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Author Topic: Aberthaw Power Station and Decarbonisation  (Read 56366 times)
TonyK
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« Reply #165 on: May 26, 2021, 17:44:07 »


Missed this one earlier!

April was the cruellest month as far as wind-powered generation was concerned, and May was less than spectacular. But the attached image shows that in the round, wind is making a significant contribution.

There is about 10400MW of wind energy capacity online at the moment, with 3500 MW  under construction, a further 3400 in pre-construction and 11500 planned. When all this is online, some time before the end of this decade, then there will be times when there is surplus generating capacity. Of course there will also be times when the wind turbines are generating next to nowt. But aside from the political hype, surely it's worth having this generating capacity? And the arguments about subsidies don't wash; all electricity generators are subsidised.

Legend:
Blue = Wind
Grey = Nuclear
Amber = Gas
Yellow = Solar
Black = Coal
Pink = Imported, mostly nuclear
That's not the easiest graph to read in terms of an immediate grasp of the figures, but amber looks pretty strong throughout the entire year.

I don't quite follow your figures. According to Power Technology, which seems to be fairly neutral in terms of types of power generation, we had around 20.7 GW (Great Western) of installed wind capacity in July 2020, when the article was updated last. Wikipedia says we have more than 24 GW as of December 2020, and goes on to list the major offshore projects. That is more than double the figure you quote, making me wonder if we are talking about the same thing. It also makes the figures for April and May look as though we have an asset worth tens of billions of pounds generating less than 5% of its supposed capacity for not insignificant periods of time, and that doubling it won't help because double nowt is nowt. As always, I admire your optimism, and wish I shared it.

In truth, we already have a lot of overcapacity in the generation system. We still have some coal power stations that stand idle for much of the time, and never produced more than 1.5 GW at any time throughout April 2021. There was a period of a few days when gas was producing under 3 GW, prompting ecstatic headlines in the papers. At some point in March (another cruel month for wind), however, gas was going flat out at 21 GW, meaning that we have at times ten times the capacity of the working CCGT (Combined Cycle Gas Turbine) plant standing idle. Apart from snow ploughs, gritters and fire extinguishers, I can't think of any other item we purchase in such profusion to stand idle for so long.

The power generation industry does not exist to solve the problems of emissions, but to sell power and collect subsidies, selling it twice in effect in the case of renewables. Each renewable energy company exists to throw in its own bit and get paid for it, while telling us that it is reducing global emissions. That last bit isn't strictly mendacious, because a wind turbine does that when the wind is blowing, and when the wind isn't blowing, the problem of emissions isn't the problem of the operator. Operators of solar farms reduce emissions too, during the hours of daylight only. We are going to need a lot more "low carbon" energy to get us out of the grip of oil and gas, and my simple mind thinks that if we try to do that by wind and solar, we will end up using gas forever. As you say, the power generated by wind and sun is gratefully received, but how far are we prepared to go as a nation in adding capacity that could in theory produce energy we don't need on an unforeseeable number of days in any year, yet come up woefully short on others? Will we be happy to dot the the landscape with batteries to store that excess for a day or so, yet still have gas to back up the batteries? At the moment, it doesn't really matter, because we are always using gas to produce electricity, and can just turn it down when it is windy. The government can say it is promoting low emission generation and preparing us for a carbon neutral future, but it is making promises for the next government but one to try to keep.

Bit of a puzzler.
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« Reply #166 on: May 26, 2021, 20:06:51 »

I got my figures by totting up the capacities listed here in the section 'List of operational and proposed offshore wind farms'. I omitted onshore wind, which was an oversight. This, and your figures, suggest that the UK (United Kingdom) government's target of 40GB may not be out of reach.

Double nowt is indeed nowt, and double 17.6GW is 35.2GW, unless my arithmetic has failed me again. That's not theoretical; it's often pretty blowy in the North Sea. No-one (as far as I am aware) is suggesting that wind has the same consistent output as nuclear power, but unlike nuclear power, wind is getting cheaper and subsidies for it are reducing.

The power industry does not, as you say, exist to solve the problem of emissions. Left to its own devices it would probably still be almost exclusively using the 300 years supply of coal Derek Ezra used to tell us about. As it is we are in a state of transition, and a heady mix of politics, economics, pragmatism and idealism is bound to create some inefficiencies. It is, as you say, all a bit of a puzzler.

Am I an optimist? Sometimes. But until we have better ways to store energy while the wind blows, there will clearly be a big hole in the equation when it's dark and the wind isn't blowing. I just don't accept that this is a reason not to expand wind generation capacity.

If it helps, I could be persuaded that SMRs are worth a look - at least while the technology develops to allow us to plug the hole.

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« Reply #167 on: May 26, 2021, 23:52:03 »


If it helps, I could be persuaded that SMRs are worth a look - at least while the technology develops to allow us to plug the hole.


And so could I. The ultimate seems to be fusion power, the holiest of grails, but 10 years away since I was a kid. Assuming it will be another 20 years minimum, we need a stop-gap, like we had the HSTs (High Speed Train) to fill in until we finished the electrification. SMR looks favourite to me, being much more familiar than CCS or grid-scale battery storage of excess renewable power. We have had small modular reactors of one sort or another since 1954, when USS Nautilus was launched. Britain's first nuclear submarine, HMS Dreadnought, was launched in 1960. That predates the introduction of natural gas as a fuel in the UK (United Kingdom) by some 7 years, and the country's conversion from coal gas was not completed until 1977. It seems odd to think that I have lived through the rise of natural gas as the clean alternative to coal gas to its demonisation as the producer of carbon dioxide, but have not seen much to suggest that a successor is standing by. Maybe not as odd as the knowledge that the population of the world has more than doubled since I was born (I am not wholly responsible!), or that my grandmother was a teenager when Orville Wright first flew and lived for a few years after the space shuttle took to space, but odd.

My children were still children when I first saw a modern wind turbine in action, at which time I thought that the solution to all of our energy problems had arrived. I think one of them was still at school when I realised that I had been wrong about that. I would not rule out the possibility that even I might see the last one in Britain cease generation. That, and the completion of the Portway Parkway station.
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« Reply #168 on: May 27, 2021, 11:08:37 »

I can follow everything you say, and agree with most of it, up to the point where you imagine a future where wind generation plays no role. That just seems eccentric. Wind turbines are getting cheaper and more efficient, and the problem of grid storage at scale may well begin to be solved in my dog's lifetime. There's no shortage of ideas, many of which look very promising. These are known technologies that just need investment and development.  You make the point yourself that fusion is a rolling ten years off. It may never happen. Meanwhile, we have technologies that work.

I might be betraying a misunderstanding of the energy market, but it seems to me that every watt generated by wind is a few cubic centimetres less gas that we have to buy from the Russians. Just under half Britain's gas come from the North Sea.

There is and never will be a Holy Grail of generation. Nuclear power must be seen as a necessary evil. It is no small matter to generate pollution that has to be guarded for 10,000 years. People started writing 5,000 years ago. 10,000 years ago, people first started settling in villages. A lot of civilisations have risen and fallen. It's a very, very long time! 
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« Reply #169 on: May 27, 2021, 18:52:46 »

The great pyramids in Egypt are among the oldest large and substantially intact man made structures..
They are a few thousand years old.
A nuclear waste repository will have to last several times longer than the pyramids.
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« Reply #170 on: May 27, 2021, 21:58:46 »


I might be betraying a misunderstanding of the energy market, but it seems to me that every watt generated by wind is a few cubic centimetres less gas that we have to buy from the Russians. Just under half Britain's gas come from the North Sea.

There is and never will be a Holy Grail of generation. Nuclear power must be seen as a necessary evil. It is no small matter to generate pollution that has to be guarded for 10,000 years. People started writing 5,000 years ago. 10,000 years ago, people first started settling in villages. A lot of civilisations have risen and fallen. It's a very, very long time! 

And there was me thinking we were getting rid of gas! As it happens, we buy a lot from Norway rather than Russia. According to the Digest of UK (United Kingdom) Energy Statistics (DUKES), our net gas imports for 2019 were 430,414 GWh. Almost 296,000 GWh of that came from Norway by pipeline. We also import LNG, the biggest supplier being Qatar. Russia was second, with 34,442 GWh, slightly more than what we bought from the US, who we pay to do our fracking for us. I'm sure we could easily replace the Russian imports by buying more from the other human rights champions instead. We are not on the end of a pipeline, as some European countries are or hope to be.

As for waste - why waste it? The original nuclear plants were primarily for producing plutonium for bombs, not energy. We don't need to do that now, I hope, Fuel can be reprocessed and reused. If eventually the waste is vitrified and dumped in former coal mines or similar, it is no longer a threat at all, whereas coal and gas put CO2 into the atmosphere that was once locked away. It sounds much more dangerous on a global scale, and will be much harder to get under control.

But I had in mind fusion, if and when it arrives, rather than fission. The radioactive waste from bashing a few tritium atoms together will be negligible. If it all ends up as Raymond Baxter once told us, so cheap that it won't be worth metering and charging for it, why would we need a mechanical alternative? (My turn to be ridiculously optimistic).
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« Reply #171 on: May 28, 2021, 11:14:33 »

I do not share your confidence regarding future natural gas supplies.
If Russia cuts of gas supplies to Europe, we would suffer shortages very quickly. The fact that we obtain little gas from Russia helps not.
There would be a general shortage of gas from other sources and we would have to outbid everyone else for the supplies from other places.

We are going to be partly reliant on natural gas for many years to come, but we should in my view reduce the degree of gas reliance as much as possible.
Every unit of electricity generated from wind or solar is several units of gas not consumed.
Our now very limited natural gas storage would last longer with significant wind and solar generation, then if generating mainly from gas.
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A proper intercity train has a minimum of 8 coaches, gangwayed throughout, with first at one end, and a full sized buffet car between first and standard.
It has space for cycles, surfboards,luggage etc.
A 5 car DMU (Diesel Multiple Unit) is not a proper inter-city train. The 5+5 and 9 car DMUs are almost as bad.
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« Reply #172 on: June 09, 2021, 14:32:21 »

Another small step towards decarbonisation  Smiley

The government have announced that sales of most types of halogen lamp are to banned from this September in a further step towards energy efficiency.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/end-of-halogen-light-bulbs-spells-brighter-and-cleaner-future

The press release is rather short on detail.
It says that SALES are to be prohibited from this September, I wonder if they mean it ? All previous bans have been on production or import, with existing stocks able to be lawfully sold.

Also no mention as to which types of lamp are to be banned. An exemption for stage, filming or TV production is noted, but which types ? Or will almost any halogen lamp still be allowed if marked "for stage use only"
« Last Edit: June 09, 2021, 15:18:28 by broadgage » Logged

A proper intercity train has a minimum of 8 coaches, gangwayed throughout, with first at one end, and a full sized buffet car between first and standard.
It has space for cycles, surfboards,luggage etc.
A 5 car DMU (Diesel Multiple Unit) is not a proper inter-city train. The 5+5 and 9 car DMUs are almost as bad.
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« Reply #173 on: June 09, 2021, 21:08:30 »

Another small step towards decarbonisation  Smiley

The government have announced that sales of most types of halogen lamp are to banned from this September in a further step towards energy efficiency.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/end-of-halogen-light-bulbs-spells-brighter-and-cleaner-future

The press release is rather short on detail.
It says that SALES are to be prohibited from this September, I wonder if they mean it ? All previous bans have been on production or import, with existing stocks able to be lawfully sold.

Also no mention as to which types of lamp are to be banned. An exemption for stage, filming or TV production is noted, but which types ? Or will almost any halogen lamp still be allowed if marked "for stage use only"

Well, as usual it announces an announcement which doesn't exit - yet. Presumably that will be in the commons, probably tomorrow. Any fiddly details will be in the legislation itself.

But, without gong to dig out the previous ones, it does look as if the production of domestic spotlights stopped in 2016, and other domestic bulbs is 2018. So this next step is the end of the run-down of stocks.

The main type not banned is actually the HL-R7, a 475/500W tubular one commonly used in floodlights - often coupled to a PIR. They are just way too powerful for LEDs to replace yet, and the stage lights will be even brighter. That's likely to be the criterion, I guess.
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« Reply #174 on: June 10, 2021, 13:08:49 »

Somewhat further away than Aberthaw, in fact completely "out of area" but nevertheless of interest, there's a project underway to export solar power from Australia's Northern Territory to Singapore.
https://suncable.sg
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« Reply #175 on: June 16, 2021, 17:28:31 »

Somewhat further away than Aberthaw, in fact completely "out of area" but nevertheless of interest, there's a project underway to export solar power from Australia's Northern Territory to Singapore.
https://suncable.sg

Impressive. I don't think we will see similar here, not just because of the climate, but because of the 12,000 acres of land required. To put that into some sort of perspective, that's about 70 times the land needed for Hinkley C for about 8% less energy in the daytime, and 100% less at night. Land is something Australia isn't short of.

It will need about 12 million of the solar panels I have 4 of on my roof. I hope the suppliers can find the staff to make them all without too much difficulty. I read yesterday that solar panel prices have started to rise after falling for a decade, which could have something to do with this.
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« Reply #176 on: June 16, 2021, 18:44:34 »

On a small island, I have misgivings about covering large areas with solar panels.
We could however considerably expand solar capacity by fitting PV modules to existing buildings or to new structures that are being built in any case.
No EXTRA land is taken up thereby.

Consider not just houses, but also railway stations and car parks.
Many stations lack waiting shelters. The cost of providing these could be offset by use of PV modules.
Many car parks could be partially roofed with PV.

PV is not the complete answer, but could play a larger part. Consider the daytime charging of all those electric cars, and trains.
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A proper intercity train has a minimum of 8 coaches, gangwayed throughout, with first at one end, and a full sized buffet car between first and standard.
It has space for cycles, surfboards,luggage etc.
A 5 car DMU (Diesel Multiple Unit) is not a proper inter-city train. The 5+5 and 9 car DMUs are almost as bad.
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« Reply #177 on: June 16, 2021, 20:35:42 »

Quote
Somewhat further away than Aberthaw, in fact completely "out of area" but nevertheless of interest, there's a project underway to export solar power from Australia's Northern Territory to Singapore.
https://suncable.sg

This piqued my interest - I reckon the distance from Northern Territory to Singapore (3348 Km according to Time & Date.com = https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/distanceresult.html?p1=72&p2=236) is less than from the parts of the Sahara in Morocco to England (the nearest I could get is 2080km from Casablanca to London  -https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/distanceresult.html?p1=136&p2=60)

If Sun Cable is viable..........

 
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broadgage
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« Reply #178 on: June 16, 2021, 22:03:41 »

Quote
Somewhat further away than Aberthaw, in fact completely "out of area" but nevertheless of interest, there's a project underway to export solar power from Australia's Northern Territory to Singapore.
https://suncable.sg

This piqued my interest - I reckon the distance from Northern Territory to Singapore (3348 Km according to Time & Date.com = https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/distanceresult.html?p1=72&p2=236) is less than from the parts of the Sahara in Morocco to England (the nearest I could get is 2080km from Casablanca to London  -https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/distanceresult.html?p1=136&p2=60)

If Sun Cable is viable..........

 

I do not feel that a link from North Africa or the Middle East to the UK (United Kingdom) would be viable. The reasons are political and human rather than technological.
The places in question have a reputation for wars, coups, revolts, and violent regime changes, and for poor governance in general.
Whom is going to invest billions in a scheme that it is liable to destruction in the next war, or to confiscation by the next regime.
Australia by contrast looks safe and stable.
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A proper intercity train has a minimum of 8 coaches, gangwayed throughout, with first at one end, and a full sized buffet car between first and standard.
It has space for cycles, surfboards,luggage etc.
A 5 car DMU (Diesel Multiple Unit) is not a proper inter-city train. The 5+5 and 9 car DMUs are almost as bad.
TonyK
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« Reply #179 on: June 17, 2021, 17:29:58 »


If Sun Cable is viable..........
 

...so is IceLink. There is an update by Askja Energy, which reckons we could be importing electricity from Iceland by 2025.
« Last Edit: June 17, 2021, 19:01:37 by TonyK » Logged

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