The Future of Power Generation in Great Britain

[Evanivitch]

hidetheelephants said:

They'll be disappointed just like every other feasibility study; flood defence is about the only way to justify it and even then the cost will be boggling.

Yep. If it's flood defence then you're looking at the most extreme, which is Cardiff to Weston Super Mare. That also has the lowest transport value.

[Mikey G]

Dont think I have seen a generation mix with such low gas ever, currently below 1GW of gas and emissions down to 21g at one point, a record low I believe..

[Condi]

I think you're probably right, just the 2 CHP's which run all the time, 1 Drax biomass unit and 1 CCGT. National Grid are certainly getting better and more comfortable with fewer thermal units on the network.

[Mikey G]

I'm surprised they dont use pumped storage more if inertia is required to maintain frequency? Especially now as today is a good day for renewables.

[Condi]

Mikey G said:

I'm surprised they dont use pumped storage more if inertia is required to maintain frequency? Especially now as today is a good day for renewables.

For when? At the moment they don't seem to have any issues with inertia, Pembrooke is the only CCGT and that is in the arse end of Wales where they seem to struggle with system requirements. The batteries do synthetic inertia/frequency response quite well.

[Talksteer]

Condi said:

I think you're probably right, just the 2 CHP's which run all the time, 1 Drax biomass unit and 1 CCGT. National Grid are certainly getting better and more comfortable with fewer thermal units on the network.

Probably because after wind the next most common source of power is "interconnector". There is 8 GW of interconnector on the grid at the moment.

[tamore]

Talksteer said:

Probably because after wind the next most common source of power is "interconnector". There is 8 GW of interconnector on the grid at the moment.

hopefully a bucketload more of them to come too.

[Condi]

Talksteer said:

Probably because after wind the next most common source of power is "interconnector". There is 8 GW of interconnector on the grid at the moment.

Yes, but flexible thermal plant gives a lot more beside simply power, like inertia, reactive power, headroom, etc which the ICs don't do.

If you look there will be more units running overnight than during the day, which seems counter-intuitive.

[Evanivitch]

Condi said:

I think you're probably right, just the 2 CHP's which run all the time, 1 Drax biomass unit and 1 CCGT. National Grid are certainly getting better and more comfortable with fewer thermal units on the network.

Isn't it their intention to run zero-gas when possible in 2025?

Big flywheels already been installed on grid and lots of testing with batteries.

[Condi]

Evanivitch said:

Isn't it their intention to run zero-gas when possible in 2025?

Yes and no. The 2 CHPs are used, as per their names, for combined heat and power, and so run 24/7. While the intention might be to run without gas or coal, there will be gas units running 24/7 for a long while yet.

Also there is about 3GW of embedded thermal generation, things like waste incinerators which run all the time as well, so while the larger gas power plants will be shut down there is stuff "going on" in the background. I'm pretty sure if they were able to do something about whatever system constraint requires Pembroke to be running then we could have seen 0 large gas power plants today - it wasn't running for energy.

[Evanivitch]

Gas been running under 1GW most of the day, new low-gCO2e/kWh record set on 5th, but currently at just 16g on some of the apps. Octopus thread is full of people who've nothing more to dump electricity into

[alangla]

Evanivitch said:

Gas been running under 1GW most of the day, new low-gCO2e/kWh record set on 5th, but currently at just 16g on some of the apps. Octopus thread is full of people who've nothing more to dump electricity into

Prime opportunity to stick a 3 bar fire in the back garden & cause some proper global warming/heating/boiling surely?

[tamore]

alangla said:

Prime opportunity to stick a 3 bar fire in the back garden & cause some proper global warming/heating/boiling surely?

take this horsest to the climate threads would you, and keep this one on the subject.

we really are starting to see the interconnections pushing energy out more often now.

PD, any sign of bottlenecks easing further?

[Evanivitch]

alangla said:

Prime opportunity to stick a 3 bar fire in the back garden & cause some proper global warming/heating/boiling surely?

During the Agile feasts during covid there were people running heating and cooling at the same time in their homes to make the money.

[Evanivitch]

Evanivitch said:

Gas been running under 1GW most of the day, new low-gCO2e/kWh record set on 5th, but currently at just 16g on some of the apps. Octopus thread is full of people who've nothing more to dump electricity into

Just seen 8g!

[Mikey G]

Evanivitch said:

Evanivitch said:

Gas been running under 1GW most of the day, new low-gCO2e/kWh record set on 5th, but currently at just 16g on some of the apps. Octopus thread is full of people who've nothing more to dump electricity into

Just seen 8g!

Well done GB saving the planet today

[Matthen]

Looks like there is a coal plant idleing away: burning off stores? Expecting everyone to fire the oven up in the next 30 mins?

Interested to know.

[tamore]

Matthen said:

Looks like there is a coal plant idleing away: burning off stores? Expecting everyone to fire the oven up in the next 30 mins?

Interested to know.

it's been on for a couple of weeks now i think. as you say, burning off stored coal before decomm?

[Evanivitch]

Matthen said:

Looks like there is a coal plant idleing away: burning off stores? Expecting everyone to fire the oven up in the next 30 mins?

Interested to know.

From what I understand they've been providing peak/STOR, but that means running the boiler at same level all day. Easiest way to burn it off.

[plfrench]

Matthen said:

Looks like there is a coal plant idleing away: burning off stores? Expecting everyone to fire the oven up in the next 30 mins?

Interested to know.

Radcliffe powerstation near Nottingham. I pass it when I go into the office - its coal pile is almost non-existent now, certainly the lowest I've ever noticed, I guess just getting rid of remaining stocks before closing for good this Autumn. The final chapter in the UK coal-fired powerstation book coming to an end.