The Alternative Green Energy Thread

Magnitio

michaels said:

JKenH said:

silverwhistle said:

JKenH said:

Edit: sorry I had to break off. If there end up being 30 million EVs averaging 22 miles a day then at around 3 mpkWh at this time of year will add 220 GWh of demand. If just half charge overnight (say midnight to 7am) that adds over 15GW to demand.

Why would half charge every night? Even at your daily average (which is more than the current figures for the UK) you'd only need to charge about once a week. I charged to 100% last night at an average of less than 2p a unit, and to take it off 100% even used a bit of V2L this evening during the peak price period.

Sorry, if the basis of my calculation wasn’t very clear. I didn’t say drivers charge ‘every’ night as you suggest. My figure averaged out charging over the whole EV fleet, based on adding sufficient charge for 22 miles per day. I wasn’t suggesting each driver added 7 kWh overnight but as an average that is how much would need to be added across the fleet. Just as you do, most will add a larger quantity and then recharge when the battery gets low which might be several days or a week later or in some case the next day.

I assumed that as most drivers are keen to be able to exploit cheap charging rates they will charge overnight when the rates are cheap concentrating charging into the early hours (say midnight to 5am). Perhaps half charging overnight is an underestimate. 

Sorry, if my figure of 22 miles per day is incorrect. This article suggests it was a reasonable stab at an average EV mileage.

https://www.fleetnews.co.uk/news/ev-mileages-increase-as-petrol-and-diesel-vehicles-drive-fewer

Your calcs make sense to me, it would seem that that amount of electricity would basically bring usage 24/7 up to the same level as the current peak?

Some people also leave their charging to when the grid is at its greenest. This is encouraged both by dynamic tariffs and energy providers publicising when it is best to fill up e.g. Greener Days from Octopus.

silverwhistle

Sorry if I misunderstood any of the figures regarding EV electricity consumption impacts. The National Grid has said they aren't worried about it and as Magnitio pointed out many of us, including myself, don't contribute to peak demand but rather help optimise utilisation of our renewable resources.

The peak costs during the recent Dunkelflaute were rather painful, but coped with, and although changes are necessary to generation, transmission, usage patterns, efficiency etc. I don't subscribe to the view that we mustn't change and can carry on relying on fossil fuels.

From the point of view of EVs think of how much energy is saved by not extracting and refining all the petrol and diesel!

JKenH

The IEA find themselves in an embarrassing situation with their latest report published today:

Coal 2024 – the new edition of the IEA’s annual coal market report, which analyses the latest trends and updates medium-term forecasts – shows that global coal use has rebounded strongly after plummeting at the height of the pandemic. It is poised to rise to 8.77 billion tonnes in 2024, a record. According to the report, demand is set to stay close to this level through 2027 as renewable energy sources play a greater role in generating power and coal consumption levels off in China.

https://www.iea.org/news/global-coal-demand-is-set-to-plateau-through-2027

In December last year they had predicted peak coal in 2023

michaels

JKenH said:

The IEA find themselves in an embarrassing situation with their latest report published today:

Coal 2024 – the new edition of the IEA’s annual coal market report, which analyses the latest trends and updates medium-term forecasts – shows that global coal use has rebounded strongly after plummeting at the height of the pandemic. It is poised to rise to 8.77 billion tonnes in 2024, a record. According to the report, demand is set to stay close to this level through 2027 as renewable energy sources play a greater role in generating power and coal consumption levels off in China.

https://www.iea.org/news/global-coal-demand-is-set-to-plateau-through-2027

In December last year they had predicted peak coal in 2023

Not sure embarrassing is the right work - forecasts are just that, the best guess.  As long as they update the forecast as new information becomes available the I can't see the problem - although perhaps the previous forecast gave a false sense of hope, the new outcome highlights why we (as in all countries globally) need to focus even harder on reducing emissions.

Personally I think we should tax the embedded carbon in our imports as current polices mean that effectively we are simply offshoring the emissions from our consumption, falsely flattering our figures at considerable economic cost.

JKenH

EDF encourage DSR participation in France in a novel way but despite the fact it would save virtually everyone money, only 1.6%of households take up the tariff.

Demand-side response is falling when net zero plans need it to rise

In addition, Electricité de France (“EDF”), the main electricity supplier in France, operates a consumer tariff similar to the DFS. The “Tempo” tariff is designed to manage electricity demand and costs, incorporating a traffic light-like system with blue, white, and red days, each having different pricing. This system replaced the older “EJP” (Effacement Jour de Pointe) tariff, which had similar demand management features.

Under the Tempo system:

• Blue days are the cheapest, with users paying prices that are 30% lower at peak times (from 06:00 to 22:00) and 41% lower at off-peak times, compared to the regulatory price. This covers 300 days per year;
• White days are moderately priced, and occur on 43 days. Savings are still 10% at peak times and 34% at off-peak times;
• Red days are the most expensive with prices three times higher than the normal rate, and limited to 22 days during winter (1 November to 31 March). The price per kWh is three times higher than the normal rate in order to encourage consumers to reduce consumption during peak demand periods, in order to manage load on the electricity grid more efficiently. Even on red days, users can save up to 16% during off-peak hours if they cut down on usage.

The vast majority of households prefer to be on the regulated tariff. Although some studies have shown that up to 100% of households would be better off on Tempo than the regulated tariff, it suffers from low public awareness, and problems for households if a series of red or white days occur on consecutive days.

https://watt-logic.com/2024/12/29/falling-dsr-participation/

JKenH

Maybe it’s not a great idea to place too much reliance on undersea cables (be it electricity or telecoms).

Sixty-mile drag mark found near damaged Baltic Sea cable, says Finland

Finnish investigators say they have found a seabed trail stretching almost 100km (about 60 miles) around the site of an underwater electricity cable that was damaged on Christmas Day in a suspected act of Russian sabotage.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/dec/30/finnish-investigators-into-suspected-sabotage-find-100km-trail-on-baltic-sea-bed

JKenH

Analysis of yesterday’s close call on the electricity grid. 

Blackouts near miss in tightest day in GB electricity market since 2011

The Winter Outlook published in October proudly announced that the capacity margin was higher than last year (and for this reason the Demand Flexibility Service (“DFS”) was designated as a normal margin management tooland not part of an emergency contingency – the DFS was not activated on 8 January). The Winter Outlook predicted that weather-corrected peak transmission system demand would be 44.4 GW, down from 44.9 GW last winter. Actual peak demand on 8 January was 46.8 GW – 2.4 GW higher than the peak demand expectation for the winter. This is a huge error.

Unfortunately, NESO is not transparent about just how close the market came to disaster today.

Interconnector owners do not control the flows under normal operations – they make capacity available and traders in the market will buy it, flowing power one way or another. This is why, as I have noted in the past, the inclusion of interconnectors in the Capacity Market is inappropriate and provides a false sense of security. Under Capacity Market rules, interconnectors must be available in a system stress event, but being available means electricity can flow, it does not mean electricity will flow to GB – the interconnector will meet the availability criteria if it is exporting.

https://watt-logic.com/2025/01/09/blackouts-near-miss-in-tighest-day-in-gb-electricity-market-since-2011/

QrizB

JKenH said:

Analysis of yesterday’s close call on the electricity grid.

Blackouts near miss in tightest day in GB electricity market since 2011

The comments from "Andrew Richards" include useful corrections / additions.

I'd spotted that the error re. blog's claim that NESO didn't operate the DFS yesterday; I'd participated in it with Octopus

JKenH

QrizB said:

JKenH said:

Analysis of yesterday’s close call on the electricity grid.

Blackouts near miss in tightest day in GB electricity market since 2011

The comments from "Andrew Richards" include useful corrections / additions.

I'd spotted that the error re. blog's claim that NESO didn't operate the DFS yesterday; I'd participated in it with Octopus

Yes, I was puzzled by Kathryn Porter’s comments about DFS. Octopus said something similar. 

This plea comes after the system chose to pay over £17 million to two fossil fuel power plants for backup power amid a cold weather snap yesterday, instead of calling on the significantly cheaper Demand Flexibility Service (DFS).

The gas stations received payments of up to £5,750 per MWh of power generated between midday and 7pm. In stark contrast, households participating in Octopus’ demand flexibility scheme ‘Saving Sessions’ during the same timeframe were offered just £900 per MWh – over six times less.

https://octopus.energy/press/pay-people-not-power-plants/

I have opted out of saving sessions this year given the reduced rates offered and the disruption coinciding with cooking our tea. Last winter, to get earlier notifications of when there might be a saving session I signed up to National Grid ESO’s (now NESO) to get notifications direct. I assumed I was still subscribed but didn’t hear anything yesterday so perhaps that has changed. There used to be a database of DFS events but I can’t find anything for 2024/5. Here is the list if 2023/4 events. https://www.neso.energy/data-portal/demand-flexibility-service/dfs_industry_notification

Edit: I logged into my NESO account and saw that the email option was off. Below that page is an example of what I would receive. 

Reed_Richards

How many suppliers are actually participating in the DFS scheme this winter?  Mine, Eon Next, has dropped out.  Perhaps it has been watered down to beyond the point where it can be useful?