The future of fuel: will today be Britain's first coal free day since the Ind Rev?

GreatApe

wotsthat wrote: »

There's no doubt now that the future is electric the only question is where that electricity is going to come from and is a no-coal target of 2025 too ambitious.

In the 1980s Europe should have done what France did and gone 75% nuclear. But with Germany divided and with the Soviets in many other EU nations plus the large coal deposits and coal Unions in the UK Poland and Germany that did not happen.

Only 100 additional reactors across 25 sites in the EU would have seen the whole EU go 70% nuclear. They would have also lasted 100 years.

Anyway that boat has sailed. The most likely outcome for the EU is heavy reliance of fossil fuels for a long time. With small additions of solar and wind annually and the false clean power of biofuels

GreatApe

antrobus wrote: »

You mean taxis.:)

Just because it's arithmetically possible, doesn't mean to say it's actually possible.

Any kind of transport is subject to peak demand. There is a reason why the No58 bus is packed at 8.00am, but only carries six OAPs clutching their bus passes at 11.00 am.:)

Yes there are peak usage cases but all 32 million cars in the UK are never ever in use at the same time. I would guess no more than 10 million are ever in use at the same time which means in time we may go towards 10 million self drive EVs displacing the 32 million private cars. This isn't even about EVs its about self drive software. With it 10 million self drive oil cars can replace 32 million private oil cars.

The first 1 million self drive EVs could displace as much as 10 million oil cars. Of course the next million EVs can not do that, the second million EVs may only be able to displace 5 million oil cars and the million EVs after that maybe only 3 million oil cars etc

GreatApe

A_Medium_Size_Jock wrote: »

It's about time we could have a coal-free power day TBH; it is great news.

Solar and wind are okay but we would need far more of each that we already have - and the feeling amongst some is that what we have so far is intrusive enough.

Nuclear is an option but IMHO what turns some public opinion against that idea is not what it is, but who would build it & even run it.
Which has lead to potentially huge costs too.
We have gone (rapidly) from a leading nation in the technology of nuclear power to a "has-been", reliant upon the Chinese and the French potentially to do our nuclear work.
Crazy, IMHO - as well as potentially dangerous.

Still, I suppose that's what happens when idealists like Corbyn & the CND begin to influence thinking even amongst just some.

We need to look ahead and develop what potential we have, like tidal power and blue-green algae as well as have an intermediate plan.
That being the problem - what exactly do we do in the meantime before new technologies are able to supply what power we need?

The UK is fine with what it has. As the coal plants close down we will just use the existing gas plants more.

There is no need for everyone to go green. A country like England could not go solar + batteries due to the low sunshine and the large amounts of land it would require.

However the middle east certainly could do that plenty of sunshine and lots of low value land to use. They can then export us the displaced oil and gas.

The real challenge is China and soon India. Both should work together to deploy 500 nuclear reactors each. Every other country with decent sunshine should go solar PV plus battery. Even the countries with poor sunshine but lots of land per capita could do solar plus butteries. For everyone else it will just be using nat gas and oil.

I suppose the UK could go biofuel but nat gas really is better.

A_Medium_Size_Jock

GreatApe wrote: »

The UK is fine with what it has. As the coal plants close down we will just use the existing gas plants more.

There is no need for everyone to go green. A country like England could not go solar + batteries due to the low sunshine and the large amounts of land it would require.

However the middle east certainly could do that plenty of sunshine and lots of low value land to use. They can then export us the displaced oil and gas.

The real challenge is China and soon India. Both should work together to deploy 500 nuclear reactors each. Every other country with decent sunshine should go solar PV plus battery. Even the countries with poor sunshine but lots of land per capita could do solar plus butteries. For everyone else it will just be using nat gas and oil.

I suppose the UK could go biofuel but nat gas really is better.

The idea of using gas is okay so long as we don't have to import it, because that way again danger lies.
And already we only supply 45% of what we use with the rest coming from mainland Europe (via where?) and Norway
We really don't want to depend heavily upon foreign gas.

Which leaves one option really for gas to remain both viable and a sensible option if we are to use gas rather than significantly increase greener sources.
How popular can we make fracking as an option?

antrobus

GreatApe wrote: »

Yes there are peak usage cases but all 32 million cars in the UK are never ever in use at the same time. I would guess no more than 10 million are ever in use at the same time which means in time we may go towards 10 million self drive EVs displacing the 32 million private cars. This isn't even about EVs its about self drive software. With it 10 million self drive oil cars can replace 32 million private oil cars....

The RAC Foundation states that over 15 million workers use a car to commute to work. And that's just for England and Wales.

http://www.racfoundation.org/assets/rac_foundation/content/downloadables/car-and-the-commute-web-version.pdf

GreatApe wrote: »

...The first 1 million self drive EVs could displace as much as 10 million oil cars. Of course the next million EVs can not do that, the second million EVs may only be able to displace 5 million oil cars and the million EVs after that maybe only 3 million oil cars etc

Like I said before, just because you believe it to be arithmetically possible, does not make it so. There is more to economics than mere arithmetic.

For example; there are likely a number of car owners who, today, have a car sitting on the driveway that costs them (say) £3k a year to run, when they could dump the car and rely on taxis costing them £1k a year and be quids in. But they choose option A for convenince, or whatever reason. What difference it would make to them if the taxi was driven by a robot rather a human?

antrobus

A_Medium_Size_Jock wrote: »

The idea of using gas is okay so long as we don't have to import it, because that way again danger lies. And already we only supply 45% of what we use with the rest coming from mainland Europe (via where?) and Norway
We really don't want to depend heavily upon foreign gas.

Yes 45% of gas comes from UK production. 38% from European pipelines, originating mainly in Norway and Russia. The remaining 17% is LNG from places like Qatar and Peru. The problem we have is that North Sea production is in decline.

https://www.britishgas.co.uk/the-source/our-world-of-energy/energys-grand-journey/where-does-uk-gas-come-from

There are four pipelines.
http://www.energy-uk.org.uk/energy-industry/gas-generation/gas-supplies.html

GreatApe

A_Medium_Size_Jock wrote: »

Solar and wind are okay but we would need far more of each that we already have - and the feeling amongst some is that what we have so far is intrusive enough.

Offshore wind has potential its going to be expensive but it is possible in the UK to go to perhaps as much as 55% wind power

GreatApe

A_Medium_Size_Jock wrote: »

The idea of using gas is okay so long as we don't have to import it, because that way again danger lies.
And already we only supply 45% of what we use with the rest coming from mainland Europe (via where?) and Norway
We really don't want to depend heavily upon foreign gas.

Which leaves one option really for gas to remain both viable and a sensible option if we are to use gas rather than significantly increase greener sources.
How popular can we make fracking as an option?

There is no problem in being reliant on gas. It's just as reliable as anything else.

In the short to medium term the world has an excess of LNG and more is coming online in Australia USA and Canada.

GreatApe

antrobus wrote: »

The RAC Foundation states that over 15 million workers use a car to commute to work. And that's just for England and Wales.

http://www.racfoundation.org/assets/rac_foundation/content/downloadables/car-and-the-commute-web-version.pdf



Like I said before, just because you believe it to be arithmetically possible, does not make it so. There is more to economics than mere arithmetic.

For example; there are likely a number of car owners who, today, have a car sitting on the driveway that costs them (say) £3k a year to run, when they could dump the car and rely on taxis costing them £1k a year and be quids in. But they choose option A for convenince, or whatever reason. What difference it would make to them if the taxi was driven by a robot rather a human?

My point is correct. Self drive cars will be utilized more than 7,900 miles a year. I think it might be as much as 15x more. I may be wrong it night be 10x as much or 5x as much but its clearly going to be a multiple above 1x. A Google search says a NYC taxi does 70,000 miles per year and about 400k miles in its 6 year life. I would expect at least that much for a robo taxi maybe even twice that figure.

The reason why people currently own lots of cars is that taxis are expensive. The human flesh computer doing the driving wants £1 per mile just for himself, the silicon computer will be happy with 5p per mile. Due to current taxis being expensive they are small in number relative to the car fleet but with robot taxis being cheaper they will be much more numerous which will make them more convenient. Instead of waiting 10 mins for one to arrive once you summon it night take 1 minute.

So once again, robo EVs will displace multiple times the human ICEs. Right now its anyone's guess but 1:10 ratio at the beginning looks quote possible

A_Medium_Size_Jock

GreatApe wrote: »

There is no problem in being reliant on gas. It's just as reliable as anything else.

In the short to medium term the world has an excess of LNG and more is coming online in Australia USA and Canada.

But the supply may not be reliable.
Personally I have no desire to become dependent upon the whims of others, especially when these "others" include such as Vladimir Putin who has already threatened gas supplies elsewhere.

Then there is the question of price; we would become subject to markets controlled by who-knows-who in the future?
As with OPEC in the past and oil prices.

For gas to be a real, viable option we must have more of our own supply rather than being dependent upon others.