Hve to admit I didn't hear about this in advance. Some kind of protest movement.
Anyway, CCGT dipped from 12.1 to 6.86, which appears to have staved off disaster. The subsequent switch-back-on accommodated largely by IC France.
No evidence was ever provided to prove that this was an effective way to disrupt the grid.
I haven't seen any claims post action that this was effective, either.
Unless industrial units join in I can't see the minimal domestic load at
22:00 being able to tip the grid over. That also assumes that a majority of consumers join in the action.Just someone's personal vanity project.
Cheers
Dave R
Anecdotally this sort of thing might have produced an effect decades ago, before pumped storage, interconnectors, wind, gas etc could be fettled in real time, and the majority of power was coming from coal and nuclear.
Someone a bit out of date with generating/distribution technology.
A lot of bullshit in social media claiming the the power suppliers "lost" £9 million in 10 minutes.
Just some dick, waving
It also helps if you announce the date and time in advance :)
Were not the anecdotal stories about unexpected drips/surges in power demand?
As a side issue does anyone know what the current price of consumer gas and electric is in Spain, the price a householder would pay, not the wholesale price? A lot of the social media reasoning for this type of action is that it will bring the prices back to 2019 levels as has happened in Spain and France. No-one seems to want to publish those prices. My Googling only reveals old data and not the current situation but possible with gas some of our former EU partners were paying the same as us before the April price rises.
I went on a tour of the CEGB control centre in the 1970s, not long after the energy crisis, when we'd had the nightly 'early shutdown' of TV etc.
They showed us the guy whose job it was effectively to read the Radio Times and TV Times, and work out when surges from kettles, loos flushing etc. were expected. Of course, he was told when commercial breaks would happen too. They said they'd only been caught out badly once, on a Bank Holiday and an unexpectedly popular programme. The frequency dropped below their internal standards, but not the contractual one (think it was
0.75 Hz and 1.5 Hz).They said the 2230 shutdown was badly thought out, as there was an enormous surge at that time, naturally (they had pointed this out, but the govenment knew better. It took weeks to get them to stagger 2220 and
2230 on alternate nights for the two major channels.I wonder if current numerous TV channels, and time shifting/recording would flatten that all out.
The Duty Engineer at TC had a phone on the LEB PABX. They'd ring during very popular shows (Like Miss World) to see if theyb were running to time.
For those who don't realise, there was a great surge caused by electric kettles going on - late night drinks or possibly hot water bottles.
Well prices in Spain are "Complex" because the standing charge varies depending on your peak demand. Use more and the smart meter drops the power. Spain also has placed windfall taxes on some energy suppliers.
So I paid
Aug/Sep Off Peak 0.12, medium .16 peak .17 Oct/No 0.17? Dec/Jan 0.20?
very few people have mains gas. Price of an "Orange" bottle of gas has risen by about 50% over the last couple of years.
Yes, I had mentioned that earlier but good to clarify. Also loos flushing (think pumping stations)
Not commissioned until 1984, but Wikipeida has this to say:
Dinorwig is operated not only to help meet peak loads but also as a short term operating reserve (STOR), providing a fast response to short-term rapid changes in power demand or sudden loss of power stations.
In a common scenario (known as TV pickup), the end of a popular national television programme or advertising breaks in commercial television programmes results in millions of consumers switching on electric kettles in the space of a few minutes, leading to overall demand increases of up to 2800 MW.
In anticipation of this surge, an appropriate number of units at Dinorwig (or other services competing for National Grid Reserve Service duty) may be brought on line as the closing credits start to roll. The monitoring of popular television channels is an important factor in electricity grid control centres.
Lots of reasons why people don't all switch off the TV and go to bed at exactly 22:30, not least because even the major terrestrial channels don't have that as a cutoff at the moment!!
I wonder if the "TV pickup" mentioned above happens at all any more?
Also flushing loos during the commercial breaks.
Yes but the quantum is smaller. E.g. after England lose a penalty shoot-out.
In passing, it's not just kettles. Opening the fridge to get out milk for the tea or beer to drown sorrows (see above re penalties) can also have a significant effect.
In message snipped-for-privacy@outlook.com, at
17:51:53 >What is significant in terms of the power surge? If it was 1GW, that'd be ~5 million fridges switching on. Which doesn't pass my sniff test.
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