Mail online article about how the rolling blackouts will be planned and implemented.

EssexHebridean

deano2099 said:

EssexHebridean said:

Trapdoor said:

EssexHebridean said:

Hmmm….under those plans we’d have a very chilly Monday and Tuesday with short charged heating overnight on both Sunday and Monday. Not exactly surprised to see that this is massively loaded towards GSH’d homes, but there you go! 

Most GSH will not work in a power cut … boiler firing, pumps and valves all need power.

Yes, I’m aware of this. With GSH though once the outage is over (and indeed if it was overnight would your heating even be on? I don’t think I know anyone with GSH that runs it 24/7 these days!) then you fire everything back up again and hey presto, house backup to temperature reasonably soon thereafter. With storage heating, if the required input has not been there - for example if three hours of the charging time is during an outage - and even more particularly if that has happened on two consecutive nights, then there IS no way of bringing the house back up to temperature the following day, the heat just isn’t there to release. 

Much less likely to require blackouts in the overnight blocks though as usage is low in those periods anyway. And there's always the option to run the storage heater at daytime rates if you really need it. Those with Gas don't have that option.

😂😂 It’s mostly only fairly modern storage heaters have the ability to run on daytime rates - and that is by them working as convention heaters. Our main heater and those that many other households rely on has no such ability - the circuit feeding it isn’t even on other than in the off peak period! It might also be remember that for those of us on E7 our day rate is substantially higher than you will be paying - mine is 44p, I believe there are some folk paying as much as 50p a unit! Hardly an affordable option for many people! 

Those with gas will be able to - if required - boost the temperature in. Advance by turning up the thermostat, and then boost it again afterwards. In reality, most won’t find they need to as the temperature won’t fall hugely inside a three hour period. 

You have highlighted one thing though - for many with storage heaters, these blackouts if they happen may very well increase their costs still further on what is already being faced.

Deleted_User said:

ariarnia said:

Deleted_User said:

ariarnia said:

Chrysalis said:

ariarnia said:

i think they planned out the hole thing because theres a good chance people will move the peak. sparky i think said that they will look at the demand the day before to see how it matches the supply and that doesn't mean all of the blocks will have a cut in a day so it might only be the peak evening periods (or we might have none at all)

I said the same, logically the peak slots are more likely to get cuts, hence the scoring system I made factors that in as well.

If you got midnight to 6am slots you laughing.  

Also the unevenness of the slot allocation is apparently not controversial even though it might be the same blocks bearing the cuts every week.

i thought you scored based on how the cuts would be for the person if they happened (you scored weekends high because people are more likly to be home at the weekend so inconvenienced) i'm talking about the chance of the cuts happening. at some of the times you scored really highly its unlikely that businesses would be using a lot of energy maybe (because this isn't only domestic its the hole area and businesses use a lot more energy than people do). so less chance of a cut even if a cut at that time would be more of a pain.

plus i dont understand why you put weekends first thing in the morning so high. the chances of me being up and wanting to do anything before 7am on the weekend when its cold and dark out are tiny! I hibernate in winter

Storage heaters perhaps - for people with electric heating the E7 periods are massively important.

wouldn't they have charged overnight? e7 means 7 hours not 3 so still 4 hours to charge earlier in the night. 

I don't have them (and never have), so maybe others who do can advise, but I would guess that at least some installations would need the whole seven hours to charge up enough?

 Yep, in really cold weather our main one does pretty much need it’s full time period. The slightly smaller quantum less so but being an “intelligent” bit of tech that balances itself over the time it has to charge I believe and so “might” just work harder to charge in the shorter time - although I suspect that 4 hours simply wouldn’t be sufficient even for that one to get it’s full charge. In the coldest days of winter our bigger one sits at full input and that just about gives us sufficient heat unless it’s seriously cold - only 4 hours of charge input would likely mean that by the time we get home it would long have discharged all its heat and the internal temperature of the building would have started to drop - with no realistic means of bringing it back up again for the remainder of the evening.

Ultimately if it’s what needs to happen then so be it - but yes, the overnight outages will affect those with electric heating far more than a peak-time outage would, and indeed also far more than a peak-time outage would affect someone with GSH too. 

Alnat1

I'm a T 

Happy to have you all round for a cuppa if it's your turn to be powerless.

I'll set up the 4-way extension in front of the big sofa and you can all bring your heated throws and plug in.

ariarnia

were a couple of old style meet ups in london back in 2008/9 i remember one to the victoria and albert museum. wouldn't surprise me if groups do arrange visiting each other over winter if it gets back. even not with power cuts. all going over to one persons house for the evening to share a pot luck saves the heating of the other houses and if everyone takes it in turn everyone can save (obviously not a suitable option for everyone. my OH would absolutely HATE the idea of being sociable to a stranger over a board game )

doodling

Hi,

Blackouts during the E7 period are extremely unlikely so those with E7 heating are unlikely to be significantly affected (other than being unable to get the heat out of modern high heat retention storage heaters during a blackout).

Blackouts are most likely during the evening peak.  There is a slim possibility of blackouts during the morning peak but I'm not expecting them.

Unless there is some major event disabling lots of generation capacity then the only thing that would cause blackouts overnight would be a gas shortage and that is unlikely in the UK this winter with things as they currently are.

SAC2334

Every one with a normal gas boiler is also affected just as much as all electric heating.

I m told that modern boilers can t function without power to the boiler and pump.  My Combi has lots of electronics .
Luckily I still have a gas fire in the main room but will lose the electronic ignition and have to light it manually 

EssexHebridean

@SAC2334 No - they are not, because once the outage has finished and the power is back on, they will have the ability to produce more heat from their now working boiler to bring the temperature back up again. If a storage heater is only partially charged because of an outage having prevented it from storing sufficient heat for the following day, there IS no more heat there to release once what was stored has run out. 

For outages during the daytime, those with older style storage heaters are unaffected, those with newer ones lose their heat output for the duration, and those with GSH lose their heat output for the duration. Those last two groups will both be able to increase the heat level again subsequently, albeit thr NSH z user will probably struggle to increase it much at that stage.

For outages overnight, those with any form of storage heaters will very likely find that they are only partially charged come morning, and so the heat runs out by - probably - mid afternoon, leading to potentially another 6-8 hours of the day with no heating. Those with GSH are unaffected for the most part as the chances are their heating would not have been running overnight anyway. 

As has already been said - the best we can really hope is that the overnight outages are far less likely to happen due to lower demand at those times naturally, although I suspect that might turn out to be false optimism, we’ll see! 

Alnat1

We also have a gas fire in the living room but haven't used it since we moved in 3 years ago, so I recently stuffed a cushion up the chimney to help block heat from escaping.

I will definitely need to remember to remove that if I do need to use the gas fire!

ariarnia

SAC2334 said:

Every one with a normal gas boiler is also affected just as much as all electric heating.

I m told that modern boilers can t function without power to the boiler and pump.  My Combi has lots of electronics .
Luckily I still have a gas fire in the main room but will lose the electronic ignition and have to light it manually 

i disagree. the difference is that your boiler kicking in to heat the house a few hours later than you wanted it to doesn't cost you any extra money. you might be chilly in the morning but thats about it. someone using a storage heater outside of there night rate will pay a lot more than they would have done if they could have charged it fully overnight. so they have a choice between paying double per kilowatt for there electric that day or going without heat. though hopefully another poster is right and overnight blackouts are less likely. 

Astria

SAC2334 said:

Good to know the exact times and days so we can all plan ahead.
 
According to Octopus I ve dropped on the S letter code 

Even though the document may be superseded by now and not be relevant anymore? It is 3 years old...

Spoonie_Turtle

Astria said:

SAC2334 said:

Good to know the exact times and days so we can all plan ahead.
 
According to Octopus I ve dropped on the S letter code 

Even though the document may be superseded by now and not be relevant anymore? It is 3 years old...

It's still the latest version on the government website https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/electricity-supply-emergency-code