Electric cars

gzoom

AdrianC wrote: »

10km2 of equatorial Indian sunshine to generate 600MW. China is building an 850MW using 27km2.
Meanwhile, UK consumption is 45GW.

So that'd be 1,450km2 at the Chinese power density - or damn near the entire area of South Yorkshire.
All I can say is that I grew up in Sheffield, so can only say that while there are undoubtedly merits to burying the entire area under solar cells, I spot a bit of a meteorological flaw in the plan...

I said the UK has WIND resources not solar. If you have been any near Scotland you know how much constant wind there is. Add in the offshore experience already there from oil and you already have a massive work force with plenty of experience in developing offshore energy generation.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jan/06/uk-wind-power-coal-green-groups-carbon-taxes

But if you want to keep on bashing renewables I can understand, its your personal opinion which your free to express.

bigadaj

gzoom wrote: »

I said the UK has WIND resources not solar. If you have been any near Scotland you know how much constant wind there is. Add in the offshore experience already there from oil and you already have a massive work force with plenty of experience in developing offshore energy generation.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jan/06/uk-wind-power-coal-green-groups-carbon-taxes

But if you want to keep on bashing renewables I can understand, its your personal opinion which your free to express.

Wind isn't constant by definition.

Wave and tidal are, but that would be too risky developing genuinely new technology rather than buying it in from China.

Martyn1981

AdrianC wrote: »

10km2 of equatorial Indian sunshine to generate 600MW. China is building an 850MW using 27km2.
Meanwhile, UK consumption is 45GW.

So that'd be 1,450km2 at the Chinese power density - or damn near the entire area of South Yorkshire.
All I can say is that I grew up in Sheffield, so can only say that while there are undoubtedly merits to burying the entire area under solar cells, I spot a bit of a meteorological flaw in the plan...

Land area is not an issue for PV in the UK. If we wanted to generate the equivalent of all UK leccy generation, then we'd have to cover 2% of England in 15% efficient PV panels. Currently about 2% of England is covered in golf courses.

In reality:
1. We are only looking to generate about 7-10% of our leccy from PV, so that's about 30-40GWp.
2. Normal efficiency panels are now about 17.5% and rising.
3. We could put 20GWp of PV on domestic rooves, and far more on commercial rooves.
4. Car park canopies, farm buildings and poultry sheds, and low grade grazing land allow a vast increase in the number.
5. Most PV farms use low efficiency thin film PV as it's cheaper per kWp than normal PV. This means they have to cover more land. Simple logic would suggest that the savings on PV costs must be greater than the increased land costs when making that business decision. From there we can conclude that land is both cheap and available.

So there is no land issue for PV in the UK, at all, we could easily go to 15-20% of supply (with idle storage built for winter wind, or nightime nuclear) without needing to use any agricultural land if we wanted too.

For the UK wind generation is more important, even though PV is going cheaper, as wind has a better seasonal spread. However, the main weakness of wind (and hydro) is that they perform worst during the summer months. So PV not only generates cheap leccy, but supports our larger generation choice.

Lastly, an oft overlooked point about PV is that it is perfect for the demand side as it doesn't benefit from economies of scale (or to be more correct, suffer from diseconomies of scale). So it supports demand side generation, reduces loads on the distribution network, and brings in demand side investment monies, which are separate to supply side funds. It also allows for reduced bills and some energy independence.

NigeWick

gzoom wrote: »

UK have more than enough wind resources to do something similar but the current government simply don't have the ability to look beyond past technologies.

Batteries are going to be HUGE buissness in the coming decade. No wonder LG/Samsung/Panasonic are all busy gearing up their production capacity.

We are on the brink of an energy revolution with a dramatic shift away from fossil, EVs are only part of the answer, something Tesla recognise. The future cannot come fast enough.

I disagree about government, I think they are being paid or otherwise influenced by nuclear & fossil energy companies and their hired lobbyists.

Batteries for now but there are other technologies like compressed air coming too.

I agree. It will not be the environmental lobby that causes it, it will be hard nosed business people seeing the cost and profit advantages.

Martyn1981

bigadaj wrote: »

Wind isn't constant by definition.

Wave and tidal are, but that would be too risky developing genuinely new technology rather than buying it in from China.

True, but off-shore wind is approaching a capacity factor of 50%, which isn't that bad compared to nuclear at 91%. Also on-shore and off-shore wind have differing generation profiles, which helps to flatten their peaks and troughs of generation a bit.

Add in wave and tidal, as you suggest, plus hydro, PV, bio-energy and storage and things start to look a lot better.

NigeWick

AdrianC wrote: »

So that'd be 1,450km2 at the Chinese power density - or damn near the entire area of South Yorkshire.

How much area do all the rooves in the country cover? Even East or West facing ones will get about 85% of what a South facing one gets. If all new builds are oriented for maximum potential and the Feed in Tariff for retrofit at least matches subsidy or contract for difference benefits that nuclear and fossil fuels get it will be well worthwhile, especially when added to offshore wind generation. Battery storage is coming down in price and is already being installed in some places.

I'll be buying an electric vehicle (EV) later this year and the battery will be a minimum of 30kWh. There is a trial of Car 2 Grid starting and I'll hopefully get my EV in time to join it. Imagine say 3 million battery EVs averaging 30kWh each connected to the grid charging from "free" solar or cheap off peak electricity and then selling it back to the grid at peak times. I have quoted 3 million as with autonomous vehicles actual ownership is likely to drop by 70 - 90% and at present there are over 30 million cars trying to use our roads.

AdrianC

NigeWick wrote: »

There is a trial of Car 2 Grid starting and I'll hopefully get my EV in time to join it. Imagine say 3 million battery EVs averaging 30kWh each connected to the grid charging from "free" solar or cheap off peak electricity and then selling it back to the grid at peak times. I have quoted 3 million as with autonomous vehicles actual ownership is likely to drop by 70 - 90% and at present there are over 30 million cars trying to use our roads.

So your car has been sitting, plugged in, for days - and when you get in it to drive somewhere, it's flat.

NigeWick

bigadaj wrote: »

Wind isn't constant by definition.

But with battery or other storage it can provide constant electricity flow. Not forgetting that batteries offer instant service and we pay gas, diesel and coal generators just to be available as well as for their generation.

Martyn1981

AdrianC wrote: »

So your car has been sitting, plugged in, for days - and when you get in it to drive somewhere, it's flat.

That's a rather silly comment isn't it?

Firstly, why hasn't the car charged up at night?
Secondly, a simple setting would allow you to choose how much discharge to allow, if at all, ensuring xkWhs even before the night long charge.
Thirdly NigeWick said 3m cars, well at just 1kW for 2 hours, they'd wipe 3GW off the evening peak. That's about a third of the peak above daytime average.

10m cars supplying 2kW for 2 hours would push the evening demand below 'normal'.

I think you are looking for problems, rather than considering the solutions.

AdrianC

Martyn1981 wrote: »

That's a rather silly comment isn't it?

Firstly, why hasn't the car charged up at night?

It did. Then it discharged again, because it was supplying power back to the grid.

That's kinda the whole point of it, right?