The Future of Power Generation in Great Britain

[Hill92]

Evanivitch said:

hidetheelephants said:

Evanivitch said:

hidetheelephants said:

If steelmaking is part of our industrial policy then there should be mining with enough output to meet some if not all of the coal consumption.

Or bringing hydrogen-based steel making to industrial scale and investing heavily in hydrogen production.

Again, all great and good to say we need more coal. Put your hand up if you want to live next to a coal mine. Because if you think we're opening coal mines and doing it in National Parks/AONB then you're living on a completely different planet.

The proposal in Cumbria is a deep mine, the footprint will be small.

And as an immediate solution to our sources of Coking coal then I'm not against it. But it's still a short term solution to a long term issue.

And it's definitely not representative of all the '300 years' of coal beneath our feet

And the steel industry are saying they don't need it. Apparently the sulphur content is too high for British Steel while Tara Steel might only use a small amount.

Real risk of being a stranded asset in the 2030s as the steel industry transitions to new technologies. Can the mine really make a profitable return in such a short period?

https://amp.theguardian.com/business/2022/may/01/s...

[hidetheelephants]

It's a commercial coal mine; they're taking the risk, who cares?

[Evanivitch]

Hill92 said:

And the steel industry are saying they don't need it. Apparently the sulphur content is too high for British Steel while Tara Steel might only use a small amount.

Real risk of being a stranded asset in the 2030s as the steel industry transitions to new technologies. Can the mine really make a profitable return in such a short period?

https://amp.theguardian.com/business/2022/may/01/s...

The sulphur content is too high if they want to meet their emissions targets, it doesn't have much of an impact on the product as it's largely removed through the blast furnace.

And steel works will always play political games when it comes to emissions.

[xeny]

We're currently burning coal and exporting electricity to France over the interconnect. I dread to think what the continental electricity pricing is at present to achieve that state of affairs.

[Evanivitch]

xeny said:

We're currently burning coal and exporting electricity to France over the interconnect. I dread to think what the continental electricity pricing is at present to achieve that state of affairs.

Also 100MW of OCGT which is quite late to be running at 8pm, so clearly someone wants it bad.

[Gary C]

Evanivitch said:

Perhaps you can argue that geographically it qualifies as deep, bit economically it will nearly all come out through open cast methods. It's cheaper, faster.

So what about the spoil?

So what about the local dust pollution?

So what about the heavy infrastructure needed to move it off-site?

Unless you're happy to live next to an open cast coal mine, I'd probably re-consider your thoughts on whether we should return to coal mining or not.

I didn't say we should return to coal mining.

[hidetheelephants]

Evanivitch said:

xeny said:

We're currently burning coal and exporting electricity to France over the interconnect. I dread to think what the continental electricity pricing is at present to achieve that state of affairs.

Also 100MW of OCGT which is quite late to be running at 8pm, so clearly someone wants it bad.

French wholesale price went nuts 12 months ago right about when they had unplanned outages, from ~60 yoyos/MWh it went up and has oscillated around 3-400% higher.

[Jambo85]

Condi said:

"We" don't own it - Shell, BP, Total etc own it and they will sell to whoever pays the most, be that here or abroad. It would be cheaper to drill for it here than import it, but only as much as the cost of transporting it to Europe over a longer term. In terms of wholesale price, prices move up and down across the world and we wouldn't disconnect ourselves from the general market movements.

The government are looking to give more licenses to drill, and we have plenty of gas left to look for, but that is more for energy security than for cost reasons. As I posted earlier, US gas prices have more than doubled and they are a big exporter, a long way from their export markets. If they are not insulated with their huge (and very cheap to access) gas reserves, then we stand no chance of insulating ourselves from world prices.

Thing is, lack of licences isn’t the reason we have seen so few new wells drilled in the last 5 years. Plenty of existing fields where - presumably - there just isn’t an attractive ROI.

[xeny]

hidetheelephants said:

French wholesale price went nuts 12 months ago right about when they had unplanned outages, from ~60 yoyos/MWh it went up and has oscillated around 3-400% higher.

FT has a story that "Flows of Russian gas to France via Germany have been halted since June 15, French pipeline operator GRTgaz said on Friday." which may be adding additional pressure. There's lots of scope developing for this to be an interesting winter.

[bucksmanuk]

Have the “establishment” had their lights go off at home yet?
Have they lost a freezer full of food?
Has the air con failed to come on at the opera?

When the answer to these questions is yes, then the money will be made available to solve the issues.

Until then, it’s the genuine buggar’s muddle, with one of the most technically illiterate governments (and opposition) incapable of planning their way out of this - the country has ever seen.

It will be 30 years too late – but do any of them actually care?

I know an engineer that briefed Cameron at No.10. on this topic. The government are clueless….however, certain senior civil servants are well aware of the issues.

[irc]

Not going well in Australie just now. Go e big on wind and currently a high pressure system sitting 9ver the whole country.

https://joannenova.com.au/2022/06/welcome-to-a-wea...

https://www.skynews.com.au/australia-news/anthony-...

Edited by irc on Friday 17th June 12:10

[Condi]

irc said:

Not going well in Australie just now. Go e big on wind and currently a high pressure system sitting 9ver the whole country.

https://joannenova.com.au/2022/06/welcome-to-a-wea...

https://www.skynews.com.au/australia-news/anthony-...

The Australian problem is nothing like you have portrayed - they have a price cap of $300AU/MWh (£170/MWh), and with the price of coal and gas going up the cap is below the cost of generation, so generators have simply switched off. It's not that they have insufficient generation, it's that the price cap makes it unviable to generate.

In the UK £170/Mwh would not be considered very high at all really, it's probably below the cost of power for the next 12/18 months.

The issue is that governments want a "free market" energy system which encourages competition, and they put rules in place to "protect" consumers, but then they don't like that companies make logical economic decisions for themselves, rather than doing things for the good of the country or the market. You see the same thing here with the huge number of retail businesses which have gone bust - they went bust because the government rules prevented them from charging more than the price cap, even though that was less than the cost of wholesale power. If you force them to operate at a loss they'll close down, simple as that.

[PushedDover]

bucksmanuk said:

Have the “establishment” had their lights go off at home yet?
Have they lost a freezer full of food?
Has the air con failed to come on at the opera?

When the answer to these questions is yes, then the money will be made available to solve the issues.

Until then, it’s the genuine buggar’s muddle, with one of the most technically illiterate governments (and opposition) incapable of planning their way out of this - the country has ever seen.

It will be 30 years too late – but do any of them actually care?

I know an engineer that briefed Cameron at No.10. on this topic. The government are clueless….however, certain senior civil servants are well aware of the issues.

Today is not a good example to frame your arguement, between Wind and Solar - the UK is 50% powered by renewables

[PushedDover]

Condi said:

The Australian problem is nothing like you have portrayed - they have a price cap of $300AU/MWh (£170/MWh), and with the price of coal and gas going up the cap is below the cost of generation, so generators have simply switched off. It's not that they have insufficient generation, it's that the price cap makes it unviable to generate.

In the UK £170/Mwh would not be considered very high at all really, it's probably below the cost of power for the next 12/18 months.

The issue is that governments want a "free market" energy system which encourages competition, and they put rules in place to "protect" consumers, but then they don't like that companies make logical economic decisions for themselves, rather than doing things for the good of the country or the market. You see the same thing here with the huge number of retail businesses which have gone bust - they went bust because the government rules prevented them from charging more than the price cap, even though that was less than the cost of wholesale power. If you force them to operate at a loss they'll close down, simple as that.

So odd that for this thread huh ?

[crankedup5]

Evanivitch said:

Gary C said:

Evanivitch said:

robinessex said:

We also have 300 years of coal under our feet as well

Under our homes, national parks and AONB, yes.

So what ?

UK coal is deep anthracite, not open cast brown.

We 'could' mine it, but of course we won't

Perhaps you can argue that geographically it qualifies as deep, bit economically it will nearly all come out through open cast methods. It's cheaper, faster.

So what about the spoil?

So what about the local dust pollution?

So what about the heavy infrastructure needed to move it off-site?

Unless you're happy to live next to an open cast coal mine, I'd probably re-consider your thoughts on whether we should return to coal mining or not.

Let’s be honest though, coal slag we can see, nuclear waste less so.
Whatever happens to clean coal tech? And where are we going to be able to buy our coal ready for next years steam functions.

[bucksmanuk]

PushedDover said:

bucksmanuk said:

Have the “establishment” had their lights go off at home yet?
Have they lost a freezer full of food?
Has the air con failed to come on at the opera?

When the answer to these questions is yes, then the money will be made available to solve the issues.

Until then, it’s the genuine buggar’s muddle, with one of the most technically illiterate governments (and opposition) incapable of planning their way out of this - the country has ever seen.

It will be 30 years too late – but do any of them actually care?

I know an engineer that briefed Cameron at No.10. on this topic. The government are clueless….however, certain senior civil servants are well aware of the issues.

Today is not a good example to frame your arguement, between Wind and Solar - the UK is 50% powered by renewables

shall we come back to this argument on a dull wind free day in January?

[PushedDover]

bucksmanuk said:

shall we come back to this argument on a dull wind free day in January?

Can't wait.
Do keep us posted for the day the lights go out.

[J4CKO]

bucksmanuk said:

PushedDover said:

bucksmanuk said:

Have the “establishment” had their lights go off at home yet?
Have they lost a freezer full of food?
Has the air con failed to come on at the opera?

When the answer to these questions is yes, then the money will be made available to solve the issues.

Until then, it’s the genuine buggar’s muddle, with one of the most technically illiterate governments (and opposition) incapable of planning their way out of this - the country has ever seen.

It will be 30 years too late – but do any of them actually care?

I know an engineer that briefed Cameron at No.10. on this topic. The government are clueless….however, certain senior civil servants are well aware of the issues.

Today is not a good example to frame your arguement, between Wind and Solar - the UK is 50% powered by renewables

shall we come back to this argument on a dull wind free day in January?

Do you advocate not using wind power at all ?

It does blow a lot of the time, currently producing 30 ish percent, do we go back to nice, safe, predictable stuff like Gas ?

Because Gas is so predictable at the moment ? like all fossil fuels subject to any change in world politics, sulky faced Russian arsewipes invading next door for example and using it as a weapon.

I think harnessing wind is a bit of a success story, if the turbines weren't doing their job at the moment we would have to find that 10 GW somewhere else.

I say use the advantage we have, i.e. a big coastline and loads of wind, splat in as many wind turbines as we can get, use the surplus to sell and produce Hydrogen, have enough capacity so the wind not blowing isnt such a big deal and gas in reserve, Nuclear there as well. And today, the wind is doing its thing, its also sunny, so more solar. It should be diverse, not relying on any one source.

Move away from Fossil fuel as much as is possible, electric vehicles for personal transport, Hydrogen for haulage etc. Hydrogen and/or electricity for heating. We cant go on burning fossils forever, it will run out, its not good for the environment and health and it leaves us open to having to deal with stbag regimes who happen to have loads of Oil and Gas.

Ironically, Putin has probably done more for renewable energy progress of late than any green lobby.

[Blib]

Condi said:

Blib said:

But, if we produced our own gas then we wouldn't be at the mercy of other producers?

We have an abundance of it. Surely, it would be cheaper to get it from under our feet thsn to import it?

"We" don't own it - Shell, BP, Total etc own it and they will sell to whoever pays the most, be that here or abroad. It would be cheaper to drill for it here than import it, but only as much as the cost of transporting it to Europe over a longer term. In terms of wholesale price, prices move up and down across the world and we wouldn't disconnect ourselves from the general market movements.

The government are looking to give more licenses to drill, and we have plenty of gas left to look for, but that is more for energy security than for cost reasons. As I posted earlier, US gas prices have more than doubled and they are a big exporter, a long way from their export markets. If they are not insulated with their huge (and very cheap to access) gas reserves, then we stand no chance of insulating ourselves from world prices.

So, there are very few advantages to the country that produces the gas?

[xeny]

Blib said:

So, there are very few advantages to the country that produces the gas?

There's some argument that especially at a large scale it is unhelpful. Have a read of the 2nd paragraph of https://www.brookings.edu/blog/future-development/...