one21
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Post by one21 on Jan 21, 2019 14:13:20 GMT
Do we really need new nuclear power installations, now that we have solar and wind power together with mass battery storage technology and hydro power. Apparently, last year 1/3 of our energy usage was generated from green energy. Also, I cannot think of a more eco friendly useful product than a solar panel or wind turbine. A solar panel is reputed to last at least 20 years (I’m not sure about a wind turbine) but they can both be recycled at the end of their useful life (what is the cost of decommissioning a nuclear power station millions no doubt)! We have a south facing roof and have had solar panels installed since 2013. One more year and they will have paid for themselves! After that it’s all profit from the FIT for the remaining 14 years at 7% per annum plus lower fuel bills. Even if we need to replace the inverter within that time there are now more efficient and lower priced ones available. Also, as electrical devices are becoming more efficient (LEDs etc) our future energy needs should reduce accordingly.
Why the government reduced its incentive for private solar roof installations is beyond me!
Edit: In haste I failed to include - ground source heat pumps and improved geo-thermal drilling techneques, allowing much greater depth with consequent reduced gas, electricity usage. Also, according to media reports, much safer / cleaner N Fusion is on the verge of feasibility.
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Steerpike
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Post by Steerpike on Jan 21, 2019 14:21:08 GMT
Do we really need new nuclear power installations, now that we have solar and wind power together with mass battery storage technology, together with hydro power. Apparently, last year 1/3 of our energy usage was generated from green energy. Also, I cannot think of a more eco friendly useful product than a solar panel or wind turbine. A solar panel is reputed to last at least 20 years (I’m not sure about a wind turbine) but they can both be recycled at the end of their useful life (what is the cost of decommissioning a nuclear power station millions no doubt)! We have a south facing roof and have had solar panels installed since 2013. One more year and they will have paid for themselves! After that it’s all profit from the FIT for the remaining 14 years at 7% per annum plus lower fuel bills. Even if we need to replace the inverter within that time there are now more efficient and lower priced ones available. Also, as electrical devices are becoming more efficient (LEDs etc) our future energy needs should reduce accordingly.
Why the government reduced its incentive for private solar roof installations is beyond me! Probably. I always thought that the UK policy of a mix of generation methods is the right choice for Britain for the foreseeable future. The Germans have committed to green(er) methods of energy production and as a result are very dependent on energy imported from France which is almost entirely reliant on nuclear.
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registerme
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Post by registerme on Jan 21, 2019 14:28:00 GMT
I think a better question is "how do we maintain baseload power generation at a sensible price"? If renewables like solar pv / wind / wave aren't consistent enough to reliably maintain baseload then we need something else. Until battery storage is a) scalable enough and b) cheap enough we need backup generators, which means gas (variable pricing) or nuclear (horrifically expensive to set up and decommission) or coal (filthy).
So I'm with steerpike, a mix of generation approaches is the right one.
As for reduced incentives for private solar roof installations I don't understand why they provided them in the first place. Instead of giving rich people like me cheaper power and more income they could have covered every hospital and school in the country with solar pv, providing the industry with the support it needed, and benefiting everybody rather than those already well off.
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Mike
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Post by Mike on Jan 21, 2019 16:31:03 GMT
Do we really need new nuclear power installations, now that we have solar and wind power together with mass battery storage technology, together with hydro power. Apparently, last year 1/3 of our energy usage was generated from green energy. According to the govt., "Low carbon sources" account for just 18.4% of our consumption - and that of course includes nuclear (almost half of it)! assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/728374/UK_Energy_in_Brief_2018.pdfOf electricity generated, wind, hydro & solar is ~20%. You can try to increase this by claiming "other renewables" are green - however they're not by most peoples definition. It includes waste incineration, gas from landfill, and burning wood. The main problems are cost, and availability. Winter provides a need for energy, with dark and generally still days. Power stations cannot be turned off & on when needed so it's not as simple as flicking on the coal/gas/nuclear whenever there's a shortage of wind/sun.
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one21
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Post by one21 on Jan 21, 2019 16:45:26 GMT
"As for reduced incentives for private solar roof installations I don't understand why they provided them in the first place. Instead of giving rich people like me cheaper power and more income they could have covered every hospital and school in the country with solar pv, providing the industry with the support it needed, and benefiting everybody rather than those already well off." I suppose they could have done both! There was a scheme whereby the installer would benefit from the FIT and the resident would benefit from reduced fuel bills - if they could not afford the installation. Very good point regarding hospital, school, and factory roofs I entirely agree. These premises are generally occupied during daylight hours making them ideally suited. I argue that if greener energy was greatly upscaled, there would be less need for additional nuclear power plants. "Lifetime: Every nuclear power station needs to be decommissioned after 40-60 years of operation due to neutron embrittlement - cracks that develop on the metal surfaces due to radiation. If nuclear stations need to be replaced every 50 years on average, then with 15,000 nuclear power stations, one station would need to be built and another decommissioned somewhere in the world every day. Currently, it takes 6-12 years to build a nuclear station, and up to 20 years to decommission one, making this rate of replacement unrealistic. " Read more at: phys.org/news/2011-05-nuclear-power-world-energy.html#jCp |
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registerme
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Post by registerme on Jan 21, 2019 17:03:15 GMT
Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of renewables, I just don't think that, at the moment, they are the answer in and of themselves.
Interestingly there was a piece a week or so ago (I forget where precisely) that claimed that people moving to LED lighting had had a material impact on the country's electricity consumption. I'm not sure of the details but the idea that consumption (hopefully decreasing) is part of the overall picture has to be correct.
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Stonk
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Post by Stonk on Jan 21, 2019 18:27:21 GMT
Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of renewables, I just don't think that, at the moment, they are the answer in and of themselves. Interestingly there was a piece a week or so ago (I forget where precisely) that claimed that people moving to LED lighting had had a material impact on the country's electricity consumption. I'm not sure of the details but the idea that consumption (hopefully decreasing) is part of the overall picture has to be correct.
I wouldn't be surprised at all. I moved my whole house to LED lighting pretty much in one swoop (except for one room where I can't get LEDs for the fitting). As a result, my electricity consumption dropped by a third. I now feel bad when I turn the light on in the room I couldn't change: with 3x 50W bulbs, it uses massively more energy than any other place in the house! Not long ago, a 150W light bulb would have been commonplace; nowadays 150W sounds like an environmental disaster.
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cb25
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Post by cb25 on Jan 21, 2019 18:33:56 GMT
Governments seem very keen on low level environmental stuff like lightbulbs, but do nothing on much bigger things like flights (Heathrow expansion being just one example).
Back on topic, I'm also not yet convinced we can rely solely on 'green' energy solutions in the short term.
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Post by bracknellboy on Jan 21, 2019 18:50:08 GMT
....(what is the cost of decommissioning a nuclear power station millions no doubt)! Had to laugh. I think you need a few more zeroes on the end of that.
Perhaps because the first part answers the second ? Incentives were a way of prime pumping the market. They've done that. And arguably it would have been more cost effective for them to have never have done that, or at lower scale, and wait for the costs to come down - as they quite dramatically have - so that little or no incentive was required.
but that is the biggest problem with wind/solar: We simply do not yet have cost effective mass battery storage. And even if we did, its doubtful surely it would be sufficient to give guaranteed capacity to meet baseload needs.
Solar works best in geos that have, ummmm, lots of sun. Hot climates have the benefit of combining max generating capacity from solar coincident with high demand driven from air con usage. We don't have that benefit, and instead combine high demand (winter) with low solar generation. Annoyingly, even wind doesn't necessarily take its place during our wet windy dreary winters, as sometimes turbines have to be shut down because of high wind speed, and the wind is fickle anyway.
Efficiency has been driving down aggregate demand (for now), I understand. Nonetheless the UK is on track to shut down much of its existing nuclear capacity (age) and much of its coal generating capacity (reduce emissions). And pulling in the other direction of demand will be the increasing trend to replace combustion engine with electric*.
As registerme said: the issue is what is going to provide the baseload. And you need a mix. Could more gas take up the slack ? Possibly. But regardless, a mix is needed.
I do think however that given some of the downward pressures on demand, the potential emergence of small scale nuclear, and the now quite rapid advance of battery technology, I think the govt has been wrong to blindly push ahead with combination of a) such huge price gurantees for Hinckly C b) push on with Moorside and Wylfa. It may well have made more sense to take a bit of a breather, look at increasing gas generation (or stop switching it off) as a cleaner than coal replacement (and can be stood up / bought on line much much more quickly than nuclear ,and recover costs over shorter time period), and take stock of developments.
So I can't say I'm entirely unhappy that Toshiba has now pulled out of Moorside, and Horizon have put everything on hold. Possibly to go the way of Toshiba/NuGen.
*One theory is that while increasing the demand, they also could be harnessed to provide a flexible distributed mass energy storage system, and this impacts the percentage that renewables could be relied on to provide.
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one21
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Post by one21 on Jan 21, 2019 20:30:56 GMT
Given the flood / drought trend in recent years, perhaps investment in additional hydro power would be appropriate. Could even utilise solar / wind energy to replenish upper reservoirs incorporating an effective energy storage solution! Not sure what the cost / benefit analysis would be compared to nuclear, but at least we wouldn't be storing up problems for future generations to deal with.
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Post by bracknellboy on Jan 21, 2019 21:28:35 GMT
Use of reservoir / hydro as effective battery is - as I’m sure you know - no longer novel, and in use in quite a few places in the world.
I suspect though that a significant problem for the UK remains the same problem as it does for pure hydro i.e. the geographic disconnect between the obvious/practical location for the “energy store” (high level reservoir) and concentration of populace where the demand is. When most of your mountains are in the Scottish highlands and a very large chunk of your population is in the SE of England.......
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ozboy
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Mine's a Large One! (Snigger, snigger .......)
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Post by ozboy on Jan 21, 2019 22:19:49 GMT
Use of reservoir / hydro as effective battery is - as I’m sure you know - no longer novel, and in use in quite a few places in the world. I suspect though that a significant problem for the UK remains the same problem as it does for pure hydro i.e. the geographic disconnect between the obvious/practical location for the “energy store” (high level reservoir) and concentration of populace where the demand is. When most of your mountains are in the Scottish highlands and a very large chunk of your population is in the SE of England....... I know Football Association about it all, but isn't there, you know, a thing called The National Grid to feed power into, from anywhere, no matter where the power is produced? Yes, yes, I know the ohmage/wattage/voltage or whatever it is weakens/lessens over distance, but the point is that power can still be generated anywhere and fed in for the national benefit?
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one21
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Post by one21 on Jan 21, 2019 23:05:56 GMT
Use of reservoir / hydro as effective battery is - as I’m sure you know - no longer novel, and in use in quite a few places in the world. I suspect though that a significant problem for the UK remains the same problem as it does for pure hydro i.e. the geographic disconnect between the obvious/practical location for the “energy store” (high level reservoir) and concentration of populace where the demand is. When most of your mountains are in the Scottish highlands and a very large chunk of your population is in the SE of England....... I know Football Association about it all, but isn't there, you know, a thing called The National Grid to feed power into, from anywhere, no matter where the power is produced? Yes, yes, I know the ohmage/wattage/voltage or whatever it is weakens/lessens over distance, but the point is that power can still be generated anywhere and fed in for the national benefit? Good point oz I've heard of at least one person converting a Water Mill to hydro power and makes 30k pa!
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Post by bracknellboy on Jan 22, 2019 8:23:17 GMT
Use of reservoir / hydro as effective battery is - as I’m sure you know - no longer novel, and in use in quite a few places in the world. I suspect though that a significant problem for the UK remains the same problem as it does for pure hydro i.e. the geographic disconnect between the obvious/practical location for the “energy store” (high level reservoir) and concentration of populace where the demand is. When most of your mountains are in the Scottish highlands and a very large chunk of your population is in the SE of England....... I know Football Association about it all, but isn't there, you know, a thing called The National Grid to feed power into, from anywhere, no matter where the power is produced? Yes, yes, I know the ohmage/wattage/voltage or whatever it is weakens/lessens over distance, but the point is that power can still be generated anywhere and fed in for the national benefit? Yes I was thinking of the issue of losses - and other issues such as perceived environmental aesthetics - "ugly pylons" - and possibly associated costs to get around -
We do generate a very small perecentage from hydro - and therefore I guess have a correspondingly small amount of pumped storage. It would interesting to know what the biggest reasons for that have been and how much of a barrier they really are.
Perhaps we have a fairly limited number of really viable sites.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 22, 2019 9:09:08 GMT
Interesting conversation, certainly EU rules (assumed carried over) means that we continue to buy most Electronic goods operating on lower and lower power, while Apple is investing in chips that can run on "energy harvesting" so one day an iPhone will not need charging. LED and the developments of LED will also require less and less power per lumen.
Meanwhile, storage is going through a lot of changes. In Germany, they have already built a reservoir in a semi-plain to ensure that some important plants can keep going (up near Hamburg). The use of more and more battery powered cars, of course, offers massive energy storage, since cars only ever are used 5% of there life the rest of the time they could just be plugged in and act as a giant battery for the whole country.
Solar, tidal, wind all seem to work in the UK. www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk/ lets you see minute by minute our usage. Solar is now being enhanced by working in those wavelengths we don't see. Tidal in Orkney is slowly moving that area to be the first hydrogen economy as they are now building the first hydrogen ferry.
Drax is now stepping up with a massive battery to be based at their site to take advantage of short term electricity shortages.
We also have to look at power distribution, we see the norm is to have massive power stations, with massive cost overruns, placed in remote places and lots of energy loss to get to where the power is consumed. There are alternatives, for instance, Rolls Royce make these fancy little nuclear power plants they stick in submarines, amazingly they don't cost-overrun and they work pretty well (when did you last see a secret sub being towed back to Scotland?). www.rolls-royce.com/media/our-stories/innovation/2017/smr.aspx if you click through you will see the whole thing sits on the back of a truck, has been made in a factory and will be disassembled in a factory.... who knew?
My own view is the market will provide, while the Daily Mail (famously, a paper that thought A Hitler was a good guy) will continue to winge to the over 60s about the lights going out.
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