How will old houses be heated in 20 years time?

[Deleted User]

From Radio 4 Today:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-55948531

A._Badger

Meanwhile, for those dissemblers who try to pretend that 'smart meters' will never be used to restrict supplies, the following is from from This Is Money and the headline (for those a little scared to click the link) reads: 

Government mulls emergency measures that would enable networks to SWITCH OFF your electricity without warning or compensation

https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-8706033/amp/Smart-meters-used-switch-electricity-without-warning-compensation.html?__twitter_impression=true

 

Mickey666

I can envisage smart appliances that switch themselves off to reduce demand on the grid eg fridges etc that work in the background and no one would notice if they switched off for an hour or so.  But I find it hard to envisage switching off a whole household or small business, especially in these days of computer dependency.  It would kill off WFH for a start.

Perhaps as an emergency measure it might be acceptable, but then we already have rare power cuts and it's ok if infrequent, ie once or twice a year.  But I can't imagine people accepting being cut off regularly just because those responsible for the grid have underestimated capacity.

Gerry1

A._Badger said:

Meanwhile, for those dissemblers who try to pretend that 'smart meters' will never be used to restrict supplies, the following is from from This Is Money and the headline (for those a little scared to click the link) reads: 

Government mulls emergency measures that would enable networks to SWITCH OFF your electricity without warning or compensation

https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-8706033/amp/Smart-meters-used-switch-electricity-without-warning-compensation.html?__twitter_impression=true

The article has several inaccuracies, but that's hardly surprising considering how little publicity there has been about Load Limiting and Load Shedding facilities already built in to existing smart meters.  Not all journalists read the smart meter specifications !  But the gist is certainly correct, it's just that most of the disconnection ability is already in place.  The author obviously doesn't realise that the communications is not just about phoning home with the meter reading, the mothership can call you and ration you or switch you off completely.

Existing smart meters can shut down domestic supplies: all the meter's output goes through a relay which can be open circuited remotely.  (Incidentally, that probably explains why so many meters have caught fire in the USA.  Think how hot the pins of a 13A plug can get using a 3kW fan heater.  Now think what it's like for the relay contacts when the meter is supplying the rated value of 100A.)

Existing smart meter rationing initially relies on the consumer turning off high power appliances when the warning is given (Load Limiting).  Non compliance means that the whole supply is remotely disconnected if the consumer does not immediately obey by reducing the consumption to below the permitted number of kW (Load Shedding).

All that's proposed is making the process a bit more automatic.  Instead of you having to turn things off yourself to stop the lights (and everything else) going off, your third generation smart meter would switch things off for you instead.  No escape - Your Smart Meter Says NO.

As for EV charging, legislation to require home chargers to be smart was quietly introduced a while ago, so it's already a case of 'Gotcha !'.

A._Badger

This isn't a fault, it's a feature - part of the overall plan and a plan that has been lied about since its inception. Once they worked out that 'Green' energy would never be able to meet demand at certain times, they either had to provide sufficient backup capacity or reduce demand. Because they are driven by dogma rather than engineering and science they did neither. They increased demand (electric car charging, mandating ASHPs, banning gas central heating and cookers etc) and forced capacity to diminish. We are about to witness the consequences. 

In any case, what do you think people will actually be able to do about it? If the past twelve months have taught us anything it is that governments can get away with a very great deal more interference in people's everyday lives than anyone would have believed possible. Given that all three major parties in the UK support a 'Green' agenda  and it is actively promoted by the mass media, what would you have us do - vote it out?

Gerry1

Mickey666 said:

But I can't imagine people accepting being cut off regularly just because those responsible for the grid have underestimated capacity.

They won't have any choice, they'll only realise when the smart meter rollout is complete.  Prohibitively expensive smart meter Time of Use tariffs will be the first stage to reduce peak demand to below the amount that the creaky old power stations can generate.  Some companies already offer them.

It's not that those responsible for the grid have underestimated capacity, they know full well what the likely demand will be but they have decided to cut costs by implementing Rationing.  The official euphemism is Demand Side Response.

The BEIS spokesperson who told Sarah 'Network companies cannot remotely "turn off" smart meters, nor could they control the amount of energy supplied to homes without the express consent of consumers' was either woefully uninformed or was deliberately misleading her.  The remote disconnection feature is already there (just read the smart meter specifications) and all that may be required to implement it is a minor tweak of the regulations.

knightstyle

Interesting thread...
In France we had a system used to reduce electric use on days of very high demand. A 24hour advance warning was given and all electricity used on that day was about six times normal price. The reward for going on this tariff was half price electricity during the summer months.
This worked well and we got used to just having a couple of lights on and heating, cooking etc with a log burner.

[Deleted User]

Ectophile said:

Dolor said:

Proponents of Hydrogen shouldn’t forget that Hydrogen created by electrolysis is only 62% heat efficient as the electricity from which it was produced. (Source New Scientist).

I can believe that figure.  But if it's a windy day, and you've got more electricity than you know what do do with, then it's worth doing something to store the spare energy instead of shutting down wind farms.

Batteries are more efficient than converting electricity to hydrogen.

Ectophile

Wobbly_Bob said:

Ectophile said:

Dolor said:

Proponents of Hydrogen shouldn’t forget that Hydrogen created by electrolysis is only 62% heat efficient as the electricity from which it was produced. (Source New Scientist).

I can believe that figure.  But if it's a windy day, and you've got more electricity than you know what do do with, then it's worth doing something to store the spare energy instead of shutting down wind farms.

Batteries are more efficient than converting electricity to hydrogen.

But hydrogen tanks are cheaper than batteries.

Mickey666

Gerry1 said:
Existing smart meters can shut down domestic supplies: all the meter's output goes through a relay which can be open circuited remotely.  (Incidentally, that probably explains why so many meters have caught fire in the USA.  Think how hot the pins of a 13A plug can get using a 3kW fan heater.  Now think what it's like for the relay contacts when the meter is supplying the rated value of 100A.)

Shouldn't be a problem, just needs the correct relay to be used that is designed for continuous 100A current, or more.
Of course, if the meter designer/manufacturer skimps on the specification . . .