Electric boiler

A._Badger

Andy_WSM wrote: »

So? I was replying to the point that was stated saying our electricity nowadays is produced "for the most part by fossil fuels".

Boxing day,
33% wind

Coal 1%,
Gas 26%.

27% fossil fuels, so not "the most part", which was the original point.

Of course it will vary day to day until the mix is favoured towards renewables and grid storage, which WILL happen.

1/ For the days on which wind and solar fail (usually a cold, still day with an anticyclone) you still need fossil fuel backups, with all the attendant costs of redundant plant on standby. The result? Sky high prices.

2/ If you ere trying to suggest these mythical backups will work you need to explain how. Note that it will not be by lithium-ion batteries due to cost, shortage of raw materials and quite profound technical limitations.

If you want some facts, try this from MIT: https://www.technologyreview.com/s/611683/the-25-trillion-reason-we-cant-rely-on-batteries-to-clean-up-the-grid/

Probably an even better analysis can be found here: https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2018/05/29/can-batteries-solve-the-intermittency-problem/

Anyone planning to heat their home in the UK using electricity alone is offering an enormous hostage to fortune.

A._Badger

Gerry1 wrote: »

But that sounds much like the original night storage heaters ! No doubt it was nice having a warm house 24/7 when electricity was cheap as chips in the 1970s, but that represents a lot of wasted energy, hence the development of Dimplex Quantum and suchlike which minimise wasted output overnight.

Seems to me that having to warm a house for much longer than is needed will negate much of the benefits of E7 and heat pump efficiencies. If a heat pump is running 24/7 the fact that the E7 daytime rates are higher than they would be on a single rate tariff will also play havoc with the cost savings.

I can assure you that night storage radiators did not keep any home properly and reliably warm in the 1970s. Nor were they chap to run back then - far from it. I tried and learned the hard way!

Gerry1

A._Badger wrote: »

I can assure you that night storage radiators did not keep any home properly and reliably warm in the 1970s. Nor were they chap to run back then - far from it. I tried and learned the hard way!

They were OK but only if correctly dimensioned. Unfortunately, this was often not the case with local authorities and housing associations who only considered the capital costs, hence the need for E10, E12 etc. But agreed, they should only be used as a last resort today because NSH is about the most expensive form of heating apart from single rate plug-in heaters.

A._Badger

Gerry1 wrote: »

They were OK but only if correctly dimensioned. Unfortunately, this was often not the case with local authorities and housing associations who only considered the capital costs, hence the need for E10, E12 etc. But agreed, they should only be used as a last resort today because NSH is about the most expensive form of heating apart from single rate plug-in heaters.

Having suffered in several properties with various models of storage radiators I would never even consider them.

The two fundamental problems are first, that you have to be psychic, so that you can foretell the weather for the following day and the second is that they emit most of their stored heat while most properties are empty, during the day. And then there are power cuts...

I'd agree with you about their unsuitability for use today on cost terms but even beyond that, fiddle with the concept as Dimplex might, the basic disadvantages are inherent and still remain.

Of course, thanks to the Green fantasists they will continue to be forced on people until enough wake up to what they are having planned for them - a compulsory all-electric future, with with an unreliable, unaffordable, inflexible method of heating.

jamesd

Air or ground source heat pump seems worth considering. It varies but you might get delivered heat of around three times the electricity input. Beats one times from direct use of an electric element in a boiler. And that multiplier will increase the environmental benefit.

Martyn1981

Gerry1 wrote: »

But that sounds much like the original night storage heaters ! No doubt it was nice having a warm house 24/7 when electricity was cheap as chips in the 1970s, but that represents a lot of wasted energy, hence the development of Dimplex Quantum and suchlike which minimise wasted output overnight.

Seems to me that having to warm a house for much longer than is needed will negate much of the benefits of E7 and heat pump efficiencies. If a heat pump is running 24/7 the fact that the E7 daytime rates are higher than they would be on a single rate tariff will also play havoc with the cost savings.

Not sure leccy was cheap in the 70's.

The point here is that heat pumps can provide the heat for about 1/3rd of the energy input from direct leccy heating, and perhaps 1/4 of the energy input from burning gas or diesel when the boiler efficiency is taken into account.

So 'charging' up the house on heat from E7 seems logical, and it's also fair to assume that the daytime COP of the heatpump will, on average, be higher than the nighttime due to higher external ambient temps.

Today, after a GCH burn from 7am to 8.30am, we've been warming the conservatory, living room, kitchen and hallway from the small (3.5kW) air con unit we have. It's been consuming around 700W. We'll now switch it off for an evening GCH burn.

Some, but not much today, of the leccy will have come from our PV, and Mch/Apr & Sept/Oct should be 100% PV powered most days.

Don't knock the 'new stuff' it's coming whether you believe in it or not.

Andy_WSM

Some people won't want to read or believe this, but it is what it is:

https://news.sky.com/story/more-power-came-from-renewable-energy-than-fossil-fuels-in-uk-in-2019-11898806

So to summarize - as I stated above and was challenged for, MOST of our electricity is now coming from renewable sources.

To say that most of our electricity is from fossil fuels is old data, obsolete, no longer the truth.

A._Badger

Andy_WSM wrote: »

Some people won't want to read or believe this, but it is what it is:

https://news.sky.com/story/more-power-came-from-renewable-energy-than-fossil-fuels-in-uk-in-2019-11898806

So to summarize - as I stated above and was challenged for, MOST of our electricity is now coming from renewable sources.

To say that most of our electricity is from fossil fuels is old data, obsolete, no longer the truth.

It's a completely disingenuous claim. The only useful measure is a tine/availability based one. When electricity demand soars, usually first thing in the working morning, that demand can only be met by imported electricity and electricity created by gas and other fossil fuel powered generators in the UK.

On a cold day, with a typical winter high pressure weather system, the same is even truer.

Using a a US figure (but it will be broadly similar in the UK) solar and wind generators produce electricity between 25 and 30% of the time. To make the whole system work you need huge investment in plant to cover for inherently unreliable renewables - hence the ridiculous cost of electricity and the prospect of brown and blackouts which we are worringly likely to experience in the next bad winter.

Cardew

Whilst wind/solar is providing an ever increasing proportion of the electricity we use, it still has a major limitation.


The peak load on the grid in UK is on a winter evening. At that time solar is producing nothing(zero) and it can be the same for wind. So as stated above we still need the generating capacity to cope with that load and that will need to be provided by fossil fuel and nuclear; the latter might be imported from France.


The real breakthrough will come when massive cheap electrical storage becomes available.

Cardew

Andy_WSM wrote: »

Some people won't want to read or believe this, but it is what it is:

https://news.sky.com/story/more-power-came-from-renewable-energy-than-fossil-fuels-in-uk-in-2019-11898806

So to summarize - as I stated above and was challenged for, MOST of our electricity is now coming from renewable sources.

To say that most of our electricity is from fossil fuels is old data, obsolete, no longer the truth.

It is interesting that your quoted article includes Nuclear as a renewable resource. I have not seen Nuclear included in the quoted figures for Renewable Energy(RE) although it is clean energy.

For the first time ever, more power came from renewable sources than from fossil fuels for a full 12 months during 2019.


Figures released by the National Grid show wind farms, hydro plants, solar and nuclear energy - alongside clean power imported by sub-sea cables - delivered 48.5% of Britain's electricity in 2019.





That compares to 43% generated by fossil fuels.

It also includes biomass, albeit states it can be quickly replaced. Depends I suppose on the definition of 'quickly'. You could make an arguement for coal as replaceable - albeit slowly;)


I wonder also if they know just what is 'clean power' imported by sub-sea cables. Most from France is Nuclear generated but how do they know what is clean?