The Alternative Green Energy Thread

michaels

As mentioned on the Agile price thread, it looks like certain producers (which includes the interconnects), realising how tight supply is are basically withholding supply in order to spike prices for day ahead which they can then fulfil for a profit knowing that demand is pretty inelastic especially as most end users do not face the spot price.

I wonder if the regulators are smart enough to spot this and investigate - no doubt even if they do it will involve bolting the stable door after the speculators have already bolted and retired with their earnings.

JKenH

Maybe the interconnector prices are just a function of supply and demand. Europe is having similar problems with supply to us. 

The swing producers are most probably gaming the market as you suggest. Maybe one last attempt to make some money out of coal. Having told the coal fired generators we don’t want/ need your dirty generation, it is ironic that we are now having to turn to them and say help out boys one last time before we shut you down for good. 

As a previous article said, it is the perfect storm for UK generation and our grid is proving what we have suspected since the January capacity warnings; we are in danger of becoming a third world country in terms of the resilience of our grid. Ideology unfortunately has forged on ahead of pragmatism and we are paying the price. I just don’t understand how the powers that be couldn’t see it coming. 

I think my wife hit the nail on the head when she said that fewer and fewer people are in top jobs for the long haul. They make all the right political noises to climb up the greasy pole knowing they will have moved on by the time the consequences of their decisions get found out. 

I believe the recent decision to automatically shut down all domestic and workplace smart chargers has only been taken on the back of concerns raised by the transport select committee that our grid can’t cope the way it is. Yes, we have known smart chargers would play a part in times of exceptionally high demand but to have to deploy them routinely to ration power 9 hours a day is an admission that we have screwed up with the planning of our electricity grid, and we are now stuck with this for the next decade at least. There is no quick fix. 

 

JKenH

Two more suppliers fail as energy prices soar

https://watt-logic.com/2021/09/15/energy-prices-soar/

michaels

And that is before the interconnector fire this morning which has pushed up gas prices again by more than 10% - 185p compared to 28p this time a year ago.

gefnew

Not Good News
National Grid site fire shuts down power cable between France and UK - BBC News
OH dear

JKenH

Pollution on some new UK trains ‘13 times one of London’s busiest roads’

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/sep/16/pollution-on-some-new-uk-trains-13-times-one-of-londons-busiest-roads

JKenH

Where are CO2 reductions the highest?

Old article (2018] but interesting.

Running the above analysis for all European countries for which we have data, we can construct a ranking:

Great Britain is the area where installing wind turbines yields the most CO2 reduction, as it displaces mostly fossil fuels (in this case gas). Note the interesting case of Eastern Denmark (DK-DK2) that displaces a surprisingly low amount of emissions. This is due to the fact that installing more wind production in Eastern Denmark has the effect of reducing hydro imports from Sweden to a larger extent than local coal and gas generation (see our previous article). As hydro generation already is low-carbon, the benefits of replacing it with wind power are very limited. The same is also true of Poland where a mix of local coal generation and Swedish hydro imports will be displaced, thus making it approximately the same level as Great Britain.

Furthermore, as building a wind turbine is not a carbon neutral investment (concrete is required to build them, ships to install them offshore..), we’ve added the additional CO2 emissions (from the IPCC) incurred as an indicator. Those emissions are calculated over the total life span of the asset, and converted to a yearly average. Using this indicator, installing a wind turbine in Norway — where it would only displace low-carbon hydro — would actually yield a slight CO2 increase, as the reductions would be insufficient to cover the initial emissions.

https://www.tmrow.com/blog/do-renewables-always-reduce-carbon-emissions/

Heedtheadvice

Could you add who the "we" is in the above post?

JKenH

Heedtheadvice said:

Could you add who the "we" is in the above post?

Tomorrow 
https://www.tmrow.com/

michaels

JKenH said:

Where are CO2 reductions the highest?

Old article (2018] but interesting.

Running the above analysis for all European countries for which we have data, we can construct a ranking:

Great Britain is the area where installing wind turbines yields the most CO2 reduction, as it displaces mostly fossil fuels (in this case gas). Note the interesting case of Eastern Denmark (DK-DK2) that displaces a surprisingly low amount of emissions. This is due to the fact that installing more wind production in Eastern Denmark has the effect of reducing hydro imports from Sweden to a larger extent than local coal and gas generation (see our previous article). As hydro generation already is low-carbon, the benefits of replacing it with wind power are very limited. The same is also true of Poland where a mix of local coal generation and Swedish hydro imports will be displaced, thus making it approximately the same level as Great Britain.

Furthermore, as building a wind turbine is not a carbon neutral investment (concrete is required to build them, ships to install them offshore..), we’ve added the additional CO2 emissions (from the IPCC) incurred as an indicator. Those emissions are calculated over the total life span of the asset, and converted to a yearly average. Using this indicator, installing a wind turbine in Norway — where it would only displace low-carbon hydro — would actually yield a slight CO2 increase, as the reductions would be insufficient to cover the initial emissions.

https://www.tmrow.com/blog/do-renewables-always-reduce-carbon-emissions/

Does this analysis include all interconnectors - eg is that Swedish and Norwegian hydro that is displaced simply lost (not used for generation) or is it diverted to other countries via interconnectors, displacing fossil fuel usage elsewhere?