Random Renewables Thread

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122304600#Comment_122304600

Will you ever stop peddling this Irish low temperature advantage making Ireland one of the best countries for PV nonsense? The very slight improvement in PV output due to low temperatures in Ireland doesn't make solar energy in Ireland economic or sensible as it does not remotely compensate for the overall apalling lack of direct sunlight.

PV capacity factor in Ireland is 11%, a solar farm in WA had a capacity factor of 30% in 2022. Those panels would absolutely bake in summer, You could probably boil water on them some days. Their efficiency might be terrible at such times, but it doesn't matter, because the vastly greater amount of direct sunlight more than compensates.

unkel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122307021#Comment_122307021

Just correcting the poster, pal. They posted something that was factually incorrect.

I have no illusions PV in Ireland is better than in the likes of Spain or your native Australia. I have never said it was, do not put words into my mouth. Your figure of a load factor of around 11% is spot on (considerably worse in the western half of the country). Compare that to offshore wind on the west coast which is 50%, about the highest in the world. We should concentrate on wind as it is far cheaper per kWh than solar PV in Ireland at massive scale.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122306952#Comment_122306952

EV sales are still growing worldwide, the rates of growth had slowed and in some countries it has dropped (e.g. Germany) often due to a reduction in grants

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122303369#Comment_122303369

I gave the numbers and workings in another post. I'll try and hunt it down and link if you would like.

The 11% capacity factor is calculated from the actual anergy generated in a year vs the theoretical amount that could be generated based on a PV capacity rating.

Where nuclear knocks it out of the park is in it's high capacity factor. I was assuming the OL-3 reactor would likely manage 93% in this regard. The Korean nuclear energy sector manages a stunning 96.4% capacity factor.

What makes the OL-3 reactor comparrison so astonishing is that it wasn't cheap and I would never advocate building one of that design due to the long construction time and high cost. Despite this it's still cheaper than Irish solar.

The S korean company KHNP has so far recently built 6 1.4 GW nuclear reactors of it's APR-1400 design. They are on an absolute roll and this is the reactor type Ireland or any other country should consider. They consistently built each in 8 years from ground breaking to commissioning and the cost was far lower than OL-3. KHNP recently commissioned one in SK - Shin Hanul 1 and the cost was €2.97 billion per GW. They recently offered to build 6 for Poland at the same price - end of last year - so I'd call that price current. Poland is only taking them up on 2 so the price might end up increasing slightly.

I don't know the decommissioning cost situation, but that's something for people to worry about in 60 years time.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122305367#Comment_122305367

Seems last year's consumption for me was 7.4MWh, although that's from end of February onwards so likely closer to 10MWh

Based on that I'm 30% more efficient than the EAB usage even with transportation added on top 😁

orangerhyme

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122307126#Comment_122307126

It's just a minor blip anyway.

EVs are predicted to reach price parity with ICEs in 2026/2027 without grants.

Price parity for total cost of ownership has already happened.

It's game over for ICEs. They'll be more expensive to buy and run in a couple of years.

The next gen of affordable EVs are just arriving on the market now.

paulbok

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122305092#Comment_122305092

It's Norway going for 100% renewables by 2030, already in the high 90's.

They're using their massive sovereign wealth fund (ironically generated from sales of fossil fuels) to develop further hydro and wind projects to go far beyond their own needs, and are aiming to be a leading seller of renewable electricity instead of oil / gas.their geography lends itself massively to both sources of renewables as well as a bit of geothermal.

Long but good video on it.

https://youtu.be/RO8vWJfmY88?si=UOLatd8bNu--hHK_

1/3 of cars are already electric and 80% of car sales on 2022 were EV's.

2/3 of houses use heat pumps already.

It must be added that their government have (as they can easily afford it) huge incentives for domestic EV and heat pump adoption.

unkel

We should have started to do the same many years ago, but with wind. It is relatively very cheap to install wind, apart from the interconnectors needed to sell it, but still hugely profitable at scale because Ireland has the highest load factor in the world at 50%.

Unfortunately much of our target market, like Germany, have very rapidly increased their own renewables in the last few years, so have less need to buy it elsewhere

Remember Micheal Martin stating "Wind is Ireland's oil" a few years ago? He was dead right and visionary enough plus open about it, which is rare for a prominent politician. But alas nothing came off it…

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122307042#Comment_122307042

In the past, in other threads, you have made the claim that Ireland is one of the best countries in Europe for solar on account of the higher efficiency of PV panels at lower temperatures.

You should take this 50% capacity factor off the west coast with a pinch of salt, and the cost even more so. The recently commissioned East Anglia one off scotland manages 46.8%. The highest capacity factor wind farms, exceeding 50% CF are the 2 commercial floaters. I think these would be best for comparrison when considering wind off the west coast, Hywind Scotland managing 52.6%, for example.

All the turbines of the Hywind Scotland floater were shredded after just 7 years of operation, with all of them having to be towed back to Norway. At the Kincardine floater, one of the turbines was destroyed after just 2 years of operation, having to then be towed back to the Netherlands.

In other words, the current generation of wind turbines can not hack the severe conditions off the west coast.

Even fixed base offshore wind is a costly joke. East Anglia one cost €4.07 billion per GW - €5.21 billion if you add the massive 28% O&M costs. This is simply not cost competitive with S Korean nuclear costing €2.97 billion per GW, that has double the capacity factor and lasts twice as long as an OSW farm - 60 years vs 30. And lets not forget that this is before even considering the cost of needing around 2.? times as much OSW capacity plus batteries or hydrogen electrolysers storage and generation plant, to match an equivalent capacity for nuclear.

There is no government costing for supplying the countries entire energy needs just using OSW or solar plus storage. You can get a fairly good ball-park idea of the cost using nuclear, but the entire renewables plan we are attempting is completely uncosted because it's unknowable.

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122313302#Comment_122313302

Martin was an absolute spoofer with that oil comment. An Irish fantasy of epic proportions. We have been importing energy at scale, so far this year, because it's cheaper and allows the CO2 numbers to be fudged.

unkel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122313556#Comment_122313556

"In the past, in other threads, you have made the claim that Ireland is
one of the best countries in Europe for solar on account of the higher
efficiency of PV panels at lower temperatures."

False. I have never said that.

Busman Paddy Lasty

Everyone has their own agenda though. Unkel is obviously pro renewables but never made the claim being accused of.

@cnocbui you are clearly pro nuclear. It's a bit rich calling out renewables zealots when you are too a zealot, but for another cause. You repeatedly reference France and ignore all the times when it is raised that France can go that high % nuclear because they have 1 continental Europe as spinning reserve. 2. Continental Europe as an overproduction export pathway. 3. Continental Europe interconnection for stabilisation.

France has cheap electricity per kWh now because the exchequer and possibly the military also funded it decades ago. Her military Generals in the 70s would have seen first hand Hitler ruling the roots in Paris only 30 years prior. That's a whole different context and set of motives than an Atlantic island reducing it's CO2 intensity for climate change.

I'm pragmatic pro nuclear myself but that seems to get lost in the nuclear threads.

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122313576#Comment_122313576

We import from the UK. Cyan is Wind, Yellow is solar.

Like us the UK must keep dispersed high inertial synchronous generators on load at all times for voltage control and grid stability. The UK imports from France and Norway. In both cases hydro's TWh alone has covered their exports for at least the last ten years.