Is it OK to waste electricity when Agile prices are negative?

molerat

About time they got their fingers out and built the planned 4.9GW of big wet batteries up here in Scotland.

Scot_39

Dolor said:

As the Agile 30min price follows the cost of producing electricity, it might be better for people to look at it through a different lens. We are helping to save the environment by using electricity when prices are low. This is where our electricity is coming from as I post (nearly 80% from renewables and nuclear)

No one is "saving" the environment by using a deliberate  excess of energy - to as the OPs title - to waste energy - at any time to save money.  The point of the thread and the survey attached.

But yes it is clearly better to use your normal energy demand when there is a high renewables content.

But the two should never be conflated.

Even the rare 80% means 20% fossil fuels with corresponding emissions.

And that in a rare situation where high winds and modest summer temperatures coincide.  As my other posts the last week doubles that mixed fossil generated energy.  And I bet you at times agile was still negative.

Because even at 20% - any excess used for purely cost savings has a real carbon emissions content.

And people boosting use - well that could even worse - actually be from gas and biomass - simply because as you also post - we often simply cannot transmit the available wind capacity - although arguably that should be reflected in agile rates over time.

There is no time when gas, biomass and even potentially still coal are not being burned somewhere in their respective plants in warm standby or actual generation.

So as the biggest cohort in vote as I type - 8 voting for fill your boots, they are clearly wrong to do so on the basis it has no environmental cost.

mmmmikey

Hi @Scot_39 I think the point becomes clearer if you look at it this way. Consider what would happen if nobody was prepared to increase their use to soak up the excess supply? As I understand it, the effect would be the grid paying the wind farms to produce less, which would have no effect on emissions. It would make no difference to the amount of emissions coming from using gas since that wouldn't change. Yes, the electricity "coming out the tap" included a proportion (about 26%) in my region at the time of the plunge pricing) but that doesn't mean that turning off the tap reduces the amount of gas burnt and the corresponding emissions. For contractual reasons the reduction is in the amount of "clean" wind energy being generated. I think your arguments about the principle of generating too much energy and the mix of wind, nuclear, etc. have some merit. But in terms of the here and now we have to deal with the situation as it is, not as we believe it should be. That is why, as I understand it, the majority (admittedly slender as I write) are saying it's OK to do. It's not a vote in favour of generating too much energy, it's a vote in favour of accepting payment to burn it off while better long term solutions are found.

[Deleted User]

We are where we are because there is a cost to consumers of turning renewable energy on and off. As more wind farms are built, then the number of plunge events will increase. If we want to reduce the number of wind farm constraint payments then we (yes, we consumers) will have to pay for an improved Grid infrastructure ( to get wind power from NW Scotland to Southern England) and more storage. The alternative option is that we stop building wind farms and start replacing it with nuclear which offers more sustainability/flexibility  (affordability is a different issue).

The problem with storage is that it is inefficient and expensive. DINORWIC, I think runs at 80% efficiency and H2 extraction which is then used to generate electricity gives an 30 to 40% efficiency return: that is, 1kWh in and 400Wh out.

[Deleted User]

No one is "saving" the environment by using a deliberate  excess of energy

I would challenge that assertion. On Saturday, 50% of our electricity was being produced from gas but on Sunday 80% of our electricity was being produced from renewables and nuclear. If I needed to put 50kWh into my car to go to work yesterday, would it be better for the environment if I charged my EV on Saturday or Sunday? The fact that the consumer is being paid to charge the car is a secondary consideration.

Renewable energy is infinite as long as the sun continues to shine and the wind continues to blow.

Scot_39

That (the 50kWh for Monday commute EV example) is not a deliberate excess example though - that's a time shift of your normal energy requirement.

As covered in my second paragraph.

It's not as another poster intimated running the likes of a patio heater on a warm summers day when it's 20+ degrees outside to gain from plunge pricing and would lead to warming itself.
Imagine if we all turned on say 3kWh for 5 hours a day over summer.

And 20%+ of that wasted energy still contributing to green House gas emissions.

The two things really are not the same thing.

[Deleted User]

Scot_39 said:

That (the 50kWh for Monday commute EV example) is not a deliberate excess example though - that's a time shift of your normal energy requirement.

As covered in my second paragraph.

It's not as another poster intimated running the likes of a patio heater on a warm summers day when it's 20+ degrees outside to gain from plunge pricing and would lead to warming itself.
Imagine if we all turned on say 3kWh for 5 hours a day over summer.

And 20%+ of that wasted energy still contributing to green House gas emissions.

The two things really are not the same thing.

So I take it that your preference would be that consumers pay constraint payments to wind farm owners to feather their turbine blades when supply exceeds demand even though this will increase energy costs even more?

FWiW, I would like to see some innovative thinking in the public sector. For example, overheating public swimming pools by a couple of degrees when energy is in abundance. Unfortunately, this requires some ‘spend to save’ expenditure. 

Scot_39

No I would rather politicians think before they design contracts that are inherently not in my interests.

And you miss the other major problem with that analagy - in that wind turbines are currently paid to feather / shut down - because we cannot even distribute their current - let alone future output - from remote locations - like off the Scottish islands - to the market demand - concentrated in Northern England, the Midlands and South.

As I said above - egl1 and egl2 HVDC transmission links are running years behind the licenses sold for some of those fields. 

How anyone thinks it is reasonable to pay more when not using a resource than when we do.

I don't directly pay the petrol station I use for 20 litres of fuel when I drive past because I'm not buying it that day - or get a cheaper price when I do fill up because I have been doing so. 

Why design a costing structure for energy that works the way it does ?

I suspect to get a cheaper headline price - to greenwash the concept - to fool the masses - for a product cost that bears no resemblance to the actual average costs quoted in renewables auctions per MWh for one.

Yes that would mean - renewables installers would demand a higher price per kWh when generating - but that then would at least be a truer more comparable cost.

In fact I'd rather we didn't erect any new wind and solar capacity at all - given between all sources - we already have inherent potential overcapacity - and how inherently unreliable - i.e. variable their output is. And with that save all the costs - running into billions in associated grid upgrades to distribute the energy to where it is needed.

And to avoid emissions at time of use - build loads of new nuclear instead - at least up until min typical UK demand capacity - c25GW - or about 5x current nuclear capacity - or about another 20 GW.

Or 25GW to end the short term live emissions environmental harm that is "biomass" - especially if Drax are in part using immature virgin forest in N America - as per the BBC documentary.

And unlike old nuclear - modern nuclear is capable of limitted load following - iirc in the range of 60-100% for the Hinkley C and Sizewell EDF design - so potentially even more than that.

mmmmikey

@Scot_39 I think the gap here is that you are commenting on how you believe the energy market should work, not how it does work. I expect if this was a discussion about how things should have been done many would agree with you (including, in large part, myself).

But wishing that things had been done differently a few years ago when the contracts were set up doesn't solve the issue we have to day of over supply in certain weather conditions. Your preferred option of not setting up the contracts in the way they have been that creates this problem is not on the table. However unpalatable, the options today are (a) pay people to use the surplus, or (b) pay the wind generators more not to use the surplus. Neither option will make a jot of difference to the amount of gas that is being used and the impact that has on the environment. But paying people to use the surplus does have the advantage of costing less which sooner or later reduces in bills that are not as high as they otherwise would have been.

Which takes me back to the original question which boils down to whether given that it is already there (a) wasting the surplus has an adverse effect on the environment, and (b) whether it has a detrimental effect on other consumers.

You're obviously passionate about this, and I say again I agree with much of what you have said, but you seem to be answering a different question. Pointing out policy and planning failures (as you see them) doesn't change the fact that they exist and the surplus is there.

So it begs the question, however much either of these options stick in the throat, what would you do - pay people to use the surplus or pay wind generators even more not to generate the surplus?

Scot_39

I have nothing against people being encouraged to use the surplus - by load shifting.

But neither do I think a minority of users with one supplier on one tariff - should be able to take unfair advantage of it - because ultimately they are not the only ones who pay for costs when it all to often simply cannot be distributed to be used at all.

But the title subject of this thread - the question asked was - "Is it OK to waste electricity...."

And the answer to that is in my book remains a resounding no.

And energy contracts are not set in stone - new ones especially.  

They have already been changed e.g. to CfD for contracts c2012 onwards (Hinkly then 2015 renewables auction) - but at that time - there was still a rush to gain sufficient renewables.  

By 2027 we will have c45 GW installed wind and solar - a core 5-6GW nuclear load - and currently summer demand is 25 GW. Existing wind delivered over c50% capacity based on weekly averages for roughly 20% of the time last year. If it does so in 2027 - thats real overcapacity at that demand level.

At peak today - we were using nearly 4GW from French interconnectors - basically most of that I suspect French nuclear - not our own. That is not UK energy security.

As Sundays 80% from renewables became 13%.  Again that is not UK energy security.

It is nonsense to say that things should remain the same - that the old pricing and subsidy for not using - can be maintained indefinitely - in such a head long march to such potential overcapacity.  Irrespective of what it says in a 15,20 or 30 yr old contracts.

Past contracts can be revisited - if there is the political will.  

The Cons under late Johnson impasse and early Truss tried to renegotiate wind deals - the windfall tax imposed months later was a second choice - born out of their failure to do so.