Is this sort of thing common?
- posted
7 years ago
Is this sort of thing common?
DerbyBorn wrote in news:XnsA6AB691C88E1ATrainJPlantntlworldc@81.171.92.236:
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Increasingly so. You can get paid a lot of money to be just on standby.
Google STOR
Getting more-so. See one of my earlier posts in the Solar energy overtook Coal thread, and in particular
More unintended consequences of the rush to intermittent power sources, of course.
Excellent lead opinion article by Matt Ridley in the Times today. There is this meme in the minds of some that batteries will save us from intermittency. Ridley says, OK, lets do some sums and cost up what we'd need. Which he proceeds to do and comes up with some trillions needed to run the grid for a week.
And pans this idea of using our (electric) cars to power the grid on windless days. Fine if you think 20 minutes constitutes "powering the grid".
I'll probably never have an electric car, but I wonder if you could at least use one somehow to power your home for a short while in an emergency? Years ago, I'd never have imagined that cars would be full of USB connectors, so some sort of mains inverter might also begin to appear. I got an inverter about 15 years ago, but have only used it once or twice, in the days when there was no standard charging connector.
Some down your part of the world predated that to an extent, SWEB as was got permission to actually generate a small amount of power itself though initially they used gas turbine engines but some of the stations were later converted to diesel. This article is old but it's an insight to how SWEB used to be considered one of the more daring* of the electricity boards. I suppose the the stations have all been closed now.
G.Harman
Yes. You are paid for standby capacity, whether used or not. And by definition, these plants only cut in when prices are 'through the roof'
You really think its unintended?
2 minutes thought tells you it's a non-starter.
Like all the cars would be after a North Atlantic High came and sat over the country in December.
After the first time that happened, who'd leave their car plugged in once it was charged?
Bit on You and Yours today from a guy who had a storage battery in his kitchen. About half the size of a boiler, he said. Stores his excess solar power from the day and allows him to boil a kettle, run the oven and charge his electric car once the sun is down. He said the payback time was approx 6 years. Probably missed some of it as I was in the car.
As ever, no figures. A bit like our EU contributions being used to fund the NHS, remove VAT from fuel, or cure world poverty, depending on who was making the promises at the time.
I'd also wonder if that battery pack would even last the 6 years required for payback?
Probably the same system featured on Rob Llewelyin's (sp?) youtube channel, uses phase change materials like those 'clicky' handwarmers to store energy.
If it is, there's a video at the foot of this page
Yes. The application for our local one has been withdrawn presumably due the the objections.
Link to the application and related paperwork incl objections here
It's all been covered in recent posts. AIR and without looking it up, if everyone had a typical electric-car battery linked to the grid and we were under a blocking high with no wind, overnight, no one would be driving to work in the morning.
ok, that's not going to be dome by phase change storage ...
Yes, the better green alternative is to cut supplies, preferably to those on green tariffs so that they can actually contribute to what they believe.
Mitsubishi make such a kit for use when there is earthquakes in Japan.
Increasingly...
Related but slightly tangential, our local hospital (Gloucester Royal) obviously has some sort of standby generators, to judge from the concrete flue containing separate stacks very like those of CCGT power stations. Does anyone know whether these are likely to be gas turbines, or the more traditional diesels? All that I know about is nuclear power stations, where the standby generating plant was diesel up to the late
60s, and gas turbines (Proteus iirc) more recently.The diesels were basically very similar to marine engines, with a rating of around 1 MW.
It strikes me that these plant could be profitable assets for grid backup, these days. Anyone know if they are used this way?
Diesel is most often used for backup since its totally self contained unless you have a gasometer handy.
Of course you can run OCGT on jet fuel since and OCGT is a jet engine with a gearbox on it....if its burners are designed for avjet rather than natural gas, I assume. Not gone into te details of what differences there are between a jet engine on Avjet and a gas turbine on natural gas,.
They can be. There is an arrangement whereby standby power can be sold to the grid at very high prices.
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