Dials and graphs

odaeio · Post by **odaeio** » 24 Mar 2013, 08:52

That wind looks dodgy to me, can it be that the wind just suddenly started to blow like crazy - more than ever before - and has not let up for two days now??? Nah, something not quite right here, or did we suddenly "commission" a few dozen new wind farms for the first time on Friday? If we have had a constant 5 gw available from wind in the past, why haven't we been using it, rather than coal/gas/buying it in?

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 24 Mar 2013, 08:56

Ok so it's first thing on a Sunday morning and it's windy but for the last few hours the UK has been getting twice as much electricity from wind than from gas. http://gridwatch.templar.co.uk/index.php

Dunno if you've looked outside, odaeip, but it's been pretty windy since Thursday afternoon. Those figures are right.

The graph here for example from the met station down the road from me show a steady average windspeed of about 35mph. We had two about 60 hours of that now.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 24 Mar 2013, 09:09

The period 2am to 7am this morning saw gas generation at about 2GW. That has to be a record low!

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 24 Mar 2013, 09:25

Odaeio, you can check the data here: http://www.ukenergywatch.org/Electricity/Realtime

It checks, but is not so pretty.

(Gas has just gone up and is now about the same as wind at ~5GW.)

odaeio · Post by **odaeio** » 24 Mar 2013, 09:38

Am watching with bated breath - so what happens if the wind stops? Also, have we perhaps just flung precaution 'n moderation out the window, and are just sucking the wind to overload, irrespective of possible consequences?
Hopefully we won't be seeing turbine blades flying 'n smoke 'n flames on the news tonight!!

Oh, the names Mitch, will try rectify the login one day....

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 24 Mar 2013, 10:15

This is just the kind of weather that is ideal for wind. It's not a storm. Windspeed is not high enough to trigger safety shutdown of turbines; just steady, continuous strong winds and the forecast looks good from that point of view for the next three days with just a gentle decline in windspeeds over the coming week.

If it hadn't been for our 5GW and the Dutch 1GW of wind we would have been burning more gas right at the record high price.

odaeio · Post by **odaeio** » 24 Mar 2013, 10:30

The wind gods must be watching over us - as for gas, is it flowing in as fast as we need? at any price? If so, then lack of storage isn't an issue, only cost.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 24 Mar 2013, 11:03

odaeio wrote: then lack of storage isn't an issue, only cost.

Hmm... that's one way of looking at it. But cost is a rather large issue. There's a free (ish) market so we won't 'run out' of gas until we run out of money. If we can pay more than the Greeks/Italian/Spanish/etc then it's their light that go out first. Storage is a way of getting cheap gas in the summer and burning it when the price is high.

A pump breaking down might lead to a physical shortage, of course, making it unavailable even for ready money.

Post by **adam2** » 24 Mar 2013, 11:49

odaeio wrote:Am watching with bated breath - so what happens if the wind stops? Also, have we perhaps just flung precaution 'n moderation out the window, and are just sucking the wind to overload, irrespective of possible consequences?
Hopefully we won't be seeing turbine blades flying 'n smoke 'n flames on the news tonight!!

Oh, the names Mitch, will try rectify the login one day....

The wind wont stop suddenly or without warning.
The output from a large number of wind turbines varies only relatively slowly and can be forcast accuratly some hours in advance, and less acuratly days in advance.
The gradual and forcast decline in wind power is easily compensated for by increasing other generation or imports, provided that capacity and fuel supplies are ample.

odaeio · Post by **odaeio** » 24 Mar 2013, 11:50

Am looking at the dials 'n graphs, but am not to up on all this. A bit disconcerting to say the least. Looks to me like coal can give us 20 to 22 gig - before Ditton closed - so that brings it down a fraction, we can only get 2 gig out of pumped storage, the interconnectors seem to be almost flat out, gas seems to be critical for offsetting demand high's. So what happens if the wind stops, and we can only run gas at half or less? Where would we get the extra 10 gig we gonna need for 7 tomorrow night? O.K., maybe not tomorrow, but in the next few days, once we've used up all the gas storage, are there a load of coal fired plants standing idle that could make up the shortfall, or do the lights REALLY go out? Can't be as bad as I think, can't be, not possible!!! Energy is infinite, if my lights go out, will have call the 'lectric company to fix the wires - I'm paying them good money, they will have to fix it within a couple of hours, but definitely before East Enders, or I will be REALLY cross!!!!

odaeio · Post by **odaeio** » 24 Mar 2013, 11:57

You seem quite unperturbed Adam2, but seriously, is this a first for wind, or have we just not used the capacity in this way before. Doesn't seem to have happened over the past year according to the graphs. If it has been available for days or weeks on end, why not use it, anything to do with testing etc, not wanting to break things perhaps?

JavaScriptDonkey · Post by **JavaScriptDonkey** » 24 Mar 2013, 12:03

Have we the option and ability to buy more nuclear power from France?

Post by **adam2** » 24 Mar 2013, 12:14

JavaScriptDonkey wrote:Have we the option and ability to buy more nuclear power from France?

Not at times of high demand as the interconnector is normally already fully loaded at such times.
We could of course build another interconnector, but apart from the cost, I dont like the idea of becoming too reliant on France.

odaeio · Post by **odaeio** » 24 Mar 2013, 12:14

Good question, perhaps the dials calibrate according to display, if not, then we only have another half a gig to come from France. Dunno what the max is that we can pull through the cable. Adam2? can you help?

odaeio · Post by **odaeio** » 24 Mar 2013, 12:16

Ah, already answered, thanks Adam.