Renewable energy

[Deleted User]

I find that this is a particularly good site to see the energy mix in any given region:

https://carbonintensity.org.uk/

If nuclear power is deemed to be green, then Wales and its near neighbours is high on the renewable scale at the time of this post.

ScarletBea

doodling said:

2. You are not buying 100% renewable electricity - if you were then you'd be sitting in the cold and dark when the wind didn't blow at night in winter.  Sorry if that spoils a carefully crafted illusion.

That's why there are batteries! All power generated by renewables is stored for use when the source isn't enough.

And I assume you mean solar - wind doesn't stop when it gets dark

Scot_39

The UK currently has nowhere near enough capacity to store renewables energy to when we need it.

In fact we paid £800 million to compensate wind farm operators 
In curtailment costs.  Because we couldn't use the energy.

That's right wind energy was available - but not harvested.

I just hope the new contracts have factored in the reality we will soon have more installed capacity than ave demand.  But given past energy contracts - I fear not.

Over 80% of it went to wind farms in Scotland - not just because we couldn't store it - we couldn't shift it around the country to where it could have been used.

We have 10s GWh of storage - 20GWh usable long store pumped hydro, a fast increasing - but still in single figures (c2.6Gwh at end of 2022, inc 0.8 new in  Nov 22 ) - grid level battery.  (Some of Ben Cruachan 45% / c3.4 GWh was reserved for grid re sync black start when built - now?  - some of BC and Dinorwig etc for peak cycles).

Coire Glas - will more than double PSH with its 30GWh - but that's several years away.


About enough to store winds output for  

30 GW installed max  - less than 1 hr
Last 12m weekly average 8.8 GW - 2.5-3 hrs
Last 12m weekly low 2.6 GW - 10 hrs.

And when wind doesn't blow - that can be days or weeks - so say to eliminate gas fuelled gen - uk experts estimate may need as much as 1500 GWh storage.

Or from another point of view - that 20 GWh storage - that's about 40 min uk annual weekly average 30GW demand

Scot_39

FreeBear said:

Cardew said:

RobM99 said:

2. You are not buying 100% renewable electricity - if you were then you'd be sitting in the cold and dark when the wind didn't blow at night in winter.  

Apart from power stations that burn wood.

By that definition coal is renewable - it just takes a few thousand years

60 million years (lignite or brown coal) to 350 million years (anthracite). A very, very long carbon cycle compared to burning wood.

But wood still a long time in respect of imminent uk 2030/5 and global 2050 environmental goals.

born_again

So these people that think they are getting 100% of the electricity we supply is from renewable sources. Just how do they think it is getting to their house. There are no extra cables that just carry renewable electric. It all get bundled & sent down the same cable.

Yet another win for marketing teams making people think they are going green, when they are far from it 🤣