OT: 300 years of coal in UK ?

In the 90s, Gummer was influenced by greepeace and the lack of decisions on radioactive waste storage facilities.......so the building of Nuclear Power Stations stopped.

When I first moved to Cumbria in the late sixties, Workington steel works had an open furnace that lit up the sky, they rolled railway lines and sent them around the world.

But which can be imported much more cheaply.

Bullshit.

He probably ate a dodgy burger.

The point is that you save energy by burning gas to make electricity to feed a *heat pump*

But of course there is no climate crisis

In message <s03jjc$pu8$ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me, The Natural Philosopher snipped-for-privacy@invalid.invalid writes

Hundreds, possibly thousands of miles I should think. The stuff wears out when you use it.

Adrian

Nuclear power stations builds stopped because the interest rates rose to unheard of levels. Gas was cheap Gas power stations were cheap. Nuclear was a political hot potato

so no more nukes

And about the fact that a CCGT driving a heat pump uses less gas than a condensing boiler...

that is not 'new' track,

This site claims that there are is 300 years' worth of coal in the world. Of course, that is at today's use rates and using today's technology.

Perhaps it comes ultimately from the same source that says Fusion Power is 20 years away.

As a minor quibble, it's not technology, it's economics. If coal were as valuable as gold or diamonds, a much higher proportion could (and would) be extracted.

Exactly. Any energy resource is subject to two economic facts (i) if its more expensive than something else, we tend to use something else unless Green legislators stop us. The capacity for Green legislation to distort the market is being pushed to the limits these days but the limits are still there (ii) if it takes more energy to extract than it gives you back, its unsustainable no matter how well its subsidised. This is what will destroy renewable energy in the end and probably western civilisation too.

EROEI (energy return over energy in) has dropped from 50-100 in the early days of oil to around 5-10 for fracked petroleum

Renewables are, overall, probably less than one. That's what worries me about Cumbria coal - but then its not being used for energy, but to make steel.

Lots of losses, however, with heat pumps being up to 400% efficient, lossey electricity production and transmission can still match or exceed the high efficiency of gas boilers. Whether the equipment is affordable to householders is another matter.

Bullshit. Pity about the steel in buildings, cars, trucks, rails, bridges etc etc etc.

Yes it makes sense to import it.

Ah, an Art Student. (a) has heard of losses (b)has no idea how to do Basic Sums to work out what effect they would have (c) is too lazy to spend time finding out.

Not that many. gas to consumer unit will be well over 50% efficient

however, with heat pumps being up to 400% efficient,

In fact a heat pump is no more than a glorified fridge. Prices should be as low as aircon units are in hot countries

Well, coal is quite labour intensive and a bit hit and miss when looking for it. Then there is the issue of the energy used to extract it, the pollution when you use it and the tech needed to burn it clean and capture the co2 and what to do with it etc. We do have a lot of coal, and there is also a lot under the sea as well, but whether its economic, sensible from the pollution and climate point of view is difficult to say, as its no good cleaning up coal if the energy you use from ground to left over has more energy input than output. Its a bit like Fusion, you need to put a lot of energy in to get a good energy equation where you win at the end. Brian

Five years, if the French ITER works when it is switched on in 2025.

The two are linked. A higher value product would justify more investment in developing new technology.

That?s bullshit, particularly with the icing up of the external heat source with the air mode ones.

Ditto.

In those days you could also see the Bessemer converters at Port Talbot Margam steelworks from the railway and from a fair distance at night.