| Ridiculous from the Tories 10:23 - Jan 30 with 6867 views | StokieBlue |
Building the largest gas power station in Europe is not the way to show the world we are serious about cutting emissions. Sure it's better than coal but given the wealth of renewables around the UK it seems the wrong direction to me.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jan/30/uk-sued-for-approving-europe
"The plant, being developed by Drax in north Yorkshire, would become the biggest gas power station in Europe and could produce 75% of the UK’s power sector emissions when fully operational"
We need a nationalised renewable energy company which will design, build and install solutions, providing jobs and keeping money inside the UK.
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| Avatar - IC410 - Tadpoles Nebula |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 15:20 - Jan 30 with 2393 views | GeoffSentence |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 14:25 - Jan 30 by r2d2 |
If you cant get the USA, China and India on board over climate change, then there really is no point in worrying, because nothing will change. |
And how do you get them onboard? One way might be to lead by example. |  |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 15:49 - Jan 30 with 2379 views | eireblue |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 13:58 - Jan 30 by Tangledupin_Blue |
We should get some gigantic electric fans and put one in front of each wind turbine for when the weather is calm. |
That’s definitely one idea.
Another which I think is quite good, is the converse of we need power when the wind isn’t blowing.
Wind turbines use excess energy to move water, and then that water is used when it is less windy.
I think there maybe or will be, wind turbines that sort of do that all together.
The UK as an Island nation, just needs to find a bit of space with some water nearby. |  | | |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 15:56 - Jan 30 with 2370 views | JakeITFC |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 14:41 - Jan 30 by StokieBlue |
How?
The articles I've read have said they could add carbon capture in the future but that's carbon neutral at best.
Unless the plan is to buy gas from abroad and an unknown cost and offset the emissions with some trees.
There is keeping the lights which I agree with and then there is building the biggest gas power station in Europe alongside an existing number of projects.
SB |
The carbon captured by the BECCS system from biomass generation (which is a zero carbon form of generation due to the renewable nature of biomass) is sufficient to offset the remaining operations in the Drax estate. |  | | |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 18:24 - Jan 30 with 2338 views | Guthrum |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 15:49 - Jan 30 by eireblue |
That’s definitely one idea.
Another which I think is quite good, is the converse of we need power when the wind isn’t blowing.
Wind turbines use excess energy to move water, and then that water is used when it is less windy.
I think there maybe or will be, wind turbines that sort of do that all together.
The UK as an Island nation, just needs to find a bit of space with some water nearby. |
There are schemes whch do precisely that (mainly in Wales and Scotland, another new one is being built near Fort Willam). However, it requires the right location, namely a place where you can put a fair-sized reservoir at considerable altitude to pump the water up into.
Not only are those options fairly limited, they are expensive to build and require a lot of extra infrastructure if in very remote places. |  |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 00:01 - Jan 31 with 2302 views | Ryorry |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 10:38 - Jan 30 by Guthrum |
The biggest problem with renewables currently is intermittency. When the wind doesn't blow or the sun shine, little or no power flows into the system.
Unless and until we have large-scale, effective energy storage systems capable of taking up the slack at short notice, we have to rely on more traditional methods to bridge the gaps. There is no choice on this matter. |
I thought the new generation solar panels capture nearly as much energy when it's cloudy but bright as when there's full sun? |  |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 07:49 - Jan 31 with 2277 views | JakeITFC |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 00:01 - Jan 31 by Ryorry |
I thought the new generation solar panels capture nearly as much energy when it's cloudy but bright as when there's full sun? |
Even if true, that still leaves ~8-16 hours a day of no solar generation (depending on the time of year).
Guthrum is right that grid scale storage is a way to solve this, but at the moment this is neither economically viable or able to provide resiliency for more than an hour or two. Traditional baseload, spinning plant generation has a number of benefits aside from just keeping the lights on and so if you get behind carbon capture as a technology, it is a really good way of keeping the system balanced. | | | |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 08:09 - Jan 31 with 2262 views | Leaky |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 10:38 - Jan 30 by Guthrum |
The biggest problem with renewables currently is intermittency. When the wind doesn't blow or the sun shine, little or no power flows into the system.
Unless and until we have large-scale, effective energy storage systems capable of taking up the slack at short notice, we have to rely on more traditional methods to bridge the gaps. There is no choice on this matter. |
I can never see why as an island race we don't harness the power of the sea, after all we get two tides a day |  | | |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 09:50 - Jan 31 with 2230 views | r2d2 |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 15:20 - Jan 30 by GeoffSentence |
And how do you get them onboard? One way might be to lead by example. |
I dont think a country whos output is about 1.1% of the worlds pollution is going to be any example to them. Tgey simply arnt interested. |  | | |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 09:58 - Jan 31 with 2224 views | StokieBlue |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 08:09 - Jan 31 by Leaky |
I can never see why as an island race we don't harness the power of the sea, after all we get two tides a day |
The Severn barrage should have been built.
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| Avatar - IC410 - Tadpoles Nebula |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 09:59 - Jan 31 with 2222 views | StokieBlue |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 07:49 - Jan 31 by JakeITFC |
Even if true, that still leaves ~8-16 hours a day of no solar generation (depending on the time of year).
Guthrum is right that grid scale storage is a way to solve this, but at the moment this is neither economically viable or able to provide resiliency for more than an hour or two. Traditional baseload, spinning plant generation has a number of benefits aside from just keeping the lights on and so if you get behind carbon capture as a technology, it is a really good way of keeping the system balanced. |
I agree we need to keep the lights on but carbon capture isn't really a long term solution. Sure it's neutral but it's still creating carbon and that has to be sequestered somewhere.
Certainly usable as a bridging option though.
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| Avatar - IC410 - Tadpoles Nebula |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 10:10 - Jan 31 with 2214 views | Leaky |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 09:58 - Jan 31 by StokieBlue |
The Severn barrage should have been built.
SB |
I was under the impression there was some talk of doing something similar at Swansea can't remember the details though | | | |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 10:29 - Jan 31 with 2207 views | Swansea_Blue |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 10:10 - Jan 31 by Leaky |
I was under the impression there was some talk of doing something similar at Swansea can't remember the details though |
Swansea tidal lagoon. Shelved because it wasn't seen as good value for money (there were a few 'interesting' stories around the developers, so I can believe the reason given). Good idea in principle though. Big, rock faced lagoon that fills up with the rising tide and then is let out through turbines when the tide falls. They had plans for a watersports centre, aquaculture (shellfish) and tourism attractions, like a path around the lagoon, visitor and education centre.
It was a hot potato environmentally as well - the bay has a SSSI dunes nearby that would have been cut off, and there were concerns about silting up in the main part of Swansea Bay.
I was torn on it. The development would have been a massive boost to the regional and an interesting addition to Swansea, which needs more investment. But the environmental issues were an obvious concern.
It may still go ahead; last I heard they were looking at revisiting the business model (although I haven't heard anything for a while). [Post edited 31 Jan 2020 10:33]
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 10:43 - Jan 31 with 2199 views | Ryorry |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 08:09 - Jan 31 by Leaky |
I can never see why as an island race we don't harness the power of the sea, after all we get two tides a day |
Quite. And wave power too. Working models for energy capture from both were extant in Orkney (Institute of Oceanography or similar, name now changed) in early 90s but no investment in R&D forthcoming. Can't think why ...* 
*Tory vested interests in oil & gas industries ... | |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 11:20 - Jan 31 with 2178 views | Tangledupin_Blue |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 09:50 - Jan 31 by r2d2 |
I dont think a country whos output is about 1.1% of the worlds pollution is going to be any example to them. Tgey simply arnt interested. |
Perhaps we should form an alliance with our neighbouring industrialised countries. Collectively we'd have more clout in standing up to the polluting giants. We could call ourselves 'European Union' or something similar. |  |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 11:31 - Jan 31 with 2168 views | Swansea_Blue |
It seems we're ploughing ahead with promoting more fossil fuel projects overseas too. I don't know much of the background, but there was a question on it in the HoP recently (which the govt tried to deflect).
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 11:38 - Jan 31 with 2157 views | footers |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 10:29 - Jan 31 by Swansea_Blue |
Swansea tidal lagoon. Shelved because it wasn't seen as good value for money (there were a few 'interesting' stories around the developers, so I can believe the reason given). Good idea in principle though. Big, rock faced lagoon that fills up with the rising tide and then is let out through turbines when the tide falls. They had plans for a watersports centre, aquaculture (shellfish) and tourism attractions, like a path around the lagoon, visitor and education centre.
It was a hot potato environmentally as well - the bay has a SSSI dunes nearby that would have been cut off, and there were concerns about silting up in the main part of Swansea Bay.
I was torn on it. The development would have been a massive boost to the regional and an interesting addition to Swansea, which needs more investment. But the environmental issues were an obvious concern.
It may still go ahead; last I heard they were looking at revisiting the business model (although I haven't heard anything for a while). [Post edited 31 Jan 2020 10:33]
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The chap doing that is out looking for investment from some, er, equally 'interesting' sources as we speak. I doubt it'll ever happen though. |  |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 13:04 - Jan 31 with 2122 views | jeera |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 10:53 - Jan 30 by chicoazul |
Well that's just it, people "cite" Scandanavia, but China Mexico Brazil Indonesia and India arent exactly racing to be Scandanavian. It's just talk. Totally pointless, just like us lecturing 2bn people about not to use coal.
This is the article I read; https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-51233444 |
But India is slowly waking up and being forced to face its pollution problems.
Parts of some cities are not dissimilar to how London's pea soupers were only a few decades ago and although we've had our revolutions, some of the places you mention haven't yet. It's coming but there's a lot of catching up to do.
So that's not to say we should stop and wait for them to play catch-up.
Steps began here with outlawing stubble burning. It now seems a bizarre thing from the past to imagine field upon field burning and choking the environment but it wasn't long ago it was the norm here. They still do it. Although insecticides...
Funding is short though and not helped by the amount of money spent on ridiculous projects such as these:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/31/world/asia/india-worlds-tallest-statue.html |  |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 13:21 - Jan 31 with 2109 views | r2d2 |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 11:20 - Jan 31 by Tangledupin_Blue |
Perhaps we should form an alliance with our neighbouring industrialised countries. Collectively we'd have more clout in standing up to the polluting giants. We could call ourselves 'European Union' or something similar. |
You are bonkers mate | | | |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 15:42 - Jan 31 with 2071 views | Radlett_blue |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 13:04 - Jan 31 by jeera |
But India is slowly waking up and being forced to face its pollution problems.
Parts of some cities are not dissimilar to how London's pea soupers were only a few decades ago and although we've had our revolutions, some of the places you mention haven't yet. It's coming but there's a lot of catching up to do.
So that's not to say we should stop and wait for them to play catch-up.
Steps began here with outlawing stubble burning. It now seems a bizarre thing from the past to imagine field upon field burning and choking the environment but it wasn't long ago it was the norm here. They still do it. Although insecticides...
Funding is short though and not helped by the amount of money spent on ridiculous projects such as these:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/31/world/asia/india-worlds-tallest-statue.html |
For it to be effective, any response to climate change needs to be global & co-ordinated, which is a near impossible ask. While every little counts - and I have long done my best to avoid single use plastics - without a major buy-in by the biggest polluters, it's unlikely to be effective. |  |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 12:21 - Feb 19 with 1872 views | StokieBlue |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 15:56 - Jan 30 by JakeITFC |
The carbon captured by the BECCS system from biomass generation (which is a zero carbon form of generation due to the renewable nature of biomass) is sufficient to offset the remaining operations in the Drax estate. |
Afternoon Jake.
Thought you might be interested in this article, it certainly goes against your view on the DRAX plant:
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/drax-carbon-neutral-plan
Any thoughts?
You specifically say the BECCS system was sufficent to offset all the other emissions on site but the article says it only offsets 1000 of 40000 tonnes each day?
SB | |
| Avatar - IC410 - Tadpoles Nebula |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 12:49 - Feb 19 with 1856 views | NthQldITFC |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 15:56 - Jan 30 by JakeITFC |
The carbon captured by the BECCS system from biomass generation (which is a zero carbon form of generation due to the renewable nature of biomass) is sufficient to offset the remaining operations in the Drax estate. |
I haven't seen any figures lately, so I am quite prepared to have my mind changed on this, but I can't see how large scale biomass generation makes any sense at all. Do you have any neutral information sources I can look at, that consider land use and yield, habitat destruction, transport of fuel to combustion point etc.? |  |
| # WE ARE STEALING THE FUTURE FROM OUR CHILDREN --- WE MUST CHANGE COURSE # | | Poll: | It's driving me nuts |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 13:05 - Feb 19 with 1834 views | JakeITFC |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 12:21 - Feb 19 by StokieBlue |
Afternoon Jake.
Thought you might be interested in this article, it certainly goes against your view on the DRAX plant:
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/drax-carbon-neutral-plan
Any thoughts?
You specifically say the BECCS system was sufficent to offset all the other emissions on site but the article says it only offsets 1000 of 40000 tonnes each day?
SB |
Again, I'm reluctant to get too involved in this but I would say that there isn't much new in that article. Happy to chat on PM if you'd like to.
On the BECCS point, I meant once it's fully operational, not today. | | | |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 13:26 - Feb 19 with 1827 views | sotd78 |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 10:43 - Jan 30 by StokieBlue |
Indeed.
Hence I cited nuclear for baseline energy and renewables for intermittent. It's the only viable low-carbon solution we have.
Huge new gas plants don't need to be part of the equation.
SB |
Never stick all the eggs in one basket. |  |
| Blue shirts/white shorts - sotd78 |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 13:36 - Feb 19 with 1816 views | StokieBlue |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 13:26 - Feb 19 by sotd78 |
Never stick all the eggs in one basket. |
A proverb which really doesn't apply to a distributed network.
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| Avatar - IC410 - Tadpoles Nebula |
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| Ridiculous from the Tories on 15:50 - Feb 19 with 1776 views | Clapham_Junction |
| Ridiculous from the Tories on 12:49 - Feb 19 by NthQldITFC |
I haven't seen any figures lately, so I am quite prepared to have my mind changed on this, but I can't see how large scale biomass generation makes any sense at all. Do you have any neutral information sources I can look at, that consider land use and yield, habitat destruction, transport of fuel to combustion point etc.? |
It makes more sense in some countries like Sweden and Latvia that are not very densely populated and have lots of local forests, and where they don't waste the heat generated in the combustion process (i.e. it's used for district heating).
The UK is not one of those places though. |  | | |
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