UK Energy Production

[Agent_zed]

I'm still waiting to learn what is an acceptable level of backup generation.

Unless someone on here is from the government dept for energy production, it's unlikely any of us know what that number is or should be unless it is specified on some document somewhere accessible to the public.

It will be governed by a few factors including cost and the ability to achieve it.

Same with any system. Do we have 100% backup for water, do we have 100% backup for hospitals etc etc.

 

[Yojevol]

I'm still waiting to learn what is an acceptable level of backup gegeneration.

I'm afraid you'll be waiting for a long time. Your concept of backup generation capacity is too simplistic. The Grid has always (at least from WW2) depended on a suite of generators that can be bought online as demand requires. The amount of capacity is based on historic demand statistics. In the good old days when we had a totally nationalised industry the grid managers would start to get worried if demand predictions exceeded 85% of the installed capacity. At that level they would contemplate bringing old mothballed coal fired stations back to life (not an easy task). Since privatisation a more commercial approach has been adopted. It's called load shedding. In exchange for favourable purchase rates, heavy industrial users agree to shut down operations in order to keep domestic lights on. If things got really bad supplies would be rationed by switching off areas for a few hours day. Emergency generators would automatically kick in for essential services like hospitals and communication systems.
The concept of a 100% backup capacity is a non-starter. It would be so expensive that the country would be completely uncompetitive.
The big benefit of going green is that our supply system will be much more diverse, but it will be much more reliant on storage systems and this is the area where there is plenty of scope for innovation and development.
Brian

 

[mwinfrance]

If things got really bad supplies would be rationed by switching off areas for a few hours day. Emergency generators would automatically kick in for essential services like hospitals and communication systems.

Hence "smart meters", which allow them to switch off , from a distance, selectively. your house "off", next door "on"..30* minutes later you "on", them off".

The actual number of minutes may vary considerably.

 

[Terry - Somerset]

There are a lot of opinions and knowledge out there on this subject.
But I'm still non the wiser.
How will electricity prices come down by us achieving net zero?

With gas the dominant source of energy, and major part of total cost, it made sense to set prices based upon gas generation. It encouraged investment in cheaper sources, discouraged investment in more expensive, benefitted efficient generators over inefficient, and broadly fair to consumers.

Green and nuclear will begin to dominate, and the price formula will need to change. Competent regulators (would be nice to have one!!) will need to set a long term framework - possibly more complex recognising the characteristics of nuclear (baseload) vs wind/solar (inherently variable).

The government needs to revise terms of reference for OFGEN to reflect their strategic intentions for the energy sector. Failure to do so quickly will reduce market confidence, make the transition from carbon to green a higher risk, extend timescales, add overall costs to no good effect.

 

[Terry - Somerset]

One of the few, many are in the pocket of the nuclear industry because where else can an unskilled person earn £40K a year plus perks for doing very little !
Most people pay to spend time at Butlins but this one pays you.

Almost all unskilled jobs will vanish once the plant becomes operational. If accepted for a job, you are also signing up for redundancy in a few years time (assuming no more delays!!).

Currently the are ~12000 folk on site + much the same again nationwide. Operating staff on site post completion are ~900.

Both current and future staffing figures may be subject to change given the project performance thus far - but unlikely to be sufficient to undermine the observation above.

 

[Sideways]

I find the concept of 'dynamic' pricing and supply totally depressing.
In a modern economy, are we to tell industry that "today's not a good day to switch on. Try tomorrow when it's a bit windier".

Why not ?
It's an eminently good answer to a problem.

The failure is in your imagination.
You're programmed by an expectation that only came into existance a few decades ago that machines run all the time and isolate us from the natural world. It isn't even good for us. That lifestyle makes a lot of people unwell.

Rather : "Make hay while the sun shines".
If you are managing scarce resources that wax and wane, just adapt to it like humanity has through most of it's existence.
Smelt aluminium and steel when the dams are high, wind blowing or sun shining to power the electric arc furnaces. Hold stock of processed metal instead of mountains of ore (or scrap). That way you won't need to smelt when the renewable energy supplies are low so you won't need to store energy to do it then or fire up a gas power station to generate it.

I made that up in 5 minutes and it's as good a way as any. There are loads of people looking at this stuff for real who will have better ideas still, cost data to model alternative solutions, and resources to put them into practice.

And if you did have to wait an extra couple of days to have a new car or TV delivered because a warehouse ran out, again So what ? We'd all get used to it in a few years just as we all got used to having next day delivery after half a lifetime of "28 day delivery".

 

[Terry - Somerset]

I used to run my big atelier ( 3 phase 90 amps per line ) in the Var on that basis..EDF called it EJP tariff electricity.. 21 days of the year I would pay about 7 times standard rate..the rest of the year I'd pay about half standard rate.The trick was either to be able to not use much leccy at all on the 21 days..or run a diesel genny on them days. EJP was only available to commercial / industrial customers, they have stopped it since and moved to something else which is only available to much bigger' customers that I was. Even so, with the equipment I had, when my biggest compressor kicked in ( about the size of a long wheelbase Transit van ) the lights would dim..and yes I did have the phases balanced. I had a separate supply from the rest of the hamlet, with a transformer type thing, as big as a medium sized fridge at the top of a pole in my car park feeding my building ( can't remember what you call them ) with a manually activated breaker at the bottom of the pole.I would be told by EDF each year when the period in which one of my 21 days would be, always in the coldest part of winter. I'd phone them after 17.00 each day during that period to discover whether the next day would be an expensive one. ( automated message would tell you, only sometimes it would not have been updated until maybe 21.00 that evening, expensive would begin early the next day .. Done that way it worked for me. True dynamic , changeable every 30 minutes would have driven me bankrupt and crazy.

Glitched mid post, hit the fatal key combo and it posted incomplete.

I presume commercial / industrial users in the UK would have had / do have something similar.

I just checked ..EJP still exists, but only to customers who had signed up before 1998...I signed up to it in 95 I think
Search EDF EJP ..everything is in french..quite a few sites about it..apparently nowadays you can find out via those sites whether the next day will be expensive ( a day EJP ) or not.. In 98 we had internet at the atelier,already had my first company site coded and running, but EDF didn't offer that via the web, and those independent leccy sites did not exist. Nor did non EDF leccy suppliers.

The UK certainly used to have a similar system - on three (triage?) high demand days they would measure usage and base a substantial fixed annual charge upon the consumption.

My then employers were avid followers of the weather forecast during cold periods and start up the on-site generators (mainly intended for critical operational back up) on those days they expected to be declared a "triage".

I recall they may have saved £six figures annually by doing this - far from trivial.

 

[Sideways]

Hence "smart meters", which allow them to switch off , from a distance, selectively. your house "off", next door "on"..30* minutes later you "on", them off".

The actual number of minutes may vary considerably.

But the real benefit of smart meters is that they record (and transmit) your power consumption at half hourly intervals. That means a whole lot of new pricing becomes possible. No need to switch people off if you can create an incentive tarrif on the fly, tell millions of people about it wirhin minutes via social media and incentivise a million people to shift their consumption backwards or forwards a bit and free up grid capacity for those who really need it.
They are piloting this stuff now. On Octopus I've done it a few times last year along with half a million others. I save a few pounds and the grid avoids spinning up a power station for the sake of an hour or two.

 

[mwinfrance]

No need to switch people off if you can create an incentive tarrif on the fly, tell millions of people about it wirhin minutes via social media and incentivise a million people to shift their consumption backwards or forwards a bit and free up grid capacity for those who really need it.
They are piloting this stuff now. On Octopus I've done it a few times last year along with half a million others. I save a few pounds and the grid avoids spinning up a power station for the sake of an hour or two.

So..we'd all have to join, and stay glued to fbook and twitit to know how much the wash that was already in the machine and running was going to cost us , or switch it off, or not.if the intention is to turn us into Pavlovs dogs walking on their hind legs and mine our data ?..Those without smart phones ( and thus no access to "social media" or who have smart phones but don't use such social media will have to pay the max eh. I can just see the scene "sorry boss, can't get on with my job, got to watch what the leccy is going to cost me, kids are at home with the heating on".

Home Solar panels for the win..and stick it to the man.

Retirees with nowt better to do than stay glued to fbook etc or their mobile phones, and who don't care about the data mining, might be happy bunnies with this..but not I..Doctors and nurses etc and other vital services have houses too, and more important, better things to do that stay glued to their phones all day in case the leccy at home ( background heating like heat pumps ) is suddenly costing them an arm and a leg while they work. People have pets at home, teenage kids at home etc while they work. They can't just say oh well it costs what it costs..

I have computers here that are working while I'm out..( transcoding, rendering etc, running lasers for long duration engraving* ) they get cut off ( they have to start working on what they were doing again ) and the kind of back up batteries that can run them for 7more than 30 mins cost a lot ..Some things they need to run for 24 hours, continually..I need the leccy price to be stable, the same 24/7 , so they can run 24/7.

Cut offs in the middle of 10 hours or a days continuous engraving can occasionally mean starting from the beginning again and scrapping what was done.

 

[Blackswanwood]

So..we'd all have to join, and stay glued to fbook and twitit to know how much the wash that was already in the machine and running was going to cost us , or switch it off, or not.if the intention is to turn us into Pavlovs dogs walking on their hind legs and mine our data ?..Those without smart phones ( and thus no access to "social media" or who have smart phones but don't use such social media will have to pay the max eh. I can just see the scene "sorry boss, can't get on with my job, got to watch what the leccy is going to cost me, kids are at home with the heating on".

Home Solar panels for the win..and stick it to the man.

Retirees with nowt better to do than stay glued to fbook etc or their mobile phones, and who don't care about the data mining, might be happy bunnies with this..but not I..Doctors and nurses etc and other vital services have houses too, and more important, better things to do that stay glued to their phones all day in case the leccy at home ( background heating like heat pumps ) is suddenly costing them an arm and a leg while they work. People have pets at home, teenage kids at home etc while they work. They can't just say oh well it costs what it costs..

I have computers here that are working while I'm out..( transcoding, rendering etc, running lasers for long duration engraving* ) they get cut off ( they have to start working on what they were doing again ) and the kind of back up batteries that can run them for 7more than 30 mins cost a lot ..Some things they need to run for 24 hours, continually..I need the leccy price to be stable, the same 24/7 , so they can run 24/7.

Cut offs in the middle of 10 hours or a days continuous engraving can occasionally mean starting from the beginning again and scrapping what was done.

You seem to have missed the point that Octopus have successfully shown a material difference can be made with incentives and volunteers rather than compulsion. You definitely don’t need to be glued to any social media to take part. The Octopus price is stable for those who don’t participate.

Separate point and not a criticism … Not sure what you are doing when you quote someone? If you use the forums inbuilt quote or reply feature it lets other users track back and see the context of what you have quoted.

 

[Terry - Somerset]

So..we'd all have to join, and stay glued to fbook and twitit to know how much the wash that was already in the machine and running was going to cost us , or switch it off, or not.if the intention is to turn us into Pavlovs dogs walking on their hind legs and mine our data ?..Those without smart phones ( and thus no access to "social media" or who have smart phones but don't use such social media will have to pay the max eh. I can just see the scene "sorry boss, can't get on with my job, got to watch what the leccy is going to cost me, kids are at home with the heating on".

Home Solar panels for the win..and stick it to the man.

Retirees with nowt better to do than stay glued to fbook etc or their mobile phones, and who don't care about the data mining, might be happy bunnies with this..but not I..Doctors and nurses etc and other vital services have houses too, and more important, better things to do that stay glued to their phones all day in case the leccy at home ( background heating like heat pumps ) is suddenly costing them an arm and a leg while they work. People have pets at home, teenage kids at home etc while they work. They can't just say oh well it costs what it costs..

I have computers here that are working while I'm out..( transcoding, rendering etc, running lasers for long duration engraving* ) they get cut off ( they have to start working on what they were doing again ) and the kind of back up batteries that can run them for 7more than 30 mins cost a lot ..Some things they need to run for 24 hours, continually..I need the leccy price to be stable, the same 24/7 , so they can run 24/7.

Cut offs in the middle of 10 hours or a days continuous engraving can occasionally mean starting from the beginning again and scrapping what was done.

Barriers to change will be easily overcome.

The technology and software largely already exists to manage an entire household, individual appliances and the EV parked outside. Most appliances can be app controlled. Central heating apps exist. EV charging can be configured based on planned use, tariff levels, etc

Forward weather data is available online. Energy companies already run programs to optimise low generating costs for any given weather and demand forecast. They should be motivated to share that data with consumers to ensure they act to minimise high demand levels.

As with all tech changes there will be early adopters, late adopters, and those simply unable or unwilling to changes. The last group are not a reason for delaying any changes.

 

[mwinfrance]

@Blackswanwood No idea how Octopus works ..I'm not in the UK..and apart from this forum..no real contact with the UK at all ( bar the Graun ) since I ceased to work with what were my two suppliers based in the UK both of whom closed due to Brexit ( they told me that was the reason) . I left over 35 years ago, I based my comment re "social media" on the preceding comment by sideways.
This forums software plays badly with linux..the "reply to"and "the quote" mechanisms ware a source of frustration to me..they don't work for me as they do for you. I frequently have to correct what they have done when I see it after posting ( preview often does not work for me) and am constantly editing..It is even worse when I inadvertently hit the key combo that posts before I'm ready..my spell checker marks all English words as incorrectly spelled as it is set to French which is now the language I use most.Keyboard is french layout ( AZERTYUIOP ) as are those on all 14 of my computers.

I read very fast and accurately in English and French, but type relatively slowly compared to many in both.If I speed up, I make more errors, and thus do more edits..I probably should get a new keyboard for this machine too as most of the letters are now worn away, so a lot of my typing is "muscle memory" in the wrong language.

My apologies for any problems that may give you and others.

Quick note for Terry..apps work, until they don't ( I can and have written apps ) or until the server is down, or there is no signal, or the app is shonky, or has lousy security, or the app writer left a zero day in there waiting to be exploited.or the company closes the service or server, or gets bought out etc etc .."app" is not an answer to any question...remember Google Home and Nest etc.

 

[Spectric]

Almost all unskilled jobs will vanish once the plant becomes operational. If accepted for a job, you are also signing up for redundancy in a few years time (assuming no more delays!!).

Wrong site.

 

[Sideways]

@mwinfrance
Your post #69.

Just no.
It's a mass of speculation and assumption that isn't based on what I wrote. It doesn't work like that now and I don't expect it to.
I have no issue with your energy needs. If you need an uninterrupted service, then buy it if it's available on the market. Perhaps more cost effective would just be to put in some backup generation and a UPS supply. In many places, to guarantee a 10hour run with zero risk of interruption you'd need it because floods, downed cables, electricity infrastructure repairs could all cause a service interruption nothing to do with renewables.

You wrote a couple of posts describing smart meters as a tool to cut people off and do rolling blackouts. I simply don't think that is very important because smart meters are much more effective delivering a carrot than wielding a stick.

Solar - go for it !
I did 2 years ago and apart from the initial cost, seeing 5MWh coming off your roof every year is quite gratifying.