Re: OT - overcast with almost no wind. Wind and solar not doing much.

newshound snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wrote

Sure, but they still f***ed up with the original scheduling of the shut downs.

No. There are mandatory maximum periods of running (3 years now in the UK, it used to be 2). Then you shut down and carry out inspections and replacements. The regulator looks at the results and tells the operators whether they can start up, or whether more work is required. Scheduling is largely out of the hands of the operators and they try very hard indeed to get plant back on when prices are high (for example by deferring planned maintenance when possible). But ultimately the date is fixed by a signature on the License Instrument.

newshound snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wrote

But they could have scheduled that earlier so the restart wouldn’t have run so close to Xmas.

No its not, they could have shut down earlier.

But its not a great idea to have them restarted in the last week before Xmas.

No it's not with a slightly earlier shutdown.

No, because you can't predict the future. They did not necessarily run to three years, they may have had to shut down earlier for some other reason, and then you have to decide what scheduled work you might bring forward to do in parallel.

In the old days, it was common to schedule major plant outages in the summer for the national benefit. Once the industry was forced into competition, the priority changes. You try to have your plant on when the system price is highest. There are rules about gaming (pulling plant off to raise the price you get on other plant) but the system is *very* complex and, as we have just seen in the UK, OFGEM is not very good at its job.

newshound snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wrote

You aren't predicting the future when you calculate that the restart will be in the week before Xmas.

Still possible to calculate when the restart will happen.

Still possible to schedule major plant outages so the restart isn't in the week before Xmas.

See above

The outages were mostly pre-scheduled by EDF and designed to finish before the worst weather sets in in January and February.

Three reactors are on planned shutdown right now, one will never be restarted, another is due up today, and the third is due up mid January.

Why argue when the facts are all there?

All that I was saying is that a *lot* of planning goes into outages, including commercial decisions. But you can't plan for emergent problems, at that point you have to re-optimise. Sometimes you bring forward work to shorten the next outage, and/or in the hope of improving plant reliability. While Christmas is a known event, weather transients are not.

Well in turning that into plain English I suppose you mean that you can't plan for the unexpected, but of course you can, its called contingency planning. At the age they are there is every chance that when a reactor is shut down for routine statutory maintenance and inspection, something will be found that renders it beyond economic repair, or in need of 6 months remedial repairs.

That is factored in - supposed to be factored in - to the grids margin calculations. EDF have done their bit and there is more nuclear power on the grid right now ahead of winter, than there has been all year.

And the wind is coming - last time I looked Ireland was exporting to GB and GB was exporting to the EU. Which is still becalmed

But we have seen massively high prices sustained, because of the wicked combination of a globally tight gas market, and our reliance on it when the wind aint blowing anywhere and the sun aint shining anywhere..and its bloody cold in Europe.

Electricity and gas prices are 5 times higher than they were in the summer.

Of course people will go bust on that.

The answer is of course more nuclear power, not more windmills and solar panels and hydrogen and batteries...but the renewable scamsters are still trying to evade blame...

It is always so interesting that renewable advocates accuse people like me of being paid for nuclear advocates, looking for reasons to promote nuclear, presumably because they are paid for renewable advocates, looking for reasons to diss nuclear.

The idea that in principle I don't care what we use to generate societies power as long as it is plentiful and available and does least damage as a side effect, and after careful analysis have concluded that nuclear is the least worst option, seems totally impossible for them to absorb.

And that is irrespective of climate change. It doesn't matter whether we want to burn fossil fuels, right now its pretty much unaffordable and is extremely insecure.

We are faced with a situation where windmills and solar panels aren't working, because of lack of wind and sun Interconnectors aren't working, because the places we interconnect to are also short of wind and sun, and interconnectors are easily cut in half by hostile submarines, and probably already have been, to see what happens. Storage technology isn't in place, and given the capacity required, would be impossibly expensive to put in place. Such coal as we have is inaccessible and extremely costly to extract in the quantities needed. And costly to de sulphurise in the stacks as well. All that is in place, is a gas network we built when we had lots of it, that now would be great of we could frack, but the greens stopped that with more lies. And that gas is now 5 times the price it was 6 months ago.

In short nothing we have or could have will enable renewable energy to work safely and securely and reliably. and affordably. Fossil or otherwise.

Except nuclear power, but if we had nuclear power, why would we want or need renewables?

The two things that buy us energy independence and reliability are stockpiled uranium and fracked UK gas.

They are precisely what the greens and renewable lobbies oppose.

Cui Bono?

On 22/12/2021 13:00, The Natural Philosopher wrote: <snip>

It wasn't what I was looking for - the damage being caused by failed dams in Argentina in the current floods - but this is a good read:

Hydro, with all its flooding risks, is of course the only "green" power source that is available 24/7.

Andy

Not necessarily 24/7. Depends on whether the reservoirs a) are reasonably full, and b) are not frozen solid. Norway occasionally has both problems, and has to import from neighbouring Sweden. This, from

I said 24/7. I deliberately didn't say 365...

(why we say 24/7/365 is another discussion!)

Andy