering out loud, so take none of this as accurate, but the many studies/reports looking to a 100% RE generation future, often called WWS (wind, water, sun), or Tony Seba's variation WSB (wind, solar and batteries), seem to suggest a roughly 70% contribution from solar for the World, but on a country by country basis, the UK has a massive wind bias, of ~70%.

And now in full waffle mode, we also need to consider demand side solar. Its costs won't fall quite as much as the PV makes up less of the total cost than supply side PV farms. But it too is falling in cost. In Australia the cost of home generation is now roughly on par with the transmission & distribution costs of leccy, so even if grid scale generation was free, it might still be cheaper to generate your own leccy at home, and at work. I've dug out my old spreadsheets where I tried to guesstimate what the UK cost of domestic generation was. At £4k for 4kWp I make it 6p/kWh at a borrowing rate of 2%, or 5.5p/kWh at a rate of 1%*. Not bad.

*This is based on a 25yr repayment mortgage model, so as to remove any questions about cost of capital, even if self funded from an instant access account paying interest (if funded at zero interest, then the cost is 5p/kWh). I also added £1k to the outstanding debt at the end of month 144 to represent a replacement inverter being installed. I don't account for panel degradation, as that will probably be less than inflation, so simpler to net it off.

Well Mart, I can't fault your theories and it would appear that the magic figure whereby renewable energy is so cheap that it can be diverted towards storage of various sorts to eventually arrive at economic cost. Anything surplus beyond that could perhaps be gobbled up in the manufacture of green Hydrogen of which vast amounts would be needed if aircraft and shipping are to be satisfied with this form. I believe it was Tony Seba who also pointed out that by 2030 renewables would become so cheap that any other forms of generation would not be competitive. That's all dependent on what other forms of storage might also be developed in the intervening years to plug the many gaps that will predictably occur.

Don't know if he will yet prove to be correct, but he was correct about EV's disrupting the FF market back in 2011 I believe and even predicting the year of it taking place!

Have to confess that I can't ever see there being sufficient land or rooftops available in the UK for Solar to actually create a situation where it would need to be curtailed. During daytime hours when solar peaks demand is generally high anyway and with more EV's coming into use, not too mention public transport and HGV's, then daytime demand may surely increase further as the option to charge while at work becomes attractive to those who cannot benefit from their domestic supply.

Technology appears to be racing away at quite a pace. Normally it would take several years to develop a vaccine for any new found desease or virus, yet half a dozen are now approved for use against Covid in the twelve months or so since it's arrival. Just goes to show that when mankind focusses on a single goal he can achieve surprising results.

Am I being too optimistic here?