Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

michaels

Exiled_Tyke said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-60903879

Looks like the treasury doesn't like the cost of nuclear! 

Was about to mention that:
No nuclear - too expensive
No Fracking - too unpopular nationally
No on shore wind - too unpopular NIMBY

Which leaves offshore wind and imported gas

and of course demand side measures but for some reason the govt seems ideologically opposed to energy saving

michaels

Martyn1981 said:

michaels said:

Then again our wind turbines which can produce nearly 20Gw have been running at well below 5 for the last couple of days and less than 2 for example today.  Floating wind will help as it allows greater dispersion of generating sites but perhaps we need 10x or more current capacity to actually 'keep the lights on' - how much would that cost compared to HPC?  Wind may cost half as much per theoretical GW but if you need 10x as much theoretical power because of intermittency then actually it costs 5x as much....

Drax Electric Insights

As discussed before, nuclear will also need storage (like intermittent RE) to help balance intraday generation to demand, and a simply mind blowing amount of seasonal storage to time shift summer excess to winter shortfall. Whereas RE generation is weighted towards the winter / higher demand, so even if we need days/weeks of long term storage for RE, it would still be a fraction of the storage capacity and cost that nuclear would need.

Once we accept that nuclear is not storage free, something you seemed to do previously, then comparisons like yours of wind capacity v's HPC become largely moot.

For the cost of nuclear generation, we can have 2+ times as much generation, and unlike nuclear it would be green and ethical, and generating in about 1/3rd of the time it takes to build new nuclear. Given that in the 2010's we displaced about half of FF generation with RE generation, then we should be able to displace the majority of the remainder this decade. With further RE deployment to tackle rising leccy demand (from industry, transport and space heating) and falling nuclear generation (as ageing nukes age out) as we need going forward.

A nuclear option would cost vastly more than a RE option, take decades longer, be (therefore) responsible for far more FF emissions during the delayed build out, need far more storage. The tendency is simply to 'hide' nuclear's storage need behind RE storage by suggesting just 'some' nuclear, or call it baseload, or simply forget about it accidentally. But since they both require storage we need to consider that cost for both, or exclude it from both, rather than trying to imply that RE / wind will cost 5x or 10x as much as HPC.

I think we both agree that nuclear plus RE makes no sense at all and I think renewable plus something else is almost certainly cheaper than nuclear plus intraday storage/curtailment but we need to cost it properly. Simply comparing average cost per Gwh of generation is not a fair comparison (unless we cost in the price of storage/curtailment/backup generation to get to the point where demand and supply are in balance at every moment not just annual totals)

shinytop

We'd be in deep doo doo if we were relying on wind now.  Solar is OK - until about 6pm.

Coastalwatch

Coastalwatch said:

As yet we haven't included the cost of decommisioning, currently standing at around £125bn for future generations to clear up after we've long gone. But why should we worry, let's just keep on kicking the can down the road.

Talking of kicking the can down the road.........

Push for new UK nuclear plants lacks facility for toxic waste, say experts

As Boris Johnson prepares a new push for nuclear power, the £131bn problem of how to safely dispose of vast volumes of radioactive waste created by the last British atomic energy programme remains unsolved.

The hugely expensive and dangerous legacy of the UK’s 20th-century nuclear revolution amounts to 700,000 cubic metres of toxic waste – roughly the volume of 6,000 doubledecker buses. Much of it is stored at Sellafield in Cumbria, which the Office for Nuclear Regulation says is one of the most complex and hazardous nuclear sites in the world.

As yet, there is nowhere to safely and permanently deposit this waste. Nearly 50 years ago the solution of a deep geological disposal facility (GDF) was put forward, but decades later the UK is no nearer to building one.

The cost of decommissioning and disposing of the radioactive waste from nuclear power stations built in the 1950s, 1970s and 1990s has risen to £131bn, according to the latest NDA annual report.

This is likely to rise further as the costs of building a deep geological disposal site rise to up to £53bn. Attempts to build an underground dump for nuclear waste have so far failed. Nine years ago an attempt to site one in Cumbria was rejected.

...........quite some legacy to leave behind for future generations.

Anyone up for leaving it in their Will to the grandchildren?

Incredible that we are talking hundreds of years, for the Nuclear Decommissioning Agency work, who's annual budget is already over £3bn!

Martyn1981

michaels said:

Martyn1981 said:

michaels said:

Then again our wind turbines which can produce nearly 20Gw have been running at well below 5 for the last couple of days and less than 2 for example today.  Floating wind will help as it allows greater dispersion of generating sites but perhaps we need 10x or more current capacity to actually 'keep the lights on' - how much would that cost compared to HPC?  Wind may cost half as much per theoretical GW but if you need 10x as much theoretical power because of intermittency then actually it costs 5x as much....

Drax Electric Insights

As discussed before, nuclear will also need storage (like intermittent RE) to help balance intraday generation to demand, and a simply mind blowing amount of seasonal storage to time shift summer excess to winter shortfall. Whereas RE generation is weighted towards the winter / higher demand, so even if we need days/weeks of long term storage for RE, it would still be a fraction of the storage capacity and cost that nuclear would need.

Once we accept that nuclear is not storage free, something you seemed to do previously, then comparisons like yours of wind capacity v's HPC become largely moot.

For the cost of nuclear generation, we can have 2+ times as much generation, and unlike nuclear it would be green and ethical, and generating in about 1/3rd of the time it takes to build new nuclear. Given that in the 2010's we displaced about half of FF generation with RE generation, then we should be able to displace the majority of the remainder this decade. With further RE deployment to tackle rising leccy demand (from industry, transport and space heating) and falling nuclear generation (as ageing nukes age out) as we need going forward.

A nuclear option would cost vastly more than a RE option, take decades longer, be (therefore) responsible for far more FF emissions during the delayed build out, need far more storage. The tendency is simply to 'hide' nuclear's storage need behind RE storage by suggesting just 'some' nuclear, or call it baseload, or simply forget about it accidentally. But since they both require storage we need to consider that cost for both, or exclude it from both, rather than trying to imply that RE / wind will cost 5x or 10x as much as HPC.

I think we both agree that nuclear plus RE makes no sense at all and I think renewable plus something else is almost certainly cheaper than nuclear plus intraday storage/curtailment but we need to cost it properly. Simply comparing average cost per Gwh of generation is not a fair comparison (unless we cost in the price of storage/curtailment/backup generation to get to the point where demand and supply are in balance at every moment not just annual totals)

Yep, that's why I consider the storage needs for nuclear and compare them to RE storage needs where they seem to balance out well, whereas the cost of new nuclear at 2x to 2.5x RE doesn't.* Hopefully considering all of the factors means that we don't (and won't) simply compare cost of generation. At least, that's what I've been doing for a decade.

*And of course that's before we consider the green and ethical issues of leaving vast subsidy and decommissioning costs to later generations, and the increased impact of AGW from delaying FF abatement due to lengthy nuclear build out times.

Martyn1981

shinytop said:

We'd be in deep doo doo if we were relying on wind now.  Solar is OK - until about 6pm.

Whilst that chart is pretty, I think you also need to consider the bigger picture. Sometimes we get a lot of generation from wind, sometimes a lot from gas. On average we are steadily displacing FF generation with RE generation. Wind is low at the moment, wind was very high a few weeks back. 

Currently when RE is low, the existing gas generation ramps up, and can at times be generating the majority of leccy, that's the plan, and seems to be working well. But on a yearly average over the last decade FF generation has fallen from around 75% to about 40%, and probably will remain less pa now than RE going forward, as it continues to decline.

In the near future, once there is enough viable excess to be economic, some of the load that RE can't carry, will be supplied by storage (as well as FF gas). In fact, in the longer term, there's a chance that some of that storage will be in the form of green methane or H2, and be burnt at the existing fleet of CCGT's, displacing FF gas, but making great use of the existing generating infrastructure and grid connections.

Of course you can point to low wind generation times, but since we do not rely currently on wind alone, I'm not sure what that proves? Since we don't rely today, nor plan in the future, to rely on a singular source of generation, I'm not sure what that proves?

I appreciate that you seem far from convinced by RE and/or storage, but the direction of travel the last decade should be eye opening, setting out trends and technological advancements. Now we have an ever growing amount of economic data on which to lean too, and whilst I appreciate 'it's' not quite yet written in stone, I would say it sure looks like a safer bet putting our money into green and ethical RE, than FF's or nuclear, and I suspect the stone engraving is just about to start.



But ..... if we are just having a bit of fun, and cherry picking periods, then last month wasn't bad, with wind generation nearly twice that of gas, and thankfully helping to reduce leccy costs a bit. Clearly Mch won't be as good with the recent drop off in wind generation boosting gas consumption.

Wind generation as a proportion of the total mix rose to 39.7% in February from the January figure of 27.5%. At the same time, the electricity produced from gas power stations fell from 37.4% of the total in January to 21.8% in February.

This big swing towards wind generation across the month from gas saw the average zero carbon measurement in the energy mix rise from 47% in January to 60% in February.

National Grid - Great Britain's monthly electricity stats

shinytop

Martyn1981 said:

shinytop said:

We'd be in deep doo doo if we were relying on wind now.  Solar is OK - until about 6pm.

Whilst that chart is pretty, I think you also need to consider the bigger picture. Sometimes we get a lot of generation from wind, sometimes a lot from gas. On average we are steadily displacing FF generation with RE generation. Wind is low at the moment, wind was very high a few weeks back. 

Currently when RE is low, the existing gas generation ramps up, and can at times be generating the majority of leccy, that's the plan, and seems to be working well. But on a yearly average over the last decade FF generation has fallen from around 75% to about 40%, and probably will remain less pa now than RE going forward, as it continues to decline.

In the near future, once there is enough viable excess to be economic, some of the load that RE can't carry, will be supplied by storage (as well as FF gas). In fact, in the longer term, there's a chance that some of that storage will be in the form of green methane or H2, and be burnt at the existing fleet of CCGT's, displacing FF gas, but making great use of the existing generating infrastructure and grid connections.

Of course you can point to low wind generation times, but since we do not rely currently on wind alone, I'm not sure what that proves? Since we don't rely today, nor plan in the future, to rely on a singular source of generation, I'm not sure what that proves?

I appreciate that you seem far from convinced by RE and/or storage, but the direction of travel the last decade should be eye opening, setting out trends and technological advancements. Now we have an ever growing amount of economic data on which to lean too, and whilst I appreciate 'it's' not quite yet written in stone, I would say it sure looks like a safer bet putting our money into green and ethical RE, than FF's or nuclear, and I suspect the stone engraving is just about to start.



But ..... if we are just having a bit of fun, and cherry picking periods, then last month wasn't bad, with wind generation nearly twice that of gas, and thankfully helping to reduce leccy costs a bit. Clearly Mch won't be as good with the recent drop off in wind generation boosting gas consumption.

Wind generation as a proportion of the total mix rose to 39.7% in February from the January figure of 27.5%. At the same time, the electricity produced from gas power stations fell from 37.4% of the total in January to 21.8% in February.

This big swing towards wind generation across the month from gas saw the average zero carbon measurement in the energy mix rise from 47% in January to 60% in February.

National Grid - Great Britain's monthly electricity stats

All I'm saying is that it doesn't matter how much RE we have, that very thin greenish line will still be very thin from time to time.
I know we can all cherry pick good and bad days (like I have just done) but at the moment we are massively reliant on fossil fuels, over the year as a whole as well as bad RE days like today.  I can see how, in theory, different types of storage could fill the gaps but I still haven't see any priced up plans to deliver them.     

silverwhistle

shinytop said:

We'd be in deep doo doo if we were relying on wind now.  Solar is OK - until about 6pm.

And of course before 6pm is when I use my juicier appliances and immersion heater. Last week I got over 75 miles of solar charging into my rather inefficient (as they go) EV without trying and still exported and won't be needing to use the grid for more mileage for quite a number of days, and aim to top up again from solar on Friday. I still ended up exporting a bit. Oh yes, also used some direct electric space heating.

I'm really only making the point that demand can be more flexible than we think, plus an increase in domestic PV will help that process and make few demands on both HV and LV networks. None of the tools at our disposal should be looked at in isolation.

NigeWick

michaels said:

Which leaves offshore wind and imported gas

What's wrong with roof solar and storage being added to the mix?

NigeWick

shinytop said:

We'd be in deep doo doo if we were relying on wind now.  Solar is OK - until about 6pm.

That's because we haven't got enough of it with storage, yet.