I have just listened to this,
Brian, it is youtube, but it is two guys talking, so only the audio matters.
Insulation, insulation, insulation. Heating is secondary factor. If hardly any heating is required, then it does not matter so much how it's done. I'm wondering how DIYable external insulation is. Hydrogen, without vast power generation capacity which could be used direct anyway, does not seem likely.
Harry, who used to post here denying the virtues of nuclear power and getting thoroughly blasted for his pains, claimed that he needed no heating in his heavily insulated bungalow, although he did have a little wood-burner for very cold spells, I believe. IIRC he insulated his property himself, using something like 30cm or more of external rigid foam insulation.
This was him, but it used to have pictures, including a bearded Harry wearing a bulky hand-knitted pullover to keep warm.
I think he was diagnosed with Cancer.....
Boiler maker believes the future is more boilers. Hold the front page, not.
The issue he completely ignores is where the hydrogen comes from. I can see hydrogen coming in handy in the case when we have a massive surplus of wind or solar generation and can lay some up in old gas wells for the winter, but it's never going to be the scale of natural gas.
So we need to reduce the heating demand: #1 is insulation and more insulation, #2 is other sources of heat, in particular heat pumps*.
Hydrogen comes a long way down the list, primarily for places which have no other heat source. A heat pump gets you 200-400% of heat for the electrical energy you put in. Water electrolysis to hydrogen is 70-80%, let's say best case 60-70% after transport.
Say electricity is 20p/kWh. Would you rather pay 5-10p/kWh heat or
28p/kWh heat? That might focus the mind irrespective of the building work needed to change heating system.Storage on a mass scale might change the game. But why not use the hydrogen to make electricity and get that 200-400% heat pump advantage? You then only pay the roundtrip efficiency cost when using hydrogen as a stored fuel source - when the wind blows you can use that electricity directly.
I think we need both, but hydrogen currently has a lot of gaps in the story...
Theo
Oh that is bad news. I wouldn't wish it on anyone, but sadly, it seems to affect a lot of people these days. I hope he gets through it OK.
Me too, I hear all sorts of stories of damp ingress/condensation taht it has put me off here where the walls are solid, damp course non existent and half the brickwork rendered.
Isn't his the usual business of building two power stations to get the output of one, as beloved by the tidal power fanatics? Why not build a new nuke and get the output of one power station for the cost of one, and which will run for 50 years, too.
Although, from the pictures he linked to, that made it look like a military bunker.
Not certain, but I think this is his place. It does look a bit bland and featureless.
When I was a teenager, the statistics were that 1 in 3 people would have cancer in their lifetime.... (1990's)
Now its 1 in 2.
Clearly with increasing life expectancy, there is now a greater probability of getting a condition such as Alzhiemers, Parkinsons etc.
We are also being kept alive longer with these conditions thanks to medical advances.
I know of someone who had lived with Prostate cancer for 20 years.....
Indeed. If you remove the punitive legislation surrounding nuclear it is, at current prices, and interest rates, the cheapest form of energy bar coal.
why bother with renewables at all?
We should have more nuclear power stations, and should be trying to do as much "in house" as possible.
Absolutely.
The problem is, the "concerned semi-intelligencia", the constituency that is driving climate crisis hysterics and the current response, is just the same one that all but killed nuclear power in the 1970's and 80's.
Going slightly OT, I liked this quote and response from the latest "Watt-Logic" blog.
'Encouragingly, Alok Sharma implied this morning that a suspension of the price cap is under consideration, although it was apparently unclear as to whether he was referring to the price cap or subsidy costs (although their removal would also be very positive). Unfortunately a Government spokeman later denied the claim, telling The Independent:
?Our energy price cap will remain in place this winter and exists to protect millions of customers from sudden increases in global gas prices.?
This statement is, unfortunately, nonsense ? consumers will not benefit if suppliers go bankrupt, and the logical conclusion of a price cap set below the level of cost recovery is a collapse of the entire industry, exactly as happened in California.'
That was always the case. FAR more die with prostate cancer than ever are killed by it.
Tim Streater explained :
+1The Natural Philosopher has brought this to us :
+1
ISTR him posting not long ago.
It looks similar. However, if it is, what you can't see is the massively thick walls behind the windows. He gave an internal view that showed that and the thick insulated block he would use to close them off at night.
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