TOT wind

The wind is going to be 'blowing a gale' later in the week. It would be interesting to see if that number changes (up or down). Don't they have to feather the blades or something if the wind is too strong?

On Wed, 22 Jan 2025 14:17:14 +0000, alan_m snipped-for-privacy@admac.myzen.co.uk>

wrote: [snip]

'Wasn't it yesterday we used to laugh at the wind behind us?' (Diana Ross - Touch me in the morning)

Yes. Either because the turbine risks damage or because the grid backbone cant handle the energy flow, They get paid in the latter case. Not sure about the former. It's all a racket, anyway. With luck Trump will put and end to it. You cant be competitive on renewables if T USA is building nukes and fracking gas.

Did you expect them to work when the wind isn't blowing? That's why we need a whole array of generating sources, enhanced storage and rationalised consumption to meet net zero. It isn't complicated. TW

It’s very complicated.

Estimates of the UK energy demand when we are all electric, suggest we need

Putting in enough wind to generate 150GW is laughable.

Solar could never produce that much.

Biomass is the second most polluting generation there is.

Tidal is a joke.

Running cables to Morocco is hardly energy-secure.

Hydrogen is for toy balloons.

We’ll need a massive grid, not just a balancing one.

December gave us a greater than two-week Dunkelflaute; battery backup would need to supply 4TWh to cover that. The world’s largest battery storage, at $half-a-billion, could supply 1/1000th of it.

FHS, do some sums.

AKA "Pure EcoBollox™"

It only fools People Who Cant Do Sums

We don't need diversity - we need around 150 nuclear power stations.

I expect them to provide energy 24 x 7. How they do it is not my business. If the wind doesn't blow, then it should be their repsonsibility to make up the shortfall at their cost, not the cost of the rest of us. If they can't do that, then what use are they?

No, we need reliable sources like nuclear. Everything else is frippery.

What did you have in mind? Any fool can we "we need xxx". That is mere belling-the-cat. If you can't make a plausible suggestion then I suggest you STFU until you can.

Ah I see. Those of us who are more equal than others, get the power. Everybody else can go hang.

Then why are you insisting on a system that makes it more complicated?

Imagine if we just had loads of nuclear power, so much so that we would have to concern ourselves with finding load rather than finding peak supply. I would be more than happy to put my electric blanket on setting

On a serious note, a future with intermittent electricity blackouts is genuinely hellish. EVERYTHING depends on it.

Windmills are a joke. I think it is Octopus, certainly one of the renewable-only suppliers, who were prattling on not long ago about having "green" gas to run their back-up generators. Oh wow, how conscientious of them.

Have you misplaced a zero? Around 15 or 16 Sizewell Cs I think. Plus a few for redundancy, when maintenance is required.

Nope. I was (a) thinking of smaller reactors than the giant EDF EPWR fuckups (b) working on the basis that we want *everything* to be electric, not just what currently is.

Remember electricity only accounts for about 30% of our energy usage. We probably need about 200GWEe to run the country and do chemical and metal smelting, concrete making and the like.

And with plenty of SMRs placed where the loads are, the grid could be reverted to what it was originally, namely a balancing grid. All designed and constructed by engineers to be efficient and reliable, unlike the fabulously expensive fantasy that the greens are foisting on us.

But..but.. you're talking sense, so there is no chance that Milliband and the current crowd in charge will give it any consideration. The idea.

Exactly. Battersea power station not only generated electricity for London, it provided district heating as well and used the Thames to deliver coal and cool the turbine exhausts.

It would be ideal for 4-6 SMRs. Surrounded by 'social housing' with free heating and low cost electricity.

Miliband may have no choice. With Reeves and Starmer already having done far more damage to the economy than Liz Truss ever did, there simply may be no money for his gratuitous EcoBollox™

I fully recommend listening to the Today programme on BBC Sounds broadcast on the 22nd January starting at 18m20s into the programme. The government gets slated for its policies by business users. About 10 minutes long.

Typical comment “The problem is that no member of the Cabinet has had to find the monthly wages”.

At this very moment Gridwatch says wind is producing 31%, almost as much as CCGT. But then what will happen if it gets windier?

They will switch turbines off. They will still get paid for what they 'could' have generated if the grid had been able to take it.

Fair enough, that's why I included SMRs in the question.

While we will need a lot more electricity, chunks of it (Heating stored hot water, charging EVs and home batteries, some industrial processes, maybe heating heat stores for later home heating), will likely be done at what are currently times of low demand. We may need 3x as much electricity per year, but the increase in peak demand (and therefore generating capacity) will likely be far lower.

We neither need nor can afford net zero.

Those who want EV's and heat pumps are welcome to them but in the meantime the rest of us are happy with our petrol/diesel cars and gas/oil boilers because they are affordable and do the job properly