The Future of Power Generation in Great Britain

[Flooble]

PushedDover said:

Cobnapint said:

irc said:

Lord Frost hits the nail on the head.

https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.telegrap...

Doesn't he just.

yet he also identifies: "Of course, we might get lucky with fusion power"

Armchair experts here on PH say we will all have this as a piece of piss in the future. Who is right?

It's been around the corner since I was at school. I'm closer to retirement than school age.

[hidetheelephants]

Fusion power is a really good way to churn out physics PhDs. It may never keep the lights on.

[Talksteer]

Gary C said:

At some point, the carbon cores will not be safe to operate and its becoming harder and nearer to being unprofitable to check, prove and justify why they are safe.

Surely not as such unprofitable at current prices. I presume it's more of an issue that it's a one way bet on the current price of energy remaining high and of it fails to do so they would loose a lot of money. If they were able put the costs on RAB it would definitely be profitable.

Gary C said:

Its also fair to say, the ONR were not really happy for us to pursue a safety case for 10 cracks, then 20 cracks, the 100 cracks then 500 cracks and wanted a encompassing case for each reactor that predicts and works to set end of life parameters as they were getting concerned that continually re-justifying more and more 'cracks' was risking undermining public & Gov confidence in their regulation.

Hmmm, if the safety case meets the targets it should be licenceable should it not.

Also correct me if I'm wrong but the actual failure mode would be only an issue if we have a 1 in 10,000 year earthquake (plus linear behaviour ~40% past said threshold). And even then the backup shut-off systems would work, and even then I presume that an AGR would do pretty well against an unprotected loss of heatsink giving operators days to introduce another means of shutdown.

Is there even a mechanism for the government to tell the ONR to knock it off for a time period?

[hidetheelephants]

Declaring a state of emergency is normally good for short circuiting legislative hurdles, it's a bit illiberal if you don't follow up with actual legislation though to allow parliamentary oversight; I wouldn't trust the current lot to not abuse it.

[Gary C]

Talksteer said:

Gary C said:

At some point, the carbon cores will not be safe to operate and its becoming harder and nearer to being unprofitable to check, prove and justify why they are safe.

Surely not as such unprofitable at current prices. I presume it's more of an issue that it's a one way bet on the current price of energy remaining high and of it fails to do so they would loose a lot of money. If they were able put the costs on RAB it would definitely be profitable.

Gary C said:

Its also fair to say, the ONR were not really happy for us to pursue a safety case for 10 cracks, then 20 cracks, the 100 cracks then 500 cracks and wanted a encompassing case for each reactor that predicts and works to set end of life parameters as they were getting concerned that continually re-justifying more and more 'cracks' was risking undermining public & Gov confidence in their regulation.

Hmmm, if the safety case meets the targets it should be licenceable should it not.

Also correct me if I'm wrong but the actual failure mode would be only an issue if we have a 1 in 10,000 year earthquake (plus linear behaviour ~40% past said threshold). And even then the backup shut-off systems would work, and even then I presume that an AGR would do pretty well against an unprotected loss of heatsink giving operators days to introduce another means of shutdown.

Is there even a mechanism for the government to tell the ONR to knock it off for a time period?

On the last point, no, not really and of course it would be really really wrong.

But yes, we have to meet safety claims for events rarer than 1 in 10,000. We work on a reliability to shutdown to a 1x10E7 event (in simple terms). Thing is, the safety case is made by ourselves and then the ONR either reject or accept it. They dont work as a 'service' and a relationship is important and so is confidence between us, them and the public. It was though we might be getting to the point that the public confidence might have been eroded.

[Condi]

Cobnapint said:

irc said:

Lord Frost hits the nail on the head.

https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.telegrap...

Doesn't he just.

Not really no, his answer to high gas prices is to build more gas power stations.

He is confusing or obfuscating the current high prices (driven by gas prices) with the high prices which occur when margins are tight as a result of stations closing and net zero. At the moment there is no shortage of margin, but it's just very expensive to generate it. That is nothing to do with net zero.

[andy_s]

Maybe relevant or not: 'Nukes and Natural Gas Are "Green," Votes E.U. Parliament'

https://reason.com/2022/07/06/nukes-and-natural-ga...

[hidetheelephants]

andy_s said:

Maybe relevant or not: 'Nukes and Natural Gas Are "Green," Votes E.U. Parliament'

https://reason.com/2022/07/06/nukes-and-natural-ga...

The faint popping noise heard was the heads of loony anti-nuclear nuts exploding.

[Flooble]

Was the "Gas is green" thing not being heavily pushed by someone or other (Germany?)

[hidetheelephants]

Flooble said:

Was the "Gas is green" thing not being heavily pushed by someone or other (Germany?)

I'm sure Gazprom financed a lot of lobbying.

[PushedDover]

7GW of Offshore Wind dialed in !

https://renews.biz/78997/offshore-wind-secures-7gw...

Go figure a reduction again in the cost of wind.
Some said years ago it would never get sub£100.....

[Evanivitch]

Flooble said:

Was the "Gas is green" thing not being heavily pushed by someone or other (Germany?)

I think it's being heavily pushed by the sensible notion that we need gas for when we haven't got Renewables generating.

So whilst I agree that doesn't make it green, it also means it shouldn't be subject to the same penalties as coal, oil, peat etc

[Condi]

PushedDover said:

7GW of Offshore Wind dialed in !

https://renews.biz/78997/offshore-wind-secures-7gw...

Go figure a reduction again in the cost of wind.
Some said years ago it would never get sub£100.....

I hope that National Grid are upgrading transmission capacity fast enough but find that doubtful.

£37/mwh is astonishingly cheap. Wonder when it gets to the point of being value without the CfD, it was talked about after the last round at £39/mwh and power prices have gone up since then.

Also nice to see tidal get in on the act, even if it is only small steps.

[pquinn]

Condi said:

I hope that National Grid are upgrading transmission capacity fast enough but find that doubtful.

Of course they aren't. That's been one of the regular flaws with the wind installs, they end up constrained because they're remote from demand and the grid capacity isn't built to allow export.

Now a sensible policy would be that paying for/adding the infrastructure forms part of the original development but I bet that doesn't happen.

[Evanivitch]

Condi said:

I hope that National Grid are upgrading transmission capacity fast enough but find that doubtful.

£37/mwh is astonishingly cheap. Wonder when it gets to the point of being value without the CfD, it was talked about after the last round at £39/mwh and power prices have gone up since then.

Also nice to see tidal get in on the act, even if it is only small steps.

Isn't Eastern HVDC a big part.of that?

[Hill92]

Condi said:

I hope that National Grid are upgrading transmission capacity fast enough but find that doubtful.

£37/mwh is astonishingly cheap. Wonder when it gets to the point of being value without the CfD, it was talked about after the last round at £39/mwh and power prices have gone up since then.

Also nice to see tidal get in on the act, even if it is only small steps.

That's already happening. For example, Moray West are taking a CfD for only 294 MW of the total 882 MW project. They've already secured a long term Corporate PPA covering another 350 MW capacity.

It's going on for twice the size of Neart Na Gaoithe (882 MW vs 448 MW) for almost the same number of turbines (60 vs 54). NNG strike price in allocation round 1 was £114.39 vs £37.35 for the AR4 projects announced today.

[dickymint]

This could be a game changer............

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/07/a...

Get's my vote if he gets to the last two candidates

[PushedDover]

pquinn said:

Condi said:

I hope that National Grid are upgrading transmission capacity fast enough but find that doubtful.

Of course they aren't. That's been one of the regular flaws with the wind installs, they end up constrained because they're remote from demand and the grid capacity isn't built to allow export.

Now a sensible policy would be that paying for/adding the infrastructure forms part of the original development but I bet that doesn't happen.

They end up constrained.... ?
Can we see your workings on percentiles?

[Evanivitch]

PushedDover said:

They end up constrained.... ?
Can we see your workings on percentiles?

https://www.ref.org.uk/ref-blog/371-constraint-payments-to-wind-power-in-2020-and-2021

We all know it happens. We all have different opinions on why it is done and the justification. I agree that more needs to be invested in the North-South transmission, but also that more needs to be done investing in alternative wind locations in the South of the country (with the help of floating off shore).

[wombleh]

EDF renationalised:
http://www.progressivepulse.org/brexit/edf-to-be-e...