Power plant approved as backup for unreliable renewables

A new plant has been approved for construction outside Eye, in Suffolk:

"It will operate as a ?peaking plant?, providing back-up to intermittent renewable electricity generation, making it the first of its kind to be permitted in England."

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"The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, Amber Rudd, granted permission for the development with a gas insulated substation on agricultural land in Yaxley, although the developer signalled their intention that they would prefer an air insulated substation. Underground cables will connect the facility to the national grid, and the developers claim the substation will be ?in-keeping? wi th the local surroundings."

It's a disused airfield, so what does that mean? It has 4 huge wind turbines on the same site, ("The turbines? hubs are at 80m, and the blades have 50m radius, meaning at full height the tip of the blade takes them to 130m"). I hope it doesn't match them. But the airfield was the perfect spot to see the Vulcan fly right overhead a few weeks ago.

Reply to
Davey
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What's its power? I don't see those numbers. Presumably significantly more than the output of the four wind turbines.

Ah! Found it. "A new Power Generation Plant, a Simple Cycle Gas Turbine gas fired power generating station capable of providing up to

299 Megawatts of electricity, incorporating up to five gas turbine generators with up to five exhaust gas flue stacks".

From

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But it's a 'Simple Cycle Gas Turbine', presumably not as efficient as a CCGT. Gridwatch shows that OCGT's are seldom used. Will it ever be used? I guess they've done their figures.

And what's 'gas insulation' and how does it differ from 'air insulation'? I don't understand (so what's new?!).

Reply to
Chris Hogg

In message , Davey writes

We looked at a house for sale in Eye a while ago. Lovely little Suffolk town, pleasant pub, but we were put off Eye by the smell from the chicken factory!

Reply to
News

A good thing you didn't look North of Redgrave, then. They have the Gressingham duck factory there. We will never buy one of them, we could not stop thinking of the stink the place generates. The whole area has chicken factory farms, it's the nature of the beast in that part of East Anglia. I worked once near Saltillo, Mexico, (2008-2009) and had to drive past the local abattoir every day. That was 'hold hand over nose and pinch nostrils closed' time on Slaughter Days.

Reply to
Davey

In message , Davey writes

Noted, thanks. We stayed near Halesworth recently, and were slightly surprised to discover that much of the land in that area is owned by Bernard Matthews.

Looking at houses and areas these days is so much easier with online facilities, but a site visit is still essential. We quite liked Halesworth, and Harleston.

Reply to
News

Very good friends of ours live in Halesworth, the main disadvantage is that the only supermarket is the Co-op. They shop mostly in Bungay, which has good high street shops still. But it's convenient for Southwold and Henham Park, especially for the annual Steam Festival, and Latitude, if that's your thing. Harleston has its own charm, although HSBC closed its branch there recently. It is even worse off for supermarkets, it only has a dire tired Budgens, which makes the Morrison's and Tesco's of Diss look like Harrods in comparison. But Harleston has an Adnam's Brewery Shop behind one of the pubs, right close to Budgens.

Reply to
Davey

Banbury is terrible for stink from the coffee factory.

Bill

Reply to
Bill Wright

I guess they have, remember that when OCGT and Oil is used it's last ditch, keep the lights on time. The holesale price for electricity will be sky high...

The switching/isolation busbars at a substation can just be bits of motorised metal that move in air, these are generally open to the elements. Or they can be sealed away surrounded by inert gas, these are generally inside a building. Presumably the planners feel a building is less of an eyesore that an open substation.

Reply to
Dave Liquorice

They must be banking on some serious shortages in the short and medium term. Bad news all round! AIUI the predictions are that the grid's ability to maintain supplies this coming winter is going to be tight. Let's hope it's a mild one.

Thanks for that.

Reply to
Chris Hogg

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