UK National Grid to drain electric car batteries at times of peak demand.

[Martin963]

Oh don't get me wrong Ken,  I agree with you.    A reliable power generation national network is vital,   and like you I suspect that politicians simply don't "get" how much work is needed to produce a kW,   let alone a MW or a GW.    I hope I've emphasised that I invested in our system almost entirely for selfishly financial reasons.   

 

Batteries used on a national scale could perhaps help to shape the demand ups and downs,    but as you imply they are a fat lot of good in a long period of winter anti-cyclonic murk.    And yes the recycling aspect of Lithium batteries worries me  (what do they do with computer laptop batteries,   because AIUI a house battery is just a scaled up version of that...?)

 

Fusion is the answer,   but it's remained tantalisingly out of reach for the whole of my lifetime.    Thorium fission might be a runner,   but again to date it all seems to be promises of "soon" rather than a working reactor.    That's why I said we need the best brains to work on the system.    Personally I think a world "Manhattan" project would be a boon for humanity,    but we don't have a world leader of sufficient stature to bring it all together.  

@ anotherbanana - no,  I don't know whether it's possible in France to have a house battery.   Of course you get a lot more sun than we do in Devon!

[Martin963]

In answer to your other question AB I gather that the company that installed our system is working flat out,   and their problem is a lack of Tesla batteries,   so they install the solar panel and control box part while waiting for the next shipment of batteries.   In our case it was a three week wait for the battery,   but they say it's got a lot worse since.    With the huge increases in electricity prices the systems are selling themselves! 

My only gripe with the Tesla system is that they (Tesla) don't give the owner full control of the system,   and the algorithm that predicts nightly power charge levels is designed for sunny California rather than Gulf Stream Britain.    There are workarounds,    but Musk's control freakery is evident in the way the system is designed,   and I and others are trying to wrest more user controls out of him,   but it's uphill work.     But that single frustration is outweighed by the money we're saving,   and those savings are likely only to get bigger and bigger as the energy crisis worsens.

[Ken]

2 hours ago, Martin963 said:

Oh don't get me wrong Ken,  I agree with you.    A reliable power generation national network is vital,   and like you I suspect that politicians simply don't "get" how much work is needed to produce a kW,   let alone a MW or a GW.    I hope I've emphasised that I invested in our system almost entirely for selfishly financial reasons.   

 

Batteries used on a national scale could perhaps help to shape the demand ups and downs,    but as you imply they are a fat lot of good in a long period of winter anti-cyclonic murk.    And yes the recycling aspect of Lithium batteries worries me  (what do they do with computer laptop batteries,   because AIUI a house battery is just a scaled up version of that...?)

 

Fusion is the answer,   but it's remained tantalisingly out of reach for the whole of my lifetime.    Thorium fission might be a runner,   but again to date it all seems to be promises of "soon" rather than a working reactor.    That's why I said we need the best brains to work on the system.    Personally I think a world "Manhattan" project would be a boon for humanity,    but we don't have a world leader of sufficient stature to bring it all together.  

@ anotherbanana - no,  I don't know whether it's possible in France to have a house battery.   Of course you get a lot more sun than we do in Devon!

There are answers, depending on your point of view! I really am a simple person and don't deal in what may be! I live in today!  Batteries, bio, windmills etc.  they don't, and cannot deliver what we need. The Manhattan project! well we should know what that produced!!! Somewhat different to todays needs. Fusion maybe the answer but we live in today, not tomorrow! Nuclear , total and all consuming is the answer, in my view, everything else is fantasy!  Give me evidence and factual substance and I can agree , but just. whimsical speculation I can't go along with.

[Teapot1]

https://www.eba250.com/vehicle-to-grid-energy-storage-on-wheels/?cn-reloaded=1

[Harnser]

9 hours ago, Teapot1 said:

Thank you, you saw my question marks, that was indicating I wanted a response and the link showed how efficient

the nuclear power is in france and how well they recycled some of the components.

The worrying bit is the 200 grams of long lived waste per person. Thats a 300 year half life and stored in caves and old mine workings. 67 million people in france x 200 grams is still quite a lot yes, 13,400,000 kg of long lived waste, per year.

I fail to understand your concern for nuclear waste stored safely underground. If it's stored safely underground it's not a danger to us is it? And don't forget some of the waste is from medical usage. Would you want to stop all nuclear medical procedures? And you should stop eating bananas and brazil nuts, a truckload of bananas contains enough radioactivity to set off the import alarms at USA ports and brazil nuts contain radium.

 

[Martin963]

@ Ken - maybe I should have made myself clearer.    When I refer to a "Manhattan Project" what I mean is a global "whatever-it-takes" push to get fusion energy working.    I know some very good brains are already on to it,   but it needs that huge impetus that only a massive "Manhattan" type project could give it,   to bring the time scale down from 20 years to 2.    Just as happened in the 1944 Manhattan Project.  

We agree far more than perhaps you care to admit,   I stated clearly "Yes we need new power stations",   and I hope I made it clear that nuclear was the option that - like you - I believe in.   I made mention of fusion as the ultimate goal,   but made it clear that it's a long way off at current rates of progress.   Perhaps I should have been clearer that I believe that fission is the bridging technology we need.

What worries me - and should worry you - is that recent attempts to build new nuclear fission power stations both in France and Britain have become totally bogged down and are running so over budget that we should all be weeping.    I'm not sure who is responsible for these cluster-f*cks,   I guess it might have something to do with poor contract drafting,   I think back to the eighties when - after the inefficiency and chaos of the  1970s - suddenly things were completed on - or even before - time,   thanks to clever contract writing that rewarded contractors for finishing early and on budget;    I seem to remember,  as an example,  that some of the last tardy segments of the M25 were eventually brought into use early once this happened.    Like you I think nuclear is the answer,   fission in the short term,  fusion in the long,   but I wish I could knock a few heads together to get these stations built.

On another related topic,   someone pointed me to this interesting project,   which if finished on time will probably beat both Hinckley Point and Flammanville for coming on stream.....

https://xlinks.co/morocco-uk-power-project/

[Ken]

I do appreciate the Incredible effort it will take to accomplish the goal of Fusion energy, if  indeed it can! Yes I know on a small scale, using more energy than it produced, it has been accomplished and it only took 30 years!! The Manhattan project, by comparison was easy! They only had to split the atom not control it. A nuclear explosion isn't too complicated actually.

I am annoyed at the delays to new power stations but suspect it is as much political as technical. I don't believe in throwing good money away after bad! I see alternatives as the 'bad' money that is wasted. The cost of wind and solar is very high and doesn't deliver all the is required and isn't  as green as the zealots make out. The cost of nuclear is all very high but does deliver; that's the real difference. 

The Moroccan article was, for me, just another example of 'pie in the sky' green wishful thinking and again not deliverable, if at all, for another eight years. We do, more or less agree on the subject but I simply cannot go down the road of 'alternative power supply'.  Dithering over power stations that have proven to work, to do the job and we have schemes like running an electric cable from Africa to Britain, it sounds like a joke I'm afraid.

[Harnser]

Once complete, the [\Morrocan] project will be capable of supplying 8 percent of Great Britain’s electricity needs.

Really? As much as 8%?

I notice there doesn't seem to be any cost estmates.

And the world's longest subsea high voltage direct current transmission cable is now:-

The UK's National Grid and Denmark's Energinet has begun work on the world's longest subsea power cable. The €2 billion Viking Link project, a 475-mile-long (765 km) cable, is being built in Lincolnshire. It will run between the UK and Denmark in order to share green energy between the two countries.

So, the Morrocan cable link is 3,800 km in length - never been done before at thet length.

The Viking link cable is 765 km in length. at a quoted cost of €2 billion.

3800/765 = 4.96 times the cost of Viking = 2 x 4.96 = €9.93 billion - so you can double that by the time it gets from project to comissioning  say €20 billion, it's the way all projects go.

Hinkley Point C nuclear power station (HPC)
Status	Under construction
Construction began	11 December 2018
Construction cost	£22 billion to £23 billion
Owner(s)	EDF Energy

But we know the nukes work 24/7 - they grind out the power relentlessly, whether the sun is shining or the wind blowing.

Reliable power is what is needed from what is known to work.

 

[Lehaut]

 

[Martin963]

That video has quite an "agenda" hasn't it.    And I didn't really understand the problem flagged up about water - surely the solar and wind systems used in this particular scenario don't need water.....?

That said,  it may well be the case that it won't come to fruition,   I merely flagged it up here as someone had flagged it up to me.   It had indeed struck me that the cost of the cable installation alone would be enormous.    I agree that the nuclear power station build programme here at home is the answer at the moment,    but will Hinckley ever actually be finished?   And why is it costing so much more than envisaged?

Edited February 15, 2022 by Martin963