Green energy is dumb

[Klause]

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/oct/07/how-green-is-britains-low-carbon-energy-supply

How green is Britain’s record on renewable energy supply?

About half of the power generated in the UK comes from low-carbon sources – here’s a breakdown of the four main sources of electricity

Adam Vaughan
@adamvaughan_uk

Saturday 7 October 2017 16.19 BST
First published on Saturday 7 October 2017 16.00 BST

As one of the UK’s renewable energy chiefs has pointed out, electric cars won’t tackle climate change if they run off fossil fuels. Matthew Wright, managing director of Dong Energy UK, said that although plug-in cars could cut local air pollution, it would be a “pyrrhic victory” if they increased greenhouse gases from coal and gas power stations.

“The fit between renewable energy and electric is a natural [one],” he argued. E.ON, one of the big-six energy suppliers, agrees: its dedicated new electric car tariff is supplied with 100% renewable power.

Put simply, the greener the electricity mix, the greener your electric car. Today, around half of power generated in the UK comes from low-carbon sources. Here’s how that breaks down, and how it might look in the future.
Wind

Nearly a third of the UK’s electricity between April and June was generated from renewable sources – a new record, and up a quarter on the same period last year. The milestone was driven in large part by the growing number of windfarms on land and around the UK’s coast. It also helped that wind speeds were relatively high and overall electricity generation was lower than normal.

The records have continued into autumn. Last Sunday night was the perfect time to plug in a car, as the carbon emissions from power generation were at their lowest level ever, because of windfarms.

Offshore windfarms have been making headlines as well as power, securing record low levels of state support in a government auction last month. Three major offshore farms will be built in the early 2020s for a subsidy price well below nuclear, and half what the technology cost just a few years ago.
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The UK has more offshore wind power capacity than any other country in the world, and is helping set records in Europe too. Last Monday, Europe generated a new high of 263 gigawatt hours of power from offshore turbines, 95GWh of which came from the UK.

Some industry-watchers think that offshore windfarms, where larger and more efficient turbines are driving costs down fast, could become so cheap that they eventually outcompete their onshore counterparts in Britain, too. But for now, those on land still provide 50% more power than those at sea.
Solar

The number of solar panels in the UK grew at a dizzying rate between 2011 and 2016, and now provide a significant source of power in the middle of the day.

Solar is a large reason the national grid went without coal power for 24 hours in April, the first time the UK had done without the dirty fuel for a day since the industrial revolution. For one brief period on a Friday in May, solar even eclipsed the UK’s eight nuclear power stations for electricity generation.

However, the outlook for the next five years is cloudier. Experts forecast the amount of solar installed will be a fifth of the capacity fitted in the past five years.
Solar panels provide a significant amount of energy but installation is starting to fall off.
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Solar panels provide a significant amount of energy but installation is starting to fall off. Photograph: Mike Kemp/Corbis via Getty Images
Nuclear
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Nuclear power stations usually provide between a fifth and a quarter of the UK’s power, taking a 23.6% share during April and June. EDF, which is building Britain’s first new nuclear station in decades at Hinkley Point in Somerset, thinks that by 2035, nuclear’s share should grow to around a third of UK power supply.

In the French state-owned firm’s vision of the future, another third will come from renewables and the last third from gas. Together, EDF sees the three as the best way of achieving reliable, affordable and low-carbon power.

But seven of the UK’s eight existing nuclear power stations, which began generating electricity in the 1970s and 1980s, are expected to come off the grid late next decade. That means for atomic power to supply a third of the UK’s needs, Hinkley Point C will need to be finished on time, and three more plants of a similar size will need to be built.

One of those could be by EDF itself, at Sizewell in Suffolk, if it can build the reactors for a subsidy price low enough that the government would agree it.

EDF is also supporting a Chinese nuclear company, CGN, which is at the start of a four-year process to get regulatory approval for a plant at Bradwell, in Essex. Other international consortia are hoping to build a plant at Wylfa in Wales and Moorside in Cumbria.
Biomass

Although environmentalists dispute the idea that wood-burning is green at all, it is still officially considered low-carbon by the UK and EU. The UK’s biggest power station, Drax in North Yorkshire, has already converted three of its six units from coal to biomass, and is exploring switching a fourth.

Later this year, an old coal power plant at Lynemouth in Northumberland is also slated to reopen as a biomass power station.

See? Once again completely ignoring facts and the point of the debate and copy pasting.


Here's one... Forget about the UK.

Look at MB and Quebec where hydro power generates electricity... And in MB a vast number of houses heat with this green electricity....

[URL="http://www.conferenceboard.ca/hcp/provincial/environment/low-emitting-electricity-production.aspx?AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1"]http://www.conferenceboard.ca/hcp/provincial/environment/low-emitting-electricity-production.aspx?AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1[/URL]

That link goes to conference board of Canada.


And a dam has a way lower maintenance cost and longer lifespan than any solar panel or windmill... Plus it's there all year.
So Chuck, all your article, when taken with my link (which has UK on it) shows is how inferior solar and wind are...

[Klause]

Oh and here's one more tidbit from a study at the University of Michigan...

battery-powered electric car fueled by electricity generated by coal gets the equivalent of 29 US miles per gallon. Ditto for oil-powered generation. On the other hand, solar power is good for 350 mpg, nuclear 2,300 mpg and hydro a whopping 5,100 miles for every blessed gallon of gasoline.

So there ya go... Nuclear (and that's based on fission not the much more efficient fusion / tokomak generation) and hydro power of all things are the most efficient power generation systems... In this case relating to EV but the same for all.


Let's see your next copy/paste, Chuck

[burnt]

If you think the sun and wind are unreliable why are you a farmer?

Oh my. There are no words...

[chuckChuck]

See? Once again completely ignoring facts and the point of the debate and copy pasting.


Here's one... Forget about the UK.

Look at MB and Quebec where hydro power generates electricity... And in MB a vast number of houses heat with this green electricity....

[URL="http://www.conferenceboard.ca/hcp/provincial/environment/low-emitting-electricity-production.aspx?AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1"]http://www.conferenceboard.ca/hcp/provincial/environment/low-emitting-electricity-production.aspx?AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1[/URL]

That link goes to conference board of Canada.


And a dam has a way lower maintenance cost and longer lifespan than any solar panel or windmill... Plus it's there all year.
So Chuck, all your article, when taken with my link (which has UK on it) shows is how inferior solar and wind are...

From your conference board of canada link
"Putting renewable and nuclear energy in context

Sources of energy that produce low amounts of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions include wind, tidal, solar, biomass, nuclear, hydroelectric, and geothermal.

Increasing renewable energy’s share of total energy consumption should be a policy goal to mitigate climate change in Canada and its peer countries. Nuclear electricity generation may also have a role to play in reducing Canada’s carbon output".

My thoughts:
Hydro is a good option. Canada has a lot of hydro capacity already. Every new hydro project should be evaluated on its' own merits. We should be looking at all options based on economics and environmental risks and benefits. That's why wind and solar are on the table where it makes sense.

Many people think it is a black and white decision. Either you are in favor of renewables and opposed to fossil sources or opposed to renewables and in favor of fossil energy.

For the time being we are all dependent on both if you consider that Canada is a major hydro producer and using a lot of coal in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia.

We shouldn't be retrofitting or building any new coal electrical generation in Saskatchewan or Alberta. Gas is abundant and being wasted in the oil industry with a large number of flares. Convert the coal plants to gas as an interim measure to reduce carbon emissions by 1/2. Its much cheaper than carbon capture and storage so says Sask Power.

[RWT101]

Why believe what some probably green-biased writer says about the distribution of the types of energy production in the UK when you can go and see for yourself any time.

http://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk/

Really interesting to see how many times that wind sucker goes to zero at exactly the wrong time.

And how often old king COAL COMES TO THE RESCUE.

Enjoy.

[burnt]

It also appears that the group-think that chucky spews ignores the levelized environmental and economic costs of producing the components needed for producing the wind turbines and solar panels.

Studies show that when the CO2 emissions, let alone toxic chemical pollutants, from the entire lifetime production cycle of "renewables", CO2 is higher for them than it is for some carbon-based systems, and astronomically higher than for hydro.

In the greatest of ironies, the production of PVP has largely moved from "clean, green" Europe to China who - guess what - burns the coal we export to them because it's too dirty for us, HAHAHA! You cannot make this stuff up!

So where is the net gain when hydro output is reduced to offset wind and solar over-production at times of low usage?

And in addition, the (supposed) environmental cost in CO2 emissions from "renewables" also comes with a huge financial penalty to me as a user because I not only have to pay the exorbitantly higher production cost for wind and solar, but also have to pay the cost of exporting the surplus from wind and solar to the US and Quebec.

And in a further twist of the knife, manufacturing and its related jobs get sucked out of Ontario across the border, following the much lower electricity rates.

Did you get that? We export highly subsidized electricity and jobs, all thanks to the unreliable production of wind and solar which gets first dibs on the domestic grid.

Even with the best window dressing, renewable does not mean sustainable, nor is it any "cleaner" in the long term.

It's all smoke and PVP mirrors hiding behind a sunny but deadly ideology.

[tweety]

So is your solution then to do nothing? Don't learn anything, don't try anything, just sit on your hands and hope an answer will show up?

If at least trying renewable energy isn't the answer, i await to hear your solution to replacing a non renewable resource.

[bucket]

As I sit in my house with natural gas high efficiency furnace.....thank you grant Devine. .....I see hydro and natural gas turbines as good intermediate step....


Hydro really has the most efficienCy. ...you could generate power at Leader and again at Gardiner dam with the same water ....it's called cascading...

As has been mentioned where do the solar panels to die....

I realize seeing old windmills in the rural areas are great photo ops but the new ones not so much....

Interesting study about the Saskatchewan river is that there is always some air movement due to the lake and the body of water....makes sense that windmills and hydro could work together....

[burnt]

So is your solution then to do nothing? Don't learn anything, don't try anything, just sit on your hands and hope an answer will show up?

If at least trying renewable energy isn't the answer, i await to hear your solution to replacing a non renewable resource.

Aw shucks, you're right tweety! We should throw billions upon billions of dollars at an ideologically driven, dead end program that boasts the predictable, measurable benefit of destroying our economy!

We should subsidize this failure simply because, like Trudeau and Morneau's hypocritical tax change fiasco, we want to reward a few well-positioned Liberal boosters who will happily feather their nests at our expense.

We should throw billions more at technology that is demonstrably deficient at meeting anywhere near the demand that is currently met by nuke, hydro and carbon-powered generation.

We should discard all the amazing advancements made in cleaning up coal generation emissions just because, well, just because coal is painted as "dirty". (I provided the stats on those advances elsewhere on here recently)

And finally, we should ignore the negative environmental side effects of wind and solar just because acknowledging them would expose the entire fallacy of the "green movement" and we don't like when hypocrites in suits are outed.

Do we tweety? Just don't forget what those butts you kiss are capable of doing to you while you're at it.

[tweety]

Burnt, i asked what the solution is. Is it in there somewhere amongst the sarcasm?

[burnt]

Burnt, i asked what the solution is. Is it in there somewhere amongst the sarcasm?

Yes, if you would care to see it.

Hydro is endless, nuke is cheap, coal has a 200+ year supply in North America. Oil, nat gas likely 100+ years, oil sands, etc.

And in addition, there have been other new, more efficient, safe and reliable non-carbon technologies discussed here for the past - who knows how long?

But your question reveals the real problem - some people are so taken by ideology and/or so credulous that they believe that the government must show us the way, rather than letting natural, entrepreneurial spirit respond to the constant demand for innovation and advancement.

But thank you for asking!

[sumdumguy]

If you think the sun and wind are unreliable why are you a farmer?

I am a farmer when rhe sun is reliable? But ask anyone with solar panels if the sun is reliable all year, they will tell it is feast or famine. You want that, go for it, but I ain't paying for it. 👎

[grassfarmer]

Well chuck thats nice since britain is a island with F#$K all for Oil reserves....

Actually it's "an island" and does have substantial oil reserves. I guess you've never heard of the North Sea oil fields?

[malleefarmer]

Same debate in australia but seems ever so slightly pendulem is swinging back to fossil fuels and even uranium.

A big report here showing all the positives of clean green renewable etc etc but the clunker is by 2020 if it all falls into place and we are clean and green average save per household will be $200 per year.

People are kinda saying what the hell so my gut feeling is there will be some kind of halfway agreement some clean green some fossil fuel dare i say it many are thinking nuclear as we have such large reserves un touched and safer than was say 20 yrs ago

[TASFarms]

A friend of mine is working on that solar farm at brooks. He Just shakes his head at the costs, not much sun this time of year. Laughs about having to clean the snow off just so they could do some testing. Pretty big job to clean the snow off and the dust for the rest of the year. He was working at a wind farm before. He is doing it for the above normal pay and the expirence. Calls it a big wast of tax payer money