Energy use and economic activity

[Nimrod103]

As an aside to a discussion on another thread about energy use in the UK, I glanced at Gridwatch just now, and a surprising thing stood out.
Electricity production (including imports) this year to date, shows it to be significantly lower, compared to this point last year. In Spring and Summer last year we were usually topping about 30 Gw, but so far this Spring and Summer we are averaging about 25-26 Gw. Any suggestions why this might be? Is economic output collapsing? Are high energy prices leading to consumers economizing on a big scale? Or is British industry taking the hit?

[BullDog]

Yes I have noticed this too. Sad thing but I regularly check the grid statistics.

[Dod101]

As an aside to a discussion on another thread about energy use in the UK, I glanced at Gridwatch just now, and a surprising thing stood out.
Electricity production (including imports) this year to date, shows it to be significantly lower, compared to this point last year. In Spring and Summer last year we were usually topping about 30 Gw, but so far this Spring and Summer we are averaging about 25-26 Gw. Any suggestions why this might be? Is economic output collapsing? Are high energy prices leading to consumers economizing on a big scale? Or is British industry taking the hit?

Quite likely that a combination of very high electricity prices and slower economic activity is leading us to a logical outcome, using less. That was the idea was it not? I know that on a personal level my electricity usage is much lower than it was.

Dod

[Tedx]

I think I posted this here a couple of weeks ago..... From Trading Economics

Domestically, the UK's National Gas Transmission projects a decline in natural gas demand to 33.25 billion cubic meters during the summer, compared to 42.08 billion cubic meters in the same period of 2022.

A near 21% decrease

More solar (including home & business solar) plus wind production coming on stream coupled with a cost related reduction in use, probably. Everyone I know has reduced their usage. My total energy consuption has gone down by 16% (from quite a low base) compared to the first 5 months of 2021 (and 2020 as well), mainly due to active energy saving including adding insulation. I suspect those that were much more keen to crank up the heating have seen much bigger falls.

Bloomberg reported recently that the National Grid have said that this coming winter should be easier to get through for the UK due to the addtional renewable capacity coming onstream in recent times.

[BullDog]

I think I posted this here a couple of weeks ago..... From Trading Economics

Domestically, the UK's National Gas Transmission projects a decline in natural gas demand to 33.25 billion cubic meters during the summer, compared to 42.08 billion cubic meters in the same period of 2022.

A near 21% decrease

More solar (including home & business solar) plus wind production coming on stream coupled with a cost related reduction in use, probably. Everyone I know has reduced their usage. My total energy consuption has gone down by 16% (from quite a low base) comped to the first 5 months of 2021 and 2020. I suspect thos that were much more keen to crank up the heating have seen much bigger falls.

Bloomberg reported recently that the National Grid have said that this coming winter should be easier to get through for the UK due to the addtional renewable capacity coming onstream in recent times.

Good luck with that when there's a high pressure weather system anchored across the UK. With Arctic-ish January temperatures, no wind or sun to speak of. And our EU friends are sure to keep sending us exported power. Aren't they? We presently survive without power cuts due to simple good luck with the winter weather. It's just a matter of time before we have bad weather induced power outages.

[Tedx]

I think I posted this here a couple of weeks ago..... From Trading Economics

Domestically, the UK's National Gas Transmission projects a decline in natural gas demand to 33.25 billion cubic meters during the summer, compared to 42.08 billion cubic meters in the same period of 2022.

A near 21% decrease

More solar (including home & business solar) plus wind production coming on stream coupled with a cost related reduction in use, probably. Everyone I know has reduced their usage. My total energy consuption has gone down by 16% (from quite a low base) comped to the first 5 months of 2021 and 2020. I suspect thos that were much more keen to crank up the heating have seen much bigger falls.

Bloomberg reported recently that the National Grid have said that this coming winter should be easier to get through for the UK due to the addtional renewable capacity coming onstream in recent times.

Good luck with that when there's a high pressure weather system anchored across the UK. With Arctic-ish January temperatures, no wind or sun to speak of. And our EU friends are sure to keep sending us exported power. Aren't they? We presently survive without power cuts due to simple good luck with the winter weather. It's just a matter of time before we have bad weather induced power outages.

Well yes, it's not an ideal situation. And lets not forget, the UK was a net energy exporter last year (according to Bloomberg), so they buy from us too.

But whats the alternative? Nukes take decades to build, coal is dirty and those two, along with gas rely on other countries to supply us with the fuel. In the short to medium term we need more gas storage while we build the renewable solutions.

[BullDog]

Good luck with that when there's a high pressure weather system anchored across the UK. With Arctic-ish January temperatures, no wind or sun to speak of. And our EU friends are sure to keep sending us exported power. Aren't they? We presently survive without power cuts due to simple good luck with the winter weather. It's just a matter of time before we have bad weather induced power outages.

Well yes, it's not an ideal situation. And lets not forget, the UK was a net energy exporter last year (according to Bloomberg), so they buy from us too.

But whats the alternative? Nukes take decades to build, coal is dirty and those two, along with gas rely on other countries to supply us with the fuel. In the short to medium term we need more gas storage while we build the renewable solutions.

We need far more grid scale energy storage. We can't continue to build more and more renewables (well we can, actually but it's arguably already too much without grid scale storage) without massive investment in grid scale energy storage. And I don't mean one to two hour battery arrays. I mean multi gigawatt energy storages. Without massive energy storage being built, we cannot decommission the gas fired CCGT fleet.

Short term, yes, I agree more gas storage is required. Probably being repurposed longer term for hydrogen storage. Problem is, even now, very few people are talking about energy storage. Everyone's focusing just on generation.

[servodude]

Well yes, it's not an ideal situation. And lets not forget, the UK was a net energy exporter last year (according to Bloomberg), so they buy from us too.

But whats the alternative? Nukes take decades to build, coal is dirty and those two, along with gas rely on other countries to supply us with the fuel. In the short to medium term we need more gas storage while we build the renewable solutions.

We need far more grid scale energy storage. We can't continue to build more and more renewables (well we can, actually but it's arguably already too much without grid scale storage) without massive investment in grid scale energy storage. And I don't mean one to two hour battery arrays. I mean multi gigawatt energy storages. Without massive energy storage being built, we cannot decommission the gas fired CCGT fleet.

Short term, yes, I agree more gas storage is required. Probably being repurposed longer term for hydrogen storage. Problem is, even now, very few people are talking about energy storage. Everyone's focusing just on generation.

If doesn't need to be grid scale in a monolithic sense
- there's arguably better arguments for distributed battery storage at a building level (in that the solutions already exist, can be easy enough to install and don't need new pylons put anywhere)
With enough of them out there the base line demand would quickly fall off
- it's just not obviously in anyones financial interest to do so

[BullDog]

We need far more grid scale energy storage. We can't continue to build more and more renewables (well we can, actually but it's arguably already too much without grid scale storage) without massive investment in grid scale energy storage. And I don't mean one to two hour battery arrays. I mean multi gigawatt energy storages. Without massive energy storage being built, we cannot decommission the gas fired CCGT fleet.

Short term, yes, I agree more gas storage is required. Probably being repurposed longer term for hydrogen storage. Problem is, even now, very few people are talking about energy storage. Everyone's focusing just on generation.

If doesn't need to be grid scale in a monolithic sense
- there's arguably better arguments for distributed battery storage at a building level (in that the solutions already exist, can be easy enough to install and don't need new pylons put anywhere)
With enough of them out there the base line demand would quickly fall off
- it's just not obviously in anyones financial interest to do so

Doesn't matter so much how multiple gigwatt weeks of storage is constructed. Just that it needs to exist.

As has already been said, UK grid demand recently hasn't been that high. Wind energy has been low for a couple of weeks. Some CCGT plant on summer shutdowns and unavailable. Solar generation obviously zero at night and curtailed due to higher than normal panel temperatures in the day. Importing what we can on the interconnectors.

Result? Getting close to running out of available generation.

The current answer last week has been to fire up a 50+ year old coal fired unit at Drax. Very soon we won't be able to do that even if we want to. The very last coal units in the UK are being decommissioned.

Coal fired generation shouldn't be happening. But it is. Because nobody has thought about energy storage on anything like the scale needed.

[Dicky99]

As an aside to a discussion on another thread about energy use in the UK, I glanced at Gridwatch just now, and a surprising thing stood out.
Electricity production (including imports) this year to date, shows it to be significantly lower, compared to this point last year. In Spring and Summer last year we were usually topping about 30 Gw, but so far this Spring and Summer we are averaging about 25-26 Gw. Any suggestions why this might be? Is economic output collapsing? Are high energy prices leading to consumers economizing on a big scale? Or is British industry taking the hit?

Shirking from home most likely.

[servodude]

If doesn't need to be grid scale in a monolithic sense
- there's arguably better arguments for distributed battery storage at a building level (in that the solutions already exist, can be easy enough to install and don't need new pylons put anywhere)
With enough of them out there the base line demand would quickly fall off
- it's just not obviously in anyones financial interest to do so

Doesn't matter so much how multiple gigwatt weeks of storage is constructed. Just that it needs to exist.

As has already been said, UK grid demand recently hasn't been that high. Wind energy has been low for a couple of weeks. Some CCGT plant on summer shutdowns and unavailable. Solar generation obviously zero at night and curtailed due to higher than normal panel temperatures in the day. Importing what we can on the interconnectors.

Result? Getting close to running out of available generation.

The current answer last week has been to fire up a 50+ year old coal fired unit at Drax. Very soon we won't be able to do that even if we want to. The very last coal units in the UK are being decommissioned.

Coal fired generation shouldn't be happening. But it is. Because nobody has thought about energy storage on anything like the scale needed.

Plenty of folk have thought about it but they seem to fixate on gigabattery scale projects rather than something more sensible (and I can see why given the way the finances and competing interests within the system work )
Seems slightly ironic given even when we used coal for heating houses we stored it locally rather than taking it from the pit every day
even just 5 hrs worth of storage would change the game wrt renewables completely

-sd

[Urbandreamer]

We need far more grid scale energy storage. We can't continue to build more and more renewables (well we can, actually but it's arguably already too much without grid scale storage) without massive investment in grid scale energy storage.

Arguably and logically you are wrong. In theory we could build enough to supply 10 times the maximum demand, to ensure supply during low wind and cloudy days. We would have to dump or sell that electricy during normal weather and find some way to ensure finance and profits, but it would be possible. By the way there currently exists counties that use 100% renewable energy and more that use in excess of 90%.

Of course this assumes a mad idea of never using gas or coal. As has been noted on another thread, we do still use coal as needed. A better alternative, waiting for mythical days of electricity storage, is to find ways to reduce fossil fuel reliance when alternatives are available, but finance them to be used when the wind drops.

[Urbandreamer]

Oh, by the way, and back on topic.

A web search will through up multiple links explaining the relationship between abundant energy and wealth/strong economies.

We don't want to USE less energy, we want to waste less energy. This is particularly important when you consider the trade off in producing it.

Energy has to be cheap enough that it is profitable to use it. If it is not, then it won't be used to produce good's.