Renew on line 113 Jan-Feb 2015
The bimonthly news
service on renewable energy
A PDF version with charts, tables and pictures is at http://renewnatta.wordpress.com
1.UK
Developments- overview
It’s an
election year and RenewableUK (RUK) has produced its own Manifesto. They present a chart, based on
DECC/CCC data, in which 56% of electricity comes from renewables by 2030, but
still a lot of nuclear in there: . http://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/295362/ET_March_2014.PDF
That seems to
be because DECC/CCC see its costs as being similar to on-land wind and less
than offshore, even by 2030. That’s debatable. RUK says onshore wind should be
the cheapest new source by 2020, while offshore wind should be at £100/MWh, and
by then ‘wind should be meeting a quarter of the
UK’s electricity need’. It adds ‘The Committee on Climate Change [CCC] expects
wind, wave and tidal to supply up to 44% of the UK’s electricity by 2030’. It also says that ‘by 2050 there is
the potential for 50% of the UK’s power to come from offshore wind alone,
depending on the development of an interconnected grid’, and it suggested that up to
20% of UK electricity could come from wave and tidal by 2050. So, if fully achieved, that’s 70% in
total by then, even leaving aside solar, biomass, hydro, geothermal.
What next? RUK says that the Government needs to ‘set a clear path for investors by
setting a 2030 decarbonisation target, with an accompanying extension of the
Levy Control Framework, and an indication of how different technologies will
play their part. The strongest signal of all would be a 2030 renewables
target.’ Continued
support was also vital for innovation to get costs down e.g. for offshore wind.
Electoral issues: RUK says that 61% of Conservative voters, 72% of Labour and 79% of Lib Dems back
wind, as (surprisingly) do most UKIP voters. In 2013 wind, wave & tidal
employed 18,465 directly, and ‘on average a wind farm contributes £100,000
per installed MW to the local community’, so ‘a typical wind farm with five 2 MW turbines represents a £1m investment in the local
area through employment, contracts and community benefits over its lifetime’.
A
good pitch! RUK says that, in CCC’s projections (see above), wind doubles or triples
from 2020 to 2030 and wave/tidal expand 20 times. Why not? At least that. And
more later: www.renewableuk.com/en/publications/guides.cfm/general-election-manifesto
*‘The UK is
better off to the tune of 1.5% of GDP if it follows the decarbonisation path
rather than doing nothing. It’s just a myth that this is all hopelessly
expensive.’ Matthew
Knight, Siemens UK Energy, at an energy fringe meeting at last years Labour
Party Conference. But former environment secretary Owen Paterson attacked
the ‘wicked green blob,’ and its
climate views at the Tory party
conference: ‘There has not been a temperature increase now for probably 18
years, some people say 26 years’. Then
he launched his alternative plan: mini-nukes/CHP/shale gas/DSM, no big nukes
or renewables. And scrap the climate change act. See below. Versus the Green Party: http://policy.greenparty.org.uk/ey.html
Wind
ups & downs Technology news
Wind energy is doing well. There were periods last year when
wind met up to 15% of power demand, over-taking nuclear, even briefly 24%: www.carboncommentary.com/2014/10/06/wind-power-exceeds-nuclear-output-for-a-few-minutes/ For current
output see: http://winderful.diascreative.net
But wind plant output over the year was relatively
low, due to low average wind speeds (a wonderful long summer), with, in Sept, a
load factor of only 9%, the 11.2 GW of wind capacity then only meeting around
3.3% of UK power demand. See Energy Matters: http://euanmearns.com/uk-wind-power-in-the-doldrums/
This web site
also had a 100% UK renewable scenario,
with a large wind contribution, which, like the Adam Smith Institute (see
later), it sees as problematic; but then it didn’t include grid balancing
options like wind-to-gas and CHP/DH/heat stores:
http://euanmearns.com/electricity-supply-electricity-demand-and-100-renewables/
http://euanmearns.com/electricity-supply-electricity-demand-and-100-renewables/
www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/windpower/11186206/Wind-farms-can-never-be-relied-upon-to-deliver-UK-energy-security.html
The UK capacity market is meant to help with balancing too, but there’s been some concern that it might be taken by (oh horror!) foreign suppliers:
The UK capacity market is meant to help with balancing too, but there’s been some concern that it might be taken by (oh horror!) foreign suppliers:
As
for new projects,
while some got
through, Communities and Local Government secretary Eric Pickles turned down 19 onshore wind farm applications last year,
provoking complaints: http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/green-living/eric-pickles-accused-of-rejecting-wind-farms-to-win-votes-9804278.html But there’s progress on some new large offshore
wind
projects. The 389 MW West of Duddon Sands project has started up in the Irish
Sea, and the
69 turbine 250 MW Burbo Bank
Extension in Liverpool Bay got development consent. So did Dong’s 660 MW Walney Extension off Cumbria and the Siemens/Mainstream
1.2 GW Hornsea 1 off
Yorkshire. E.on’s Rampion off Sussex has already been accepted, but is to be cut by
300 MW, to 400 MW with 116 turbines. Next, Abu Dhabi’s Masdar is to
invest £525m in the planned Dudgeon project, off Norfolk. Meanwhile a 630 MW alternative to the 970 MW Navitus Bay project on the South coast has been submitted, while 4
projects in the Forth and Tay, 2.28 GW in all, have got development consent from the Scottish
Government - Neart Na Gaoithe, the Inch Cape Inc project, and Seagreen’s Alpha
and Bravo projects.
Though
elsewhere the story is not so good and may get worse: http://bit.ly/1rXxN8y
RWE has decided
not to go ahead with the 340 MW Galloper offshore project off Essex/Suffolk. It blamed tight time scales to secure
financing while still qualifying for the soon-to-expire renewables obligation
subsidy scheme. Fellow developer SSE had pulled out of the project in Sept, but
RWE said that it had been in talks with possible investors, including the Green
Investment Bank. Wind Power Monthly said RWEs move ‘will ring alarm bells
about the UK government’s incoming CfD subsidy scheme, with RWE seemingly
unwilling to develop the project underthis regime’.
It noted
concerns that the budget allocated to fund projects under the CfD wont cover
all
planned
off-shore wind projects. ScottishPower said it could cancel the East Anglia One project if didn’t get a CfD.
Not
Bust: The £20m TAG Teeside offshore wind turbine foundation plant at
Billingham was on the ropes, due to lack of orders. But Danish and German investors
have stepped in. And MHI Vestas are to
lease Vestas’ production facilities on the Isle of Wight to produce blades for
the V164 8 MW turbine, as part of a wider £200m UK production plan.
7.5
GW of EU-UK grid links
Following an
initial assessment of bids, Ofgem says 5 new large grid interconnector projects could be built. Along with the 1
GW ElecLink to France and 1 GW Belgian Nemo project Ofgem already assessed, the
projects, worth £6bn, could provide up to 7.5 GW of UK capacity access. Ofgem
says all 5 projects meet minimum eligibility criteria. They would link the UK’s
network to France, Ireland, Norway and Denmark, adding to the existing 3.5 GW
of French, Irish and Dutch links. Ofgem will now move to the next stage of
assessment, looking at their impact, how they interact, and whether they
deliver value for money. If successful, work on some could start in 2016 with
power connections in 2019/20. http://www.ofgem.gov.uk/publications-and-updates/ofgem-shortlists-five-new-electricity-interconnectors
Long
distance solar -
a
long shot?
PV solar is doing quite well in the UK, despite
the FiT cuts and solar farm opposition: it got to
over 5GW last year-
and maybe 7GW soon? http://www.solarpowerportal.co.uk/guest_blog/uk_solar_pv_industry_reaches_5gw_installed_capacity_3467
There has also
been a proposals for a much
grander concept- concentrated solar power plants in Tunisia sending power back to the UK. This
follows DECCs idea of offering
CfD support for
projects outside the UK. Irish wind projects were one possibility, but TuNur, a
partnership with UK renewables investor Low Carbon, developer Nur Energy, and
Tunisian investors, says it has already spent €10m developing a 2 GW CSP site
in the south of the country, for a possible 2018 start up. It initially had
links with the Desertec initiative, but later withdrew. A bit of a stretch.
DECC said ‘to reduce costs for British consumers,
any future non-UK project would need to compete on cost-effectiveness with
projects in the UK before being allocated a CfD’. TuNur says it can. But Solar Century said ‘The very last thing we need is
the additional medium-term uncertainty that would be created in the early years
of the next Parliament from any decision to push on with opening up the CfD
scheme and Levy Control Framework budget to foreign projects’. www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-29551063
Solar
Farms hit again
The new Environment Secretary Liz Truss seems to have picked up where the old one,
The new Environment Secretary Liz Truss seems to have picked up where the old one,
Owen Paterson,
left off, and has come out against solar farms: ‘Solar panels are best placed on the
250,000 hectares of south facing commercial rooftops where they will not
compromise the success of our agricultural industry’. The Mail quoted her as saying: ‘I’m very concerned that a lot of our land is
being taken up with solar farms. We’ve already got 250 of them and we’ve got
10,000 football pitches worth of new solar farms in the pipeline. They are
ugly, a blight on the countryside, and villages are pushing production of meat
and other traditional British produce overseas. I’m not against them per se -
they’re fine on commercial roofs and school roofs - but it’s a big problem if
we are using land that can be used to grow crops, fruit and vegetables. We
import two-thirds of our apples, and using more land for solar panels makes it
harder to improve that.’ www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2798657/eclipse-solar-farms-environment-secretary-liz-truss-tells-farmers-no-handouts-ugly-fields-glass-grow-veg.html
And
her Department (DEFRA), has announced that from January, farmers will lose
their right to claim subsidies for fields filled with solar panels, so as to ‘ensure
more agricultural land is dedicated to growing crops for food’. So farmers using fields for PV arrays will lose payments for that land
under the EU Common Agricultural Policy. Defra said this will save ‘up to
£2m of taxpayers’ money each year that won’t be available for these subsidies’. It added ‘The changes the
government is making are expected to slow down the growth of solar farms in the
countryside in England. There are currently 250 installed, with the biggest
covering as much as 100 hectares. Under previous plans, the number of fields
dedicated to solar farms was set to increase rapidly, with over 1,000 ground-based solar farms
expected by the end of the decade across the UK. These changes should help to halt this expansion as it
will now become less financially attractive for farmers to install the solar
panels.’
Dare we say that Golf courses take up more room - over 0.5% of UK land area (see Forum). But
then, asked in Parliament (Oct 27)
what estimate DEFRA had made of the area of
land occupied by solar arrays that was arable land useable for economically
farmed fruits or vegetables, the minister admitted ‘We have made no estimate of the amount of land occupied by solar panels which was arable land useable for economically farmed
fruits or vegetables’.
Tut tut..
*There have been
objections to a PV array on an old
tennis court on Burgh Island in Devon: www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/solarpower/11178836/Agatha-Christie-island-and-the-divisive-solar-plot.html
But if land use is an issue, then float it! www.fwi.co.uk/articles/29/10/2014/147341/reservoirs-and-lakes-offer-floating-solar-space.htm
Wave
and tidal power
Ecotricty’s Searaser
wave pump system has been
doing well in trials: www.theecologist.org/News/news_round_up/2610729/new_wave_generator_brightens_ocean_power_prospects.html
But
tragically pioneering company Pelamis has gone into administration, after
failing to secure more development funding. Aquamarine, the Oyster’s developer, is
also in trouble, with some staff being released. MCT is also in crisis. Siemens is to sell off Marine Current Turbines- the pioneering UK company it look over in
2012, due to the slow pace of orders.
www.businessgreen.com/bg/news/2383214/siemens-to-offload-marine-current-turbines-tidal-power-business
DECC
Renewables progress review
The
problems above may slow things, but for the moment
the overall picture for renewables in
the UK is still good, despite the slight fall in mid 2014 due to low wind
speeds: with 22 GW total installed, in the first quarter they hit 19.5% of electricity.
www.gov.uk/government/statistics/energy-trends-section-6-renewables
For
how they see the next phase, look at the overview produced by Innovate UK (the
new name for the Technology Strategy Board) ‘Energy strategy 2012 to
2015’: it focuses on cost cutting
innovation. www.gov.uk/government/publications/energy-strategy-2012-to-2015
But variable wind takes another hit..
Wind farms can never be relied upon to keep the
lights on in Britain because there are long periods each winter in which they
produce barely any power, says a report produced for the Adam Smith
Institute and
Scientific Alliance. It
claims that a 10 GW fleet of wind farms across the UK could only ‘guarantee’ to
provide less than 2% of its maximum output as firm supply, because ‘long
gaps in significant wind production occur in all seasons’. Its model found that for 20 weeks in a
typical year the wind farms would generate less than 20% (2 GW) of their
maximum power, and for nine weeks it would be less than 10% (1 GW). www.adamsmith.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Assessment7.pdf
This is hardly
news: although it can provide some input most of the time, in isolation, within
any specific region like the UK, wind is mainly a fuel saver, not a firm energy
supplier. But within a grid network with other renewables inputs, demand
management and energy storage facilities, it may be possible to balance the
overall system, without the need for fossil fuel backup, as was demonstrated by
the German Kombikraftwerk modeling exercise: http://bit.ly/1u40xwM. That avoided grid imports, but if you also
allow supergrid links over long distances, then it is also possible to import
green power from other regions in the EU if there is a surplus, for extra grid
balancing. However this report claims that there will be times when there is
little wind anywhere in the north EU. Some disagree, looking to wider EU
footprints. But it would take time for this and other balancing options to be
developed, so back-up plants may be needed for a while. That’s what the
capacity market is all about - linking in already existing fossil gas plants. But these can
gradually be converted to run on green gas - biogas and stored gas from surplus
wind-to-gas conversion. The key thing is that, if short-term grid balancing
isn’t enough, it’s easy to store gas long-term, to deal with lulls in green
supply. After all that’s what happens when nuclear plant go off-line for a
while unexpectedly, as some have recently.
Capacity
Market - first annual auction
The Capacity
Market auction in
December led to ~ 49 GW of capacity being contracted, out of ~ 65 GW of
submissions, for reserve/back up duties from 2018 onwards if required, most of
it being existing or refurbished fossil-fired capacity, along with near 8 GW of
nuclear.
That raised
some hackles: Prof. Catherine Mitchell at Exeter University said that it was
‘supporting the status quo’, with the vast majority of payments going to large,
well-known generators: ‘They have done a great job in persuading Government
that unless customers pay this extra amount it would be uneconomic for them to
keep the power plants running and the lights will go out. All of this money would have been far
better used to develop a sensible demand side response market’. As it was only a tiny amount went to DSR
(0.35 GW) but 2.7 GW did go to storage. The success of gas plants, large and
small (around 25 GW in all), is not surprising, but the fact that coal (biomass
co-fired) also got shares is worrying, if you see the aim the Capacity Market
as being to reduce emissions.
It’s even worse
if you think the aim was to back new capacity. Dave Jones, an analyst at
Sandbag, said that: ‘The capacity market looks more like a subsidy scheme to
keep heavy polluters online, rather than as a mechanism to encourage new
investment - only five per cent of auction revenues will go to new investment.
The capacity mechanism is actually slowing decarbonisation of the UK power
sector.’ www.carbonbrief.org/blog/2014/12/capacity-market-secures-some-new-gas-while-providing-stay-of-execution-to-old-coal-%281%29/
Most of the
projects (44 GW) are only contracted for a year, but there were some longer
term larger commitments. However The
Telegraph pointed out
that only one large new gas plant was contracted for and felt that this was odd
given the alleged yawning energy gap and expected plant closures. It reported: ‘critics
have suggested the policy is turning out to be poor value for money as it will
hand vast subsidies to old nuclear plants that would have kept running anyway,
and to old coal plants that are simultaneously being subjected to environmental
taxes designed to force their closure’. www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/11303088/Households-to-pay-new-11-energy-bill-levy-to-keep-the-lights-on.html
Seems no one
liked it! But it was cheaper than
expected, at £19.40/kW (totaling £990m) down from the initial reverse auction
price of £75/kW. When it starts up, in 2018, it will put around £11 p.a. on
consumers bills. And if you see it as just a way to ensure supply and demand
are matched given expected plant closures and the increase in variable
renewables, well it just about makes financial sense: gas plants are cheap,
upgrading them is cheaper than building new ones and cheaper than storage. But
demand management is surely going to be the cheapest option of all, long term.
Interconnectors may also have a role, as DECC recognized. It has opened the
scheme to grid links to Europe from 2020:
But what about
consumers? Can’t they play an active role? This challenge failed:
Maybe in the
next round? Which will take it up to ~ 51 GW.
*The overall
approach was said to be ‘technology neutral’, so in theory all options should
have been eligible, although clearly it all depends on costs. Some feared the
auction would yield a preponderance of cheaper but less environmentally
appropriate options, e.g. there had been media stories about hundreds of diesel
generators being used, along with 2-3 GW of small reciprocating gas fired
plant. As can be seen something near that has emerged. It would be good if some
could be CHP units feeding local peak heat loads, displacing peak power demand.
Maybe next time
DECC changes Policy News
Prof. John Loughhead has replaced Prof. David Mackay at DECC as Chief Scientist.
The Chief
Scientific Advisor role
is a fixed term post. The new post holder has been the Executive Director of
the UK Energy Research Centre and has a strong engineering approach. However,
although he has said he was ‘agnostic’ on the nuclear issue, he has in the past
expressed at least guardedly pro-nuclear views: ‘If the UK is to remain on
the path of reducing atmospheric emissions of greenhouse gases, it will need to
retain some nuclear capacity. Renewables are going to play a role, but they’re
going to need support if they’re to continue on a downward path of cost.’ See Renew 195 for the 2011 debate he had
with Prof. David Elliott in a GlobalNet21 House of Commons meeting on the future of nuclear.
New
Views An issue he, and DECC, may have to
address is whether a large-scale nuclear-led approach will be viable in future: http://projects.exeter.ac.uk/igov/new-thinking-is-the-centralised-utility-model-past-its-sell-by-date/ IGov at Exeter University clearly sees
distributed options as a better bet, stressing the benefits of focusing more on
the demand side: http://projects.exeter.ac.uk/igov/new-thinking-network-governance-and-distributed-energy-resources/
Similar points
were made, in its submission to the Lords ‘UK energy resilience’ review, by the
Lancaster University based Demand Centre: a more resilient electricity system, could be achieved in part ‘through
the pursuit of changes to patterns of energy demand rather than focusing only
on the supply side’, adding
that ‘these changes may, indeed, prove cheaper or have wider social benefits
than the more commonly-considered alternatives.’ www.demand.ac.uk
The
official line is that large-scale new nuclear is a key component of the future low carbon energy system,
and that, as the ETI put it in evidence to the Lords ‘resilience’ review: ‘without
investment in a major new nuclear build programme, the cost and difficulty of
meeting the UK climate change targets will rise very significantly’. Some of the other submissions are also
worth at look: www.parliament.uk/documents/lords-committees/science-technology/Resilienceofelectricityinfrasrtucture/Resilienceofelectricityinfrastructureevidence.pdf
There
are other variants, including that promoted by Owen Paterson (see below). An
amusing, if rather wild, speculation was floated by Euan Mearns on the Energy
Matters web site. After
noting that Paterson ‘has been well advised’ by various contrarians (he names Matt Ridley, John Constable & Benny Peiser) he
suggests, as ‘a speculative fantasy’ that ‘Paterson was sacked by David Cameron to provide
space for him to go off and formulate a sensible energy policy for the Tories
in the lead up to next May’s general election. That Ed Davey is sacked in the
New Year to be replaced by Mr Paterson and then the gloves come off
and the
Green jobs
Do green projects actually create new net jobs?
A new UKERC report
on ‘Low Carbon Jobs’ asks if policy-driven expansion of green energy actually
creates jobs, taking account of both jobs created and jobs displaced. The
report looks at job creation in renewable and energy efficiency and reviews
over 90 existing studies. It concludes that there can be positive net job gains
since these options are labour intensive. But it adds, if there is full
employment, investing in job intense options isn’t needed. And it concludes
that ‘What matters in the long-term is overall economic efficiency, taking
into account environmental externalities, the desired structure of the economy,
and the dynamics of technology development pathways. In other words, the proper
domain for the debate about the long-term role of renewable energy and energy
efficiency is the wider framework of energy and environmental policy, not a
narrow analysis of green job impacts.’
www.ukerc.ac.uk/publications/low-carbon-jobs-the-evidence-for-net-job-creation-from-policy-support-for-energy-efficiency-and-renewable-energy.html Ok, but don’t we want green jobs?
i.e. better replacement
jobs. For a more prescriptive approach: www.climate-change-jobs.org/ See the separate back up notes.
For
a good overview: www.carbonbrief.org/blog/2014/11/can-green-energy-policy-create-jobs/
Meanwhile, Siemens
is to invest £160m in wind turbine production and installation facilities in
Hull creating 1,000 new jobs.
Outlier views - the backlash continues
The
cost of renewables and carbon taxes will put an extra £983 a year on household
bills by 2030 (£26bn in all). There could also be blackouts. That was a key
message in the media last year picked up from a report from the Scientific
Alliance/Adam Smith Institute (see above): www.express.co.uk/news/uk/522800/Wind-farms-blamed-for-winter-power-cut-and-rise-energy-bills
The
remedy? New nuclear and gas plants to help plug shortfalls as old coal plants
were closed. And no more silly wind power.
A
similar sort of blast came from former Environment secretary Owen Paterson, in a speech to the Global
Warming Policy Foundation - with which the Scientific Alliance seem
to
have much in common. He said the effects of climate change had been
‘consistently and widely exaggerated’, and that policies to encourage onshore
wind farms will cost £1.3 trillion
by 2050. He said the UK was alone
in having legal mandatory emission cut targets. That, and much else, was
denied, in a response to early reports of his views, by the governments
advisory Climate Change Committee. It also insisted that global warming
has slowed not halted. And on his
fears on the cost of the low carbon policy, it said ‘an average dual-fuel
household
will see around a £10 increase each year in energy bills until the mid-2020s,
after which theimpact of low-carbon policies on bills is expected to fall’.
The
CCC was less concerned about his technology proposals. Leaving aside his very
hostile comments on renewables
(see below), his backing for CHP and demand management
is
welcome, unless he meant mini-nuke/shale gas fired CHP, and big imposed supply cuts. He also backedAD from waste, but said
it would be small. Basically his world would be
shale
gas/mini-nuke based… but not big nukes: too slow to build. Or CCS…
CCC: www.theccc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Owen-Patersons-speech-to-the-GWPF-the-CCCs-response.pdf
Paterson’s
analysis of renewables
‘Onshore
wind is already at maximum capacity as far as available subsidy
is concerned [...] DECC is struggling to control this subsidy drunk industry.
Planning approval for renewables overall, including onshore wind, needs to come
to a halt or massively over-run the subsidy limits set by the Treasury’s Levy
Control Framework. However, this paltry supply of onshore wind […] has
devastated landscapes, blighted views, divided communities, killed eagles,
carpeted the countryside and the very wilderness that the “green blob” claims
to love, with new access tracks cut deep into peat, boosted production of
carbon-intensive cement, and driven up fuel poverty, while richly rewarding
landowners.
Offshore
wind is proving a failure. Its gigantic costs, requiring more
than double the subsidy of onshore wind, are failing to come down as expected,
operators are demanding higher prices, and its reliability is disappointing, so
projects are being cancelled as too risky in spite of the huge subsidies
intended to make them attractive. There is a reason we are the world leader in
this technology - no other country is quite so foolish as to plough so much
public money into it.
Hydro is maxed out. There is no opportunity to
increase its contribution in this country significantly.
Tidal and wave power despite interesting
small-scale experiments is still too expensive and impractical. Neither the
astronomical prices on offer from the government, nor huge research and
development subsidies have lured any commercial investors to step into the
water. Even if the engineering problems could be overcome, tidal and wave
power, like wind, will not always be there when you need it.
Solar power may one day be a real contributor to
global energy […] But it is a non-starter as a significant supplier to the UK
grid today and will remain so for as long as our skies are cloudy and our
winter nights long. Delivering only 10 percent of capacity, it’s an expensive
red herring for this country and today’s solar farms are a futile eye-sore, and
a waste of land that could be better used for other activities.
Biomass
is not zero carbon. It generates more CO2 per unit of energy even
than coal. Even DECC admits that importing wood pellets from North America to
turn into hugely expensive electricity here makes no sense if only because a
good proportion of those pellets are coming from whole trees. The fact that
trees can regrow is of little relevance: they take decades to replace the
carbon released in their combustion, and then they are supposed to be cut down
again. If you want to fix carbon by planting trees, then plant trees! Don’t cut
them down as well. We are spending ten times as much to cut down North American
forests, as we are to stop the cutting down of tropical forests. Meanwhile,
more than 90% of the renewable heat incentive (RHI) funds are going to biomass.
That is to say, we are paying people to stop using gas and burn wood instead.
Wood produces twice as much carbon dioxide than gas.’
Owen Paterson
Energy saving
DECC has been trying to talk up the Green Deal and ECO schemes and some progress does seem to have been
made, despite the ECO cuts backs. Energy Secretary Ed Davey said ‘We’re
aiming to make 1 million homes warmer and more energy efficient by March 2015 –
and we’re on track with nearly 800,000 homes helped through ECO and the Green
Deal by the end of August. More than 350,000 homes have now had a Green Deal
Assessment and our recent research indicates that 70% of people go on to get
work done. Now with an extra £100 million for household energy efficiency, even
more people will be able to cut their energy bills and have warmer homes
sooner.’ www.gov.uk/government/publications/research-into-the-green-deal-and-eco-programme-supply-chain
and www.gov.uk/government/publications/green-deal-customer-journey-survey-summary-report-quantitative-survey-wave-3 It’s good to see upgrades being done. But in terms of
new build, there can be potential air quality/moisture /mold and also radon gas
problems with high tech, highly-insulated houses: https://theconversation.com/energy-efficient-buildings-beware-possible-health-risks-31813
Community
wind Beinn Ghrideag Community Wind Farm, in the Isle of Lewis,
has won £11m from Santander Corporate & Commercial to build a wind farm and
deliver its community-focused plan.A £5 local bribe to accept
local wind: http://gu.com/p/43vbk
Zero
Carbon Homes-nuclear imports not an ‘allowable solution’
The government
was asked, in a Parliamentary question
(23 Oct), whether, in delivery of the Zero Carbon Homes policy, house builders can contract with a
third party to deliver the carbon abatement measures outside of the built
environment with (a) renewable energy technologies, (b) carbon capture and
storage and (c) nuclear power in order to meet the house builder’s zero carbon
obligation. Here is the ministerial reply: ‘The Government intends to adopt
a flexible approach to defining the off site carbon abatement measures
(allowable solutions) which can be supported by house builders to meet their
zero carbon obligation and not apply restrictions which would rule out
innovative, cost effective approaches. The Government’s consultation on “Next Steps
to Zero Carbon - Allowable Solutions” set out examples of potential measures
which could be supported, including renewable energy measures. The Government
has not considered support for carbon capture and storage or nuclear power in
the context of allowable solutions. However, the criteria based approach set
out in the consultation for identifying appropriate carbon abatement measures
would require that measures will need to bring forward additional, verifiable
carbon savings at a cost effective price. Given carbon capture and storage, and
nuclear power, would have high upfront costs, they would be unlikely to be
cost-effective.’ So nukes
and CCS are too expensive! Just as
we thought… across the board.
Green
Heat The UK target is to have 25% of heating
met by low carbon sources. Heat pumps and biomass boilers are being supported
by the Renewables Heat Incentive (RHI), but WWF’s report Warm homes, not
Warm Words says that just
2% of UK heating demand currently comes from low carbon sources. So it calls
for a drastic scaling up of heat networks and renewable heat technologies
across the country, and argues that ministers should confirm the future of the
RHI out to 2020. WWF says ‘In the next 15 years, the UK needs to insulate
eight million lofts, install nearly four million heat pumps and quadruple the
number of homes connected to heat networks. That’s not going to happen without
stronger government support. The prize at the end will be many warmer,
healthier homes that are cheaper to run.’ The report was welcomed by the Combined Heat and
Power Association and the Renewable Energy Association. However the exact mix
can be debated. It’s true that the UK needs a lot more heat pumps if the aim is
to replace gas use for heating, but domestic heat pumps make most sense in
off-gas areas. CHP fed District heating arguably is better in urban areas, with
COP equivalents of up to 20, rather than ~3 for heat pumps.
And for a global view, from the IEA: www.iea-dhc.org/home.html
Micro CHP: www.catalyst-commercial.co.uk/energy-blog/dubbed-the-game-changer-flow-energys-home-generator
£10m
for Community Energy
DECC noted that
Ethical investment company Ethex had found that renewable energy projects are the most
popular type of community investment, with £29m raised for 56 projects since
early 2012. And the number of community owned
renewable energy schemes in England could increase, given DECCs new £10m Urban
Community Energy Fund. It
will give community groups in England the opportunity to bid for grants of up
to £20,000, or loans of up to £130,000 to help kick-start their projects. DECC
says ‘Community groups can reap the benefits of renewable energy by creating
“power hubs” in their area. Installing solar panels on local buildings or
factories or building an anaerobic digestion plant to create energy from local
waste can save whole communities money’.
Community
electricity projects will also now get further support under the Feed-in Tariff
Scheme, for small-scale projects. For the first time, registered charities will
be entitled to the same benefits as other community groups and two community
projects (or one community project and one commercial project), each up to 5
MW, will now be able to share a single grid connection and receive separate
FiTs. The FIT will also now be guaranteed for an extra six months - giving
communities more time to get their project up and running.
Community
Energy England said: ‘Without risking the integrity of the wider
Feed-in-Tariff scheme, this will stimulate community involvement in larger
Renewable schemes. It will be a great boost to projects using the split
ownership model under the voluntary protocol for Shared Community Ownership.’
*£10m isn’t much compared to the other funding: see this
Ministerial ‘priorities’ speech, which mentions nuclear many times, shale gas a lot, renewables hardly at all: https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/goldman-sachs-global-natural-resources-conference
But there is some money for PV for schools
*The £11bn smart
meter rollout has been
delayed yet again: it now may not start until late 2016. www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/11242115/11bn-energy-smart-meter-roll-out-suffers-fresh-delay.html#disqus_thread
Whatever became of CCS?
The
UK Carbon Capture and Storage programme has been moving ahead very slowly, but, in a
Commons debate on Nov. 20th, Under-Secretary of State for Energy and Climate
Change, Amber Rudd,
noted that ‘We have set aside £1 billion to support the first CCS projects
in the UK, and we are investing £100 million of that now in the development of
detailed engineering and planning designs for those projects. […] We want a
strong and successful CCS industry that can compete on cost with other low-carbon
technologies in the 2020s, and that deploys up to 13 GW by 2030.’
She added ‘we
have made good progress with the White Rose and Peterhead projects over the
past year’. The first
aims to build ‘the world’s biggest oxyfuel power plant at the Drax site in
Yorkshire with full Carbon Capture and Storage [...] That will link into the
planned development of a CO2 transportation and storage infrastructure called
the Yorkshire Humber CCS trunkline, which could have capacity for additional
CCS projects in the area and provide the foundation for further CCS projects in
the region.’ And Shell’s Peterhead project, ‘could
become the world’s first commercial-scale gas CCS project. The proposal is to
attach carbon capture technology to the existing gas power plant at Peterhead
and transport the CO2 for permanent storage in the depleted Goldeneye gas
field.’
Tim Yeo, Tory chair of the Energy and Environment
Select Committee, gave it a guarded blessing: ‘Progress in the past 10 years
or so has been patchy, to put it no more strongly. The competitions unveiled in
2007 were expected to deliver an operating CCS project by this year, but
initially they did not manage to support any projects at all. We had something
resembling a lost decade. In 2012, an NAO report on this matter criticised the
Government’s handling of the competition, and a second competition, which was
announced in that year, is now looking to fund two projects that we hope will
be operational between 2016 and 2020. Despite that slightly faltering start, I
am pleased with the recent attempts to move a bit faster.’ Though he added: ‘I do not believe that
progress has yet been sufficient to enable Governments - here or anywhere- to
base their energy and climate change policy on the assumption that an
economically viable form of carbon capture and storage will be available in the
near future, or, possibly, even the next decade’. Exactly. So why are we backing new gas projects?
Labour’s Dr Alan
Whitehead said that,
given emission limits, ‘we already face the likelihood that known fossil
fuel reserves would have to stay in the ground if we do not do something about
how we burn them, never mind us fracking rocks apart to provide new sources’.
Power out - keeping the lights on
There is still
a large reserve capacity, but with some large old plants closing, like the
Didcot ‘A’ coal plant, the UK has found it a bit more challenging to meet
demand when there are unexpected outages.
The fire at the Didcot ‘B’ gas-fired plant last Oct. briefly reduced capacity by
about 600 MW, but it was repairable, and on its own
this was not a problem.
However the nuclear fleet had also been in trouble, with some unplanned
shut downs last year due to faults, loosing all output from one 450 MW reactor
at Hunterston B, and from the two 450 MW reactors at Heysham and from another
two at Hartlepool, as well as from one 400 MW reactor at Dungeness B (the other
was offline for refueling). That’s 2.65 GW of nuclear losses in all. Restarts
were put in hand: for the current (daily) state of play see:
But the boiler
cracks found at Heysham and Hartlepool mean that, for safety sake, their output will be reduced 75-80 %, i.e. by ~240 MW. If it goes ahead, Hinkley won’t be on line until 2023 at the earliest, so it’s no immediate help. With wind supplying 24% at one point, we’ve
made it through
the winter (so far) and the plant margin allegedly has remained above 4%, although
extra measures were taken:
http://utilityweek.co.uk/news/uk-has-a-65-per-cent-supply-margin-says-baroness-verma/1063502#.VEYpLShQRFg
and www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-29715796
The
UK has a peak winter demand of ~60 GW and ~86 GW generation capacity, plus up to 4 GW
from inter-connectors to foreign electricity systems. So if all this is
available there is more than sufficient to cover the peak. But by 2020, as
older gas-fired plants are retired, and more variable renewables come on line,
it could get harder to meet peak loads unless new demand side measures are
adopted. See UKERC’s view below. More:/www.carbonbrief.org/blog/2014/10/five-things-we-learned-from-national-grids-winter-outlook-report/
So what next? How can we avoid problems in future?
Demand side measures and energy saving can help, but on the supply side,
there are many new plants in the pipeline. In
addition to the various new offshore wind farms (maybe 2 GW this year if all
goes well), and PV (2 GW more this year?), there are also plans for more
gas-fired plants, including two 299 MW
fast-response open cycle gas in S. Wales, and a third in Bedfordshire, possibly
by 2018. Also in the medium term, there’s wave and tidal stream power (maybe
150-200 MW by 2018), plus the 240 MW Swansea tidal lagoon. That could be ready
by 2018, if all goes well - Prudential is to inject up to £100m to pump prime
this project. Wind and PV are likely to continue to expand rapidly, with maybe
over 30 GW of wind by 2020, and 10 GW or more of PV, and a lot more of both
after that, with wave and tidal by then moving into the GW range. So there
should be no problems with capacity, and, though there will be grid-balancing
issues, biomass/biogas fired plants and the new capacity
market and demand management can help with that. So can imports on the new grid
links - by 2020 there could be 11 GW in all.
Demand Reduction
UKERC has contributed evidence to a
Government Inquiry on electricity demand-side measures.
It argued that the Government's current target, identified in the Electricity
Demand Reduction Strategy, of 32 TWh/year, was too conservative, as it excluded
potential savings in household lighting and appliances. The Governments figure
assumes the savings will be delivered through EU product policy- essentially
product labeling and standards. That approach of course has it own problems and
limits: www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/nov/18/brussels-targets-super-sized-tvs-in-drive-for-energy-efficiency But UKERC says innovation
theory indicates that, in any case, information (via labels) and minimum
standards alone are not the most effective policy - they don’t encourage the
development, marketing and purchase of new energy efficient products. Where
life cycle costs of new products initially exceed those of less efficient
products, financial incentives may be needed to allow enough volume production
to reduce costs to manufacturers. A combination of standards, information and
incentives is needed. But EU product policy has no mechanisms to provide
incentives: these need to be created nationally.
http://ukerc-news.org.uk/UP4-2TN4P-7OPMNG-1BKVFR-1/c.aspx
*A new domestic smart
demand
controller: www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/household-bills/11196763/250-energy-saving-from-new-black-box.html
DECCs Annual Energy Statement 2014
|
|
UK Climate Targets - the next phase
The
UK has ambitious climate targets, setting the context for the renewables
programme, and indeed the nuclear, CCS and energy efficiency programmes, with
an overall commitment to an 80% cut in emissions from 1990 levels by 2050. The
2008 Climate Change Act provides a basis for these targets, and introduced a
system of 5-yearly carbon budgets. While UK so far emissions are within these
budgets, further cuts will be increasingly challenging - e.g. if it doesn’t shut
coal plants as planned: http://www.wwf.org.uk/about_wwf/press_centre/?uNewsID=7370. But the 4th carbon budget
(2023-27) has been agreed, though it’s controversial: Owen Paterson wants to
dump the whole thing! As a condition of accepting it, the government insisted
that it should be reviewed. Though it has accepted the advice from the
Committee on Climate Change (CCC) that it should not be relaxed.
However it’s
a political battle ground.
* The UK Energy
Research Centre (UKERC) has been reviewing the feasibility of the UK’s planned
low carbon pathway to 2030, and the uncertainties that could have an impact on
its
achievability. Prof. Jim Watson, UKERC’s Research Director, outlined
their views at UCL.Video: www.youtube.com/uclenergyinstitute and
www.youtube.com/user/UCLISR
Fracking
fine ‘There is an impressive amount of scientific
evidence that, with a robust regulatory regime, the risks to the environment and
public health are low. We
concluded that, with such a regime in place, the environmental risks are small,
whereas the benefits, if shale gas development can take place, are substantial.’
Chair, Economic Affairs
Select Committee www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201415/ldhansrd/text/1411040002.htm#14110462000324
The
UKERC however insisted that it was too soon to say if shale gas would be
significant or cheap in the UK and that there was too much hype: www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-30013668
Certainly it is
all very uncertain! For example, the global oil price fall may hurt renewables, but also
nuclear and shale gas..
It gets crazier A wind farm near the Sellafield nuclear site has been opposed on
safety grounds. www.whitehavennews.co.uk/news/fears-voiced-over-wind-turbines-near-sellafield-1.1174620 But ex-chief scientist Prof Sir David King says we ‘might well’ be able to do
without nuclear, and rely on renewables, if energy storage was developed: www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/nuclearpower/11244499/Nuclear-power-may-not-be-needed-says-top-atomic-advocate.html
This from someone who has
pushed nuclear hard..
Hinkley fallout Nuclear news
On the 3.2 GW Hinkley European Pressurised-water Reactor
project, now cleared to proceed, the European Commission said that the initial
investment guarantee fee, which EDF would have paid to the UK Treasury, was too
low for a project with this risk profile. So it was ‘significantly raised’,
reducing the subsidy by more than £1bn. But there are still big financial
risks, which taxpayers and consumers may yet be called on to meet if things go
badly: this £24bn project will be seen as too big to allow to fail. A 4 year
construction-delay grace period has, it seems, been built into the draft contract. But even by
2023, when, all being well, it’s meant to start up, gas prices may well be low
(if you believe the rhetoric on shale gas). More likely, prices for wind &
PV will be lower. Either way, Hinkley could become a ‘stranded asset’, but with
consumers still having to pay the high CfD price for 35 years - and the
possibility of a review of the price upwards after 15 and 25 years if operational
costs are higher than expected. What a deal! It seems that 16 commissioners voted in favour of the project deal, just ahead of the 15 votes needed for approval. Evidently a near run
thing: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-29536793 But contracts
have yet to be signed. And, buried deep in euro-commission minutes from
8 Oct., is an admission that there was ‘regret, expressed by some, that all
the long-term costs for the British Treasury had not been integrated into the
calculation of the cost of the project, for instance the cost of storing the
nuclear waste or of dismantling the plant at the end of its lifetime’. So even the £24bn may be a bit of a
fiction. All in, with insurance, capital loan costs and inflation included
we’ve seen £34bn cited.
And with
overrun costs, it could be more: completion of the EPR being built in France,
already 5 years late, has been delayed by yet another year, adding to Areva’s
financial woes.
* German environment minister Barbara Hendricks said the
decision was ‘utterly wrong’: ‘As far as I know, the nuclear power plant
Hinkley Point C will receive guaranteed prices for more than 30 years, which are considerably higher than our feed-in tariffs that are being decreased successively’.
Germany, which aims to gets 80% of its power from renewables by 2050, may join Austria (near 80% already) in challenging the EC decision. They, like
Denmark (aiming for 100%), may fear that investor funding for their
renewables programmes could be undermined by heavy state subsidises for nuclear
projects elsewhere. No new nuclear projects are planned in France, but Areva welcomed the EC’s ‘positive
signal for nuclear investors in Europe,’ which it said will help ‘consolidate
the leadership of French nuclear industry in the third generation nuclear reactor market.’ But would any government other than the UK’s get
away with it? And risk undermining their renewables?
* In the UK, a right-wing
backlash on Hinkley say that shale gas and even solar would be cheaper: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/11150015/Solar-energy-and-shale-are-the-future-not-costly-nuclear-power-plants.html And Owen Paterson
said ‘big nukes’ weren’t the way ahead. Labour hinted that it would seek a
better Hinkley contract. More militantly, for a green view, see: www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2592833/hinkley_c_will_cost_britain_dear_if_its_ever_built.html
and more technically: http://www.carboncommentary.com/blog/2014/10/22/cambridge-nuclear-engineer-casts-doubt-on-whether-hinkley-point-epr-nuclear-plant-can-be-constructed/
Meanwhile,
the National Audit Office is looking at the Hinkley deal: http://t.co/8qeRumvZUt And the Times claimed a
special ‘secret’ government review is looking at whether Hinkley can really go
ahead as planned: www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/business/industries/utilities/article4272779.ece It’s all looking a bit
fraught..
Hold your breath
On
averaged data it shouldn’t happen, but this may explain cancer clusters: www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2574389/radioactive_spikes_from_nuclear_plants_a_likely_cause_of_childhood_leukemia.html The numbers are small, but it may be refueling that does it. You can
see which units are off-line at: www.edfenergy.com/energy/power-station/daily-statuses But it doesn’t say exactly when they are refueling. Meanwhile
some old plants struggle to stay on: www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/11169625/Nuclear-reactor-heat-turned-down-to-stop-boilers-cracking.html
See above - their
reduced output will put more strain on the grid. http://Some
of them do seem to be past their use by date: www.heraldscotland.com/news/environment/alarm-after-serious-breakdowns-at-ageing-hunterston-nuclear-plant.25565033 www.heraldscotland.com/news/environment/alarm-after-serious-breakdowns-at-ageing-hunterston-nuclear-plant.25565033 And Sellafied clearly has ageing problems, with photos published by the Ecologist showing ‘cracked concrete tanks holding water contaminated with
high levels of radiation, seagulls bathing on the water, broken equipment, a
dangerous mess of discarded items on elevated walkways, and weeds growing
around the tanks’. All very worrying, with no long-term waste store in sight.
2. Global developments
US
and China agree
The joint
US-Chinese plan to cut emissions (see later below) got some positive coverage- the
USA’s 26-28% by 2025 cut target compares quite well with the EUs:
By comparison
however, China’s commitment to cap its emissions ‘by around 2030’, though
welcome, was seen as a bit weak and open ended.
PV solar romps ahead
- but mostly in Asia
- but mostly in Asia
PV
solar is
accelerating rapidly, to around 150 GW total, due in part to the spectacular
price reductions - see the IEA log-log ‘learning curve’ chart below. But take up in the EU has fallen due to
cuts in FiTs. Not so in Asia: see the chart left. China (the source of many of
the cells) and Japan are roaring ahead. But so too is the USA.
What next? If batteries continue to get
cheaper, then PV + storage may lift off in a big way at the domestic scale: it is
already happening in Germany. It may take longer for utility scale PV+ storage
to be viable. Large CSP, with molten salt heat stores, still has the edge,
depending on location. NREL say it has a 5-6% price advantage over ‘non-store’ plants. But
large PV/CPV is catching up.
Bioenergy - 14% of total…
Not everyone
backs biomass, given the emission/land-use issues, but the World Bioenergy
Association says bioenergy contributes over 14% of global energy, and
its ‘WBA Global Bioenergy Statistics 2014’ report has useful
data on the global situation, by area and source:
overall solid
biomass supplied 89% of total bioenergy,
and over 90% of bioenergy is used for heat -
the rest for transport and electricity. 70% of biofuel production is in the Americas, while
Europe led in biomass energy conversion, Asia and Africa in biomass for direct heat.
… but wind still the best
Taking account of
all lifecycle energy requirements, wind Power has one of the lowest emission impacts of all energy
supply options, though CO2 negative
BECCs could beat it: http://www.aweablog.org/blog/post/new-report-wind-turbines-repay-their-energy-footprint-in-5-to-8-months
And odd view The Energy Matters web site seems to be strongly pro-nuclear.
A
recent post by Euan Mearns, who runs it, relayed all the standard arguments
against renewables, ending up with ‘There are a very large
number of engineers and scientists who envisage nuclear fission as the near
term bridge to a nuclear fusion future’. Its
rendition of BPs data is hard to reconcile with IRENA’s view that renewables
now supply 18% of global energy (not 9% as shown left) and could reach 30% or
more by 2030. But BP is very conservative. Its 2014 Energy Outlook
says renewables will only supply14% of global electricity by 2035. Though it also says, including
biofuels, renewables will have a higher share of primary energy than nuclear by
2025. www.bp.com/energyoutlook
Clearly views differ:
http://euanmearns.com/the-new-global-dictator/
and www.irena.org/remap/
For a
more radical global green energy review see: www.theecologist.org/blogs_and_comments/commentators/2477299/decarbonising_the_world_energy_system_without_nuclear.html
EU - weak energy targets set EU News
In January last
year, the European Commission (EC) suggested that the EU should cut carbon emissions by 40% but only
raise the share of renewables to 27% by 2030, up from 20% by 2020. That is pretty
unchallenging. Greenpeace has pointed out that it would mean that renewables growth would drop
from almost 7% p.a. in this decade to under 2% in 2020-30. It took a while for
the EC to propose an energy efficiency target for 2030, to replace the current ‘20% by 2020’ target. One perverse
issue is that higher levels of efficiency would undermine the EU Emissions
Trading Scheme - the carbon price would fall as there would be less
CO2 to trade! But in July it proposed a 30%
by 2030 energy saving
target. Greenpeace saw it all as ‘gutless’. It had come up with its own 2030
targets - a 45% share of renewables, 40% energy savings (compared to 2005) and
a 55% cut in domestic CO2 emissions
(compared to 1990). That, it said, would cut annual 2030 fossil fuel imports
dramatically - gas by 35%
and oil by 45%.
As coal power plants were phased out in the 2030s, coal imports would cease
altogether before the end of the next decade. But it was not to be, and we’re
stuck with a proposed
30% overall reduction non-mandatory target. Or less..Moreover if the targets are not
technology specific they may lead to more
nuclear..
Denmark: on-land wind the
cheapest
Onshore wind power is the cheapest form of electricity
generation in Denmark, according to a
new research study released by the Danish Energy Agency. New onshore wind
plants due to come online in 2016 will generate at just over 30 ore (3 p)/ kWh.
Offshore wind power is in second place, with new centralized coal and natural
gas plants and decentralized combined heat and power, at almost nearly 60 ore
(6p)/kWh. Solar and new large dedicated and converted biomass power stations,
and decentralized biomass, are estimated to be the most expensive, all at 85-90
ore (9 p) /kWh. PV may yet do better, but Denmark has been a leader and a big
investor in wind energy since the 1970s. In December last year, wind met more
than 50% of the country’s electricity demand for the first time. www.energymarketprice.com
* A bit of a concern, minks farmed near a wind project have
reportedly suffered health problems with ultra sound blamed:
www.masterresource.org/2014/06/health-effects-from-wind-turbines/
France: offshore floating wind
and energy saving
With France now committed to accelerating renewables to get to 40% of power by 2030, while ramping down nuclear by 25%, offshore wind is being pushed hard. The EU-funded Floatgen project will install a 2 MW demonstrator floating turbine at France’s SEM-REV test site, off Le Croisic, by the end of the year, if all goes to plan. The test site was originally earmarked for the Winflo demonstrator, but that project is under review. Meanwhile progress is being made with the Vertiwind 2 MW direct drive, vertical-axis floating turbine (pic left), designed for waters up to 200 metres deep. Also see: http://cleantechnica.com/2014/10/14/french-mashup-to-launch-floating-wind-turbines/
and energy saving
With France now committed to accelerating renewables to get to 40% of power by 2030, while ramping down nuclear by 25%, offshore wind is being pushed hard. The EU-funded Floatgen project will install a 2 MW demonstrator floating turbine at France’s SEM-REV test site, off Le Croisic, by the end of the year, if all goes to plan. The test site was originally earmarked for the Winflo demonstrator, but that project is under review. Meanwhile progress is being made with the Vertiwind 2 MW direct drive, vertical-axis floating turbine (pic left), designed for waters up to 200 metres deep. Also see: http://cleantechnica.com/2014/10/14/french-mashup-to-launch-floating-wind-turbines/
Funding for
projects like this is to come from a new tax regime, with
a €10 bn package of tax breaks, low-cost loans and
bonuses to boost investment in renewables and cut oil and gas bills. On the energy
saving side, homeowners will be allowed to deduct 30%
of the cost of thermal insulation from their taxable income, up to a maximum of
€16,000 per couple. A bonus will also be available to those who buy an electric
or any other clean car, raised from €6,700 to €10,000 if they scrap a diesel
car at the same time. Electric car
owners will also get a 30% rebate on the cost of installing a charger at home.
A €1.5 bn fund to subsidise ‘zero-waste’ and ‘energy-plus’ communities, or
buildings producing more energy than they import sources, will be set up. PV
solar is being pushed too, though from a low base.
*But
France has cut its goal of providing smart meters to 95% of power
customers by 2020 to 90%
German green energy costs
There is a lot
happening in Germany. It may install 4GW of offshore wind in 2014-16. Completed projects include
Dan Tysk 288MW, Global Tech 1 400MW and Borkum West 2 200MW. And UK company ITM
Power’s 300kWThuga wind-to-gas PEM electrolyser has been running well
for over a year, injecting gas into the German gas mains.
However,
a very critical report on the ‘Development
and Integration of Renewable Energy: Lessons Learned from Germany’, by
Finadvice in Switzerland for the US Edison Electric Institute, says: ‘Over the last decade,
well-intentioned policy makers in Germany and other European countries created
renewable energy policies with generous subsidies that have slowly revealed
themselves
to be unsustainable, resulting in profound unintended consequences for all industry
stakeholders. While these policies have created an impressive roll-out of renewable energy resources, they have also clearly
generated disequilibrium in the power markets, resulting in significant
increases in energy prices to most users, as well as value destruction for all
stakeholders: consumers, renewable companies, electric utilities, financial
institutions, and investors.’ It’s a pretty damning review, claiming that ‘because FITs levels were
administratively driven and slow to adapt to the evolution of the solar market,
the incentive became excessively generous, which initiated an uncontrolled
development of renewables, which, in turn, created unsustainable growth with a
myriad of unintended consequences’.
The report says
the FITs cost over $412 bn to date and might reach
$884 bn (€ 680 bn) by 2022. It says household electricity prices in
Germany have more than doubled, from €140/ MWh in 2000 to over €290/MWh in
2013, while wholesale prices in Germany for base load have fallen dramatically
from €90-95/MWh in 2008 to €37/MWh in 2013. As a result of all this ‘German
utilities have seen their stock plunge by nearly 45% since 2010’. While there’s no doubting that it cost a
lot and needed adjustment, that’s now underway, with a new premium market
replacing guaranteed FiTs for new projects and the EEG surcharge levy cut last year to €61.7/MWh
from €62.4. This year PV will get €27/MWh, biomass €16, onshore wind €12
offshore wind €5. http://renews.biz/77455/germany-lowers-re-surcharge/
An optimistic
interpretation is that the early pioneering phase resulted in consumers helping
to launch a massive 70 GW+ if renewables using FiTs, with, as a result, unit
costs falling*, so the costs of the next more
commercial phase will now be less. But it’s not clear if the new market system
will continue to cut costs. Certainly this report doesn’t give any evidence for
that- it’s just anti-FiT! More likely the new regime, and the cuts, will just slow capacity growth.
Much
has been made of the rise of coal use in Germany. But Schneider & Froggatt* say that the key
driver was ‘the price signal on the European power exchange market, not the
nuclear phase-out’. They claim that ‘as
in other countries, cheap coal prices on the world market (mainly because
efficiency, gas, and renewables displaced so much coal from the U.S. market),
coinciding with spiking natural-gas prices and a collapsed EU carbon market,
led to perverse effects: while German power production from natural gas plants
dropped by 25% during 2010-2013, lignite plants boosted production by 10% over
the same period and coal plants by 4%’.
They
conclude that ‘these effects, however, are expected to be brief and
temporary’,
pointing out that that ‘the coal uptick, particularly in 2013, was not
driven by domestic demand, since efficiency and renewables were both rising;
rather, it was entirely to serve record German power exports, chiefly to
Holland and France’. That in turn was because ‘Europe has a large structural overcapacity, so in the absence of a
significant carbon price, there has been an increasing incentive to operate existing
lignite and coal fired power plants. Germany does not have any capacity
problems, on the contrary, the country never exported more than in 2013 with
72.2 TWh or 33.8 TWh net, a 46% increase in net exports over the previous year,
and due to its highly competitive wholesale prices, (which renewable power has
sharply reduced in the past few years), Germany is the only country that
consistently is a net exporter of electricity to France.’ Are they right? What happens next? Between 2010-13 gross
electricity use fell by 2.9%, renewables rose by 45% to 25.3%. If that trend
continues, on the way to 80% renewables and a 50% energy use cut, coal
use should fall. Though short-term it may depend on gas prices!
*10 GW of coal
may be cut: http://www.euractiv.com/sections/energy/germany-may-cut-coal-fired-energy-protect-climate-309617 Also see http://www.businessgreen.com/bg/news/2360089/coal-generation-down-as-germany-breaks-yet-another-renewables-record
Global roundup
Brazil: Renewables are rising, but so are fossil fuels, partly due to
rising demand, as in all the ‘BRIC’ countries: http://yearbook.enerdata.net/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=%5BYB-0714%5D+Yearbook+Launch+EU
India: The renewables programme in India, another key BRIC
country, has suffered from uncertainties and policy changes, but may get moving
under the new government, though the 2014 budget allocation was tiny compared
with the $1.7bn allocation to nuclear.
It has around 39
GW of large hydro and 32 GW of new (non hydro) renewables capacity in
place. At 20 GW, wind has a 62% share of the total new
renewables (with 7.2 GW in the Tamil Nadu area, 3.5 GW in Maharashtra and 3.4
GW in Gujarat), and solar PV is at 2.6 GW (8.2%). Much of that is in Gujarat (860 MW) but there
is 667 MW in the desert state of Rajasthan. A new development is floating PV: a pontoon system, supporting 50 MW of PV
panels, is to be floated on a lake in the southern state of Kerala, in a ~ $70m
project led by the National Hydro Power Corporation. It will reduce the rate of
evaporation - and avoids land use. Next, the new12th Plan aims for 29.8 GW of new renewable
capacity: 15 GW of wind, 10 GW solar, 2.1 GW small hydro and 2.7 GW bio-power,
including waste to energy. In addition, the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar
Mission is looking to add 2 GW of off-grid solar by 2022, as well as more local
solar thermal capacity. A small tidal project is also being considered. On the
big scale, 6 state-owned companies are setting up the world’s largest PV plant,
a $4.4 bn 4 GW project, across 48 sq km of salt plains in Rajasthan, ultimately
supplying 6.4 TWh p.a.. It will be built in phases over 7 years, the first 750
MW costing $1.09 bn to be set up in 3 years. www.renewableenergyfocus.com/view/39020/india-powers-towards-renewable-energy-part-i/
And there’s a WWF scenario with India getting to near 100%
renewables by 2051
China is the BRIC country pushing renewables most, Russia (see below) the least, though that’s changing: http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2014/07/russias-state-supported-renewable-project-auction-heavily-favors-solar?cmpid=WNL-Wednesday-July16-2014
USA projects: Focusing on innovation,
the US Dept of Energy is funding work on thermo-chemical
heat storage using sand-like particles called perovskites, instead of molten
salts to store energy, for use with CSP plants: http://social.csptoday.com/technology/two-sunshot-awards-investigate-perovskites-csp-thermochemical-storage There’s also some interesting work on PV balancing: http://emp.lbl.gov/publications/integrating-solar-pv-utility-system-operations
*The big CSP plant in the Mojave desert seems to be killing birds that fly into the focused beam:
Japan Some utilities, worried about grid links, are
blocking new PV/renewables.
Energy is SE Asia- Malaysia, Thailand, Burma and
Australia
In an Ashgate study, Energy, Governance and Security in Thailand and Myanmar,
Australia
academic Adam Simpson explores the key role played by environmental
A study of Australia is also needed- it
seems to want to link up with New Zealand
and Canada to oppose what it sees as dangerous growth limiting
climate policies like Obama’s :
See this slightly oblique historical Blog from the author of a new
book on Energy in Australia: http://euanmearns.com/germanys-energiewende-as-a-model-for-australian-climate-policy/ The current
situation is dire..
On Malaysia see: www.lowcarbonfutures.org/news/2014/06/23/climate-smart-cities-report-launch-malaysia
Renewables
in Russia - not much interest
Russia’s renewable energy potential is vast: the
wind resource in the north has been put at 350GW. A 2003 IEA report said renewables
with economic potential correspond to about 30% of total primary energy supply,
while the technical potential was estimated to be more than 5 times greater
than its energy needs. So how has it done? Hydro supplies 16% of its electricity and that may
rise (only about 20% of the potential has been taped so far), but new
renewables have been sidelined - with just 200 MW of solar and wind installed
so far. The aim is to get 4.5% from wind and solar by 2020 - maybe 6 GW. Not too great.
Renewable
Energy World (REW) ran an interesting article last year noting that renewables
were mainly only seen as relevant to remote regions. It quoted Cody Thompson,
at IFCs Advisory Services for Europe and Central Asia: ‘There has been some
success in the regions on the retail market, specifically solar plants in
Yakutia and wind stations on Kamchatka. We view isolated regions such as these
as having great potential for the development of renewable energy, as they
often rely on expensive and heavily subsidized diesel generation. As such,
renewable technologies can compete economically even without additional support
from the government, when compared to the true cost of diesel generation,
including fuel costs and subsidies.’ But REW
also quoted Ivan Dmitrij Graciov, chair of the Russian Duma (Parliament) Energy
Committee, who was pretty dismissive: ‘Sakha, like Kamchatka and Sakhalin,
our remote and isolated regions, sure, don’t have many energy alternatives due
to the adverse climate conditions. But developing solar capacity there cannot
be seen as a single solution, especially in the light of the mind-blowing cost
at $3 per kWh.’ He went
on: ‘In general, I don’t like to see when the hype about green energy
compromises conventional energy sources’. For Sakha, he explained, building a floating nuclear
plant in Tiksi could be ‘perhaps the best solution’ long-term. Economically, nuclear was
‘much smarter and substantiated than developing the expensive non-hydro
renewable sources’.
Interestingly
though, REW noted that Crimea already has around 400 MW of PV and wind capacity
installed - twice that in the whole of Russia. You might think the annexation
of this sunny
region into Russia could change the picture. But Grachiov said no :‘The
Crimean solar generation cost,now at a whopping 0.34 euro cents, is largely fed
with the
budget money.
This is pretty insane taking into account that Ukraine has been on the brink of
bankruptcy for quite sometime. For many, it is first a vivid example of
super-expensive
solar energy,
not of the benefits it gives.’ So not much may happen there.
Overall Grachiov
was unapologetic about the low status given to green energy: ‘The 200 MW we
are receiving now from non-hydro generation may seem to some like our
backwardness,’ but he
asserted it was expensive: ‘The advanced Germany spends $40 billion in green
subsidies annually. I don’t think this is a right thing to follow’.
See below.
So new renewables
may remain on the margins, and even the low 2020
target may be missed. The Energy
Forecasting Agency, quoted in the IFCs 2011Waking the Green Giant report, pessimistically said only about
0.3-0.4 GW of new renewables may be installed by 2020: the 4.5% target might
not be met until 2030, with maybe only 6.1GW in place then. http://www.ifc.org/wps/wcm/connect/topics_ext_content/ifc_external_corporate_site/ifc+sustainability/learning+and+adapting/knowledge+products/publications/publications_report_greengiant Things have
improved since then, nearly 500 MW of PV being given support for the period
2015-18 (see p19 above). But the main future focus is nuclear, with 22
GW in place and plans to double that.
*REW www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2014/06/can-the-frigid-sakha-awaken-russias-clean-energy-potential?
Also http://rt.com/business/russian-renewable-energy-potential
* Oil &
gas remain central for now, but on the nuclear
disposal/reprocessing issues see these video: http://greenworld.org.ru/videofilms/ONM_itog_ang_121114.mp4
and http://greenworld.org.ru/videofilms/techa_eng.mp4
Crimean
cuts
Crimea’s four PV plants have a total capacity
of 227MW. They benefited from the Ukrainian feed-in tariff, but it seems they
can no longer run under that lucrative scheme and it’s not clear if Russia will
support them at the same level. Same for the 7 wind projects. It seems they all
had to shut down after annexation. But they may be restarted.
Green energy access for Africa
EED’s ‘Energy
Access Review’ looks at energy poverty in East Africa. It argues that they key problem is that
incomes are so low, e.g. although 93% of households in Kenya own a mobile phone
less than 30% of the same households have direct access to electricity-with for
example students using street
lights to study.
Big grid solutions
may be fine for urban areas, but in sparsely populated rural areas, far
from the grid, ‘stand alone’ off grid
projects are spreading: EED says that ~850,000 solar home systems have been
installed in Africa with Kenya hosting ~320,000 systems.
For remote but more
populated village areas, it sees local mini-
grids as the way
ahead - see: www.eedadvisory.com/download/8328/
and http://digital.renewableenergyworld.com/renewableenergyworld/20140910#pg53
More discussion of green energy policy and
implementation issues:
The big picture: In the 2102 Greenpeace Energy [R]evolution scenario for Africa, by 2050, 92% of electricity comes from renewables, with wind at 200 GW, CSP 161 GW and PV 155 GW. Hydro was at 50 GW.
Morocco
Concentrating
solar power is growing
fast, with 2GW planned by 2020. A hybrid gas/ 20 MW solar CSP power plant
opened at Ain Beni Mathar in 2011. The 160MW Noor 1 CSP plant, the first of 3,
with molten salt heat storage, is being built at Ouarzazate. Airlight Energy’s
plant at Ait Baha, has concrete troughs and a pebble heat store.
China &US join in carbon cuts
In a
surprise joint announcement, the US and China have committed to cut emissions, though
the US
plan is more forthright, aiming to cut emissions by at least 26%, and hopefully 28%, from 2005
levels, by 2025, while China only says it will seek to cap emission rises by about
2030.
But it would aim to get 20% of its energy from non-fossil fuels by 2030, an update
to the existing 15% by 2020 target. Some felt China was getting off easily, but
it’s still progress: www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/nov/12/what-does-china-need-to-do-to-meet-its-carbon-pledge
China’s offshore wind
China appears to have pulled back
on its offshore ambition after a government admission last year that it would
struggle to hit its target of 5 GW by 2015 and 7.1 GW by 2016. WPO
Intelligence
says that China only plans to install 1.5 GW in 2015 and may only reach 3.9 GW
cumulative by 2016. Even so, they say it will move ahead of Germany and the UK:
www.windpowermonthly.com/article/1301372/windpower-data-offshore-installations-2014-16 I
It
sees the USA
entering the race at long last - overtaking the Belgians & Dutch.
The
German projections seem ambitious given recent cutbacks. And where’s Denmark?
Also
see DECCs new 2050 energy calculator for Japan, following on from their
earlier ones for China and India: http://blog.decc.gov.uk/2014/07/29/japans-low-carbon-navigator/ It says Japan could cut emissions by
80% by 2050, with or without nuclear, but would need CCS.
French n-waste site plan Nuclear News
France is looking at how to deal with its nuclear Waste. Although
decommissioning will mean some extra waste will have to be dealt with, the
phase out of some of its nuclear plants, under the new ‘25% less nuclear’
energy policy, will reduce the production of nuclear wastes from spent fuel: its current
nuclear programme generates over 1kg per person per year. But France already
has a lot to deal with. So far most of it has been kept at reactor sites or at
the Cap de Hague reprocessing plant. But following initial public consultations
on the concept, detailed feasibility studies for Cigéo, the proposed French
underground disposal site for radioactive waste, are being carried out, prior
to an application to regulators for a go ahead in 2017.
Some test tunnels have already been dug, and a pilot project to test disposal techniques is
proposed.
The full thing,
with a large network of tunnels in clay, at a site about 150 miles east of
Paris near Bure in the Meuse/Haute Marne area (the Champaign district!), is meant to be the final
resting place for around 2700 cubic metres of high-level radioactive waste and
about 40,000 cu. m of long-lived intermediate-level waste. Altogether that’s
99% of the radioactivity from France’s nuclear power generation so far. The
design will allow for reversibility, at least for ~100 years, so future
generations could more easily remove the waste, should they decide to do so. If
it gets the go ahead, it’s been claimed that the first limited phase of waste
loading might start in 2025, but the full thing wouldn’t be ready for use until
the 2070s. By that time it could take spent fuel (which would have cooled
/decayed enough by then); however the current assumption is that it will be
reprocessed fuel waste, with the plutonium extracted. A 2012 estimate was that it would cost over €16bn. No
foreign waste can be taken, under French law. There has been some local opposition and it was
suggested that ‘having a six-month debate on a project that will last
100,000 years’ was a
little odd, given the
environmental and ethical issues.
US n-waste: Yucca back! $15bn so far…
Despite the Obama’s efforts to kill it off, a tiny bit of
new funding for licensing the Yucca Mountain high-level nuclear
waste repository was included in the draft fiscal 2015 Energy Appropriations
Act - $205m to
‘support continued adjudication’ of the licence application. The Administration
wanted to ‘zero out’ funding for the project. But the House of Representatives
appropriations committee said: ‘inconsistencies can be seen in the
Administration’s
proposal to reduce core research funding for nuclear energy, which will
continue to be a vital base load electricity source in future years, and the
Administration’s willful disregard of the federal government’s legal
responsibilities regarding Yucca Mountain’. Support was also proposed for the stalled/contested
MOX programme.There’s also a draft
$12.6 bn loan guarantee solicitation for advanced nuclear projects.
Hot
potato The German government is still working on draft legislation to enable a start on a search for a final disposal site for
nuclear waste. In the UK, 2040 is the due start date- but with no
site in view!
EU Subsidies needed
Last
year, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, France, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland, Romania,
Slovakia,
Slovenia and the UK petitioned the European Commission, noting that ‘market
failures’ were
preventing new nuclear build from supporting EU goals for energy security, and
calling for a ‘level playing field’ for all low-emission sources in the EU. ‘National
support mechanisms, consistent with the Internal Energy Market and the
competition rules provided by the Treaty on the Functioning of the European
Union may therefore be needed’, i.e. nuclear also needs subsidies! Maybe one aim was to ensure the EC
looked favorably on the UK’s proposed nuclear CfD/loan guarantee funding.
Others could then follow. Well that now seems to be how it is. But the French
EPR has been delayed yet again - by another year.
*
Russia
plans to start building 3 sodium-cooled fast neutron reactors before 2030.
Small Modular Reactors: poor prospects
Though
much talked up recently, SMRs are not looking too good:
www.power-eng.com/articles/npi/print/volume-7/issue-3/departments/enrichment/the-promise-of-smrs-is-not-looking-so-promising.html But US-UK co-operation has been called for: www.world-nuclear-news.org/NN-small-reactor-developers-assess-UK-US-collaboration-15071401.html
3.
Forum Odds
and ends for you to chew on
Comments welcome!
Comments welcome!
82% of UK public back PV solar www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/342426/Wave_10_findings_of_DECC_Public_Attitudes_Tracker_FINAL.pdf
IGov The Innovation and Governance for
a Sustainable Economy
IGov’s website,
based on work at Exeter University led by Prof. Catherine Mitchell, is a useful
source of analysis of UK energy policy. If you want to explore the deadening
complexities and shortcomings of UK policies and institutions, and what the
positive alternative might look like, see this post:
In
at
least some peoples view, it’s got pretty bad, with Forbes claiming that ‘Siemens invested in
UK wind despite Government policy not because of it’: www.forbes.com/sites/mikescott/2014/03/31/siemens-invested-in-uk-wind-sector-despite-government-policy-not-because-of-it/? While in its demolition of the UK Government’s case for state-aid
for the Hinkley nuclear plant, UK Friends of the Earth has pointed out how in
its central projections ‘DECC assumes a tailing off in growth in
renewables post 2020’.
Local
energy
In the small
village of Wedmore in Somerset a local community co-op has created a 1 MW solar
plant, with 4000 PV panels providing local power.
Facts and fiction
The
energy and climate debate is awash with views, some of which reflect biases.
Take this bleak view of nuclear power and Fukushima from the US:
It’s
hard to know if this is overstated, or if UNSCEAR et al are right. Whose info and analysis can you trust?
What about this wider perspective on nuclear from Aljazeera, which seems very
reasonable: http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2014/6/nuclear-energy-independenceeurope.html
But views can differ and be
polarized, e.g. the otherwise useful Energy Collective’s US web site has
carried some contrarian views from Willem Post. He’s critical of renewables and
linked policies, and favours nuclear: http://theenergycollective.com/posts/published/user/61439
The UK based Energy
Matters web site also
often has some good material e.g. see http://euanmearns.com/do-we-have-enough-uranium-to-go-nuclear/
Though scroll
down for Post’s input on the renewables lobby:‘It really is a form of
insanity, i.e., RE aficionados repeating statements with no connection to
reality, as if in a trance. Their distortions of truth are a menace to more
sane society, and to economic well-being. At every opportunity, we need render
them harmless, as society does with other nut cases.’
And it’s upfront
in its pro-nuclear position and keen to cover criticisms of renewables: http://euanmearns.com/the-balancing-capacity-issue-a-ticking-time-bomb-under-the-uks-energiewende/
Nothing
wrong with that - we need to keep sharp. And it’s reasonable for there to be a spread of
viewpoints: it’s always worth looking at a range views, including ‘outlier
‘ones! www.xonitek.com/press-room/company-news/the-stone-age-didnt-end-because-they-ran-out-of-stones/ But some with deviant views can be tiresome,
obsessive and time wasting. Though we would be the last to try to shut them
out. Even REF and the GWPF! www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/jun/25/hugh-muir-diary-bbc-today-programme :
Nevertheless,
occasionally, when faced with inane negative comments e.g. about the energy
needed to build wind turbines being more than they will produce, some hard
facts help lift the fog: ‘US researchers have carried out an environmental
lifecycle assessment of 2 MW wind turbines mooted for a large wind farm in the
US Pacific Northwest…. they conclude that in terms of cumulative energy
payback, or the time to produce the amount of energy required of production and
installation, a wind turbine with a working life of 20 years will offer a net
benefit within five to eight months of being brought online.’ http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/06/140616093317.htm
Wind
farm fires.. a new dig at wind
Wind turbine
fires are ‘ten times more
common than thought’, a study by Imperial College and Edinburgh University
says. The Telegraph quoted Dr Guillermo Rein, from Imperial’s Mech Eng Dept: ‘Fires
are a problem for the industry, impacting on energy production, economic output
and emitting toxic fumes. This could cast a shadow over the industry’s
green credentials. Worryingly
our report shows that fire may be a bigger problem than what is currently
reported.’
The study used
data compiled by the Caithness Windfarm Information Forum (CWIF), an anti-wind
lobby group, which recorded 1,328 accidents involving wind farms globally
between 1995 and 2012. Of these, 200, 15%, involved turbines catching on fire,
implying 11.7 fires per year. But the study, published in the journal Fire
Safety Science, backed
CWIF’s view that the true number is far higher. It points out that the wind
industry body, Renewable UK, has admitted there were 1,50 wind farm accidents
and incidents in the UK alone between 2006 and 2010, while just 142 individual
accidents in the UK were documented in CWIF’s database over the same period. So
the actual number was around 10 times higher, as could be the number of fires,
i.e. maybe around 117 p.a. in the UK. Wind Power Monthly pointed out, the assumption that fire
episodes are proportionate may not be valid: ‘there is likely to be a
different rate of reporting for different accidents, with turbine fires a more
newsworthy incident than a gearbox breakdown’. It also said the risk of fire had to be put in
perspective. It ran a (different!) quote from Imperial’s Guillermo Rein: ‘In
terms of fire hazard, the figures are almost negligible. It is a one in
10,000
probability of a fire. By comparison with other energy industries, fire
accidents are much less frequent in wind turbines than other sectors, such as
oil and gas, which globally has
thousands of fire accidents per year.’
The study sees the main causes of fires as lightning strikes, electrical malfunction, mechanical failure,
and errors with maintenance. It
warns that high winds can quickly fan a fire inside a turbine housing: ‘Once ignited, the chances of
fighting the blaze are slim due to the height of the wind turbine and the
remote locations they are often in’ with there being a risk that ‘under high wind conditions, burning
debris from the turbine may fall on nearby vegetation and start forest fires or
cause serious damage to property.’ RenewableUK said it welcome any work that helped
improve safety and reliability, but felt that the reliability of some of the
data sources used might be questioned and noted that ‘the operational
practices and design standards are such that the actual safety risks
associated fire are extremely low. No member of the public has ever been
injured by a wind turbine in the UK.’ http://www.windpowermonthly.com/article/1303975/turbine-fire-report-based-anti-wind-group-data and http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/windpower/10971762/Wind-turbine-fires-ten-times-more-common-than-thought-experts-warn.html
..and
infra sound noise too:
www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/08/10/Scottish-Government-to-Investigate-Health-Effects-of-Wind-Turbines and www.masterresource.org/2014/06/health-effects-from-wind-turbines/
Transports of eco-delight
We don’t cover transport issues much in Renew (we’re swamped with info and
there have to be some limits), but amusing recent highlights included Tesla going ‘open source’ on their
up-market electric roadster: www.teslamotors.com/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-you and Harley Davidson is developing an all-electric prestige bike:
www.theengineer.co.uk/home/blog/an-electric-harley-davidson-shows-how-mainstream-evs-have-become/1018801.article? All a long way from what most people need and can
afford, but its part of the mood change - making green transport options part
of the social zeitgeist. Though probably much more relevant are the various
electric/hydrogen/fuel cell/biogas car, bus and truck options. And now air
power cars! www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2679990/Car-runs-air-New-hybrid-greener-electric-rivals.html
Plus of course
trains, bikes and feet.
Nuclear
is the Answer self-selecting open poll
In a Vision
Prize poll last year, open
to ‘climate scientists and other scientists or researchers with relevant
expertise’ and backed by two US Universities and the UK IoP’s Environmental
Research Web, a strongly anti-coal (64%) but even stronger pro-nuclear view
emerged. Of the nearly 100 scientist who participated, 71% agreed with the view
that that nuclear power is a critical component of any realistic plan to
achieve climate stabilization, while 67% backed the view that renewables will
not be able to scale up fast enough, these views being based on the public
statement made by Dr Ken Caldeira, Dr Kerry Emanuel, Dr James Hansen and Dr Tom
Wigley in Nov 2013. http://environmentalresearchweb.org/cws/article/opinion/57973
Is this how
most scientists feel? This poll is suggestive, but doesn’t help to tell us for
sure: given that it is by open invitation, it’s hard to know if its
representative e.g. is it meant to reflect views globally? In the USA?
What type of scientists? And being open invitation, it invites bias! It’s
possible for lobby groups (on either side) to high-jack open polls like
this (making sure members and colleagues enter votes), so we can end up mainly
measuring lobbying strength! But if, for whatever reason, it’s even partly
representative, then these results on nuclear/renewables are worrying. Would
the same results emerge if you asked engineers? Or the wider public? Properly structured statistically
balanced public opinion polls, with large samples (1000 +), have usually
indicated strong opposition to nuclear in most but not all countries - the US
and UK being examples of the latter - coupled with strong support for
renewables everywhere. But then, for some, nuclear is still the answer - in
fact we should have done it long ago, then all would be well:
Amory Lovins on reactions to Fukushima: http://blog.rmi.org/blog_2014_07_08_opposite_energy_policies_turned_fukushima_disaster_into_a_loss_for_japan_and_a_win_for_germany He says Germany did it right!
PV: go west for more?
Prof.
Ralph Gottschalg, Loughborough University, says angling solar panels east and
west, rather than south, would increase the amount of electricity generated
overall, as it avoids shadowing
and allows for more cells to be put in any given area, and also (a bit
more credibly, we feel), if westerly, allows you to collect energy when demand
is higher - in the early evening. As we have reported, that’s what they are
thinking about in the US and Germany. www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2708808/Half-solar-panels-Britain-facing-wrong-way-face-east-west-not-south.html#ixzz38oQk62lS
Solar farms enhance
Biodiversity http://solar-trade.org.uk/media/140428%20STA%20BRENSC%20Biodiversity%20Gudelines%20Final.pdf
Ban
golf courses!
www.businessgreen.com/bg/james-blog/2379507/the-national-interest-demands-it-lets-ban-golf-courses
Coal
bed methane Shale gas isn’t the only worry, but
maybe mine gas is OK. It’s less of a threat, given that otherwise it may escape
and it’s a powerful greenhouse gas, much more so that the CO2 that’s produced when it’s burnt. And you don’t have
to frack with pressurised water to get it, although evidently if you do then
you get more out. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/an-environmental-risk-assessment-for-coal-bed-coal-mine-and-abandoned-mine-methane-operations-in-england
Corporate eco-horrors An interesting Friends of the Earth Australia report. The 121st
edition of their Chain Reaction newsletter looks at ‘Emerging technologies and corporate
control’ covering GM, synthetic biology, nano - and geo-engineering horrors and
the way the renewables and climate change issues are subverted. Whoever said
FoE were single-issue campaigners! www.foe.org.au/sites/default/files/CR%23121-web-3MB.pdf
Energy prices The profits of,
and prices charged by, the UK’s Big 6 keep rising. They say their costs are
rising and green taxes too. And industry is hit. But for some big users there
are let-outs (see link below): no wonder the EU-ETS doesn’t work. Though in climate terms,
energy ought to cost everyone more. www.gov.uk/government/publications/eu-emissions-trading-system-compensation-for-indirect-costs-in-2013-to-2014-and-2014-to-2015-guidance
Our favorite anti-wind diatribe from last year: www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2713830/Lunacy-sea-As-Ministers-agree-world-s-biggest-wind-farm-Brighton-Britain-succumbed-catastrophic-folly.html
NATTA For a full guide to
NATTA’s various offerings, the PDF version of this ROL with more graphics and
charts, and access to our free annual end of year review, see: http://renewnatta.wordpress.com
*With the closure of the Fogey server, the old NATTA web site and emails no longer
work.
Goodbye Ches We are
very sad to report the death, on Christmas eve, of Ches Lincoln, who for many years was our IT wizardess.
After her retirement from the OU, she ran the Fogeys server which carried our
NATTA/Renew web site. She will be missed.