The Future of Power Generation in Great Britain

The Future of Power Generation in Great Britain

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Condi

17,231 posts

172 months

Thursday 20th May 2021
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Meeten-5dulx said:
Anyone have info on the UK ETS scheme?
Starter yesterday below the EU scheme price and ended the day at a premium.
It’s making up a larger and larger portion of the wholesale electricity price.
What do you want to know about it? Basically the same as the EU carbon trading scheme it replaces, with some different, but similar, technical nonsense in the background regarding intervention and increased supply rules.

You're right about it making up a larger proportion of the price, but that is the way it was designed (EU and UK schemes) because that supports low carbon generation. Gas price is very high too at the moment - summer hasn't arrived yet. Current temperatures are a significant amount below seasonal normal so heating gas demand is not as low as normal. Power in general is expensive.

There are a lot of UK emitters hedged with EUA (EU allowances) who will need to roll out of one and into another, but you have something like 18 months after the end of year to hold the allowances, so there is no rush.

Meeten-5dulx

2,588 posts

57 months

Thursday 20th May 2021
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Condi said:
What do you want to know about it? Basically the same as the EU carbon trading scheme it replaces, with some different, but similar, technical nonsense in the background regarding intervention and increased supply rules.

You're right about it making up a larger proportion of the price, but that is the way it was designed (EU and UK schemes) because that supports low carbon generation. Gas price is very high too at the moment - summer hasn't arrived yet. Current temperatures are a significant amount below seasonal normal so heating gas demand is not as low as normal. Power in general is expensive.

There are a lot of UK emitters hedged with EUA (EU allowances) who will need to roll out of one and into another, but you have something like 18 months after the end of year to hold the allowances, so there is no rush.
So is there an overdemand like in the EU?
Will the call to Net Zero increase demand (has it already?)
Is the current price as expected?
Will the level of credits reduce over time?

The swap between EU and UK, I assume there are EU organisations that have UK allowances? In fact how does the swap for this holding EUETS work? Can they be used in the UK?

Gas storage levels are at 5yr lows so it makes sense that the price for balance of s21 and w21 is high.
Is there anything bearish? I can't see it.

Gary C

12,489 posts

180 months

Thursday 20th May 2021
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take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey said:
Besse had a few big events... Complete loss of feed water was another.


https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&amp...
Yes, that was an interesting time for the operators.

I know its easy to say 'it wouldn't happen here' because the unexpected is by definition 'unexpected' but its interesting how the power density of the PWR makes responses to loss of heat removal accidents need such quick resolution and puts the operators under huge pressure to respond.

We aren't actually allowed to intervene for the first 5 minutes of a reactor trip no matter what happens to allow the Post Trip Sequence Equipment to do its thing, and we only rely on electric pumps and even if all that fails, we can use natural circulation to cool the reactor for many hours, using the carbon core as a heatsink.
It might never start up again after such an accident, but it should remain safe. To be honest, our greatest fear is a CO2 leak into the building which could kill operators trapped inside such a large building but even that would be a risk to us, not the reactor.


Condi

17,231 posts

172 months

Thursday 20th May 2021
quotequote all
Meeten-5dulx said:
So is there an overdemand like in the EU?
Will the call to Net Zero increase demand (has it already?)
Is the current price as expected?
Will the level of credits reduce over time?

The swap between EU and UK, I assume there are EU organisations that have UK allowances? In fact how does the swap for this holding EUETS work? Can they be used in the UK?

Gas storage levels are at 5yr lows so it makes sense that the price for balance of s21 and w21 is high.
Is there anything bearish? I can't see it.
1) How do you mean "over-demand"? There is a mechanism in place which should, over time, tighten up the number available, although quite what is causing the current increase in price is questionable. Funds and investors see EUAs as a one way bet, and each time a fund buys then that someone who isn't an end user buying it, so removes an allowance from the market, although they will have to trade back out at some point. Prices could be high because concrete plants and power generators are working hard right now. In theory there shouldn't be a structural under supply, the supply should reduce over time as inefficient processes and carbon intensive processes are replaced with lower carbon processes.

2) No, not really. If anything under "net zero" then very few UKAs will be needed as most processes are carbon neutral, or offset rather than needing an allowance.

3) No idea, am not close enough to that market to know for sure, but I would say it's about what was expected. It's not a million miles away from where the EU price was and 1 auction isn't anywhere near enough to get a good price point from. It will take a few months for the market to get an idea of where prices should be.

4) Yes.

5) Nobody owned any UKA's until yesterday. I doubt any EU companies bought UKAs - they'd just buy EUA's instead. UK companies have been buying EUA's because they haven't been able to trade UKAs until May, and yet were out of the EUETS since Jan, so EUAs were the only hedge they could have. The swap is simply buying one selling the other. UK companies have to present a UKA, so at some point will have to sell EUAs and buy UKAs.

6) Nord Stream 2, which could mean larger amounts of Russian gas into Europe for this winter is the big bear. A bit "will they, wont they?" regarding US sanctions, but it looks like it will now happen.

PushedDover

5,659 posts

54 months

Monday 24th May 2021
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Sounds a stretch, but something for everyone in here - and widely reported across multiple platforms :

Article said:
Anglo-American joint venture Hecate Independent Power Limited (HIP) has launched its HIP Atlantic Project for installing 10,000 MW of fixed and floating wind turbines in the North Atlantic connected to the UK grid.

The long-length, high-capacity, high-voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission cables which will connect the wind farms to the UK grid are to be manufactured in the United Kingdom at a GBP 200 million bespoke power cable plant to be built at a port in the northeast of England, HIP said

The total project cost is estimated at GBP 21 billion (USD 30 billion).

HIP has lodged four connection applications with National Grid Company for an initial 4,000 MW of grid connections to the United Kingdom’s 400 kV electricity transmission system across four connection sites.

Each wind farm – or pod – will be in a different North Atlantic location, and each pod consisting of 1,000 MW of wind turbines will have its own dedicated cable linked to the UK. Full dispatch of the HIP offshore wind pods will be under the exclusive control of the UK electricity system operator making HIP Atlantic Britain’s first captive wind farm in overseas territorial waters, HIP said.

First Wind Farms to Be Built Off Iceland

HIP Atlantic’s initial 2,000 MW of generation capacity, targeted to be off the southern and eastern coasts of Iceland, is expected to be commissioned in early 2025 to coincide with the United Kingdom’s de-commissioning of its last coal-fired power plants and the last of its original generation of commercial nuclear power plants.
{cynic mode} -Nice timing for COP conference[/cynic mode}
The HIP Atlantic HVDC transmission cables will never connect to the Icelandic transmission system. The high availability wind capacity will be solely connected to the UK, dispatched by National Grid.

Iceland will be a significant beneficiary of HIP Atlantic’s investment programme in offshore wind, the developer said. The initial Icelandic investment for the first 2,000 MW pilot phase of the project is expected to be GBP 2.9 million in 2021, rising to an additional GBP 144 million through 2025. Up to 500 new jobs located in southern and eastern Iceland are associated with just the 2,000 MW pilot phase.

UK Content

HIP’s planned offshore wind pods in the North Atlantic will all be installed in a different meteorological catchment area from current North Sea and Irish Sea wind farms and so HIP renewable electricity can be supplied at times when existing British wind farms are becalmed, HIP said. This diversity of wind source provides a geographical portfolio effect to protect the UK transmission grid from too much offshore wind capacity installed in just one region.

HIP Atlantic aims to maximise the British manufactured content in every element of its equipment manufacturing and installation process. The initial 2,000 MW capacity alone is expected to result in some 15,000 new jobs in the United Kingdom.

“HIP Atlantic fulfils the Prime Minister’s vision of attracting investment and job creation in the North of England as part of this country’s ambitious policy to make Britain the world leader in offshore wind energy,” HIP’s Chairman, Sir Tony Baldry, said.

”We will stretch the zone of British-operated wind generation outside of our traditional territorial waters, pushing the boundaries of existing cable technology to generate over 1,000 kms from our grid landfall points throughout England.”

Current Developments

HIP Atlantic is currently finalising an institutional investment of ordinary equity capital into a project SPV to develop its first two 1,000 MW fixed-bottom offshore wind projects.

Separately, HIP Atlantic is working with investment partners for a new HVDC cable manufacturing facility with room for expansion and with an associated deep water berth for loading cable laying vessels in excess of 275 metres in length.

HIP Atlantic is also working with a group of ship owners to modify existing vessels capable of laying the long lengths of HVDC cable required to connect wind turbine capacity to the United Kingdom at connection points on the 400 kV transmission system which have been agreed with National Grid Company. These will be the largest dedicated power cable vessels in operation in the world today that will be largely operated by British crews, the developer said.

HIP said that the approach of using dedicated, UK-based HVDC cable laying ships permits power to be delivered to connection points along the east or west coasts of England to tie into specific new hyperscale data centres being developed by large digital users of renewable energy.

The developer has worked across British government departments and agencies – including the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) and National Grid Electricity System Operator (National Grid ESO) – to secure the necessary recognition that captive renewable power, generated outside the UK but dispatched exclusively by the UK transmission system operator may be connected to the UK grid and is eligible for CFDs.

HIP is comprised of Hecate Wind LLC (Hecate), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hecate Holdings LLC, and Independent Power Corporation PLC.
Awaiting the nitpicking from the armchairs.

Evanivitch

20,139 posts

123 months

Monday 24th May 2021
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The amount of HVDC interconnection would be huge. Not only from Iceland to Ireland (as previously proposed at 1GW) but then to the rest of Britain (currently 1GW). Even if it landed at Scotland, it would blow all recent infrastructure improvements out of the water.

take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey

5,199 posts

56 months

Monday 24th May 2021
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I'm not remotely current on wind, but about 20 odd years ago when I was at AEA Tech we looked at some of the environmental impact studies.

There was evidence then that if you take the energy out of the weather system, it changes the system. The paper that stuck in my memory was the drying of sssi wetlands down wind of a turbine installation.

Seems to have died a death as an issue - has it just been conveniently ignored or was the science wrong back then... Exaggerating the impact.

CraigyMc

16,423 posts

237 months

Monday 24th May 2021
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take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey said:
I'm not remotely current on wind, but about 20 odd years ago when I was at AEA Tech we looked at some of the environmental impact studies.

There was evidence then that if you take the energy out of the weather system, it changes the system. The paper that stuck in my memory was the drying of sssi wetlands down wind of a turbine installation.

Seems to have died a death as an issue - has it just been conveniently ignored or was the science wrong back then... Exaggerating the impact.
Depends. Was the study back then funded by BP?

take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey

5,199 posts

56 months

Monday 24th May 2021
quotequote all
CraigyMc said:
Depends. Was the study back then funded by BP?
No idea... It was a long time ago.

Only reason it stuck was a later paper I read theorising the use of large wind turbines in the hurricane belt to reduce the severity of said hurricanes... It gave credence to the previous claims that you can change local weather with them i. e change rainfall patterns, etc. and you need surprisingly few to do so.

Evanivitch

20,139 posts

123 months

Monday 24th May 2021
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take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey said:
CraigyMc said:
Depends. Was the study back then funded by BP?
No idea... It was a long time ago.

Only reason it stuck was a later paper I read theorising the use of large wind turbines in the hurricane belt to reduce the severity of said hurricanes... It gave credence to the previous claims that you can change local weather with them i. e change rainfall patterns, etc. and you need surprisingly few to do so.
I think there's a gross misunderstanding of the energy involved in this, the limited altitude turbines work at, and the efficiency in which they can actually extract power.


There's also a question of installation. America often has very dense, much smaller wind farms. Not something you see often in the UK as the nature of turbulence, and the size of the turbines is very different

Condi

17,231 posts

172 months

Monday 24th May 2021
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Unsupported offshore floating wind?

One interesting comment buried down in the notes for the article is this....

HIP said:
HIP's 65 per cent net capacity factor (as against 40-45 per cent for North Sea wind farms) supports electricity pricing that is comparable with the most recent UK offshore licensing round auction.
So they expect to get about 40% more energy out than the current offshore wind farms.

10GW more of wind will give NG all kinds of headaches. It would make a lot of sense to connect some of this offshore wind directly to other countries, that way you could send 2GW to Iceland, 2GW to Ireland and 6GW to GB or whatever, rather than 10GW into the UK which then has to export it anyway via existing interconnectors. I believe there are plans to do that with some of the North Sea farms already. It would make more money for the developers too if they have more connections they can send power to wherever it is most valuable.

CraigyMc

16,423 posts

237 months

Monday 24th May 2021
quotequote all
Condi said:
Unsupported offshore floating wind?

One interesting comment buried down in the notes for the article is this....

HIP said:
HIP's 65 per cent net capacity factor (as against 40-45 per cent for North Sea wind farms) supports electricity pricing that is comparable with the most recent UK offshore licensing round auction.
So they expect to get about 40% more energy out than the current offshore wind farms.

10GW more of wind will give NG all kinds of headaches. It would make a lot of sense to connect some of this offshore wind directly to other countries, that way you could send 2GW to Iceland, 2GW to Ireland and 6GW to GB or whatever, rather than 10GW into the UK which then has to export it anyway via existing interconnectors. I believe there are plans to do that with some of the North Sea farms already. It would make more money for the developers too if they have more connections they can send power to wherever it is most valuable.
In normal circumstances, I can't see us exporting much power to Iceland -- they have no need of it, being the world's largest per capita power producer (hydro and geothermal). So many green energy sources, such a small population. If hydrogen ever takes off*, Iceland will be like the new middle east.

*Pun. You're welcome.

Condi

17,231 posts

172 months

Monday 24th May 2021
quotequote all
CraigyMc said:
In normal circumstances, I can't see us exporting much power to Iceland -- they have no need of it, being the world's largest per capita power producer (hydro and geothermal). So many green energy sources, such a small population. If hydrogen ever takes off*, Iceland will be like the new middle east.

*Pun. You're welcome.
Depends. At -£10 power price for a whole weekend they can probably afford to turn their hydro plants off and save for another day.

The more interconnected your grid is, the more efficient it is. With so much wind being plugged into the GB network we are getting very high price days and very low priced days, which is not great without large scale storage, which doesn't seem to be happening. Makes much more sense to plug the wind into many different networks and distribute it on the basis of value. For example, Spain and Portugal often have higher prices than surrounding countries, so maybe worth laying a cable down to there?

alangla

4,825 posts

182 months

Monday 24th May 2021
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Evanivitch said:
There's also a question of installation. America often has very dense, much smaller wind farms. Not something you see often in the UK as the nature of turbulence, and the size of the turbines is very different
These have to be seen to be believed, e.g. https://goo.gl/maps/eCyVZAkjKo7jsupz9 - loads of very short turbines in rows on the floor of a valley. The overhead picture shows just now dense the turbines are - https://goo.gl/maps/NCbeA8a56SUu1Wzp7 In the UK they'd be much taller, spread out & on the hill tops.

EDIT - slightly further east on the same road - https://goo.gl/maps/wizo5u3wtPBF6A4J8 - rotate the view round to see the scale & layout of the windfarm.

Edited by alangla on Monday 24th May 12:17

PushedDover

5,659 posts

54 months

Monday 24th May 2021
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Cost of maintenance of Bob in a pick up truck is minimal as is the land cost.
Downside is that it is low yield and rarely near population (aka where needed)

PushedDover

5,659 posts

54 months

Tuesday 25th May 2021
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https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/may/25/n...

North Sea green energy could overtake oil and gas by 2030, says study
More than half of offshore energy jobs could be in low carbon sectors, including wind and renewables.
"Meanwhile a fifth of offshore energy industry jobs in 2030, or 40,000 roles, will be linked to other clean energy sectors such as producing hydrogen from renewable energy, or capturing and storing the carbon emissions from factories and heavy industry under the seabed."



PushedDover

5,659 posts

54 months

Wednesday 26th May 2021
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Popped up on my feed today:

"
Sometimes a good graphic says more than a hundred page report. This one from RIDG helpfully translates a highly technical issue - transmission charging - and puts it in the clearest possible context - comparative £s on the cost of energy.

As this shows, the UK charging regime already incentivises imports of electricity (green and brown), while penalising renewable projects in the UK's windiest places. If European interconnection increases, while charging rockets for Scottish projects (as currently planned) that effect will be compounded. As a result some of the windiest projects - and the jobs and investment that comes with them- may not happen in the UK.

This issue has been around for a long time and solutions are available including investments in England-Scotland cross-border infrastructure. Offshore developers can play a role to support that process but any solution must include structural changes to radically reduce or eliminate locational penalties for Scottish projects.

Scotland has one of the world's best wind resources and wind is a key enabler of decarbonisation of power. UK regulators must act quickly to ensure price signals drive a Scottish wind energy boom in the next decade or risk investments going overseas and the UK's journey to net zero being overly reliant on imported power.

Full report
"





Thought some of you may find interesting.

Condi

17,231 posts

172 months

Wednesday 26th May 2021
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I saw that too, in some ways its very interesting, in some ways it's a little disingenuous.

To say that Germany has £0 transmission costs is obviously nonsense - it does, but the charges are not directly linked to generators but paid for in a different way. Someone, somewhere has to pay for the overhead lines, the transformers, the infrastructure.

The system we have here was designed to encourage generation near points of consumption, and so by charging a wind turbine in the North of Scotland more transmission charges than a wind turbine 10 miles from the M25 you're better reflecting the costs involved of shipping that energy to a user. Whether that is still the best way to achieve NG's aims in 2021 is a different question, but when the system was designed it worked as intended. Indeed, it still works as intended because the biggest system constraint is the Scotland/England boundary, and so charging generators north of that boundary for the infrastructure improvements required to overcome the constraint is arguably exactly what it was supposed to do!

It follows on the back of a very similar report published by SSE Transmission who said 95% of respondents in their area would like to see it changed. Well, of course they would, but 95% of generators in England who would see their TNOUS costs increase would probably NOT like to see it changed! hehe

CraigyMc

16,423 posts

237 months

Wednesday 26th May 2021
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I sometimes refer to this for a bit of a quick look at where the power lines are. https://openinframap.org/#4.41/52.82/2.15

It's probably incomplete.

Gary C

12,489 posts

180 months

Wednesday 26th May 2021
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CraigyMc said:
I sometimes refer to this for a bit of a quick look at where the power lines are. https://openinframap.org/#4.41/52.82/2.15

It's probably incomplete.
Looks fairly up to date in our area with the heysham sub extension and the 4mw solar site. Good reference.