The Lemon Fool

I scanned back through the threads and we don't seem to have one for wind snippets, so here is one

European Grid Marks Highest Percentage of Wind Ever

European wind energy broke a new record on Saturday, 28 October, with 24.6% of the EU’s electricity demand powered by wind – highest percentage ever recorded, WindEurope reported. Offshore wind turbines accounted for 2.8% of this share, while those on land met 21.8% of EU’s electricity demand.

Leading in wind energy generation on Saturday was Denmark, where wind represented 109% of its electricity demand, followed by and 61% in Germany...

When it comes to the expansion of wind energy, Europe saw 6.1GW of new capacity installed in the first half of 2017. ...At the end of 2016, Europe had an installed offshore wind capacity of 12.6GW....., Europe has the potential of reaching a total of 70GW of installed offshore wind energy by 2030.

etc http://www.offshorewind.biz/2017/11/01/ ... 02&uid=718

dspp wrote:I scanned back through the threads and we don't seem to have one for wind snippets, so here is one

European Grid Marks Highest Percentage of Wind Ever

European wind energy broke a new record on Saturday, 28 October, with 24.6% of the EU’s electricity demand powered by wind – highest percentage ever recorded, WindEurope reported. Offshore wind turbines accounted for 2.8% of this share, while those on land met 21.8% of EU’s electricity demand.

Leading in wind energy generation on Saturday was Denmark, where wind represented 109% of its electricity demand, followed by and 61% in Germany...

When it comes to the expansion of wind energy, Europe saw 6.1GW of new capacity installed in the first half of 2017. ...At the end of 2016, Europe had an installed offshore wind capacity of 12.6GW....., Europe has the potential of reaching a total of 70GW of installed offshore wind energy by 2030.

etc http://www.offshorewind.biz/2017/11/01/ ... 02&uid=718

As of this moment, in the UK, wind is providing 1.2% of demand, and CCGT 56%, even coal 11% (from Gridwatch). Good we have fossil fuels as a back up.
Why is the Govt thrashing the supply cos when their own recent study* showed that the high bills were due to going green, and that lowering standard tariffs would come at the cost of increased prices for best deals.

*Couldn't find that very recent academic study of the UK power market on Google. Has anybody got a link. I seem to be finding it increasingly difficult to find what I want on search engines these days - has there been a change? I put in 2017 as a search element, and up come reports from 20 years ago. Search engines should not be doing that, I would have thought.

We should remember this is a one day figure and there was a huge storm across europe. Our daughter and husband were travelling through it and had tales to tell. If the economic cost of the storm damage and interruption to business are calculated and included this "record achievement" would result in a negative economic result.

Cornytiv

"Phillip-Davies states that it is time the UK raises its offshore wind ambition, as the current goal of adding 1-2GW per year during the 2020s means it could become the technology with the largest installed capacity.

“The sector has responded, and an Offshore Wind Sector Deal will be finalised later this year setting out the industry’s substantial commitments to the Industrial Strategy. The question now is whether 30GW by 2030 is ambitious enough,” said SSE’s Chief Executive."
https://www.offshorewind.biz/2019/01/24 ... -ambition/


and an updated beginners guide to offshore wind
https://www.thecrownestate.co.uk/media/ ... m-2019.pdf

Nimrod103 wrote:
As of this moment, in the UK, wind is providing 1.2% of demand, and CCGT 56%, even coal 11% (from Gridwatch). Good we have fossil fuels as a back up.

Couple of links to real-time GridWatch data, for anyone interested (currently, wind is providing around 25% of UK demand) -

http://gridwatch.co.uk/

https://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk/

Some UK data for 3.30pm (Friday 25th Jan 2019) -



Cheers,

Itsallaguess

So CCGT means a Combined Cycle with gas combined with a steam turbine, but how do you generate the steam? Still it is all very interesting although the fact is that is costing all a lot I am sure.

Dod

Just answered my own question. Very clever. IAAG thanks for the link. I find the info quite fascinating if you go to the actual webpage.

Dod

Dod101 wrote:So CCGT means a Combined Cycle with gas combined with a steam turbine, but how do you generate the steam? Still it is all very interesting although the fact is that is costing all a lot I am sure.

Dod

They have a waste heat boiler on the gas turbine exhaust, which drives the steam turbine.

TJH

For the last 20-30 years the prevailing view amongst major Western traditional engineering companies was that a) wind turbines were too small to be really useful, and b) they could climb on the train once the products and industry had reached scale and c) in the meantime let the smallfry take all the risk whilst they chuckled on the sidelines. Siemens jumped wholeheartedly on the train at one point, GE also, UTC dabbled & quit (Clipper). Over the last 15-years there has been a lot of Chinese/Asian interest and they are now very significant players*.

I have been thinking for some time that the opportunity to jump on the train was passing, and an announcement** by Hitachi that they were pulling out and instead becoming a sales agent for Enercon suggests I am correct. A previous indicator was when MHI teamed with Vestas as the capital demands of developing the 10MW class towards the 20MW class became too great for either on its own. It would appear that the acquisition cost to enter at scale is now too great for even the largest incumbent trad engineers. If this hypothesis is correct, what that means is that the opportunity for legacy fossil-fuel engineering companies to step neatly across has passed. Like tobacco & oil/gas they may have very profitable declines, but are now facing eventual extinction if they don't already have their foot firmly on the wind pathway.

regards, dspp


*
https://www.bizvibe.com/blog/top-10-win ... ers-world/
https://www.windpowermonthly.com/articl ... akers-2017

**
https://www.offshorewind.biz/2019/01/28 ... roduction/

FB,
I think GE and Siemens made the right move at the right time for the right reasons. The others missed the train. GE then broke their company, but the wind bit is good. How I can invest in renewables in a sensible way is still a mystery to me.
regards,
dspp

I have had a teensy weensy bit of personal professional exposure to Drax's biomass stream. I wouldn't go there.

Let's face it Drax had to spend £700m on Iberdrola's cast-offs simply to remain in-play as a generator with perhaps a future. If Drax survives and prospers it will be because of political reasons (too-big-to-fail) rather than for serious long term pathway reasons. I don't like putting my investments too close to one country's politics.

I agree with NG, but that's not a way to invest in renewables. It is a way to invest in energy whilst remaining agnostic. What I am seeking is a sensible way that I can invest in renewables without either a) taking a morality haircut, or b) getting creamed by the insiders running many of the conduits for their own benefit, or c) worse still, both.

regards, dspp

I don't know enough about the subject to make judgements on what stocks to purchase directly, so I get my exposure to wind (and solar) through John Laing Environmental Assets investment trust (JLEN):

https://www.hl.co.uk/shares/shares-sear ... -group-npv

Actually, EGL (Econ Global Utilities trust) also gives some exposure, through a number of overseas energy companies, but also includes NG in the UK:

https://www.hl.co.uk/shares/shares-sear ... ructure-1p

INRG may be of interest

E.ON is set to decommission the two-turbine Blyth offshore wind project, the first wind farm built in UK waters.

According to the company’s Offshore Technical Specialist, Patrick Rainey, wind farms usually have a lifespan of 20-25 years and Blyth has reached the end of its time.... The 4MW project features two 2MW turbines commissioned in December 2000, which were at that time the most powerful units, E.ON said.

https://www.offshorewind.biz/2019/03/12 ... t-retires/

Gosh I am getting old. And if I recall correctly we started discussing the project in the early 1990s. There's been a heck of a lot of progress since then.

regards, dspp

The work is expected to begin in April and take place for some four to six weeks off the Northumberland coast, E.ON said.

Certainly sounds easier than oil and gas decommissioning.

StepOne

StepOne wrote:

The work is expected to begin in April and take place for some four to six weeks off the Northumberland coast, E.ON said.

Certainly sounds easier than oil and gas decommissioning.

StepOne

==================================

indeed.

and very very very very ................................much easier than nuclear .....

dspp wrote:What I am seeking is a sensible way that I can invest in renewables without either a) taking a morality haircut, or b) getting creamed by the insiders running many of the conduits for their own benefit, or c) worse still, both.

regards, dspp

Well I use to own shares in Vestus. I still own SSE. My original investment was in Scottish Hydropower that became part of SSE.I sold Vestus and am seriously considering disposing of SSE.

Investing in renewables is easy, but making money at it less so. IF you are happy to invest in fixed interest then debentures are available in solar farms.

Investing in wind however is problematic. Siemens and GE do other things, in addition to wind. Bosch do wind stuff, but it's a small part of their operations. Vestus is a pure play, but with limited resources for R&D. BP use to invest as did Shell. Indeed Shell are investing in electricity and EV infrastructure, but it's a tiny part of what they do. There are picks and shovels companies, but they too are not a pure play.

Then there is the tiny risky blue sky stuff. Tidal lagoons. Tidal surge generators. Storage technologies. I'm not sure that I'd describe investing in them as taking a morality haircut, but I would describe it as BRAVE, then suck my teeth in a way that indicated that by brave I mean reckless.

The load factors for offshore wind increased by 1.2 percentage points, from 38.9% to 40.1%,

These are amazing load factors that are coming in from offshore wind.

https://www.offshorewind.biz/2019/03/28 ... ecords-uk/

dspp wrote:The load factors for offshore wind increased by 1.2 percentage points, from 38.9% to 40.1%,

These are amazing load factors that are coming in from offshore wind.

https://www.offshorewind.biz/2019/03/28 ... ecords-uk/

I read in Wikipedia that the 'load' factor is called 'capacity' factor, but I presume they are the same thing. Wikipedia says that Horns Rev 2 in Denmark is managing an average of 47.7%, which may be about the maximum for northern Europe. This is also deduced for the UK by eyeballing the graphs in Gridwatch, which shows that for March, which is invariably a windy month, the wind turbine contribution was high about 50% of the time, and low the rest - not much middling generation. Looking over last year's plot, the Late Winter/Early Spring and Autumn are windy but the rest of the year, not so much. I would tentatively suggest that for capacity factors, this is as good as it gets.