Mr. Tokyo, I'm not sure that allowing Crazyland, the Crazy States of Crazonia and Crazakistan a significant economic advantage at a time of great competitiveness anyway is a brilliant idea. When the Woe, Doom, and Horror arrives courtesy of global warming (in this scenario) they'll be best-placed to either construct infrastructure or seize natural resources, whilst Goodland and Goodonia will have impoverished themselves anyway.
Mr. M, I quite agree. The climate is changing because it has always changed.
So (in the thought experiment) rather than let Crazyland take advantage of you, you choose DEATH?
If you still believe in the global warming scam then if all these other countries are carrying on building new coal power stations every week then the outcome is going to be the same either way. So the only sensible response is to plan to mitigate the consequences.
The outcome isn't going to be the same either way, it's a matter of degree, so less is better.
There may turn out to be tipping points so that 5x isn't too bad, 10x is about the same, 11x is devastating but 15x is equally devastating, but if there are then we don't know what they are.
According to Kaye Adams on BBC Scotland, Grangemouth to close.
Still, BBC UK have their priorities right:
LATEST: Zara Phillips and family friend Oliver Baker among Prince George's godparents named ahead of his christening Emilia Jardine-Paterson, Hugh Grosvenor, Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton and William van Cutsem also named as Prince George's godparents
There's no hurry to frack. The shale gas isn't going anywhere any time soon, and it's unlikely to be less valuable in a few years' time than it is now.
Very sad. I used to be able to sit in school and look out at the Grangemouth refinery. Also did some work experience there which was great fun. It was a stunning looking plant in a brutally industrial sort of way.
"But that simply does not hold up to the evidence - nuclear generators around the world have struggled to make and sell electricity at a profit because (a) capital costs are enormous, (b) maintenance is non-trivial, and (c) availability rates are usually below 80%."
Is that Global experience rather than just UK British Energy experience and has there been examination of the performance of newer build plants compared to older, more maintenance heavy plants?
The number of privately built and financed merchant nuclear power plants in the history of the world is...
Zero.
There were plans NRG to build two new nuclear plants in Texas. However, this was cancelled two years ago as it was simply uneconomic. In the US, older nuclear plants are being decomissioned as increasing maintenance causes them to become money sinks. (See both Exelon and NRG.)
Who is funding Olkiluoto Unit 3 or does it have government guarantees?
I'm not surprised that the 1970s generation of reactors are incurring high maintenance costs but my interest would be in how the later build plants are comparing. Also I'd expect the operator experience from the current generation of plants to help reduce the costs of the next generation of nukes.
Olkiluoto 3 is owned by Teollisuuden Voima Oy, a private company with a number of shareholders. It has signed a long-term energy supply contract at an above market rate.
Finland is part of Nordpool, which is - essentially - the pan-Nordic electricity grid. The current price of electricity in the area, which is awash with Hydro, is €38.50. There is absolutely no way Olkilouto 3 would be profitable without a long-term supply contract given that baseload electricity is more than a third cheaper than UK electricity.
Mr. Divvie, that's not a Scottish/business-specific issue, that's a mad royal hysteria issue. I'm a monarchist, but the saturation level coverage of everything royal does go too far.
General media priorities are stupid to the point of offence. In 2006, I think, when the World Cup was held in Germany, one news organisation (unsure if it was the BBC or Sky) cut away from a man who had been tortured by the Saudis and denied justice to show 'live pictures' (gasp!) of the England team bus arriving at its hotel in Germany.
"But that simply does not hold up to the evidence - nuclear generators around the world have struggled to make and sell electricity at a profit because (a) capital costs are enormous, (b) maintenance is non-trivial, and (c) availability rates are usually below 80%."
Is that Global experience rather than just UK British Energy experience and has there been examination of the performance of newer build plants compared to older, more maintenance heavy plants?
The number of privately built and financed merchant nuclear power plants in the history of the world is...
Zero.
There were plans NRG to build two new nuclear plants in Texas. However, this was cancelled two years ago as it was simply uneconomic. In the US, older nuclear plants are being decomissioned as increasing maintenance causes them to become money sinks. (See both Exelon and NRG.)
Who is funding Olkiluoto Unit 3 or does it have government guarantees?
I'm not surprised that the 1970s generation of reactors are incurring high maintenance costs but my interest would be in how the later build plants are comparing. Also I'd expect the operator experience from the current generation of plants to help reduce the costs of the next generation of nukes.
Olkiluoto 3 is owned by Teollisuuden Voima Oy, a private company with a number of shareholders. It has signed a long-term energy supply contract at an above market rate.
Finland is part of Nordpool, which is - essentially - the pan-Nordic electricity grid. The current price of electricity in the area, which is awash with Hydro, is €38.50. There is absolutely no way Olkilouto 3 would be profitable without a long-term supply contract given that baseload electricity is more than a third cheaper than UK electricity.
Load factor (% of maximum operating power per year) for the UK's early Magnox stations was 57% over their entire life-time (they were Cold War plutonium-for-weapons producers, with electricity a genuinely useful by-product)
Early Pressurised Water Reactors operated, globally, at around 75% and more modern ones (eg Sizewell at 83%
The latest generation of reactors are designed to operate with a load factor of >95%. That includes, of course, Hinkley Point C.
Down-times are carefully pre-planned and entirely predictable - unlike wind, for example.
For contrast, coal and oil have load factors well under 60% (often because they are turned off in summer when loads are low, to cut carbon emissions), wind is ~95% (but variable) and solar is 99% - but only when the sun is shining! Great in day-time Arizona, not so good in winter nights in the UK.
Gas turbines (especially CHP plants) run around 95-98% of load capacity & have the advantage of being able to be turned on and off rapidly - impossible with any thermal-based plant (coal, oil, nuclear)
So the up-thread comments stating as fact '80% load factor for nuclear' are both misleading (the other power alternatives' load factors are not stated) & outdated/historically wrong, since they relate to previous generations of nuclear plant.
So - the historic 80% load factor of old-generation nuclear power plants exceeds that of even the most modern thermal plants, but falls well short of that from Gas Turbine & solar/wind plants (if - big IF!) you accept that there will be no power generated at certain known times (eg night!) & that the area that needs to be devoted to such energy farms is massive and the cost of the power they generate in anything but optimum geographical locations is extraordinarily high.
A tropical desert would be ideal to site solar (using hot water is more efficient than PV cells) and somewhere with constant, steady winds would be ideal for wind turbines.
In both these cases, the significant transmission losses from remote generating areas to power-hungry cities have been ignored.
I conclude that the misinformation and disingenuous nature of those posts citing 80% load factor for nuclear power were deliberately misleading.
According to Kaye Adams on BBC Scotland, Grangemouth to close.
Still, BBC UK have their priorities right:
LATEST: Zara Phillips and family friend Oliver Baker among Prince George's godparents named ahead of his christening Emilia Jardine-Paterson, Hugh Grosvenor, Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton and William van Cutsem also named as Prince George's godparents
Mr. Tokyo, I'm not sure that allowing Crazyland, the Crazy States of Crazonia and Crazakistan a significant economic advantage at a time of great competitiveness anyway is a brilliant idea. When the Woe, Doom, and Horror arrives courtesy of global warming (in this scenario) they'll be best-placed to either construct infrastructure or seize natural resources, whilst Goodland and Goodonia will have impoverished themselves anyway.
Mr. M, I quite agree. The climate is changing because it has always changed.
So (in the thought experiment) rather than let Crazyland take advantage of you, you choose DEATH?
If you still believe in the global warming scam then if all these other countries are carrying on building new coal power stations every week then the outcome is going to be the same either way. So the only sensible response is to plan to mitigate the consequences.
The outcome isn't going to be the same either way, it's a matter of degree, so less is better.
There may turn out to be tipping points so that 5x isn't too bad, 10x is about the same, 11x is devastating but 15x is equally devastating, but if there are then we don't know what they are.
The outcome is going to be the same because the AGW scam is garbage. So degrees of no effect are still no effect.
For a second time, can I recommend everyone commenting on nuclear power, please read this article from The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists. For the record, it is very much a pro-nuclear publication, but the article clears up a number of misconceptions that people have.
Mr. Tokyo, I'm not sure that allowing Crazyland, the Crazy States of Crazonia and Crazakistan a significant economic advantage at a time of great competitiveness anyway is a brilliant idea. When the Woe, Doom, and Horror arrives courtesy of global warming (in this scenario) they'll be best-placed to either construct infrastructure or seize natural resources, whilst Goodland and Goodonia will have impoverished themselves anyway.
Mr. M, I quite agree. The climate is changing because it has always changed.
So (in the thought experiment) rather than let Crazyland take advantage of you, you choose DEATH?
If you still believe in the global warming scam then if all these other countries are carrying on building new coal power stations every week then the outcome is going to be the same either way. So the only sensible response is to plan to mitigate the consequences.
The outcome isn't going to be the same either way, it's a matter of degree, so less is better.
There may turn out to be tipping points so that 5x isn't too bad, 10x is about the same, 11x is devastating but 15x is equally devastating, but if there are then we don't know what they are.
If other countries are building new coal power stations at the rate of one a week then closing down two is not going to be the difference between life and DEATH!!!!!!
In one year the significance of closing down those two (just relative to new builds not including existing coal stations) would be 1:26. In two years it would be 1:78 (as the previous year's ones will count twice by then). In three years the significance of those two would be 1:156 etc.
Just by their own arguments the only logical response is to mitigate the consequences - for which you need an industrial base for which you need an energy policy designed to support an industrial base.
Mr. Tokyo, that's a terrorist argument. If the choice is living under tyranny, or enjoying a curtailed but free life, I suspect many would opt for the latter.
I don't think it's exactly a terrorist argument. In the example Crazyland aren't out to kill us, they just don't care either way. It's more like a normal international political collective action problem.
If other countries are building new coal power stations at the rate of one a week then closing down two is not going to be the difference between life and DEATH!!!!!!
I guess you missed the start of this discussion upthread, in which case the exchange isn't going to make much sense to you...
Mr. M, I quite agree. The climate is changing because it has always changed.
Before Homo Erectus learned how to create fire, fire only existed because of lightning and other natural processes. Therefore it is impossible for humans to start fires.
Thanks, I was looking at that earlier. I'm not really seeing what Booker and this bloke are getting so upset about. Got a few days per year when you need some extra capacity? Plonk down a bunch of containers full of diesel generators here and there. Maybe they're not very efficient, but you don't run them for long. What's supposed to be the problem?
Should be a pretty interesting PMQs today with Grangemouth no doubt dominating (and the difficult balancing exercise for the PM there with the key factors being people's jobs and livelihood, the power of the unions, any possible energy price impact, and the impact on the Scots independence debate), plus the fallout from John Major's typically spot-on intervention last night.
Difficult for Ed too to decide what to go on, and he too has got the Unite issue hanging over him - and his mate Len putting hundreds of Scottish folk out of work and possibly triggering a fuel crisis for his own (failed) political ends.
Mr. Me, although I think you're utterly wrong that's a clever argument.
My counterpoint would be that this effort to make mankind the centre of everything (climate changing? It must be because of us!) is as deluded as the Catholic dogma that once had Earth as the centre of the universe.
Thanks for your IME article. Can I recommend you read the Bulleting of Atomic Scientists piece I posted earlier.
I read that too, along with some others which 10mins on Google pointed me towards. The thing is, that I recall being told, decades ago, that UK nuclear stations (ie Magnox and AGC) had the highest load factors of any UK installed generating capacity, and that, since nuclear power stations took weeks, if not months, to wind up and slow down (whilst their fuel was almost free) it made sense to run them as 'base-load' generators and to operate them as much as was humanly possible.
Indeed, being able to refuel these stations whilst they were still operating (at something below full capacity, it's true) was regarded at the time as a design and engineering breakthrough.
So the 57% cited came as a shock and surprise to me and I suspect includes the end-years of their generating life-time, when, IIRC, a number of these stations were found to have cracks in some stainless-steel pipes and so needed extensive rebuilds - when shut down! - in order to be certified as safe and to operate for another 10+ years.
My central point still stands - the 80% cited is both misleading (you did not give the load factors for other thermal power stations) and historic: modern stations (weapons-grade plutonium no longer required!) should operate at >95% load factor, which is close to that of the best gas plants.
Thus the case for nuclear as base-load generators is a good one, whilst that for using coal for such capacity is even better: whether the UK generates 100% 'renewable' or 100% from coal will not make one iota of difference to the world's climate, now or at any time in the future - whether AGW is 100% right or 100% wrong.
We're simply too small and too insignificant to matter.
However, DELIBERATELY raising the price of power will lead, inevitably, to lower economic growth, loss of high energy-dependent manufacturing & jobs & further harm our balance of payments.
To say nothing of impoverishing 'the little people' and being a particularly regressive tax, since the poor and old spend more time at home and spend more money on fuel than those out earning high wages in offices heated at their customers' expense!
'Greenery' = idiocy (see Ed Miliband and David Cameron for details, though Clegg's 'decarbonisation by 2030 (?) must take the biscuit for being stark raving bonkers.
If other countries are building new coal power stations at the rate of one a week then closing down two is not going to be the difference between life and DEATH!!!!!!
I guess you missed the start of this discussion upthread, in which case the exchange isn't going to make much sense to you...
It makes perfect sense. If you believe closing down two power stations is the difference between life and DEATH!!!!! then if other countries are building new ones at the rate of one a week then the outcome will be the same either way and the only sensible response is to mitigate the consequences.
If other countries are building new coal power stations at the rate of one a week then closing down two is not going to be the difference between life and DEATH!!!!!!
I guess you missed the start of this discussion upthread, in which case the exchange isn't going to make much sense to you...
It makes perfect sense. If you believe closing down two power stations is the difference between life and DEATH!!!!! then if other countries are building new ones at the rate of one a week then the outcome will be the same either way and the only sensible response is to mitigate the consequences.
This Grangemouth shnanigans makes Scottish Independence more or less likely ?
Who knows?
From what I've read, Salmond has been heavily involved in trying to get both sides to talk - but when an irresistible force (INEOS) meets an immovable object (UNITE) there is only so much any politician can do.
This is a bad day for the UK - and an even worse one for Scotland.
Thanks, I was looking at that earlier. I'm not really seeing what Booker and this bloke are getting so upset about. Got a few days per year when you need some extra capacity? Plonk down a bunch of containers full of diesel generators here and there. Maybe they're not very efficient, but you don't run them for long. What's supposed to be the problem?
Erm...that someone needs to invest in backup plant that sits idle most of the time but still needs to generate an economic return. This is precisely what is crucifying the German power market right now. Until renewables become storable you must invest twice - in the renewable and in its backup.
Thanks, I was looking at that earlier. I'm not really seeing what Booker and this bloke are getting so upset about. Got a few days per year when you need some extra capacity? Plonk down a bunch of containers full of diesel generators here and there. Maybe they're not very efficient, but you don't run them for long. What's supposed to be the problem?
Is the cost of this backup included in the mWhr calculations for wind ?
Thanks, I was looking at that earlier. I'm not really seeing what Booker and this bloke are getting so upset about. Got a few days per year when you need some extra capacity? Plonk down a bunch of containers full of diesel generators here and there. Maybe they're not very efficient, but you don't run them for long. What's supposed to be the problem?
The problem is two fold. Firstly it is the scale and secondly it is indicative of the fact that we no longer have a reliable power generation system that can meet our needs and so are being forced to make use of an extremely inefficient and (by the argument of those who believe the AGW garbage) polluting generation system as backup.
If other countries are building new coal power stations at the rate of one a week then closing down two is not going to be the difference between life and DEATH!!!!!!
I guess you missed the start of this discussion upthread, in which case the exchange isn't going to make much sense to you...
It makes perfect sense. If you believe closing down two power stations is the difference between life and DEATH!!!!! then if other countries are building new ones at the rate of one a week then the outcome will be the same either way and the only sensible response is to mitigate the consequences.
That's not what I'm saying, read the thread.
"So (in the thought experiment) rather than let Crazyland take advantage of you, you choose DEATH?"
How much hydro capability does the UK have, can't imagine England has much - Scotland however maybe ?
I've always thought that the CEGB excessively promoted and favoured a few, giant, generating plants rather than many, small, local ones.
In particular, we could surely install many small HEP plants on England's rivers, each supplying power to 1000-100,000 homes, but being near-100% reliable and free to run (as well as being inconspicuous!).
Surely 10,000 small generators is safer in the event of a major disaster (cause whatever you care to postulate) than <100 very large ones?
Bad day - at least the refinery is staying open - though for how much longer, time will tell.
Probably until they've re-engineered the heat and power supplies to the Kinneil facility, which processes oil from the Forties Field, on an adjacent site.
If other countries are building new coal power stations at the rate of one a week then closing down two is not going to be the difference between life and DEATH!!!!!!
I guess you missed the start of this discussion upthread, in which case the exchange isn't going to make much sense to you...
It makes perfect sense. If you believe closing down two power stations is the difference between life and DEATH!!!!! then if other countries are building new ones at the rate of one a week then the outcome will be the same either way and the only sensible response is to mitigate the consequences.
That's not what I'm saying, read the thread.
"So (in the thought experiment) rather than let Crazyland take advantage of you, you choose DEATH?"
I admit i added all the exclamation marks.
Sure, but then you jumped from the thought experiment, which was phrased as the simplest way of expressing the collective action problem, to a load of specific stuff about coal stations.
If you insist we can adjust the thought experiment to cover that particular detail: If nobody does anything, everybody dies. If everybody does something, nobody dies. If the non-crazy countries do something, half the people die. My view on this is that letting everybody die might be worth taking as a negotiating position, but if it turned out it wasn't going to work you should go ahead anyway and save whoever you could.
The best Hydro option would be to ignore the greenies and hollow out some mountains (as per Dinorwig) and let renewables be used to pump water up into them. We would then be able to STORE renewable energy inputs (this is the key problem) and do some smart peak / trough demand management - stabilising load factors across the whole supply chain.
Bad day - at least the refinery is staying open - though for how much longer, time will tell.
That is not quite what the company is saying. What they are saying, according to the Beeb, is that a decision on the refinary will be made once the threat of strike action has been removed. In short it still appears to be up for grabs as well.
In a sane world, having contributed to this much damage, UNITE would now work hard to get a no strike deal that will ensure the continued existence of the refinery with a quid pro quo of further investment to protect its long term future but in the current mess, who can say what will happen next?
Bad day - at least the refinery is staying open - though for how much longer, time will tell.
Probably until they've re-engineered the heat and power supplies to the Kinneil facility, which processes oil from the Forties Field, on an adjacent site.
Or until the joint owner of the refinery agrees with the Ineos plan...
Thanks, I was looking at that earlier. I'm not really seeing what Booker and this bloke are getting so upset about. Got a few days per year when you need some extra capacity? Plonk down a bunch of containers full of diesel generators here and there. Maybe they're not very efficient, but you don't run them for long. What's supposed to be the problem?
Is the cost of this backup included in the mWhr calculations for wind ?
That would depend which calculations you're talking about, but you certainly need to bear them in mind - likewise the costs of transmission lines.
Thanks, I was looking at that earlier. I'm not really seeing what Booker and this bloke are getting so upset about. Got a few days per year when you need some extra capacity? Plonk down a bunch of containers full of diesel generators here and there. Maybe they're not very efficient, but you don't run them for long. What's supposed to be the problem?
I think it's great that we seem to have discovered a cost-efficient and green way to power the national grid. I think it should be shouted from the roof tops. I think there should be a big parade through London with people throwing flowers at the BBC's global warming reporters. It's only right we share with the world that running your national grid off 1000s of diesel generators is the way to go. It's not like they'd just laugh or anything.
And for all i know you're right. The end of a long chain of really stupid energy decisions has led by accident to a great way of doing things and the world should be told.
Mr. Me, although I think you're utterly wrong that's a clever argument.
My counterpoint would be that this effort to make mankind the centre of everything (climate changing? It must be because of us!) is as deluded as the Catholic dogma that once had Earth as the centre of the universe.
Yes, I hope we can agree that cleaving to either end of the spectrum of we can have no effect/we control everything is absurd, and we need to judge where we lie on the basis of evidence for each particular phenomenon under investigation.
Would you agree that the argument you repeated that because X was caused by A in the past it is impossible for it to be caused by B now is a load of cobblers?
To judge whether the globe is warming due to natural changes now, one would have to compare the natural changes that have occurred that would cause warming and judge whether they are sufficient to cause the recent observed warming. In that context, an argument about the absence of SUVs during the end of the last ice age is specious bollocks. Would you agree?
The best Hydro option would be to ignore the greenies and hollow out some mountains (as per Dinorwig) and let renewables be used to pump water up into them. We would then be able to STORE renewable energy inputs (this is the key problem) and do some smart peak / trough demand management - stabilising load factors across the whole supply chain.
You might like this guy's approach, which is to pump water into the mountain and lift up the mountain. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XF7mbEsEP04 (He gets to the actual point about 8:30.)
If other countries are building new coal power stations at the rate of one a week then closing down two is not going to be the difference between life and DEATH!!!!!!
I guess you missed the start of this discussion upthread, in which case the exchange isn't going to make much sense to you...
It makes perfect sense. If you believe closing down two power stations is the difference between life and DEATH!!!!! then if other countries are building new ones at the rate of one a week then the outcome will be the same either way and the only sensible response is to mitigate the consequences.
That's not what I'm saying, read the thread.
"So (in the thought experiment) rather than let Crazyland take advantage of you, you choose DEATH?"
I admit i added all the exclamation marks.
Sure, but then you jumped from the thought experiment, which was phrased as the simplest way of expressing the collective action problem, to a load of specific stuff about coal stations.
If you insist we can adjust the thought experiment to cover that particular detail: If nobody does anything, everybody dies. If everybody does something, nobody dies. If the non-crazy countries do something, half the people die. My view on this is that letting everybody die might be worth taking as a negotiating position, but if it turned out it wasn't going to work you should go ahead anyway and save whoever you could.
Right - so mitigating the consequences becomes the only logical response (excluding negotiating positions).
Brooks Newmark MP @TweetBrooks On #bbcdp 12.30pm 2day discussing blight of plan for solar panels on up to 300 acres of beautiful north Essex countryside. @BraintreeTweets
Anyone know whats wrong with solar panels now, is this some Continuity NIMBY group I've missed?
I'll tell you what's wrong with solar panels - we live in Northern Europe. It's not very sunny.
Whether its shown on facebook or not , heads have to roll at UNITE after this . How can a union jeaopardise such a insdustry and jobs over petty internal politics?
Unite party granted emergency question after PMQs.
Panic after the event...
Another "Emergency" Question? Mr Speaker Bercow, you spoil us.
It's a farce now. Why not just create a half hour daily slot called Opposition Point Scoring Session and have done with it? It'd save the Speaker's office some paperwork.
My central point still stands - the 80% cited is both misleading (you did not give the load factors for other thermal power stations) and historic: modern stations (weapons-grade plutonium no longer required!) should operate at >95% load factor, which is close to that of the best gas plants.
While only time will tell regarding the 95% rate (I'd be happy to bet on sub 90% over the first decade of operation), I think the point about the load factor is not how much is actually used, but how often is it available?
With thermal plant, availability is higher than load - i.e., you turn your gas plant off when it becomes uneconomic to generate electricity (i.e. the middle of the night).
With nuclear, given low marginal costs, the plant essentially runs all the time it is not in either scheduled or unscheduled maintenance. So, availability factor equals load factor.
So, it is crucially important to realise that 57% load factor for nuclear meant you needed to have backup power - a la wind - for the large periods of time when the plant was unavailable. The joy of gas, diesel and coal is that it is dispatchable power.
I am not pushing a 'pro-green' agenda, I am merely pointing out the nuclear is a very expensive way of generating electricity compared to the conventional alternatives.
"Ineos has been flagging likely cuts for months but instead of engaging with the situation and organising a coherent plan to save jobs, Unite called a strike over a pathetic and petty issue related to Labour Party internal politics."
Joyce must be a PB Tory!
This has been quite a 'non-story'.....no one is laughing now.....
The best Hydro option would be to ignore the greenies and hollow out some mountains (as per Dinorwig) and let renewables be used to pump water up into them. We would then be able to STORE renewable energy inputs (this is the key problem) and do some smart peak / trough demand management - stabilising load factors across the whole supply chain.
You might like this guy's approach, which is to pump water into the mountain and lift up the mountain. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XF7mbEsEP04 (He gets to the actual point about 8:30.)
My late father in law was one of the engineers responsible for the fitting out of Cruachan on Loch Awe in the early 1960s. It was a brilliant piece of engineering and we are still benefitting from it today.
I think the problem with this sort of scheme is one that RCS has pointed out several times before. Suitable mountains with higher placed lochs or lakes tend not to be very near major areas of consumption resulting in significant transportation losses and making the storing of energy in this way a lot less economic than it seems on the face of it.
How much hydro capability does the UK have, can't imagine England has much - Scotland however maybe ?
I've always thought that the CEGB excessively promoted and favoured a few, giant, generating plants rather than many, small, local ones.
In particular, we could surely install many small HEP plants on England's rivers, each supplying power to 1000-100,000 homes, but being near-100% reliable and free to run (as well as being inconspicuous!).
Surely 10,000 small generators is safer in the event of a major disaster (cause whatever you care to postulate) than <100 very large ones?</p>
It sounds like there will be a small hydro scheme on the River Exe, though there are a variety of complications which look to have scuppered the chances of some other possibilities.
These things can definitely be done. I recall that on a visit to Castle Drogo the National Trust there have repaired the hydropower that was installed early in the 20th century to produce electricity for the site. And I believe the Queen had a small turbine built in the river at Windsor. Ah, yes, see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-22174947
If other countries are building new coal power stations at the rate of one a week then closing down two is not going to be the difference between life and DEATH!!!!!!
I guess you missed the start of this discussion upthread, in which case the exchange isn't going to make much sense to you...
It makes perfect sense. If you believe closing down two power stations is the difference between life and DEATH!!!!! then if other countries are building new ones at the rate of one a week then the outcome will be the same either way and the only sensible response is to mitigate the consequences.
That's not what I'm saying, read the thread.
"So (in the thought experiment) rather than let Crazyland take advantage of you, you choose DEATH?"
I admit i added all the exclamation marks.
Sure, but then you jumped from the thought experiment, which was phrased as the simplest way of expressing the collective action problem, to a load of specific stuff about coal stations.
If you insist we can adjust the thought experiment to cover that particular detail: If nobody does anything, everybody dies. If everybody does something, nobody dies. If the non-crazy countries do something, half the people die. My view on this is that letting everybody die might be worth taking as a negotiating position, but if it turned out it wasn't going to work you should go ahead anyway and save whoever you could.
Right - so mitigating the consequences becomes the only logical response (excluding negotiating positions).
If you had ways of mitigating it you'd obviously want to use those as well, but you'd be nuts to ignore viable prevention options just because they only partially solved the problem, in the absence of cooperation from Crazyland.
My view is that we know climate change occurs naturally and that, therefore, strong evidence must be presented before we believe that this latest pattern (currently a plateau, I might add) is anything other than natural.
I have little faith in the scientists involved, however. When the IPCC [climate change chaps, not the rozzer panel] got their 2007 predictions wrong, then increased the percentage (from 90% to 95%, I think) of how confident they were they were right it does not inspire hope in their impartiality (or arithmetic abilities).
"In that context, an argument about the absence of SUVs during the end of the last ice age is specious bollocks. Would you agree?"
Show me the man making this claim and I shall call him a silly sausage. I have referred (not here but in the past) to the Medieval warm period and the warm period during the reigns of Caligula and Claudius.
Unite party granted emergency question after PMQs.
Panic after the event...
Another "Emergency" Question? Mr Speaker Bercow, you spoil us.
It's a farce now. Why not just create a half hour daily slot called Opposition Point Scoring Session and have done with it? It'd save the Speaker's office some paperwork.
There's every chance today might be 'Opposition own-goal' scoring session.
I have much more sympathy with this emergency question than Dr The Honourable Tristram "I've got a PhD from Cambridge you know!" Hunt's question - which he fumbled in any case....
My central point still stands - the 80% cited is both misleading (you did not give the load factors for other thermal power stations) and historic: modern stations (weapons-grade plutonium no longer required!) should operate at >95% load factor, which is close to that of the best gas plants.
While only time will tell regarding the 95% rate (I'd be happy to bet on sub 90% over the first decade of operation), I think the point about the load factor is not how much is actually used, but how often is it available?
With thermal plant, availability is higher than load - i.e., you turn your gas plant off when it becomes uneconomic to generate electricity (i.e. the middle of the night).
With nuclear, given low marginal costs, the plant essentially runs all the time it is not in either scheduled or unscheduled maintenance. So, availability factor equals load factor.
So, it is crucially important to realise that 57% load factor for nuclear meant you needed to have backup power - a la wind - for the large periods of time when the plant was unavailable. The joy of gas, diesel and coal is that it is dispatchable power.
I am not pushing a 'pro-green' agenda, I am merely pointing out the nuclear is a very expensive way of generating electricity compared to the conventional alternatives.
But as far as PBTories are concerned it is GOOD to subsidise Nuclear, it is BAD to subsidise Wind, Solar etc.
Brooks Newmark MP @TweetBrooks On #bbcdp 12.30pm 2day discussing blight of plan for solar panels on up to 300 acres of beautiful north Essex countryside. @BraintreeTweets
Anyone know whats wrong with solar panels now, is this some Continuity NIMBY group I've missed?
I'll tell you what's wrong with solar panels - we live in Northern Europe. It's not very sunny.
Bang on.
Solar panels are fundamentally uneconomic for 'utility scale' power in Northern Europe.
It is, however, worth noting that solar is increasingly attractive in sunnier climes. Firstly, unlike wind, solar output is - effectively - peaking plant. It supplies power during the day when demand is highest and air conditioners are running flat out. This is much more attractive than wind, which tends to blow in the middle of the night, when demand is lowest.
It's also worth noting that increasingly in Germany, people are putting solar panels on their roofs, without signing up to subsidy programmes. It is actually economic in Munich now to put panels up, just to lower your existing bill. The effective cost of electricity in Southern Germany is probably €0.26-27/KWh, as opposed to about €0.30 for the stuff that EON or RWE sells you.
Brooks Newmark MP @TweetBrooks On #bbcdp 12.30pm 2day discussing blight of plan for solar panels on up to 300 acres of beautiful north Essex countryside. @BraintreeTweets
Anyone know whats wrong with solar panels now, is this some Continuity NIMBY group I've missed?
I'll tell you what's wrong with solar panels - we live in Northern Europe. It's not very sunny.
The problem is that they've decided to put it on open space, rather than demolishing Braintree for this purpose.
On solar: I've read that new solar panels only need ambient light, not direct sunlight, to work. If so, that's very useful. There's an argument for having them included on all new houses, to permanently decrease the overall energy we need to deliver from the National Grid.
My central point still stands - the 80% cited is both misleading (you did not give the load factors for other thermal power stations) and historic: modern stations (weapons-grade plutonium no longer required!) should operate at >95% load factor, which is close to that of the best gas plants.
While only time will tell regarding the 95% rate (I'd be happy to bet on sub 90% over the first decade of operation), I think the point about the load factor is not how much is actually used, but how often is it available?
With thermal plant, availability is higher than load - i.e., you turn your gas plant off when it becomes uneconomic to generate electricity (i.e. the middle of the night).
With nuclear, given low marginal costs, the plant essentially runs all the time it is not in either scheduled or unscheduled maintenance. So, availability factor equals load factor.
So, it is crucially important to realise that 57% load factor for nuclear meant you needed to have backup power - a la wind - for the large periods of time when the plant was unavailable. The joy of gas, diesel and coal is that it is dispatchable power.
I am not pushing a 'pro-green' agenda, I am merely pointing out the nuclear is a very expensive way of generating electricity compared to the conventional alternatives.
The most recent US reactor is Watts Bar 1 running since 1996. Load factor for the first 6 years was 88.8%, 77.7%, 98.9%, 84.4%, 92.4%, 97.5% and then after 17 years the cumulative load factor is 89.7% (after 10 years it was 88.8%).
It would seem fair to say that the most recent generation of reactors was already near 90% load and that increasing the load factor further in the next generation of reactors is not that out-landish a concept.
Brooks Newmark MP @TweetBrooks On #bbcdp 12.30pm 2day discussing blight of plan for solar panels on up to 300 acres of beautiful north Essex countryside. @BraintreeTweets
Anyone know whats wrong with solar panels now, is this some Continuity NIMBY group I've missed?
I'll tell you what's wrong with solar panels - we live in Northern Europe. It's not very sunny.
Except Germany is breaking solar production records month after month. The last time I looked at a map, their latitude was very similar to that of the UK.
"Ineos has been flagging likely cuts for months but instead of engaging with the situation and organising a coherent plan to save jobs, Unite called a strike over a pathetic and petty issue related to Labour Party internal politics."
Joyce must be a PB Tory!
This has been quite a 'non-story'.....no one is laughing now.....
Quite. In the article Eric Joyce certainly pulls no punches - not that he ever did..!
The best Hydro option would be to ignore the greenies and hollow out some mountains (as per Dinorwig) and let renewables be used to pump water up into them. We would then be able to STORE renewable energy inputs (this is the key problem) and do some smart peak / trough demand management - stabilising load factors across the whole supply chain.
This greenie has long been trying to point that out to the renewable energy naysayers.
Worth remembering that one of the main reasons for building the pumped storage stations, such as Dinorwig, was to store the electricity produced overnight by nuclear, which you can't turn off when demand falls.
There are lots of other interesting ideas being introduced along these lines. Producing gas with excess electricity is another option for example.
Brooks Newmark MP @TweetBrooks On #bbcdp 12.30pm 2day discussing blight of plan for solar panels on up to 300 acres of beautiful north Essex countryside. @BraintreeTweets
Anyone know whats wrong with solar panels now, is this some Continuity NIMBY group I've missed?
I bet he wouldn't have any problems with building a Nuclear plant in those 300 acres.
On solar: I've read that new solar panels only need ambient light, not direct sunlight, to work. If so, that's very useful. There's an argument for having them included on all new houses, to permanently decrease the overall energy we need to deliver from the National Grid.
There are some very interesting thin-film technologies that integrate into windows and generate a meaningful amount of electricity at very low cost. While they would be prohibitively expensive to retrofit existing buildings, if they are put in at build-time they pay for themselves in just a couple of years (especially when you remember that you don't pay tax on electricity you generate and use yourself.)
On solar: I've read that new solar panels only need ambient light, not direct sunlight, to work. If so, that's very useful. There's an argument for having them included on all new houses, to permanently decrease the overall energy we need to deliver from the National Grid.
Mr Wiffle Stick, everybody, Solar generates a certain % of the incident energy that falls on the panel. Clearly that equals zero at night. At a lat of 55north in the UK we only get less than half the incident energy of an equatorial panel. Ambient light is there - but is has very little energy in it. Panels need bright direct sunlight hitting at 90 degrees to be optimal. A grey, cloudy late November afternoon in Cleethorpes is not going to be enough - by a wide, wide margin.
"An indefinite shutdown of both the refinery and petrochemicals plant at Grangemouth could cost the Scottish economy as much as 2 per cent of gross domestic product."
Right - so mitigating the consequences becomes the only logical response (excluding negotiating positions).
If you had ways of mitigating it you'd obviously want to use those as well, but you'd be nuts to ignore viable prevention options just because they only partially solved the problem, in the absence of cooperation from Crazyland.
If your ability to mitigate the consequences requires an industrial base and your viable prevention options would a) only work if everybody did them and b) would destroy your industrial base if they don't then it would be (and is) nuts to adopt those preventive options.
Even if the global warming scam was true, in the absence of global collective action it is completely irrational for game theory reasons for this country to go it alone.
Brooks Newmark MP @TweetBrooks On #bbcdp 12.30pm 2day discussing blight of plan for solar panels on up to 300 acres of beautiful north Essex countryside. @BraintreeTweets
Anyone know whats wrong with solar panels now, is this some Continuity NIMBY group I've missed?
I'll tell you what's wrong with solar panels - we live in Northern Europe. It's not very sunny.
Bang on.
Solar panels are fundamentally uneconomic for 'utility scale' power in Northern Europe.
It is, however, worth noting that solar is increasingly attractive in sunnier climes. Firstly, unlike wind, solar output is - effectively - peaking plant. It supplies power during the day when demand is highest and air conditioners are running flat out. This is much more attractive than wind, which tends to blow in the middle of the night, when demand is lowest.
It's also worth noting that increasingly in Germany, people are putting solar panels on their roofs, without signing up to subsidy programmes. It is actually economic in Munich now to put panels up, just to lower your existing bill. The effective cost of electricity in Southern Germany is probably €0.26-27/KWh, as opposed to about €0.30 for the stuff that EON or RWE sells you.
Solar prices are declining all the time, so even in the (Southern) UK, I would expect residential - not utility scale - to be cost effecient in about four or five years.
How much is lost in tax revenues from the Grangemouth closure? Unite have shown that they want to turn Scotland into an economic wasteland. They have destroyed jobs, incomes and cash flows not just at that plant.
Its back to the 60s with Len and his merry men at Unite, tune in to see which firms they wreck next.
Brooks Newmark MP @TweetBrooks On #bbcdp 12.30pm 2day discussing blight of plan for solar panels on up to 300 acres of beautiful north Essex countryside. @BraintreeTweets
Anyone know whats wrong with solar panels now, is this some Continuity NIMBY group I've missed?
I'll tell you what's wrong with solar panels - we live in Northern Europe. It's not very sunny.
Bang on.
Solar panels are fundamentally uneconomic for 'utility scale' power in Northern Europe.
It is, however, worth noting that solar is increasingly attractive in sunnier climes. Firstly, unlike wind, solar output is - effectively - peaking plant. It supplies power during the day when demand is highest and air conditioners are running flat out. This is much more attractive than wind, which tends to blow in the middle of the night, when demand is lowest.
It's also worth noting that increasingly in Germany, people are putting solar panels on their roofs, without signing up to subsidy programmes. It is actually economic in Munich now to put panels up, just to lower your existing bill. The effective cost of electricity in Southern Germany is probably €0.26-27/KWh, as opposed to about €0.30 for the stuff that EON or RWE sells you.
Solar prices are declining all the time, so even in the (Southern) UK, I would expect residential - not utility scale - to be cost effecient in about four or five years.
World Solar Power generation increased by 102% in 2012 [ not 1.02% ]
It's also worth noting that increasingly in Germany, people are putting solar panels on their roofs, without signing up to subsidy programmes. It is actually economic in Munich now to put panels up, just to lower your existing bill. The effective cost of electricity in Southern Germany is probably €0.26-27/KWh, as opposed to about €0.30 for the stuff that EON or RWE sells you.
Solar power potential is roughly the same in SW England as in Munich.
As solar panels become cheaper it will increasingly make sense to use solar in England too.
"Government plans to use individual voter register for 2015 election Plans to replace household voter register boosted by experiment suggesting most of electorate can be transferred automatically."
Comments
Falkirk = non story.
Disaster for the employees.
There may turn out to be tipping points so that 5x isn't too bad, 10x is about the same, 11x is devastating but 15x is equally devastating, but if there are then we don't know what they are.
Still, BBC UK have their priorities right:
LATEST:
Zara Phillips and family friend Oliver Baker among Prince George's godparents named ahead of his christening
Emilia Jardine-Paterson, Hugh Grosvenor, Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton and William van Cutsem also named as Prince George's godparents
http://news.sky.com/story/1158553/grangemouth-petrochemical-plant-to-close
Very sad. I used to be able to sit in school and look out at the Grangemouth refinery. Also did some work experience there which was great fun. It was a stunning looking plant in a brutally industrial sort of way.
Grangemouth dispute: Ineos says petrochemical plant will close
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-24631342
I fear UNITE got its members to play Russian Roulette with a fully loaded revolver.....
Finland is part of Nordpool, which is - essentially - the pan-Nordic electricity grid. The current price of electricity in the area, which is awash with Hydro, is €38.50. There is absolutely no way Olkilouto 3 would be profitable without a long-term supply contract given that baseload electricity is more than a third cheaper than UK electricity.
General media priorities are stupid to the point of offence. In 2006, I think, when the World Cup was held in Germany, one news organisation (unsure if it was the BBC or Sky) cut away from a man who had been tortured by the Saudis and denied justice to show 'live pictures' (gasp!) of the England team bus arriving at its hotel in Germany.
http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=84095
So a similar deal to Hinkley C then? Cheers
Early Pressurised Water Reactors operated, globally, at around 75% and more modern ones (eg Sizewell
The latest generation of reactors are designed to operate with a load factor of >95%. That includes, of course, Hinkley Point C.
Down-times are carefully pre-planned and entirely predictable - unlike wind, for example.
For contrast, coal and oil have load factors well under 60% (often because they are turned off in summer when loads are low, to cut carbon emissions), wind is ~95% (but variable) and solar is 99% - but only when the sun is shining! Great in day-time Arizona, not so good in winter nights in the UK.
Gas turbines (especially CHP plants) run around 95-98% of load capacity & have the advantage of being able to be turned on and off rapidly - impossible with any thermal-based plant (coal, oil, nuclear)
So the up-thread comments stating as fact '80% load factor for nuclear' are both misleading (the other power alternatives' load factors are not stated) & outdated/historically wrong, since they relate to previous generations of nuclear plant.
So - the historic 80% load factor of old-generation nuclear power plants exceeds that of even the most modern thermal plants, but falls well short of that from Gas Turbine & solar/wind plants (if - big IF!) you accept that there will be no power generated at certain known times (eg night!) & that the area that needs to be devoted to such energy farms is massive and the cost of the power they generate in anything but optimum geographical locations is extraordinarily high.
A tropical desert would be ideal to site solar (using hot water is more efficient than PV cells) and somewhere with constant, steady winds would be ideal for wind turbines.
In both these cases, the significant transmission losses from remote generating areas to power-hungry cities have been ignored.
I conclude that the misinformation and disingenuous nature of those posts citing 80% load factor for nuclear power were deliberately misleading.
See:
http://www.imeche.org/knowledge/themes/energy/nuclear-power/about-nuclear-power/reliability
+ wiki (which has links to European nuclear sites giving much much more information re historic, current and projected nuclear power production)
Now watch the union spin machine and hangers on blame anyone but themselves.
Smear to full throttle captain!
http://thebulletin.org/nuclear-aging-not-so-graceful
Still Len will pick up £100k plus and his squeeze will get a cushy seat eventually. .
In one year the significance of closing down those two (just relative to new builds not including existing coal stations) would be 1:26. In two years it would be 1:78 (as the previous year's ones will count twice by then). In three years the significance of those two would be 1:156 etc.
Just by their own arguments the only logical response is to mitigate the consequences - for which you need an industrial base for which you need an energy policy designed to support an industrial base.
How much hydro capability does the UK have, can't imagine England has much - Scotland however maybe ?
No doubt there will be a queue of buyers waiting outside John Swinney's door this morning looking to buy the plant?
Or perhaps not. This is a significant blow for Scotland which already has an incredibly weak manufacturing base.
Thanks for your IME article. Can I recommend you read the Bulleting of Atomic Scientists piece I posted earlier.
To summarise the piece, it says load factors achieved never live up to plans!
"We need to build more homes - just don't make them social housing
Most of what we think we know about Britain’s housing market is plain wrong."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/constructionandproperty/10397242/We-need-to-build-more-homes-just-dont-make-them-social-housing.html
RCS,
"Why would you want any of these decisions made for non-economic reasons?"
I wouldn't, but the inaction was due to political reasons. Although to be fair to Tony, he had Iraq to invade instead.
Frankly, I'd be happy to burn politicians if we could make it economical.
I doubt if we disagree (and I bow to your superior knowledge of energy economics), but my target was their reluctance to take a decision when timely.
I wonder if Alex Salmond, will make a press announcement.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-24631342
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24624934
Bad day - at least the refinery is staying open - though for how much longer, time will tell.
Difficult for Ed too to decide what to go on, and he too has got the Unite issue hanging over him - and his mate Len putting hundreds of Scottish folk out of work and possibly triggering a fuel crisis for his own (failed) political ends.
My counterpoint would be that this effort to make mankind the centre of everything (climate changing? It must be because of us!) is as deluded as the Catholic dogma that once had Earth as the centre of the universe.
Indeed, being able to refuel these stations whilst they were still operating (at something below full capacity, it's true) was regarded at the time as a design and engineering breakthrough.
So the 57% cited came as a shock and surprise to me and I suspect includes the end-years of their generating life-time, when, IIRC, a number of these stations were found to have cracks in some stainless-steel pipes and so needed extensive rebuilds - when shut down! - in order to be certified as safe and to operate for another 10+ years.
My central point still stands - the 80% cited is both misleading (you did not give the load factors for other thermal power stations) and historic: modern stations (weapons-grade plutonium no longer required!) should operate at >95% load factor, which is close to that of the best gas plants.
Thus the case for nuclear as base-load generators is a good one, whilst that for using coal for such capacity is even better: whether the UK generates 100% 'renewable' or 100% from coal will not make one iota of difference to the world's climate, now or at any time in the future - whether AGW is 100% right or 100% wrong.
We're simply too small and too insignificant to matter.
However, DELIBERATELY raising the price of power will lead, inevitably, to lower economic growth, loss of high energy-dependent manufacturing & jobs & further harm our balance of payments.
To say nothing of impoverishing 'the little people' and being a particularly regressive tax, since the poor and old spend more time at home and spend more money on fuel than those out earning high wages in offices heated at their customers' expense!
'Greenery' = idiocy (see Ed Miliband and David Cameron for details, though Clegg's 'decarbonisation by 2030 (?) must take the biscuit for being stark raving bonkers.
From what I've read, Salmond has been heavily involved in trying to get both sides to talk - but when an irresistible force (INEOS) meets an immovable object (UNITE) there is only so much any politician can do.
This is a bad day for the UK - and an even worse one for Scotland.
As true for Brunel's railways and ships as for Wembley Stadium!
I admit i added all the exclamation marks.
In particular, we could surely install many small HEP plants on England's rivers, each supplying power to 1000-100,000 homes, but being near-100% reliable and free to run (as well as being inconspicuous!).
Surely 10,000 small generators is safer in the event of a major disaster (cause whatever you care to postulate) than <100 very large ones?
Panic after the event...
If you insist we can adjust the thought experiment to cover that particular detail: If nobody does anything, everybody dies. If everybody does something, nobody dies. If the non-crazy countries do something, half the people die. My view on this is that letting everybody die might be worth taking as a negotiating position, but if it turned out it wasn't going to work you should go ahead anyway and save whoever you could.
In a sane world, having contributed to this much damage, UNITE would now work hard to get a no strike deal that will ensure the continued existence of the refinery with a quid pro quo of further investment to protect its long term future but in the current mess, who can say what will happen next?
job loses at Grangemouth.
And for all i know you're right. The end of a long chain of really stupid energy decisions has led by accident to a great way of doing things and the world should be told.
Would you agree that the argument you repeated that because X was caused by A in the past it is impossible for it to be caused by B now is a load of cobblers?
To judge whether the globe is warming due to natural changes now, one would have to compare the natural changes that have occurred that would cause warming and judge whether they are sufficient to cause the recent observed warming. In that context, an argument about the absence of SUVs during the end of the last ice age is specious bollocks. Would you agree?
"Fumbling, dumbed-down, politicised" Unite has let down workers at Grangemouth, says @ericjoyce http://ericjoyce.co.uk/2013/10/grangemouth-tragedy/ …
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XF7mbEsEP04
(He gets to the actual point about 8:30.)
It's a farce now. Why not just create a half hour daily slot called Opposition Point Scoring Session and have done with it? It'd save the Speaker's office some paperwork.
With thermal plant, availability is higher than load - i.e., you turn your gas plant off when it becomes uneconomic to generate electricity (i.e. the middle of the night).
With nuclear, given low marginal costs, the plant essentially runs all the time it is not in either scheduled or unscheduled maintenance. So, availability factor equals load factor.
So, it is crucially important to realise that 57% load factor for nuclear meant you needed to have backup power - a la wind - for the large periods of time when the plant was unavailable. The joy of gas, diesel and coal is that it is dispatchable power.
I am not pushing a 'pro-green' agenda, I am merely pointing out the nuclear is a very expensive way of generating electricity compared to the conventional alternatives.
Joyce must be a PB Tory!
This has been quite a 'non-story'.....no one is laughing now.....
I think the problem with this sort of scheme is one that RCS has pointed out several times before. Suitable mountains with higher placed lochs or lakes tend not to be very near major areas of consumption resulting in significant transportation losses and making the storing of energy in this way a lot less economic than it seems on the face of it.
See: http://www.transitionexeter.org.uk/energy/exe-hydro
These things can definitely be done. I recall that on a visit to Castle Drogo the National Trust there have repaired the hydropower that was installed early in the 20th century to produce electricity for the site. And I believe the Queen had a small turbine built in the river at Windsor. Ah, yes, see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-22174947
My view is that we know climate change occurs naturally and that, therefore, strong evidence must be presented before we believe that this latest pattern (currently a plateau, I might add) is anything other than natural.
I have little faith in the scientists involved, however. When the IPCC [climate change chaps, not the rozzer panel] got their 2007 predictions wrong, then increased the percentage (from 90% to 95%, I think) of how confident they were they were right it does not inspire hope in their impartiality (or arithmetic abilities).
"In that context, an argument about the absence of SUVs during the end of the last ice age is specious bollocks. Would you agree?"
Show me the man making this claim and I shall call him a silly sausage. I have referred (not here but in the past) to the Medieval warm period and the warm period during the reigns of Caligula and Claudius.
It's possible man-made global warming is occurring, but given how rubbish the true believers wearing white coats and pretending to be scientists have been at predicting even the near future (http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/snowfalls-are-now-just-a-thing-of-the-past-724017.html) I am not convinced.
I'd add that the starting point of science is to be sceptical.
I have much more sympathy with this emergency question than Dr The Honourable Tristram "I've got a PhD from Cambridge you know!" Hunt's question - which he fumbled in any case....
Solar panels are fundamentally uneconomic for 'utility scale' power in Northern Europe.
It is, however, worth noting that solar is increasingly attractive in sunnier climes. Firstly, unlike wind, solar output is - effectively - peaking plant. It supplies power during the day when demand is highest and air conditioners are running flat out. This is much more attractive than wind, which tends to blow in the middle of the night, when demand is lowest.
It's also worth noting that increasingly in Germany, people are putting solar panels on their roofs, without signing up to subsidy programmes. It is actually economic in Munich now to put panels up, just to lower your existing bill. The effective cost of electricity in Southern Germany is probably €0.26-27/KWh, as opposed to about €0.30 for the stuff that EON or RWE sells you.
I am trying to work out what this means from a right/left perspective....
The most recent US reactor is Watts Bar 1 running since 1996. Load factor for the first 6 years was 88.8%, 77.7%, 98.9%, 84.4%, 92.4%, 97.5% and then after 17 years the cumulative load factor is 89.7% (after 10 years it was 88.8%).
http://www.iaea.org/PRIS/CountryStatistics/ReactorDetails.aspx?current=699
It would seem fair to say that the most recent generation of reactors was already near 90% load and that increasing the load factor further in the next generation of reactors is not that out-landish a concept.
Joyce not pulling any punches.
Quite. In the article Eric Joyce certainly pulls no punches - not that he ever did..!
It's on their business section.
Weird.
Worth remembering that one of the main reasons for building the pumped storage stations, such as Dinorwig, was to store the electricity produced overnight by nuclear, which you can't turn off when demand falls.
There are lots of other interesting ideas being introduced along these lines. Producing gas with excess electricity is another option for example.
Solar generates a certain % of the incident energy that falls on the panel. Clearly that equals zero at night. At a lat of 55north in the UK we only get less than half the incident energy of an equatorial panel. Ambient light is there - but is has very little energy in it. Panels need bright direct sunlight hitting at 90 degrees to be optimal. A grey, cloudy late November afternoon in Cleethorpes is not going to be enough - by a wide, wide margin.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/47e49356-3bc9-11e3-b85f-00144feab7de.html?ftcamp=published_links/rss/world_uk_politics/feed//product&siteedition=intl#axzz2iXVNC5vF
Even if the global warming scam was true, in the absence of global collective action it is completely irrational for game theory reasons for this country to go it alone.
take the power back and nationalise grangemouth for the scot people..you are being played by westminster and their global masters."
Oh dear, Ms Cooper, will be so disappointed...!
You know the drill.
'Cameron in the pocket of energy bosses', 'Yachts', 'Fat Cats' etc
Its back to the 60s with Len and his merry men at Unite, tune in to see which firms they wreck next.
As solar panels become cheaper it will increasingly make sense to use solar in England too.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/Pvgis_Europe-solar_opt_publication.png
Plans to replace household voter register boosted by experiment suggesting most of electorate can be transferred automatically."
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/oct/23/government-individual-voter-register-2015-election