Why don't we harness tidal, wave and hydro power more?

System

This discussion was created from comments split from: Energy Price Guarantee should it go up in April?.

fergie_

The rush to renewables has by and large ignored it's biggest achiles heel - variability - by no planning for mass storage built in parallel.

Yes from an environment perspective it's great - as even without that storage we of course burn less gas - much less when it's working well - but we still need to burn almost as much when it isn't. (18.5GW when wind dropped to 2.3GW last Mar)

And to be fair - trying to insist on even a fraction of storage for installed capcity - would likely have killed it off - in the early days.

I've never understood why we don't harness tidal, wave and hydro power more.

Scot_39

Tidal flow got only about 41MW of the c11GW licensed in 2022 auction.

It's CfD cost was over 5x that for fixed off-shore wind.

Big projects proposed in past - lie the Swansea lagoon etc - have had their environmental objections too.

We do use hydro power in UK - but the larger ones - seem to be pumped storage hydro - Dinorwig, Ben Cruachan etc.

But we apparently have nearly 2GW on non pumped hydro schemes according to

https://www.hydropower.org/country-profiles/united-kingdom

According to another site - there are nearly 2000 sites in total.

ariarnia

fergie_ said:

The rush to renewables has by and large ignored it's biggest achiles heel - variability - by no planning for mass storage built in parallel.

Yes from an environment perspective it's great - as even without that storage we of course burn less gas - much less when it's working well - but we still need to burn almost as much when it isn't. (18.5GW when wind dropped to 2.3GW last Mar)

And to be fair - trying to insist on even a fraction of storage for installed capcity - would likely have killed it off - in the early days.

I've never understood why we don't harness tidal, wave and hydro power more.

salt water destroys most things quite quickly and that means it can be expensive compared to wind. then also eco concerns. 

BUFF

fergie_ said:

The rush to renewables has by and large ignored it's biggest achiles heel - variability - by no planning for mass storage built in parallel.

Yes from an environment perspective it's great - as even without that storage we of course burn less gas - much less when it's working well - but we still need to burn almost as much when it isn't. (18.5GW when wind dropped to 2.3GW last Mar)

And to be fair - trying to insist on even a fraction of storage for installed capcity - would likely have killed it off - in the early days.

I've never understood why we don't harness tidal, wave and hydro power more.

Hydro potentially has a lot of environmental issues which is why it is being taken out in many other places e.g. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/160411-klamath-glen-canyon-dam-removal-video-anniversary

Tidal in the form of barrage schemes is similar in potential for massive environmental damage but there is a lot of research going into wave & individual tidal turbines.

Scot_39 said:

Be interesting to know of any other large scale schemes and costs / technologies being built / or planned in UK currently.

Glenmuckloch 400MW pumped storage in Dumfries & Galloway 
https://www.op-en.co.uk/projects/glenmuckloch-wind-farm-and-pumped-storage-hydro

MattMattMattUK

fergie_ said:

The rush to renewables has by and large ignored it's biggest achiles heel - variability - by no planning for mass storage built in parallel.

Yes from an environment perspective it's great - as even without that storage we of course burn less gas - much less when it's working well - but we still need to burn almost as much when it isn't. (18.5GW when wind dropped to 2.3GW last Mar)

And to be fair - trying to insist on even a fraction of storage for installed capcity - would likely have killed it off - in the early days.

I've never understood why we don't harness tidal, wave and hydro power more.

Tidal generally require specific geography, the Severn is theoretically a good site, provided you are willing to ignore the huge loss of habitat, the silt build up, the increased cost of using the river and the fact that per kWh it would be somewhere between four and fifteen times the cost of wind.

We do not have a huge amount of sites suitable for hydro, again they require largeish rivers with specific geography. Wave we have the geography for, but it is significantly more expensive per installed capacity than wind or solar and for large scale deployments it is untested.

The only real way to move away from gas is for us to build a large number of nuclear power stations, 120-200 reactors with several per site would be the way to go, we could have all of our power (including a full transition away from hydrocarbons for vehicles and gas for home usage) carbon free and secure from the volatility of international markets by 2050. 

Qyburn

Tidal flow generation will be cyclic as well. Possibly the day+a bit cycle could be balanced by installations in different places but the Spring/Neap and Solstice/Equinox differences affect the whole country. 

Tidal pool systems could create a constant head between one pool topped up every high tide and one emptied every low. I wouldn't even like to think how much it would cost to do that on a worthwhile scale.

I guess conventional hydro could act as storage even without pumping, by choosing to run only when needed. I don't know how that would work commercially. They used to run the hydros for frequency regulation, I don't know if that's still a factor.

Qyburn

BUFF said:

fergie_ said:

The rush to renewables has by and large ignored it's biggest achiles heel - variability - by no planning for mass storage built in parallel.

Yes from an environment perspective it's great - as even without that storage we of course burn less gas - much less when it's working well - but we still need to burn almost as much when it isn't. (18.5GW when wind dropped to 2.3GW last Mar)

And to be fair - trying to insist on even a fraction of storage for installed capcity - would likely have killed it off - in the early days.

I've never understood why we don't harness tidal, wave and hydro power more.

Hydro potentially has a lot of environmental issues which is why it is being taken out in many other places e.g. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/160411-klamath-glen-canyon-dam-removal-video-anniversary

Tidal in the form of barrage schemes is similar in potential for massive environmental damage but there is a lot of research going into wave & individual tidal turbines.

Scot_39 said:

Be interesting to know of any other large scale schemes and costs / technologies being built / or planned in UK currently.

Glenmuckloch 400MW pumped storage in Dumfries & Galloway 
https://www.op-en.co.uk/projects/glenmuckloch-wind-farm-and-pumped-storage-hydro

Do you happen to know it's capacity, ie MWh? I can't see that stated.

Apodemus

Qyburn said:

BUFF said:

fergie_ said:

The rush to renewables has by and large ignored it's biggest achiles heel - variability - by no planning for mass storage built in parallel.

Yes from an environment perspective it's great - as even without that storage we of course burn less gas - much less when it's working well - but we still need to burn almost as much when it isn't. (18.5GW when wind dropped to 2.3GW last Mar)

And to be fair - trying to insist on even a fraction of storage for installed capcity - would likely have killed it off - in the early days.

I've never understood why we don't harness tidal, wave and hydro power more.

Hydro potentially has a lot of environmental issues which is why it is being taken out in many other places e.g. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/160411-klamath-glen-canyon-dam-removal-video-anniversary

Tidal in the form of barrage schemes is similar in potential for massive environmental damage but there is a lot of research going into wave & individual tidal turbines.

Scot_39 said:

Be interesting to know of any other large scale schemes and costs / technologies being built / or planned in UK currently.

Glenmuckloch 400MW pumped storage in Dumfries & Galloway 
https://www.op-en.co.uk/projects/glenmuckloch-wind-farm-and-pumped-storage-hydro

Do you happen to know it's capacity, ie MWh? I can't see that stated.

No, I can't see it either, but the maximum installed capacity is 400MW, the storage capacity is 3.3 million cubic metres and the maximum head of water is about 210m, so I'm guessing someone with the right set of skills might be able to work it out from that?

BUFF

Qyburn said:

BUFF said:

fergie_ said:

The rush to renewables has by and large ignored it's biggest achiles heel - variability - by no planning for mass storage built in parallel.

Yes from an environment perspective it's great - as even without that storage we of course burn less gas - much less when it's working well - but we still need to burn almost as much when it isn't. (18.5GW when wind dropped to 2.3GW last Mar)

And to be fair - trying to insist on even a fraction of storage for installed capcity - would likely have killed it off - in the early days.

I've never understood why we don't harness tidal, wave and hydro power more.

Hydro potentially has a lot of environmental issues which is why it is being taken out in many other places e.g. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/160411-klamath-glen-canyon-dam-removal-video-anniversary

Tidal in the form of barrage schemes is similar in potential for massive environmental damage but there is a lot of research going into wave & individual tidal turbines.

Scot_39 said:

Be interesting to know of any other large scale schemes and costs / technologies being built / or planned in UK currently.

Glenmuckloch 400MW pumped storage in Dumfries & Galloway 
https://www.op-en.co.uk/projects/glenmuckloch-wind-farm-and-pumped-storage-hydro

Do you happen to know it's capacity, ie MWh? I can't see that stated.

https://www.buccleuch.com/landmark-investment-deal-for-glenmuckloch-pumped-storage-hydro-psh-and-windfarm-project-in-dumfries-and-galloway/

Scot_39

Qyburn said:

Tidal flow generation will be cyclic as well. Possibly the day+a bit cycle could be balanced by installations in different places but the Spring/Neap and Solstice/Equinox differences affect the whole country. 

Tidal pool systems could create a constant head between one pool topped up every high tide and one emptied every low. I wouldn't even like to think how much it would cost to do that on a worthwhile scale.

I guess conventional hydro could act as storage even without pumping, by choosing to run only when needed. I don't know how that would work commercially. They used to run the hydros for frequency regulation, I don't know if that's still a factor.

Still do as AFAIK - as far as I know at least some of the turbines at Dinorwig etc are still being activated / deactivated on a regular basis for impacts of large load changes e.g. so called TV pickup.

It was designed for a 16s iirc 0 - full generation / grid synchronised spin-up.

See e.g. https://www.fhc.co.uk/en/power-stations/dinorwig-power-station/ 

See e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TV_pickup

Grid level substation regulation also helps controls reactive load balancing to maintain voltage levels - but ultimately generation balancing user load the goal.