"Dave Liquorice" wrote in message
ll.co.uk...
On Sun, 4 Jul 2010 20:47:23 +0100, wrote:

Personally I don't think photo voltaics are worth it, very capital
intensive and ineffecient at converting the available energy into
useable energy.

They are, IIRC, about 100 times more efficient than plants. Farming, eh?
Even less efficeient than PV. And PV at least gives you 'leccy straight
off the bat.

'leccy is difficult to store in any meaningful quantity. Oh and how
much CO2 is released and energy consumed to make PV cells? Are they
actually energy positive in the UK?

--
Cheers
Dave.



Probably about as much as the bloody windmills ... :-)

Arfa

"NT" wrote in message
...
On Jul 4, 8:47 pm, wrote:
Dave Liquorice wrote:
Personally I don't think photo voltaics are worth it, very capital
intensive and ineffecient at converting the available energy into
useable energy.

They are, IIRC, about 100 times more efficient than plants.
Farming, eh? Even less efficeient than PV. And PV at least
gives you 'leccy straight off the bat.

#Paul

The energy return is really a red herring. Money return is what
counts, its not as if we're short of energy.


NT

We wouldn't be if they built some more nuclear generation plants, but as
long as we are generating electricity from gas and oil and coal, we're gonna
keep getting shorter of it, aren't we ? I don't happen to believe that all
of these alternative power generation technologies are worth a jot in the
grand scheme of things. And ones for the home are more for green conscience
salving. I can just about live with benefits from using the heat energy of
the sun. Given time, you might actually be able to win a few quid with a
reduction in fuel costs for heating your water, but generating a few watts
of electricity when you least need it, at a huge capital outlay, with
complex electronic engineering involved - the manufacturing and shipping
around the world of which all has its own energy budget - seems to me to
make no sense, except to be able to tell people that you are doing your bit
to 'save the planet' ...

Arfa

On 2010-07-02 10:56:41 +0100, Tim Streater said:

In article ,
NT wrote:

"Chris J Dixon" wrote in
messagenews:5o2r26d8ljra9b75uq8g2khtkdalk4stqk@4ax .com...

Steve Firth wrote:

It would certainly be better to DIY.

Only if you are not interested in being paid the Feed-in tariff.
To be eligible, you have to use both approved components and
approved installers.

Chris
--


I really don't know a lot about this subject, other than what I've read in
general, but just to fling a curved ball in for a moment, if the OP's sister
is intent on having panels on a less-than-ideal-facing roof, wouldn't she do
better to make them water-heating panels ? I seem to recall reading that the
energy saved on fuel for heating the same water, is quite significant, and
that the installation costs are not that high. If the fuel saving *is*
significant, then I would have thought that with the very high energy costs
that we suffer now, the 'effective' returns might be quite good, without the
hassle of having to sell energy back via a government scheme of dubious
longevity, and without the inherent progressive efficiency reduction that
comes with PV panels. Anyone here clever enough to do the comparative sums ?
I'd be quite interested to know this for myself.

Arfa

Its possible to make solarthermal pay its way and some, but not easy,
and commercial installs, as a rule, don't. Since the op was asking
about basics I cant see a good diy design/instal being likely.

On the upside it would waste a lot less money than PV.

I'm told that heat pumps are cost effective - even in lowish outside
temps. A quick google shows Danfoss and Hitachi, at least, make them.
Anyone considered these?

Of course, heat pumps depend on large amounts of (grid provided)
electricity. I seem to recall something like 1/4 to 1/3 of the total
overall heat energy produced by a heat pump needs to be provided with
electricity to power it.

Given the state of our generating infrastructure in this country I
would not want to be dependent on relatively cheap (and available!)
electricity for my heating in the medium and long term.

"Arfa Daily" wrote in message
news:yjgYn.83028$We4.58395@hurricane...


"NT" wrote in message
...
On Jul 4, 8:47 pm, wrote:
Dave Liquorice wrote:
Personally I don't think photo voltaics are worth it, very capital
intensive and ineffecient at converting the available energy into
useable energy.

They are, IIRC, about 100 times more efficient than plants.
Farming, eh? Even less efficeient than PV. And PV at least
gives you 'leccy straight off the bat.

#Paul

The energy return is really a red herring. Money return is what
counts, its not as if we're short of energy.


NT

We wouldn't be if they built some more nuclear generation plants, but as
long as we are generating electricity from gas and oil and coal, we're
gonna keep getting shorter of it, aren't we ? I don't happen to believe
that all of these alternative power generation technologies are worth a
jot in the grand scheme of things. And ones for the home are more for
green conscience salving. I can just about live with benefits from using
the heat energy of the sun. Given time, you might actually be able to win
a few quid with a reduction in fuel costs for heating your water, but
generating a few watts of electricity when you least need it,

Over all users the middle of the day is not when it is least needed, that
comment only applies to domestic users.

Large scale solar generation for commercial use makes sense in terms of it
being generated at the time that it is actually needed, though of course its
viability depends upon the costs involved (which I suspect will come down
eventually).

tim

Piers Finlayson
wibbled on Monday 05 July 2010 09:02


Of course, heat pumps depend on large amounts of (grid provided)
electricity. I seem to recall something like 1/4 to 1/3 of the total
overall heat energy produced by a heat pump needs to be provided with
electricity to power it.

Given the state of our generating infrastructure in this country I
would not want to be dependent on relatively cheap (and available!)
electricity for my heating in the medium and long term.

I was talking to an air-con engineer last Saturday. He was saying that,
according to the contact he's had with manufacturers and various seminars,
that the big push is to get air source pumps into a viable state as it is
well recognised that ground source is too expensive and/or difficult for the
majority to adopt.

Apparently, they have air source producing useful output at air temperatures
slightly below freezing and producing useful temperatures on the output
side, so as always the effort is to make it viable commercially.

It sounded potentially quite promising. Not sure if it's going to be a
matter of years or a decade, but watch this space...

--
Tim Watts

Managers, politicians and environmentalists: Nature's carbon buffer.

Huge
wibbled on Monday 05 July 2010 10:32

On 2010-07-05, Tim Watts wrote:

I was talking to an air-con engineer last Saturday. He was saying that,
according to the contact he's had with manufacturers and various
seminars, that the big push is to get air source pumps into a viable
state as it is well recognised that ground source is too expensive and/or
difficult for the majority to adopt.

Apparently, they have air source producing useful output at air
temperatures slightly below freezing and producing useful temperatures on
the output side, so as always the effort is to make it viable
commercially.

It sounded potentially quite promising. Not sure if it's going to be a
matter of years or a decade, but watch this space...

Given that air source heat pumps are routinely installed in the USA, I
don't really understand what the issue is.



Which bits of the USA though? Cold northern areas or generally warmer
southern climes?

--
Tim Watts

Managers, politicians and environmentalists: Nature's carbon buffer.

Arfa Daily wrote:


"NT" wrote in message
...
On Jul 4, 8:47 pm, wrote:
Dave Liquorice wrote:
Personally I don't think photo voltaics are worth it, very capital
intensive and ineffecient at converting the available energy into
useable energy.

They are, IIRC, about 100 times more efficient than plants.
Farming, eh? Even less efficeient than PV. And PV at least
gives you 'leccy straight off the bat.

#Paul

The energy return is really a red herring. Money return is what
counts, its not as if we're short of energy.


NT

We wouldn't be if they built some more nuclear generation plants, but as
long as we are generating electricity from gas and oil and coal, we're
gonna keep getting shorter of it, aren't we ? I don't happen to believe
that all of these alternative power generation technologies are worth a
jot in the grand scheme of things.

They are not, not in this country anyway.

Nuclear is the only sane option at the moment.

Solar has a lot to offer in hot desert places.

Just as geothernmal and hydrolelectric work well where Natuer favours them.


And ones for the home are more for
green conscience salving.

Totally agree.

I can just about live with benefits from using
the heat energy of the sun.

You cant actually. The UK as a whole ceased to be cost effectively able
to support its population on pure solar radiation 400 years ago. At a
population of 2-5 million, its possible.

At a population of 60M+ its not


Given time, you might actually be able to
win a few quid with a reduction in fuel costs for heating your water,
but generating a few watts of electricity when you least need it, at a
huge capital outlay, with complex electronic engineering involved - the
manufacturing and shipping around the world of which all has its own
energy budget - seems to me to make no sense, except to be able to tell
people that you are doing your bit to 'save the planet' ...


This is correct. 99% of the eco greenwash stuff is predicated on the
assumption that we HAVE to use sunlight in some form to generate power.
Not that we have to get rid of carbon pollution.

If you take the latter view, what ,makes sense is nuclear, nuclear, nuclear.




Arfa

Piers Finlayson wrote:
On 2010-07-02 10:56:41 +0100, Tim Streater said:

In article
,
NT wrote:

"Chris J Dixon" wrote in
messagenews:5o2r26d8ljra9b75uq8g2khtkdalk4stqk@4ax .com...

Steve Firth wrote:

It would certainly be better to DIY.

Only if you are not interested in being paid the Feed-in tariff.
To be eligible, you have to use both approved components and
approved installers.

Chris
--


I really don't know a lot about this subject, other than what I've
read in
general, but just to fling a curved ball in for a moment, if the
OP's sister
is intent on having panels on a less-than-ideal-facing roof,
wouldn't she do
better to make them water-heating panels ? I seem to recall reading
that the
energy saved on fuel for heating the same water, is quite
significant, and
that the installation costs are not that high. If the fuel saving *is*
significant, then I would have thought that with the very high
energy costs
that we suffer now, the 'effective' returns might be quite good,
without the
hassle of having to sell energy back via a government scheme of dubious
longevity, and without the inherent progressive efficiency reduction
that
comes with PV panels. Anyone here clever enough to do the
comparative sums ?
I'd be quite interested to know this for myself.

Arfa

Its possible to make solarthermal pay its way and some, but not easy,
and commercial installs, as a rule, don't. Since the op was asking
about basics I cant see a good diy design/instal being likely.

On the upside it would waste a lot less money than PV.

I'm told that heat pumps are cost effective - even in lowish outside
temps. A quick google shows Danfoss and Hitachi, at least, make them.
Anyone considered these?

Of course, heat pumps depend on large amounts of (grid provided)
electricity. I seem to recall something like 1/4 to 1/3 of the total
overall heat energy produced by a heat pump needs to be provided with
electricity to power it.

Correct.


Given the state of our generating infrastructure in this country I would
not want to be dependent on relatively cheap (and available!)
electricity for my heating in the medium and long term.


At 50% generating efficiency a 3:1 heatpump uses about 50-70% of the
equivalent fossil fuel burnt in a boiler.

The actual costs of using electricity are break even when say oil rises
to 50-60p/liter WITHOUT a heat pump. That because coal and nuclear are
cheaper, and there is less tax applied to electricity generation.

WITH a heat pump, its already cheaper than using oil or gas.

figures suggest a +50% uplift in grid and generating capacity would be
needed to go 'all electric' on domestic and office heating.,

"Tim Watts" wrote in message
...
Piers Finlayson
wibbled on Monday 05 July 2010 09:02


Of course, heat pumps depend on large amounts of (grid provided)
electricity. I seem to recall something like 1/4 to 1/3 of the total
overall heat energy produced by a heat pump needs to be provided with
electricity to power it.

Given the state of our generating infrastructure in this country I
would not want to be dependent on relatively cheap (and available!)
electricity for my heating in the medium and long term.

I was talking to an air-con engineer last Saturday. He was saying that,
according to the contact he's had with manufacturers and various seminars,
that the big push is to get air source pumps into a viable state as it is
well recognised that ground source is too expensive and/or difficult for
the
majority to adopt.

Apparently, they have air source producing useful output at air
temperatures
slightly below freezing and producing useful temperatures on the output
side, so as always the effort is to make it viable commercially.

It sounded potentially quite promising. Not sure if it's going to be a
matter of years or a decade, but watch this space...

Surely this only works for cooling. The outside air is normally going to be
colder than the inside air so this is a cheaper way to cool the inside.

It is never going to work for heating up a house (except in some very
extreme outside conditions that I think we can ignore)

tim

On Mon, 05 Jul 2010 10:44:05 +0100, Tim Watts wrote:

Given that air source heat pumps are routinely installed in the
USA, I
don't really understand what the issue is.

Which bits of the USA though? Cold northern areas or generally warmer
southern climes?

And which way are they pumping? Outside heat in or inside heat out?
B-)

--
Cheers
Dave.

Tim Watts wrote:
Piers Finlayson
wibbled on Monday 05 July 2010 09:02


Of course, heat pumps depend on large amounts of (grid provided)
electricity. I seem to recall something like 1/4 to 1/3 of the total
overall heat energy produced by a heat pump needs to be provided with
electricity to power it.

Given the state of our generating infrastructure in this country I
would not want to be dependent on relatively cheap (and available!)
electricity for my heating in the medium and long term.

I was talking to an air-con engineer last Saturday. He was saying that,
according to the contact he's had with manufacturers and various seminars,
that the big push is to get air source pumps into a viable state as it is
well recognised that ground source is too expensive and/or difficult for the
majority to adopt.

Apparently, they have air source producing useful output at air temperatures
slightly below freezing and producing useful temperatures on the output
side, so as always the effort is to make it viable commercially.

It sounded potentially quite promising. Not sure if it's going to be a
matter of years or a decade, but watch this space...

air source works, but its limited both in efficiency and in power output.

Makes a lot of sense in cities though where there is a huge spill of
thermal energy from the activity - transport etc.

Huge wrote:
On 2010-07-05, Tim Watts wrote:
Huge
wibbled on Monday 05 July 2010 10:32

On 2010-07-05, Tim Watts wrote:

I was talking to an air-con engineer last Saturday. He was saying that,
according to the contact he's had with manufacturers and various
seminars, that the big push is to get air source pumps into a viable
state as it is well recognised that ground source is too expensive and/or
difficult for the majority to adopt.

Apparently, they have air source producing useful output at air
temperatures slightly below freezing and producing useful temperatures on
the output side, so as always the effort is to make it viable
commercially.

It sounded potentially quite promising. Not sure if it's going to be a
matter of years or a decade, but watch this space...
Given that air source heat pumps are routinely installed in the USA, I
don't really understand what the issue is.


Which bits of the USA though? Cold northern areas or generally warmer
southern climes?

Good point. I only have direct experience of my Mother's house, which was (she
now lives in a retirement community) in Pennsylvania. Much colder than the UK
in the winter and much, much hotter in the summer. The heat pump ran both
the heating and air-con. All the houses on the estate she lived on had
them - the only energy source was electricity. When it was substantially
below freezing, she had to switch to pure resistive heating, since the heat
pump would ice up.


Aye, and there's the rub.

Ground source is far more useful as teh overall land temperature varies
less.

The best approach on a new build is to use the ground under the house,
and the plot..pumping heat into it in summer using the system as aircon,
and out again in winter using a heat pump.

tim.... wrote:


"Tim Watts" wrote in message

Apparently, they have air source producing useful output at air
temperatures

Surely this only works for cooling. The outside air is normally going to be
colder than the inside air so this is a cheaper way to cool the inside.

It is never going to work for heating up a house (except in some very
extreme outside conditions that I think we can ignore)

Many already in operation. Clue: reverse the system.

I worked in an office (UK) which was perfectly adequately heated
with such a system.

Chris
--
Chris J Dixon Nottingham UK


Have dancing shoes, will ceilidh.

tim.... wrote:
"Tim Watts" wrote in message
...
Piers Finlayson
wibbled on Monday 05 July 2010 09:02


Of course, heat pumps depend on large amounts of (grid provided)
electricity. I seem to recall something like 1/4 to 1/3 of the total
overall heat energy produced by a heat pump needs to be provided with
electricity to power it.

Given the state of our generating infrastructure in this country I
would not want to be dependent on relatively cheap (and available!)
electricity for my heating in the medium and long term.
I was talking to an air-con engineer last Saturday. He was saying that,
according to the contact he's had with manufacturers and various seminars,
that the big push is to get air source pumps into a viable state as it is
well recognised that ground source is too expensive and/or difficult for
the
majority to adopt.

Apparently, they have air source producing useful output at air
temperatures
slightly below freezing and producing useful temperatures on the output
side, so as always the effort is to make it viable commercially.

It sounded potentially quite promising. Not sure if it's going to be a
matter of years or a decade, but watch this space...

Surely this only works for cooling. The outside air is normally going to be
colder than the inside air so this is a cheaper way to cool the inside.

It is never going to work for heating up a house (except in some very
extreme outside conditions that I think we can ignore)


I dont think you understand what a heat pump is. Thats like saying a
fridge only works if the room is at -5C..


tim

"The Natural Philosopher" wrote in message
...
Arfa Daily wrote:


"NT" wrote in message
...
On Jul 4, 8:47 pm, wrote:
Dave Liquorice wrote:
Personally I don't think photo voltaics are worth it, very capital
intensive and ineffecient at converting the available energy into
useable energy.

They are, IIRC, about 100 times more efficient than plants.
Farming, eh? Even less efficeient than PV. And PV at least
gives you 'leccy straight off the bat.

#Paul

The energy return is really a red herring. Money return is what
counts, its not as if we're short of energy.


NT

We wouldn't be if they built some more nuclear generation plants, but as
long as we are generating electricity from gas and oil and coal, we're
gonna keep getting shorter of it, aren't we ? I don't happen to believe
that all of these alternative power generation technologies are worth a
jot in the grand scheme of things.

They are not, not in this country anyway.

Nuclear is the only sane option at the moment.

Solar has a lot to offer in hot desert places.

Just as geothernmal and hydrolelectric work well where Natuer favours
them.


And ones for the home are more for green conscience salving.

Totally agree.

I can just about live with benefits from using the heat energy of the sun.

You cant actually. The UK as a whole ceased to be cost effectively able to
support its population on pure solar radiation 400 years ago. At a
population of 2-5 million, its possible.

At a population of 60M+ its not


Given time, you might actually be able to win a few quid with a reduction
in fuel costs for heating your water, but generating a few watts of
electricity when you least need it, at a huge capital outlay, with complex
electronic engineering involved - the manufacturing and shipping around
the world of which all has its own energy budget - seems to me to make no
sense, except to be able to tell people that you are doing your bit to
'save the planet' ...


This is correct. 99% of the eco greenwash stuff is predicated on the
assumption that we HAVE to use sunlight in some form to generate power.
Not that we have to get rid of carbon pollution.

If you take the latter view, what ,makes sense is nuclear, nuclear,
nuclear.




Arfa


Yes, I'm a little unclear as to what exactly the objections are to nuclear
power generation. I watched that BBC programme last week "How to Build a
Nuclear Submarine". The people of Barrow-in-Furness where the things were
being built had no fear of the nuclear angle. They just said that it was
something they had lived with for many many years. In the same vein as a
similar prog that I saw a few months ago about the biggest (U.S.) nuclear
sub in the world, just a few kilos of the enriched uranium fuel, would run
the thing for 25 years. In fact, I think it said that the American one was
commissioned sometime in the 80s, and had never been refueled so far. The
naval nuclear engineer responsible for the commissioning of the RN sub's
reactor, said on the BBC prog that although the exact details of output were
classified, when running at full chat, it would be enough to power a town
the size of Portsmouth. I can see that there is potentially an issue with
the high level radioactive waste, but before you have to finally declare the
reactor at the end of its life, the amounts of that are small. I'm sure that
with proper attention and maintenance, they are pretty safe - the French
seem to think so - so what is it about them that scares people ? In these
days of hysterical eco-bollox, I would have thought that the advantages, and
even disadvantages, far outweighed the (possible) impact of continuing to
burn fossil fuels ?

Arfa

On 5 July, 10:32, Huge wrote:

Given that air source heat pumps are routinely installed in the USA, I don't
really understand what the issue is.

This is England, home of the Daily Mail and Fear Of Foreign Plumbing.

It's well known that heat pumps attract foxes and gypsies, who will
then steal your antimacassars.

On 5 July, 11:12, "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:

And which way are they pumping? *Outside heat in or inside heat out?

State of the art in this is Dutch greenhouses. They have some
interesting systems recently where they store excess heat in the
Summer by warming underground water, then extract it in the colder
part of the year.

Also any claim that "technology X only works in America because they
have plenty of land" looks a bit flimsy if the over-crowded Dutch
manage to make it work as well.

tim....
wibbled on Monday 05 July 2010 11:12


Surely this only works for cooling. The outside air is normally going to
be colder than the inside air so this is a cheaper way to cool the inside.

It is never going to work for heating up a house (except in some very
extreme outside conditions that I think we can ignore)

tim

No, that's exactly what this chap was saying - they *can* extract practical
heat from a few degrees below freezing[1] in test apparatus. They're also
trying to use CO2 as the refridgerant which isn't easy but as I understand,
makes for a better machine. He didn't say that affordable such machines were
available yet, just that there was a good chance there will be.

[1] I presume there will have to be some reversal cycles to defrost the
evaporator. But if you think about it, cold outside is better as the air is
already dryish. Damp warmer weather would be the worst for icing up.

--
Tim Watts

Managers, politicians and environmentalists: Nature's carbon buffer.

Huge wrote:
On 2010-07-05, Arfa Daily wrote:

so what is it about them [nuclear reactors] that scares people?

I think it all comes down to the fundamental anti-science bias of our
current society.


You are Russia. Its is the cold war. Reactors make plutonium for bombs.
And a little el;electricity.You have an army of agents provoocateurs in
every European country, mounting a campaign of propaganda and
disinformation. Your natural targets are organisations of people who
don't like their government. CND, the communist party etc etc. You spin
the facts and where the facts are not clear, you raise spectres of
unreasoning panic.

QED

Andy Dingley wrote:
On 5 July, 10:32, Huge wrote:

Given that air source heat pumps are routinely installed in the USA, I don't
really understand what the issue is.

This is England, home of the Daily Mail and Fear Of Foreign Plumbing.

It's well known that heat pumps attract foxes and gypsies, who will
then steal your antimacassars.
its really that they are just bloody expensive, and require the complete
heating system designed to use them.

Give it time.

On Jul 5, 7:18*am, "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:
On Sun, 4 Jul 2010 20:47:23 +0100, wrote:
Personally I don't think photo voltaics are worth it, very capital
intensive and ineffecient at converting the available energy into
useable energy.

They are, IIRC, about 100 times more efficient than plants. Farming, eh?
Even less efficeient than PV. *And PV at least gives you 'leccy straight
off the bat.

'leccy is difficult to store in any meaningful quantity. Oh and how
much CO2 is released and energy consumed to make PV cells? Are they
actually energy positive in the UK?

PV cells themselves might return their invested energy eventually, but
add the rest of the system and it doesnt look likely


NT

Andy Dingley wrote:
On 5 July, 11:12, "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:

And which way are they pumping? Outside heat in or inside heat out?

State of the art in this is Dutch greenhouses. They have some
interesting systems recently where they store excess heat in the
Summer by warming underground water, then extract it in the colder
part of the year.

Also any claim that "technology X only works in America because they
have plenty of land" looks a bit flimsy if the over-crowded Dutch
manage to make it work as well.

If you go deep enough, you can use small areas of land.,. The final
issue is whether the average summer insolation is more than the winter
draw over the same land area.

in general, it is. Cities have to heat more land area proportionately,
BUT with high rise buildings in close proximity, heat requrements are a
bit less anyway.

AND the summer requirements for aircon means you can charge up heatbanks
underground.

Of course, its a big investment, and needs to be done at design stage.
You cant really get the best with retrofitting.

Some interesting stuff is going into big office blocks and the like tho.

HOWEVER the actual capital costs of it all are interesting compared to
say - simply building 50-100 nuclear power plants. It might be cheaper
to simply burn the electricity. Or the uranium as it were.

NT wrote:
On Jul 5, 7:18 am, "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:
On Sun, 4 Jul 2010 20:47:23 +0100, wrote:
Personally I don't think photo voltaics are worth it, very capital
intensive and ineffecient at converting the available energy into
useable energy.
They are, IIRC, about 100 times more efficient than plants. Farming, eh?
Even less efficeient than PV. And PV at least gives you 'leccy straight
off the bat.
'leccy is difficult to store in any meaningful quantity. Oh and how
much CO2 is released and energy consumed to make PV cells? Are they
actually energy positive in the UK?

PV cells themselves might return their invested energy eventually, but
add the rest of the system and it doesnt look likely


Oh I think they will return the energy taken to make them all right.
Not sure about the energy to transport install and service them.



NT

On Jul 5, 9:01*am, "Arfa Daily" wrote:
"NT" wrote in message
...
On Jul 4, 8:47 pm, wrote:
Dave Liquorice wrote:


Personally I don't think photo voltaics are worth it, very capital
snip


The energy return is really a red herring. Money return is what
counts, its not as if we're short of energy.

We wouldn't be if they built some more nuclear generation plants, but as
long as we are generating electricity from gas and oil and coal, we're gonna
keep getting shorter of it, aren't we ?

We the country will construct whatever energy facilities we need.
Probably nuclear, if not then other options. I dont think there's much
risk of us chosing to go short because of some foolish greenwash. At
the end of the day no country chooses economic meltdown, political
approval seeking only continues for as long as it doesnt cost too
much. Any day we want more energy we can choose to have it, thus there
is really no shortage.


NT

On Jul 5, 11:07*am, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:
Arfa Daily wrote:

"NT" wrote in message
...
On Jul 4, 8:47 pm, wrote:
Dave Liquorice wrote:


I can just about live with benefits from using
the heat energy of the sun.

You cant actually. The UK as a whole ceased to be cost effectively able
to support its population on pure solar radiation 400 years ago. At a
population of 2-5 million, its possible.

At a population of 60M+ its not

Possible yes, desirable no way. The greens will have us back in the
medieval era if they ever get their way.


NT

NT wrote:
On Jul 5, 9:01 am, "Arfa Daily" wrote:
"NT" wrote in message
...
On Jul 4, 8:47 pm, wrote:
Dave Liquorice wrote:


Personally I don't think photo voltaics are worth it, very capital
snip


The energy return is really a red herring. Money return is what
counts, its not as if we're short of energy.

We wouldn't be if they built some more nuclear generation plants, but as
long as we are generating electricity from gas and oil and coal, we're gonna
keep getting shorter of it, aren't we ?

We the country will construct whatever energy facilities we need.
Probably nuclear, if not then other options. I dont think there's much
risk of us chosing to go short because of some foolish greenwash.

Tell that to half of Northern Europe.

At
the end of the day no country chooses economic meltdown, political
approval seeking only continues for as long as it doesnt cost too
much.

The problem is that its easier for a government to allow economic
meltdown, rather than face an electorate with tough choices.

'Its not us, honest, its the EU/global financial crisis/The War/The Will
of Allah'



Any day we want more energy we can choose to have it, thus there
is really no shortage.


There really is, since the lead time and politcical bargaining to get
nuclear sets built is 10-15 years.

Ditto coal fired etc.

And every single oil producing region there is is deeply politically
unstable in some way or other.



NT

NT wrote:
On Jul 5, 11:07 am, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:
Arfa Daily wrote:

"NT" wrote in message
...
On Jul 4, 8:47 pm, wrote:
Dave Liquorice wrote:


I can just about live with benefits from using
the heat energy of the sun.
You cant actually. The UK as a whole ceased to be cost effectively able
to support its population on pure solar radiation 400 years ago. At a
population of 2-5 million, its possible.

At a population of 60M+ its not

Possible yes, desirable no way. The greens will have us back in the
medieval era if they ever get their way.



I wouldn't mind a population of 2M as long as I was one of them.

Of course at that level, we could burn coal and oil with no real effect
on anything.

NT

NT wrote:
The energy return is really a red herring. Money return is what
counts, its not as if we're short of energy.

Money is merely a cultural artefact, and can be made in any
desired quantity. Clearly, it far surpasses 1kW/m2 on the
earth's disk in its intrinsic value.

#Paul

On 5 July, 11:07, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Just as geothernmal and hydrolelectric work well where Natuer favours them.

Geothermal can have serious problems with acid rain. Many of the sites
which offer enough geothermal to generate power, as opposed to merely
space heating, have groundwater full of sulphides. This means either
venting it, with emission problems, or a horrible expensive system of
down-hole plumbing with a secondary circuit.

It can work, but it's not the free lunch that was hope for.

On 5 July, 11:38, "Arfa Daily" wrote:

similar prog that I saw a few months ago about the biggest (U.S.) nuclear
sub in the world, just a few kilos of the enriched uranium fuel, would run
the thing for 25 years. In fact, I think it said that the American one was
commissioned sometime in the 80s, and had never been refueled so far.

The problem is that nuclear power reactors that compact and that
simple are _horrendously_ expensive, such that only a military budget
can afford them. They traded engineering complexity for fuel
enrichment - the enrichment levels in a sub reactor are extremely
high, which makes the rest of the design smaller and simpler in
comparison. However manufacturing this fuel is orders of magnitude
more difficult than fuel for a typical commercial power nuke. There's
also a real proliferation risk. You can't make much that goes bang out
of PWR fuel from a power reactor, but you certainly can from a
submarine PWR.

One of the sad aspects of the current British purchase of nukes is
that we're inevitably going to buy old inefficient PWR designs from
the USA or France. Far better designs would be the high-temperature
gas reactors that Europe was working on in the '70s, and have since
been developed by the Chinese.

Andy Dingley wrote:
On 5 July, 11:38, "Arfa Daily" wrote:

similar prog that I saw a few months ago about the biggest (U.S.) nuclear
sub in the world, just a few kilos of the enriched uranium fuel, would run
the thing for 25 years. In fact, I think it said that the American one was
commissioned sometime in the 80s, and had never been refueled so far.

The problem is that nuclear power reactors that compact and that
simple are _horrendously_ expensive, such that only a military budget
can afford them. They traded engineering complexity for fuel
enrichment - the enrichment levels in a sub reactor are extremely
high, which makes the rest of the design smaller and simpler in
comparison. However manufacturing this fuel is orders of magnitude
more difficult than fuel for a typical commercial power nuke. There's
also a real proliferation risk. You can't make much that goes bang out
of PWR fuel from a power reactor, but you certainly can from a
submarine PWR.

One of the sad aspects of the current British purchase of nukes is
that we're inevitably going to buy old inefficient PWR designs from
the USA or France. Far better designs would be the high-temperature
gas reactors that Europe was working on in the '70s, and have since
been developed by the Chinese.

Fairly sure our sub reactors are made by rolls royce actually.

On 5 July, 15:57, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Fairly sure our sub reactors are made by rolls royce actually.

Yes, but as pointed out, they bear little relation to the sort of
reactors used for power generation.

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember The Natural Philosopher
saying something like:

You are Russia. Its is the cold war. Reactors make plutonium for bombs.
And a little el;electricity.You have an army of agents provoocateurs in
every European country, mounting a campaign of propaganda and
disinformation. Your natural targets are organisations of people who
don't like their government. CND, the communist party etc etc. You spin
the facts and where the facts are not clear, you raise spectres of
unreasoning panic.

Ding, ding, ding, with a helping of dong.
I'd long known the various anti-nuke bodies were influenced by Soviet
agents, MI5 told me so.
We're all paying the price now, though.

On Jul 5, 1:35*pm, wrote:
NT wrote:
The energy return is really a red herring. Money return is what
counts, its not as if we're short of energy.

Money is merely a cultural artefact, and can be made in any
desired quantity. *Clearly, it far surpasses 1kW/m2 on the
earth's disk in its intrinsic value.

#Paul

The value of money is what counts, ie what it can purchase. Printing
it just gives more units worth less per unit.


NT

Andy Dingley wrote:
On 5 July, 15:57, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Fairly sure our sub reactors are made by rolls royce actually.

Yes, but as pointed out, they bear little relation to the sort of
reactors used for power generation.

You would be surprised, but anyway, that was not the point: the point is
they are not foreign made.

Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember The Natural Philosopher
saying something like:

You are Russia. Its is the cold war. Reactors make plutonium for bombs.
And a little el;electricity.You have an army of agents provoocateurs in
every European country, mounting a campaign of propaganda and
disinformation. Your natural targets are organisations of people who
don't like their government. CND, the communist party etc etc. You spin
the facts and where the facts are not clear, you raise spectres of
unreasoning panic.

Ding, ding, ding, with a helping of dong.
I'd long known the various anti-nuke bodies were influenced by Soviet
agents, MI5 told me so.

Good grief. you needed to be told? It would have been odd if they had
NOT been.


We're all paying the price now, though.

Indeed. bearded besandalled real ale swilling greenies under your feet
wherever you look..

There will always be the disaffected cultists. Today its no longer
animal rights, its eco warriors.

NT wrote:
On Jul 5, 1:35 pm, wrote:
NT wrote:
The energy return is really a red herring. Money return is what
counts, its not as if we're short of energy.
Money is merely a cultural artefact, and can be made in any
desired quantity. Clearly, it far surpasses 1kW/m2 on the
earth's disk in its intrinsic value.

#Paul

The value of money is what counts, ie what it can purchase. Printing
it just gives more units worth less per unit.


NT
Ultimately money as a cost relates simply to the man hours needed to
arrive at the product, times the standard of living of those men.

Low standard of living (china) or low man hours (hi tech investment)
reduces the costs.

fuel is free, at the point of mining/drilling etc .. If it lasts anyway.
Then you cant get it at any price at all..

"Arfa Daily" wrote in message
news:NCiYn.44629$cJ6.42108@hurricane...



Yes, I'm a little unclear as to what exactly the objections are to nuclear
power generation.

For me it's the (apparent) completely open ended costs of disposal. If the
private sector is going to be allowed to build nuclear power stations they
have to factor in the total cost of decommissioning into their kWh price,
but they can't.

tim

"The Natural Philosopher" wrote in message
...
tim.... wrote:
"Tim Watts" wrote in message
...
Piers Finlayson
wibbled on Monday 05 July 2010 09:02


Of course, heat pumps depend on large amounts of (grid provided)
electricity. I seem to recall something like 1/4 to 1/3 of the total
overall heat energy produced by a heat pump needs to be provided with
electricity to power it.

Given the state of our generating infrastructure in this country I
would not want to be dependent on relatively cheap (and available!)
electricity for my heating in the medium and long term.
I was talking to an air-con engineer last Saturday. He was saying that,
according to the contact he's had with manufacturers and various
seminars,
that the big push is to get air source pumps into a viable state as it
is
well recognised that ground source is too expensive and/or difficult for
the
majority to adopt.

Apparently, they have air source producing useful output at air
temperatures
slightly below freezing and producing useful temperatures on the output
side, so as always the effort is to make it viable commercially.

It sounded potentially quite promising. Not sure if it's going to be a
matter of years or a decade, but watch this space...

Surely this only works for cooling. The outside air is normally going to
be colder than the inside air so this is a cheaper way to cool the
inside.

It is never going to work for heating up a house (except in some very
extreme outside conditions that I think we can ignore)


I dont think you understand what a heat pump is.

I think I do (BICBW)

Thats like saying a fridge only works if the room is at -5C..

No, because you can run the fridge down to -5 by putting more power in.

The idea of an "efficient" heat pump is that you use less power to "extract"
the heat from somewhere else that you would use to heat up the place
instead.

tim

tim.... wrote:
"Arfa Daily" wrote in message
news:NCiYn.44629$cJ6.42108@hurricane...


Yes, I'm a little unclear as to what exactly the objections are to nuclear
power generation.

For me it's the (apparent) completely open ended costs of disposal. If the
private sector is going to be allowed to build nuclear power stations they
have to factor in the total cost of decommissioning into their kWh price,
but they can't.


They do, and they can. The problem is that no one has actually defined
exactly what decomissioning means. Currently 15% of build cst is set
aside for decommissioning, BUT teh government refuses to say whether at
some later date it might just decide to change the rules, and make the
companies liable for wrapping the whole things in cotton candy and
having the board of directors lick it all off.


I mean, should a coal fired station have to spend the totality of its
profit fixing the carbon its used, back into coal?


Having spent a lot of money concentrating radioactive ores to get decent
fission, just grinding the ores up and scattering them back in uranium
mines where they came from is deemed unacceptable. In fact nothing
satisfies the green ****ers.

The easiest way to decommission a reactor is take the high level waste
out, reprocess that, and then fill the sodding thing with a decent
concrete, and leave it for 500 years. But that is not satisfactory
apparently, either.


On a decent times scale, nuclear power is removing net radioactivity
from the planet.

They should get medals.


tim