| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 17:19 - Apr 28 with 1584 views | BloomBlue |
I just had to laugh at my Spainish mate who laughed when Heathrow airport lost power, something about UK 3rd world power supply, hmmmmm this must make Spain's power 5th world. |  | |  |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 17:35 - Apr 28 with 1547 views | Lord_Lucan |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 17:19 - Apr 28 by BloomBlue |
I just had to laugh at my Spainish mate who laughed when Heathrow airport lost power, something about UK 3rd world power supply, hmmmmm this must make Spain's power 5th world. |
As long as it doesn’t come over the border and affect Morocco I couldn’t care less.
🇲🇦 ☀️ 🏖️ |  |
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| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 19:30 - Apr 28 with 1383 views | BanksterDebtSlave |
Cash is King.
Something about complex systems being more fragile. Get used to it. |  |
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| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 20:45 - Apr 28 with 1302 views | DJR |
My son still doesn't have electricity in Malaga. Fortunately, he bought some food earlier today, and 4G is now working, but he is having to preserve his phone's battery life. [Post edited 28 Apr 20:45]
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| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 20:49 - Apr 28 with 1291 views | DJR |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 17:35 - Apr 28 by Lord_Lucan |
As long as it doesn’t come over the border and affect Morocco I couldn’t care less.
🇲🇦 ☀️ 🏖️ |
What could possibly go wrong?
The Moroccan National Electricity Company (ONEE) has connected its grid to Spain via the two existing link lines across the Strait of Gibraltar, after receiving a request from Red Eléctrica Española (REE) to restore service through the interconnection between the two countries, El Pais is reporting. | | | |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 05:29 - Apr 29 with 1056 views | Ryorry |
Blaming it on “extreme temperature variations in Spain causing “anomalous oscillations” in very high-voltage lines” seems odd when BBC TV reported weather conditions there as being moderate, calm and stable. |  |
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| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 06:38 - Apr 29 with 969 views | bournemouthblue |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 05:29 - Apr 29 by Ryorry |
Blaming it on “extreme temperature variations in Spain causing “anomalous oscillations” in very high-voltage lines” seems odd when BBC TV reported weather conditions there as being moderate, calm and stable. |
You'd think it would be a country where temperature can vary a lot more as well, given how hot it can get |  |
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| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 07:49 - Apr 29 with 868 views | BarcaBlue |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 06:38 - Apr 29 by bournemouthblue |
You'd think it would be a country where temperature can vary a lot more as well, given how hot it can get |
I assume it's down to poor infrastructure after a blip caused by who knows what. Nobody really knows yet or is not saying.
I was without light for just 5 hours but my daughter didn't get hers back till 6 this morning, and she's just 2 hours away. Poor girl was coping with a baby and small child, I just had to deal with cold tortilla and the beers didn't even have time to warm up. |  | | |
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| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 09:36 - Apr 29 with 769 views | OldFart71 |
If you like it's just my conspiracy theory. Nothing to do with Spain or Portugal, but the UK. We pay the highest energy costs anywhere. Possibly due to millipede and his fantasy of zero net. But I believe it's a ploy to keep the usage of energy down as we don't have the capacity in this Country. Partly why this lunacy of getting everyone to have an EV won't work as there's neither the capacity or the chargers available and if as what happened in Spain and Portugal happened here nobody would get anywhere. |  | | |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 10:25 - Apr 29 with 731 views | redrickstuhaart |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 09:36 - Apr 29 by OldFart71 |
If you like it's just my conspiracy theory. Nothing to do with Spain or Portugal, but the UK. We pay the highest energy costs anywhere. Possibly due to millipede and his fantasy of zero net. But I believe it's a ploy to keep the usage of energy down as we don't have the capacity in this Country. Partly why this lunacy of getting everyone to have an EV won't work as there's neither the capacity or the chargers available and if as what happened in Spain and Portugal happened here nobody would get anywhere. |
Net zero is quite obviously (1) a very good idea both in respect of climate and energy security; (2) an obligation we agreed with most of the civilised world; (3) a massive opportunity to take the lead in worl technology and generate jobs and wealth.
Just saying. | | | |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 10:50 - Apr 29 with 657 views | blueasfook |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 07:49 - Apr 29 by BarcaBlue |
I assume it's down to poor infrastructure after a blip caused by who knows what. Nobody really knows yet or is not saying.
I was without light for just 5 hours but my daughter didn't get hers back till 6 this morning, and she's just 2 hours away. Poor girl was coping with a baby and small child, I just had to deal with cold tortilla and the beers didn't even have time to warm up. |
What's odd about this outage is how widespread it was. Usually the power network would have resilience and an outage like say a transformer blowing up would be fairly localised and affect only a small area. This seems to be a failure on a national level which suggests something much more catastrophic and fundamental to the power networks operation. |  |
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| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 10:51 - Apr 29 with 642 views | SuperBlue1998 |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 09:36 - Apr 29 by OldFart71 |
If you like it's just my conspiracy theory. Nothing to do with Spain or Portugal, but the UK. We pay the highest energy costs anywhere. Possibly due to millipede and his fantasy of zero net. But I believe it's a ploy to keep the usage of energy down as we don't have the capacity in this Country. Partly why this lunacy of getting everyone to have an EV won't work as there's neither the capacity or the chargers available and if as what happened in Spain and Portugal happened here nobody would get anywhere. |
Sorry but this just fundamentally misunderstands the UK energy sector and renewables.
Renewable energy is far far cheaper and less capital intensive than fossil fuels. However, the price of energy in the UK wholesale spot market (which is where the action is) is set by gas/fossil fuels about 98% of the time.
The obstacle I believe to the expansion of renewables is the profit motive and marketisation of the sector. Renewables are cheaper but the costs are spread differently - more up front - so have to be funded by financial institutions/banks. Because energy prices are so volatile (because they're set by gas and gas is so volatile) banks are less likely to take a risk. The situation is different for fossil fuels because guarantees are returned in a way because gas prices are the fundamental driver.
Another key fact is that companies are not vertically integrated - that is to say a different company retails the energy to that which distributes it to that which generates it. Combined with how spot markets are organised, this is why savings from (far!) cheaper renewables are not passed onto customers.
The argument that net zero/renewables contribute to higher energy costs is a complete fallacy and reveals a total lack of understanding about the sector and how it works | | | |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 10:57 - Apr 29 with 604 views | leitrimblue |
I like to think it's the residents of Canada Real giving Madrid residents a little taste of life in a shanty town |  | | |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 11:14 - Apr 29 with 574 views | SuperKieranMcKenna |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 10:51 - Apr 29 by SuperBlue1998 |
Sorry but this just fundamentally misunderstands the UK energy sector and renewables.
Renewable energy is far far cheaper and less capital intensive than fossil fuels. However, the price of energy in the UK wholesale spot market (which is where the action is) is set by gas/fossil fuels about 98% of the time.
The obstacle I believe to the expansion of renewables is the profit motive and marketisation of the sector. Renewables are cheaper but the costs are spread differently - more up front - so have to be funded by financial institutions/banks. Because energy prices are so volatile (because they're set by gas and gas is so volatile) banks are less likely to take a risk. The situation is different for fossil fuels because guarantees are returned in a way because gas prices are the fundamental driver.
Another key fact is that companies are not vertically integrated - that is to say a different company retails the energy to that which distributes it to that which generates it. Combined with how spot markets are organised, this is why savings from (far!) cheaper renewables are not passed onto customers.
The argument that net zero/renewables contribute to higher energy costs is a complete fallacy and reveals a total lack of understanding about the sector and how it works |
It’s surprising this isn’t more widely known. Which is why Starmer’s promise that GBE will bring down energy cost for consumers is somewhat disingenuous. Until we have mass energy storage capacity we’ll continue to need a base load of gas (or nuclear) so without fundamentally changing the pricing structure we could be driven by the cost of gas even if the majority of energy is from renewables.
I can certainly see why people immediately suspect Russian involvement here, they’ve been linked to a number of attacks on European energy infrastructure since the war. It is of course a key tactic of theirs in Ukraine also (I.e trying to cripple their energy network). | | | |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 11:22 - Apr 29 with 531 views | SuperBlue1998 |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 11:14 - Apr 29 by SuperKieranMcKenna |
It’s surprising this isn’t more widely known. Which is why Starmer’s promise that GBE will bring down energy cost for consumers is somewhat disingenuous. Until we have mass energy storage capacity we’ll continue to need a base load of gas (or nuclear) so without fundamentally changing the pricing structure we could be driven by the cost of gas even if the majority of energy is from renewables.
I can certainly see why people immediately suspect Russian involvement here, they’ve been linked to a number of attacks on European energy infrastructure since the war. It is of course a key tactic of theirs in Ukraine also (I.e trying to cripple their energy network). |
Yes absolutely - and yeah, an important clarification you make about the base load requirements being why gas ends up always setting the price in spot markets | | | |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 11:42 - Apr 29 with 482 views | ArnoldMoorhen |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 11:14 - Apr 29 by SuperKieranMcKenna |
It’s surprising this isn’t more widely known. Which is why Starmer’s promise that GBE will bring down energy cost for consumers is somewhat disingenuous. Until we have mass energy storage capacity we’ll continue to need a base load of gas (or nuclear) so without fundamentally changing the pricing structure we could be driven by the cost of gas even if the majority of energy is from renewables.
I can certainly see why people immediately suspect Russian involvement here, they’ve been linked to a number of attacks on European energy infrastructure since the war. It is of course a key tactic of theirs in Ukraine also (I.e trying to cripple their energy network). |
And Putin promised "chaos and disruption" for all countries who assist Ukraine.
Nobody on TWTD has access to proof that this is the case, of course, but it is entirely rational to put it forward as a possible reason.
The counter-argument is that you don't need to attribute to malice what could be more easily explained by incompetence, but if there was a single point of failure that was readily accessible to a malicious actor, then that also qualifies as incompetence. | | | |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 12:00 - Apr 29 with 457 views | BarcaBlue |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 11:42 - Apr 29 by ArnoldMoorhen |
And Putin promised "chaos and disruption" for all countries who assist Ukraine.
Nobody on TWTD has access to proof that this is the case, of course, but it is entirely rational to put it forward as a possible reason.
The counter-argument is that you don't need to attribute to malice what could be more easily explained by incompetence, but if there was a single point of failure that was readily accessible to a malicious actor, then that also qualifies as incompetence. |
It's a concern that whatever the point of failure was, it's now blindingly obvious what the consequences are. Something that won't have been missed. | | | |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 12:28 - Apr 29 with 416 views | baxterbasics |
They are explaining it as some kind of freak weather phenomenon.
But it does smack of Putin doing his bit to cause chaos and disruption around Europe, as he has been elsewhere.
It's crazy how dependent we are on tech and infrastructure never failing us.
Remember hearing a talk when I worked at BT from one of the research directors about what would happen if just the internet stops working for any length of time. How quickly food runs out, shops empty, transport halted, banks dead. This was in THE NINETIES. Imagine today. |  |
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| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 12:29 - Apr 29 with 414 views | DJR |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 07:49 - Apr 29 by BarcaBlue |
I assume it's down to poor infrastructure after a blip caused by who knows what. Nobody really knows yet or is not saying.
I was without light for just 5 hours but my daughter didn't get hers back till 6 this morning, and she's just 2 hours away. Poor girl was coping with a baby and small child, I just had to deal with cold tortilla and the beers didn't even have time to warm up. |
I didn't catch it all but someone on BBC News said that the grid in this country needs to be balanced to keep it stable, and that their are occasions when renewables have to be switched off and replaced by gas.
This article may go some way to explaining what she was saying, and maybe an oversupply of solar in Spain was a cause, which I think that the person was suggesting.
https://www.ecotricity.co.uk/our-news/2021/the-national-grid-balancing-market-wh
"National Grid needs to keep generation closely matched to consumer demand across the country at all times, down to the nearest few seconds, to keep the grid stable.
Too little electricity means people will suffer power shortages or blackouts.
Too much electricity destabilises the grid because the system frequency starts to rise - generators start to trip if it deviates too far from the standard 50Hz that we’re all used
to." [Post edited 29 Apr 12:32]
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| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 12:44 - Apr 29 with 381 views | BarcaBlue |
| The purge has started in Spain & Portugal on 12:29 - Apr 29 by DJR |
I didn't catch it all but someone on BBC News said that the grid in this country needs to be balanced to keep it stable, and that their are occasions when renewables have to be switched off and replaced by gas.
This article may go some way to explaining what she was saying, and maybe an oversupply of solar in Spain was a cause, which I think that the person was suggesting.
https://www.ecotricity.co.uk/our-news/2021/the-national-grid-balancing-market-wh
"National Grid needs to keep generation closely matched to consumer demand across the country at all times, down to the nearest few seconds, to keep the grid stable.
Too little electricity means people will suffer power shortages or blackouts.
Too much electricity destabilises the grid because the system frequency starts to rise - generators start to trip if it deviates too far from the standard 50Hz that we’re all used
to." [Post edited 29 Apr 12:32]
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That's been reported here too. Showing a graph where demand and supply is always in near unison til suddenly it fell off a cliff at lunchtime yesterday.
As somebody who doesn't have any deeper understanding this seems incredibly precarious. Every Spanish village, town and city are a spaghetti of cables and boxes so it"s no real surprise that a balancing act of energy provision has an inherrent weak spot. | | | |
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