I notice on grid watch the power requirement at the moment (17:30) is
55.41 GW.
Nuclear as usual is flat out, Coal is rising and looks near its limit,
CCGT (I presume this is gas) also looks to be near its limit and Wind,
well as usual when it is needed it is rubbish.
The other generation and imports does not amount to much.

Just How much can the UK generate in GW and how near are we to its
limit, also what happens if we go over our maximum generation limit?

Barry

In article , Corporal Jones
scribeth thus
I notice on grid watch the power requirement at the moment (17:30) is
55.41 GW.
Nuclear as usual is flat out, Coal is rising and looks near its limit,
CCGT (I presume this is gas) also looks to be near its limit and Wind,
well as usual when it is needed it is rubbish.
The other generation and imports does not amount to much.

Just How much can the UK generate in GW and how near are we to its
limit, also what happens if we go over our maximum generation limit?

Barry


I'm sure TNP who was responsible for that site will be able to tell you
but AIUI when the going gets rough they ask or demand some large
industrial consumers to slow down or shut down..

Or they connect up the thermocouple they have in the house of Commons
and that tides 'em over;!...

--
Tony Sayer

In article ,
Corporal Jones writes:
I notice on grid watch the power requirement at the moment (17:30) is
55.41 GW.
Nuclear as usual is flat out, Coal is rising and looks near its limit,
CCGT (I presume this is gas) also looks to be near its limit and Wind,
well as usual when it is needed it is rubbish.
The other generation and imports does not amount to much.

Just How much can the UK generate in GW and how near are we to its
limit, also what happens if we go over our maximum generation limit?

Firstly, assuming there's no more scope to import anymore, some
large industrial consumers are cut off - they buy electricity
at a cheaper rate on the condition it can be cut off when supplies
are short. (Same happens for some gas customers, and since gas is
used to generate electricity, this often happens together as
a shortage of one can cause a shortage of the other.)

The other thing that can be done is a reduction in the supply
voltage, but this is nowhere near as effective today as it was
10 or more years ago, as many more loads are constant power.

Having lived through some earlier periods of shortage, a plea
to use less is likely to go out in the media.

Ultimately, if these measures don't resolve any shortage, then
we're into planned rolling power cuts. If the loss of supply
is unplanned (e.g. a power station drops off when there's no
spare capacity), then you get unplanned load shedding - an
area will be cut off to keep the rest of the grid running.
This will either resolve by restoration of the supply, or it
will turn into planned rolling power cuts if the supply
can't be increased (and none of the above measures can make
up for it).

As I've said before, we're probably coming to the end of a
long period (decades) of reliable supply in this country,
because we haven't maintained the investment prior to
privatisation of the industry which got us into the position
of having one of the most stable supplies in the world.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

On 10/12/12 17:30, Corporal Jones wrote:
I notice on grid watch the power requirement at the moment (17:30) is
55.41 GW.
Nuclear as usual is flat out, Coal is rising and looks near its limit,
CCGT (I presume this is gas) also looks to be near its limit and Wind,
well as usual when it is needed it is rubbish.
The other generation and imports does not amount to much.

Just How much can the UK generate in GW and how near are we to its
limit, also what happens if we go over our maximum generation limit?

There's a fair bit more gas in reserve (20GW in total I think), but
that's about if for coal.

there's a bit of oil and OCGT and even diesel lying around.

But I agree. Its early in the year to be pulling that much grid-juice.
Does not bode well.


Barry


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On 10/12/12 18:14, Andrew Gabriel wrote:

As I've said before, we're probably coming to the end of a
long period (decades) of reliable supply in this country,
because we haven't maintained the investment prior to
privatisation of the industry which got us into the position
of having one of the most stable supplies in the world.

And one mad green political knee jerk after another has destroyed the
business case for investment in kit that actually works, as opposed to
kit that siphons green subsidy out of consumers.

this may amuse you.
http://www.templar.co.uk/downloads/R...imitations.pdf


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

En el artículo , The Natural Philosopher
escribió:

But I agree. Its early in the year to be pulling that much grid-juice.
Does not bode well.

(21:15) we seem to be pulling quite a bit from the froggies and cloggies
as well, 1GW each.

It's been a beautiful sunny day up here in the north-west, if somewhat
cold, but believe it's a bit perky dahn sarf.

--
(\_/)
(='.'=)
(")_(")

On 10/12/2012 17:30, Corporal Jones wrote:
CCGT (I presume this is gas)

Yes. And as no-one has seen to enlighten you:

Combined Cycle Gas Turbine is basically a jet aircraft engine connected
to a generator. Then because the exhaust is hot you can run a steam
engine off it.

Open Cycle Gas Turbine doesn't have the steam engine, so it's less
efficient.

You can run a CCGT in open mode, and that part of it will fire up in
minutes. The steam part takes ages, which means it doesn't respond well
to a sudden increase in requirements when the wind drops.

Andy

On Mon, 10 Dec 2012 17:30:44 +0000, Corporal Jones wrote:

Just How much can the UK generate in GW and how near are we to its
limit,

I thought we only had about 60GW maximum capacity but that doesn't tally
with what TNP said about having "20GW of gas in reserve" CCGT looks to
have reached about 18GW this evening. Oil or OCGT didn't put in an
appearance that I noticed.

Just downloaded the complete data set but my spreadsheet gets a very bad
headache trying to handle it all. I think the peak demand last winter was
in the first two weeks of Feb 2012. In that period the peak was at 1740
on the 8th:

demand coal nuclear ccgt ocgt french irish dutch pumped hydro wind
59165 24159 8051 22094 132 -2042 -212 -828 1799 854 1566

Note:

We were exporting 3.082 GW to the continent, is that included in the
demand figure or is it in addtion? Giving a total capacity at this time
of 62.247GW?

Oil is missing. In the data set the Oil column (P) doesn't even have a
zero in it. It could be an artifact of my spreadsheets head ache but I
don't think so.

If you add up all the positive values you get 58.655GW 0.510GW less than
demand.

... also what happens if we go over our maximum generation limit?

The lights go out, somewhere. As others have said big industrial
consumers are dropped off first but ultimately they "load shed", that is
whole sections of the country are cut off for a period.

If we struggle this winter in will be very interesting to see what
happens next or the one after as several large coal fired stations will
have been forced to close by the Large Combustion Directive by then.

I suspect that even if they do have to drop large commercial consumers
off the grid it won't be mentioned very much in the media. Goes against
the governments "green" credentials and is a bit embrassing when they
have to explain why the lights are going out. They'll waffle of course
and blame "the other lot" for previous decisions, the fact they have all
sat on their hands for decades and failed to make the required long term
strategic decisions isn't relevant to short term politicians.

Provided a large power station doesn't unexpectedly drop off line the
grid can probably survive by dropping off the large commercial consumers
rather than the scheduled rolling blackouts like the early 70's. They
only need to trim the top off the peak in demand not reduce overall
demand.

--
Cheers
Dave.

On Mon, 10 Dec 2012 17:30:44 +0000, Corporal Jones
wrote:

I notice on grid watch the power requirement at the moment (17:30) is
55.41 GW.
Nuclear as usual is flat out, Coal is rising and looks near its limit,
CCGT (I presume this is gas) also looks to be near its limit and Wind,
well as usual when it is needed it is rubbish.
The other generation and imports does not amount to much.

Just How much can the UK generate in GW and how near are we to its
limit, also what happens if we go over our maximum generation limit?

The UK 'total' is theoretically approaching 80GW (see below) but quite a bit of
generation is offline at the moment.

Only one interconector (the Dutch one) is fully available.

The French one is down to 1GW at the moment, 1.5GW from next week, and back to
2GW from the new year. Irish interconector (North to Scotland) is down 0.25GW
(half capacity) for another couple of months The new East - West Irish
Interconnector (Republic to NW England) is coming online in late January @ 0.5GW

Take week 98 of 2013 (the highest currently declared week for next year) and the
MW declared availability is as follows:

25845 Coal
27165 CCGT
8693 Nuclear
2338 Oil
1227 OCGT
1045 Hydro
792 Other (Biomass)

2828 Pumped Storage

5702 Wind

2000 French
1000 Dutch
500 Irish
500 East-West

So that is

67.1GW of Generation
2.8 GW of Pumped storage (circa 7 hours)
5.7GW of Intermittent, disruptive, polluting, scenery destroying, investment
sapping, bill inflating, worthless, pointless, useless wind

+/- 4GW of interconnect (some realistically only being one way)

By the end of next year, CCGT rises about 3GW to 30230, Coal drops about 4GW to
21987, Oil drops by 1GW to 1370, Wind rises marginally to 6GW, Nuclear will
almost certainly drop 0.5GW.

One thing is pretty certain, this time next year there will be around 2GW less
generation available and it could be even worse due to more Euro eco ********
about protecting marine environments

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-s...wales-20660152




--

On 10/12/12 21:18, Andy Champ wrote:
On 10/12/2012 17:30, Corporal Jones wrote:
CCGT (I presume this is gas)

Yes. And as no-one has seen to enlighten you:

Combined Cycle Gas Turbine is basically a jet aircraft engine connected
to a generator. Then because the exhaust is hot you can run a steam
engine off it.

Open Cycle Gas Turbine doesn't have the steam engine, so it's less
efficient.

You can run a CCGT in open mode, and that part of it will fire up in
minutes. The steam part takes ages,

20 mins or so with modern kit.

which means it doesn't respond well
to a sudden increase in requirements when the wind drops.


no. It means it doesnt repsond well to cold starts. Its actually a fully
dispatchable power plant and whilst wear at say half power is obviously
not much less than full power, gas consumption tracks very well with output.

So there is a tendency to use rather more than you need running below
full chat.

Giving you emergency headroom. And at the moment we have 2GW or so
pumped storage to take care of short term peak requirements.





Andy


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On 10/12/12 21:34, Dave Liquorice wrote:
On Mon, 10 Dec 2012 17:30:44 +0000, Corporal Jones wrote:

Just How much can the UK generate in GW and how near are we to its
limit,

I thought we only had about 60GW maximum capacity but that doesn't tally
with what TNP said about having "20GW of gas in reserve" CCGT looks to
have reached about 18GW this evening. Oil or OCGT didn't put in an
appearance that I noticed.

Just downloaded the complete data set but my spreadsheet gets a very bad
headache trying to handle it all. I think the peak demand last winter was
in the first two weeks of Feb 2012. In that period the peak was at 1740
on the 8th:

demand coal nuclear ccgt ocgt french irish dutch pumped hydro wind
59165 24159 8051 22094 132 -2042 -212 -828 1799 854 1566

Note:

We were exporting 3.082 GW to the continent, is that included in the
demand figure or is it in addtion? Giving a total capacity at this time
of 62.247GW?

Think that exports form part of demand. As does pumping UP the storage

Just as invisible wind generators and domestic solar firms a negative
part of demand although its largely so small its not worth ****ing
around with.

Oil is missing. In the data set the Oil column (P) doesn't even have a
zero in it. It could be an artifact of my spreadsheets head ache but I
don't think so.

artefact. Its in the database for sure.

its a lot easier to stuff it in a mysql database.

IIRC there's about 2-3GW of emergency oil/OCGT out there.

Oddly the way gas prices are going they may actually de-mothball the
oil. On balance its not a lot more emissions intensive than gas, and
bunker oil is cheap as chips what with ships being laid up and all.

There is a LOT of mothballed plant that COULD be put back online if the
government stuck two fingers up at the EU and the greens.


If you add up all the positive values you get 58.655GW 0.510GW less than
demand.

... also what happens if we go over our maximum generation limit?

The lights go out, somewhere. As others have said big industrial
consumers are dropped off first but ultimately they "load shed", that is
whole sections of the country are cut off for a period.

If we struggle this winter in will be very interesting to see what
happens next or the one after as several large coal fired stations will
have been forced to close by the Large Combustion Directive by then.

I suspect that even if they do have to drop large commercial consumers
off the grid it won't be mentioned very much in the media. Goes against
the governments "green" credentials and is a bit embrassing when they
have to explain why the lights are going out. They'll waffle of course
and blame "the other lot" for previous decisions, the fact they have all
sat on their hands for decades and failed to make the required long term
strategic decisions isn't relevant to short term politicians.

Provided a large power station doesn't unexpectedly drop off line the
grid can probably survive by dropping off the large commercial consumers
rather than the scheduled rolling blackouts like the early 70's. They
only need to trim the top off the peak in demand not reduce overall
demand.

Yes. The real **** hits the fan when the old coalers go. Still the good
news is the nukes are going to run till they fall to pieces (well until
they are beyond economic repair anyway) 2023 IIRC.

My bet is that we will either have left the EU or will simply cry 'force
majeure' and run a lot of old coal and oil and nuclear anyway. The
emissions to BUILD new plant probably exceed the emissions in keeping
the old plant going.


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On 10/12/12 23:57, The Other Mike wrote:
On Mon, 10 Dec 2012 17:30:44 +0000, Corporal Jones
wrote:

I notice on grid watch the power requirement at the moment (17:30) is
55.41 GW.
Nuclear as usual is flat out, Coal is rising and looks near its limit,
CCGT (I presume this is gas) also looks to be near its limit and Wind,
well as usual when it is needed it is rubbish.
The other generation and imports does not amount to much.

Just How much can the UK generate in GW and how near are we to its
limit, also what happens if we go over our maximum generation limit?

The UK 'total' is theoretically approaching 80GW (see below) but quite a bit of
generation is offline at the moment.

Only one interconector (the Dutch one) is fully available.

The French one is down to 1GW at the moment, 1.5GW from next week, and back to
2GW from the new year. Irish interconector (North to Scotland) is down 0.25GW
(half capacity) for another couple of months The new East - West Irish
Interconnector (Republic to NW England) is coming online in late January @ 0.5GW

Take week 98 of 2013 (the highest currently declared week for next year) and the
MW declared availability is as follows:

25845 Coal
27165 CCGT
8693 Nuclear
2338 Oil
1227 OCGT
1045 Hydro
792 Other (Biomass)

2828 Pumped Storage

5702 Wind

2000 French
1000 Dutch
500 Irish
500 East-West

So that is

67.1GW of Generation
2.8 GW of Pumped storage (circa 7 hours)
5.7GW of Intermittent, disruptive, polluting, scenery destroying, investment
sapping, bill inflating, worthless, pointless, useless wind

+/- 4GW of interconnect (some realistically only being one way)

By the end of next year, CCGT rises about 3GW to 30230, Coal drops about 4GW to
21987, Oil drops by 1GW to 1370, Wind rises marginally to 6GW, Nuclear will
almost certainly drop 0.5GW.

One thing is pretty certain, this time next year there will be around 2GW less
generation available and it could be even worse due to more Euro eco ********
about protecting marine environments

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-s...wales-20660152



yerrs,(and thanks for the heads up: I ought to have all that in the
database as well) BUT lets look at February. And imagine UK demand peaks
at 60GW, the wind ain't blowing, harry's panels aren't working cos the
sun went down, Germany is up **** creek and they need 4GW from us to
keep Bavarian beer cool..so total generation demand peaks out at 64GW..

...and we have 67.1 plus 2.8 peak pumped.

Now imagine if Drax trips out..

The problem is that cold weather across Europe *will* coincide with ****
solar and wind output.

All we need is the coincidence of a significant power station outage and
we are sailing very close to the wind indeed.

Having said that, I think 2015 is when the **** may well hit the fan.









--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 03:01:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

Take week 98 of 2013 (the highest currently declared week for next
year) and the MW declared availability is as follows:

Week 98? They "CEGB" must use different "weeks" to the rest of us. B-)

When is week 98 of 2013?

One thing is pretty certain, this time next year there will be around
2GW less generation available and it could be even worse due to more
Euro eco ******** about protecting marine environments

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-s...wales-20660152

Yes I saw that. I bet RWE are *really* pleased, having gone through all
the right proceedures and got all the right approvals etc.

Typical bloody Eurocrats, "you need to do X Y & Z to comply with
Regulations M N & O", so you do X Y & Z and get compliance with
regulations M N & O signed off. 6 months later the Eurocrats say why have
you done X Y & Z you should have done A B & C and doing Y with Z
contravens regulation M anyway...

If they can't run the plant I expect RWE will be taking some body to
court over lost revenues etc, and guess who will be picking that bill
up...

I ought to have all that in the database as well)

Be nice, particulary if it's real time as well. Well as "real time" as
the declared capacities are.

BUT lets look at February.

Yep the declared capacities for Dec, Jan, Feb would be better than the
aboslute maximum available. Febuary particulary as that is generally when
the coldest part of winter is.

Having said that, I think 2015 is when the **** may well hit the fan.

That's when it's scheduled to hit the fan, but it could be earlier as the
coal stations that have to closed at that point in time will probably run
out of hours well before then and the new gas plants might not be
finished...

--
Cheers
Dave.

Corporal Jones wrote:
Nuclear as usual is flat out, Coal is rising and looks near its limit,

And at the same time UK Coal is putting in plans to go out of
business:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/n.../9735823/.html

JGH

In article ,
The Natural Philosopher wrote:
Oddly the way gas prices are going they may actually de-mothball the
oil. On balance its not a lot more emissions intensive than gas,

Depends on how balanced your view is.

--
*When blondes have more fun, do they know it?

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On 11/12/12 09:04, Dave Liquorice wrote:
On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 03:01:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

Take week 98 of 2013 (the highest currently declared week for next
year) and the MW declared availability is as follows:

Week 98? They "CEGB" must use different "weeks" to the rest of us. B-)

When is week 98 of 2013?

One thing is pretty certain, this time next year there will be around
2GW less generation available and it could be even worse due to more
Euro eco ******** about protecting marine environments

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-s...wales-20660152

Yes I saw that. I bet RWE are *really* pleased, having gone through all
the right proceedures and got all the right approvals etc.

Typical bloody Eurocrats, "you need to do X Y & Z to comply with
Regulations M N & O", so you do X Y & Z and get compliance with
regulations M N & O signed off. 6 months later the Eurocrats say why have
you done X Y & Z you should have done A B & C and doing Y with Z
contravens regulation M anyway...

If they can't run the plant I expect RWE will be taking some body to
court over lost revenues etc, and guess who will be picking that bill
up...

I ought to have all that in the database as well)

Be nice, particulary if it's real time as well. Well as "real time" as
the declared capacities are.

BUT lets look at February.

Yep the declared capacities for Dec, Jan, Feb would be better than the
aboslute maximum available. Febuary particulary as that is generally when
the coldest part of winter is.

Having said that, I think 2015 is when the **** may well hit the fan.

That's when it's scheduled to hit the fan, but it could be earlier as the
coal stations that have to closed at that point in time will probably run
out of hours well before then and the new gas plants might not be
finished...

read the fine print in the draft energy bill.

The minister has the power in an emergency to override a lot of the
directives.



--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On 11/12/12 10:21, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
The Natural Philosopher wrote:
Oddly the way gas prices are going they may actually de-mothball the
oil. On balance its not a lot more emissions intensive than gas,

Depends on how balanced your view is.

well its mostly long chain hydrocarbons of the sort CnH2n +H2

so its between coal and methane exactly for emissions of CO2.

Sulphur is another matter but than CAN be scrubbed out.


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 03:01:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Having said that, I think 2015 is when the **** may well hit the fan.

I'll hopefully have my insulation and heating finished by then. Then
it will be two fingers up to the lot of them.

On 11/12/12 14:03, Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 03:01:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Having said that, I think 2015 is when the **** may well hit the fan.

I'll hopefully have my insulation and heating finished by then. Then
it will be two fingers up to the lot of them.

On the coldest day of the winter so far, wind power is contributing a
staggering 90MW

Harry's been quiet hasn't he? With dense fog here, I don't suppose his
subsidy harvesters are paying for themselves..

Time to go and split logs for the woodburner I think.



--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 09:04:53 +0000 (GMT), "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 03:01:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

Take week 98 of 2013 (the highest currently declared week for next
year) and the MW declared availability is as follows:

Week 98? They "CEGB" must use different "weeks" to the rest of us. B-)

When is week 98 of 2013?

I *meant* week 8!


--

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 03:01:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

BUT lets look at February. And imagine UK demand peaks
at 60GW, the wind ain't blowing, harry's panels aren't working cos the
sun went down, Germany is up **** creek and they need 4GW from us to
keep Bavarian beer cool..so total generation demand peaks out at 64GW..

On the French interconnector and on the Dutch interconnector (and probably on
the Irish ones too) it is *impossible* to trade export to the point where it
affects system margin in the UK.

..and we have 67.1 plus 2.8 peak pumped.

Now imagine if Drax trips out..

If you mean all of it then that is not classed as a credible fault.

64GW is also around 10GW *above* the currently predicted max demand this winter
(1 November 2012 to 28 February 2013) although we peaked at around 55GW levels
yesterday and the predicted peak tomorrow is nearly 58GW

As I've said previously this winter isn't going to be a problem and given a
triple dip recession we are possibly secure for a few more winters to come...


--

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 02:49:42 +0000, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:


Oddly the way gas prices are going they may actually de-mothball the
oil. On balance its not a lot more emissions intensive than gas, and
bunker oil is cheap as chips what with ships being laid up and all.

There is a LOT of mothballed plant that COULD be put back online if the
government stuck two fingers up at the EU and the greens.

There is not that much that is mothballed. Fawley was originally 2GW but 1GW of
that hasn't run for the best part of a decade. The whole place is permanently
closing in a few months. Grain has 1.3GW mothballed with 1.3GW available until
end of 2015 , Littlebrook 1GW mothballed, 1GW available until 2015, Kingsnorth
has nearly run out of hours under LCPD. That covers the English oil generation.
Scotland has Peterhead but there are severe constraints on export across into
England.

As ar as coal is concerned Ironbridge at 1GW is running out of hours under the
LCPD and Didcot A 2GW is going at the end of March 2013.

Yes. The real **** hits the fan when the old coalers go. Still the good
news is the nukes are going to run till they fall to pieces (well until
they are beyond economic repair anyway) 2023 IIRC.

Some like Wylfa (the last of the Magnox's) 0.5GW are shutting much sooner than
that, almost certainly this coming year. Others will go before 2019 (Heysham 2
1.2GW, Hartlepool 1.2GW, Hinkley Point B 0.9GW) Dungeness B 1GW probably about
the same time, Hunterston B 1GW is now 2023 as is Torness 1.3GW. Sizewell B
1.2GW is currently 2035

So that leaves just 3.5GW of nukes post 2019, and 1.2GW post 2023. A f*cking
disgrace.

My bet is that we will either have left the EU or will simply cry 'force
majeure' and run a lot of old coal and oil and nuclear anyway. The
emissions to BUILD new plant probably exceed the emissions in keeping
the old plant going.

Recession and sky high prices will drive demand down. The folly of
privatisation and the dash for gas is coming to bite the UK and destroy its
economy.

--

On 11/12/12 14:46, The Other Mike wrote:
On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 03:01:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

BUT lets look at February. And imagine UK demand peaks
at 60GW, the wind ain't blowing, harry's panels aren't working cos the
sun went down, Germany is up **** creek and they need 4GW from us to
keep Bavarian beer cool..so total generation demand peaks out at 64GW..

On the French interconnector and on the Dutch interconnector (and probably on
the Irish ones too) it is *impossible* to trade export to the point where it
affects system margin in the UK.

..and we have 67.1 plus 2.8 peak pumped.

Now imagine if Drax trips out..

If you mean all of it then that is not classed as a credible fault.

64GW is also around 10GW *above* the currently predicted max demand this winter
(1 November 2012 to 28 February 2013) although we peaked at around 55GW levels
yesterday and the predicted peak tomorrow is nearly 58GW

60GW has been seen..

As I've said previously this winter isn't going to be a problem and given a
triple dip recession we are possibly secure for a few more winters to come...


I think so too, barring some unexpected and 'in-credible' fault somewhere.




--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On 11/12/12 14:48, The Other Mike wrote:
On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 02:49:42 +0000, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:


Oddly the way gas prices are going they may actually de-mothball the
oil. On balance its not a lot more emissions intensive than gas, and
bunker oil is cheap as chips what with ships being laid up and all.

There is a LOT of mothballed plant that COULD be put back online if the
government stuck two fingers up at the EU and the greens.

There is not that much that is mothballed. Fawley was originally 2GW but 1GW of
that hasn't run for the best part of a decade. The whole place is permanently
closing in a few months. Grain has 1.3GW mothballed with 1.3GW available until
end of 2015 , Littlebrook 1GW mothballed, 1GW available until 2015, Kingsnorth
has nearly run out of hours under LCPD. That covers the English oil generation.
Scotland has Peterhead but there are severe constraints on export across into
England.

As ar as coal is concerned Ironbridge at 1GW is running out of hours under the
LCPD and Didcot A 2GW is going at the end of March 2013.

Yes. The real **** hits the fan when the old coalers go. Still the good
news is the nukes are going to run till they fall to pieces (well until
they are beyond economic repair anyway) 2023 IIRC.

Some like Wylfa (the last of the Magnox's) 0.5GW are shutting much sooner than
that, almost certainly this coming year. Others will go before 2019 (Heysham 2
1.2GW, Hartlepool 1.2GW, Hinkley Point B 0.9GW) Dungeness B 1GW probably about
the same time, Hunterston B 1GW is now 2023 as is Torness 1.3GW. Sizewell B
1.2GW is currently 2035

So that leaves just 3.5GW of nukes post 2019, and 1.2GW post 2023. A f*cking
disgrace.

My bet is that we will either have left the EU or will simply cry 'force
majeure' and run a lot of old coal and oil and nuclear anyway. The
emissions to BUILD new plant probably exceed the emissions in keeping
the old plant going.

Recession and sky high prices will drive demand down. The folly of
privatisation and the dash for gas is coming to bite the UK and destroy its
economy.


There is an election coming up in 2015... I would bet that by that time
there wont be much of an EU, and the LCP directive will be ignored.

And catastrophic climate change will be all about an impending little
ice age.,


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

By the end of next year, CCGT rises about 3GW to 30230, Coal drops about 4GW to
21987, Oil drops by 1GW to 1370, Wind rises marginally to 6GW,


Its all off err .1 GW at the moment perhaps we'd best switch summatt
off;?....

Nuclear will
almost certainly drop 0.5GW.

One thing is pretty certain, this time next year there will be around 2GW less
generation available and it could be even worse due to more Euro eco ********
about protecting marine environments

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-s...wales-20660152

Winder if they'll take VAT off insulation products perhaps;?...

--
Tony Sayer

In article , Grimly
Curmudgeon scribeth thus
On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 03:01:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Having said that, I think 2015 is when the **** may well hit the fan.

I'll hopefully have my insulation and heating finished by then. Then
it will be two fingers up to the lot of them.

So what's the power situation over there then Grimly?...
--
Tony Sayer

Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 03:01:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Having said that, I think 2015 is when the **** may well hit the fan.

I'll hopefully have my insulation and heating finished by then. Then
it will be two fingers up to the lot of them.

I will have my insulation and a 4kW central-to-the-house coal stove - so we
will not freeze.

I think I will equip the CH when I do it with a contingency supply from a
generator so at least HW keeps working too - I'll arrange a single feed to
the boiler, pumps and control circuits on a 13A plug with 2 sockets - the
2nd socket being fed from a male weatherproof "socket" outside.

Might as well run that circuit to the computer/network/wifi areas too...



--
Tim Watts Personal Blog: http://www.dionic.net/tim/

"A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject."

The Other Mike wrote:
64GW is also around 10GW *above* the currently predicted max demand this winter
(1 November 2012 to 28 February 2013) *although we peaked at around 55GW levels
yesterday and the predicted peak tomorrow is nearly 58GW

All more evidence as to the stupidity of the obsession with electric
heating that is the only sane justification for the obsession with
using gas to make electricity instead of sending the gas down pipes to
consumers where they can use it to make heat directly.

JGH

On Dec 11, 4:45*pm, Tim Watts wrote:
I think I will equip the CH when I do it with a contingency supply from a
generator so at least HW keeps working too

I'm thinking of doing the same, but given that our CH is gas rather
than oil is there much point? In the event of a major electricity
supply failure does the gas keep flowing (and indeed the water)?

Richard.
http://www.rtrussell.co.uk/

On 11/12/12 17:02, jgharston wrote:
The Other Mike wrote:
64GW is also around 10GW *above* the currently predicted max demand this winter
(1 November 2012 to 28 February 2013) although we peaked at around 55GW levels
yesterday and the predicted peak tomorrow is nearly 58GW

All more evidence as to the stupidity of the obsession with electric
heating that is the only sane justification for the obsession with
using gas to make electricity instead of sending the gas down pipes to
consumers where they can use it to make heat directly.

JGH

what obsession with electric heating?


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On 11/12/12 18:30, Richard Russell wrote:
On Dec 11, 4:45 pm, Tim Watts wrote:
I think I will equip the CH when I do it with a contingency supply from a
generator so at least HW keeps working too

I'm thinking of doing the same, but given that our CH is gas rather
than oil is there much point? In the event of a major electricity
supply failure does the gas keep flowing (and indeed the water)?

Richard.
http://www.rtrussell.co.uk/

for a while, yes.


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:36:06 +0000, tony sayer
wrote:

I'll hopefully have my insulation and heating finished by then. Then
it will be two fingers up to the lot of them.

So what's the power situation over there then Grimly?...

Still got a couple of peat-fired stations (which the EU don't like at
all, at all), got some oil and gas burners too. There's 20 minutes of
stored power in a pumped hydro and some actual hydro on the Shannon.

www.spiritofireland.org is slowly gathering momentum and before the
**** hits the fan big time, might actually get somewhere.
TNP notwithstanding, there are massive areas on the western seaboard
where the wind doth blow and the water could flow - all we need to do
is kill off the nimbys.

On 11/12/2012 02:34, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 10/12/12 21:18, Andy Champ wrote:
On 10/12/2012 17:30, Corporal Jones wrote:
CCGT (I presume this is gas)

Yes. And as no-one has seen to enlighten you:

Combined Cycle Gas Turbine is basically a jet aircraft engine connected
to a generator. Then because the exhaust is hot you can run a steam
engine off it.

Open Cycle Gas Turbine doesn't have the steam engine, so it's less
efficient.

You can run a CCGT in open mode, and that part of it will fire up in
minutes. The steam part takes ages,

20 mins or so with modern kit.

which means it doesn't respond well
to a sudden increase in requirements when the wind drops.


no. It means it doesnt repsond well to cold starts. Its actually a fully
dispatchable power plant and whilst wear at say half power is obviously
not much less than full power, gas consumption tracks very well with
output.

So there is a tendency to use rather more than you need running below
full chat.

Giving you emergency headroom. And at the moment we have 2GW or so
pumped storage to take care of short term peak requirements.


How the heck do they get the steam side of it up and running in 20
minutes? I'd assumed it really was a shaft turbine (and you can fire
them up full power from cold, although it's cruel) feeding some kind of
boiler with the exhaust.

So - 20 minutes to get the oil warmed up, let the blades heat evenly,
and the GT part is running. I can easily believe that.

But surely the steam must take longer? And surely until the steam is up
to heat you're using just as much gas for the turbine side as you would
after the steam is running?

I'm obviously missing something. Comes of having fans an inch across in
my kit...

Though short term (~= ad. breaks) isn't what bothers me. It's the 3
days flat calm nationwide we get occasionally.

Andy

On 11/12/2012 20:24, Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
Still got a couple of peat-fired stations (which the EU don't like at
all, at all), got some oil and gas burners too. There's 20 minutes of
stored power in a pumped hydro and some actual hydro on the Shannon.

www.spiritofireland.org is slowly gathering momentum and before the
**** hits the fan big time, might actually get somewhere.
TNP notwithstanding, there are massive areas on the western seaboard
where the wind doth blow and the water could flow - all we need to do
is kill off the nimbys.

Trouble is the wind bloweth not all the time. And you need another
system you can turn on when there isn't any wind.

Andy

On 11/12/12 21:40, Andy Champ wrote:
On 11/12/2012 02:34, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

no. It means it doesnt repsond well to cold starts. Its actually a fully
dispatchable power plant and whilst wear at say half power is obviously
not much less than full power, gas consumption tracks very well with
output.

So there is a tendency to use rather more than you need running below
full chat.

Giving you emergency headroom. And at the moment we have 2GW or so
pumped storage to take care of short term peak requirements.


How the heck do they get the steam side of it up and running in 20
minutes? I'd assumed it really was a shaft turbine (and you can fire
them up full power from cold, although it's cruel) feeding some kind of
boiler with the exhaust.


I think they have very small flash steam type boilers.

So - 20 minutes to get the oil warmed up, let the blades heat evenly,
and the GT part is running. I can easily believe that.

Better than that. I think the gas turbine is pretty much full output in
10-12 mins on the latest ones. From a cold start.

But surely the steam must take longer? And surely until the steam is up
to heat you're using just as much gas for the turbine side as you would
after the steam is running?


Yes, the steam does take longer.. thats 40 mins or so. But yes, they are
running at that point at OCGT efficiency - 37% or so. As opposed to 60%
plus with the steam section up. I had some time/output curves somewhere.


I'm obviously missing something. Comes of having fans an inch across in
my kit...

Though short term (~= ad. breaks) isn't what bothers me. It's the 3
days flat calm nationwide we get occasionally.


Like today.

I ****ed myself larfing when some mad ozzie bitch who runs the green
party was on 'Jeff Randall' who said that the way to solve the energy
crisis wasn't to use gas at all, especially not fracked, offshore wind
farms solar panels and economising would be all we needed to do.

It was by then dark, freezing cold, and the total wind output across the
UK from over 6GW of installed kit was less than 1% of the national
demand. Which peaked at 56.7 GW.

I was wondering whether to write to her and ask her to send me some of
what she had been smoking, but then I realised it had patently caused
terminal brain damage.



Andy


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On 11/12/12 20:24, Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:36:06 +0000, tony sayer
wrote:

I'll hopefully have my insulation and heating finished by then. Then
it will be two fingers up to the lot of them.

So what's the power situation over there then Grimly?...

Still got a couple of peat-fired stations (which the EU don't like at
all, at all), got some oil and gas burners too. There's 20 minutes of
stored power in a pumped hydro and some actual hydro on the Shannon.

www.spiritofireland.org is slowly gathering momentum and before the
**** hits the fan big time, might actually get somewhere.
TNP notwithstanding, there are massive areas on the western seaboard
where the wind doth blow and the water could flow - all we need to do
is kill off the nimbys.

So you can build wind follies while the new East West link supplies the
real power from coal power stations, so you get to keep the moral high
ground and pretend you have a sustainable grid, and we burn the coal to
keep your dreams alive?

Sheesh. Why aren't you breeding Leprechauns instead?


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On 11/12/12 21:45, Andy Champ wrote:
On 11/12/2012 20:24, Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
Still got a couple of peat-fired stations (which the EU don't like at
all, at all), got some oil and gas burners too. There's 20 minutes of
stored power in a pumped hydro and some actual hydro on the Shannon.

www.spiritofireland.org is slowly gathering momentum and before the
**** hits the fan big time, might actually get somewhere.
TNP notwithstanding, there are massive areas on the western seaboard
where the wind doth blow and the water could flow - all we need to do
is kill off the nimbys.

Trouble is the wind bloweth not all the time. And you need another
system you can turn on when there isn't any wind.

Andy
And then you realise you have simply duplicated the capacity and doubled
the capital cost, and the amount of fuel you save by running the CCGT in
whore's drawers mode, which negates any fuel reduction you might have
got, destroys the profitability of the gas stations as well, trebles
their maintenance cost and halves their lifetimes, and makes you utterly
dependent on imported gas.

Sounds like a plan...that Dougal might have dreamed up in a father Ted
episode.

http://www.templar.co.uk/downloads/R...imitations.pdf


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:14:12 +0000, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

On 11/12/12 14:46, The Other Mike wrote:

64GW is also around 10GW *above* the currently predicted max demand this winter
(1 November 2012 to 28 February 2013) although we peaked at around 55GW levels
yesterday and the predicted peak tomorrow is nearly 58GW

60GW has been seen..

Not seen anything that high, February 2012 was around 59GW

Highest demand of this winter was today at 56652 between 1700 and 1730


--

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 20:24:29 +0000, Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012 15:36:06 +0000, tony sayer
wrote:

I'll hopefully have my insulation and heating finished by then. Then
it will be two fingers up to the lot of them.

So what's the power situation over there then Grimly?...

Still got a couple of peat-fired stations (which the EU don't like at
all, at all), got some oil and gas burners too. There's 20 minutes of
stored power in a pumped hydro and some actual hydro on the Shannon.

www.spiritofireland.org is slowly gathering momentum and before the
**** hits the fan big time, might actually get somewhere.
TNP notwithstanding, there are massive areas on the western seaboard
where the wind doth blow and the water could flow - all we need to do
is kill off the nimbys.

Having blighted nearly the entire coastline with ugly 1970's house shaped
objects painted white the view from the sea to land is vile. Sticking wind
turbines out at sea will spoil the view the other way. If ever there was a
need to demonstrate the devastating impact of a hands off approach to planning
then the coastline of Ireland is it.

Build a few nukes FFS and stop desecrating the country with wind turbines.


--

In message
,
Richard Russell writes
On Dec 11, 4:45*pm, Tim Watts wrote:
I think I will equip the CH when I do it with a contingency supply from a
generator so at least HW keeps working too

I'm thinking of doing the same, but given that our CH is gas rather
than oil is there much point? In the event of a major electricity
supply failure does the gas keep flowing (and indeed the water)?

Not if there's any electronics in your boiler

--
geoff