@transparent  Thanks for that.  I guess that, in principle, I have no argument against selling green electricity to other countries, but I don't like it being wasted.  Im unclear whether locating producers close to a supply point enables the latter but fails to avoid the former.

Posted by: @transparent

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During winter storms of 2024/25, it was too dangerous for our wind-farms to remain active.

I assume thats due to the storm force, so just a feature of wind farms?

Posted by: @transparent

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NESO sought to buy electricity from Battery Energy Storage Sites (BESS). However, many had already contracted to sell elsewhere in Europe for a higher price, using the marine interconnectors.

As a result, NESO is then forced to pay very high prices to secure supplies from Gas Turbine generation plants to meet our national demand.

Now this is where I become lost with the business logic and also whether I should be annoyed or not!

Many claim we have the highest electricity prices in Europe (although so far as I can tell thats not actually true, but also as far as I can tell we are amongst the more expensive) yet its cost effective for suppliers to sell to mainland Europe.  How does that work out.  Also if they do export, who pays the transmission charge and do we benefit from reciprocal purchases?  

Posted by: @jamespa

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Solar panels are less evocative en mass

I don't mind a field of solar panels, especially if they support biodiversity and we're built on class 3 or lower farmland, which is itself an industrial use.  Surrounding a village with solar isn't reasonable though, and to be honest huge solar projects are not decentralised enough in my view.

I agree on wind turbines, I have no issue seeing them from my window, obviously not so close as to cause shadow or significant noise.

@transparent yes I couldn't lay my hand on your quality and detail of information, but I agree that we need to be pushing renewables development where it has the most beneficial outcomes for UK citizens.  It seems there is a catch 22 of the grid infrastructure self reinforcing the buildout in the "wrong" places.

Posted by: @scalextrix

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Surrounding a village with solar isn't reasonable though, and to be honest huge solar projects are not decentralised enough in my view.

So how do you feel about surrounding these large 'villages' in Cambridgeshire?

This is taken from the planning application by Sunnica for a massive solar farm and Battery Storage with a 500MW connection to the 400kV transmission grid.

Although the area is within East Cambridgeshire District Council, the size of the proposals (50MW+) placed them within the rules for a Nationally Significant Infrastructure Proposal.
NSIPs get handled by the Planning Inspectorate, rather than the LPA.

The Planning Inspectorate recommended approval, including compulsory purchase orders for the flat arable land that Sunnica required.

That recommendation was given despite the Application Documents providing no details at all of the BESS...
... not even the capacity!

The incoming Secretary of State at DESNZ signed the Orders within the first week of the current government. 😮 

Posted by: @scalextrix

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I couldn't lay my hand on your quality and detail of information

and that's one of the 'complaints' I've raised with NESO and the RESPs.

Councillors sitting on planning committees are in no better situation than the general public.

There's a clear need for NESO to instigate a Training and Public Awareness strategy on energy issues.

Posted by: @jamespa

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Whilst I wouldn't want a wind turbine in my garden, I'd love to be able to see some, preferably quite close.  They seem to me to be one of the more evocative machines of the modern age (just as windmills are one if the more evocative machines of the past).  Personally I can't understand people who say they are ugly. 

...

Personally I would turn that round a bit. I can understand some not liking the appearance of a wind turbine but I cannot accept any attempt to argue that old wind turbines (windmills) are good whilst new wind turbines are bad. It's a bit like trying to suggest we should only allow historically rigged sailing ships in the Channel because modern propellor driven ships spoil the view of people living on the coast.

I can, of course, accept the arguments of scale - one windmill = good, 100 wind turbines as a farm = bad - but that's not an argument against wind turbines as much as an argument for sensible development planning processes.

Posted by: @jamespa

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...

Solar panels are less evocative en mass, but on roofs are essentially a utilitarian covering with no great visual merit, just like tiles.  However they have more functionality than tiles.   Only thatch, it seems to me, conveys any real visual emotion as a roof covering.  Thus aside from thatch Im as happy visually with solar panels as I am with tiles.

When, many years ago, I first visited New Zealand, I found many houses there have a variety of different corrugated metal roofs. It's something that took me by surprise and actually made me a little homesick at the time, and the Kiwis admitted they often missed the sound of rain on a metal roof when they were away from home - it was a comforting and evocative sound for them. Many people in the UK feel similarly about the look of many kinds of traditional roof coverings, particularly local variations of tiles.

Whilst I wouldn't say I'm totally fixated on roof coverings I can certainly admit to personally noticing a difference between utilitarian concrete tiles, slate tiles and older clay tiles. I do not, however, see anything incongruous about solar panels on most roofs. After all, there are any number of instances of new houses built next to old ones so the mixing of styles is nothing new. Obviously, for slate roofs where aesthetics are critical there's the added option of PV tiles that look like slate.

Eventually, I'm agreeing with you in general even if there are a few details on which I'm not so sure.

Posted by: @jamespa

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Posted by: @jamespa

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Whilst I wouldn't want a wind turbine in my garden, I'd love to be able to see some, preferably quite close.

Personally I would turn that round a bit.

I think the wind does that @majordennisbloodnok 

Posted by: @transparent

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Posted by: @jamespa

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Posted by: @jamespa

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Whilst I wouldn't want a wind turbine in my garden, I'd love to be able to see some, preferably quite close.

Personally I would turn that round a bit.

I think the wind does that @majordennisbloodnok 

Badoom, tsh

I'll get your coat; taxi's already ordered.

Posted by: @transparent

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So how do you feel about surrounding these large 'villages' in Cambridgeshire?

Each village appears to have an entire aspect where there looks to be no development at all, you can travel in that direction and see no solar at all, to me that doesn't qualify as "surrounded".  I live in the countryside and I appreciate that I can go out for a walk and see a rural environment, if I were truly surrounded by solar farms that would significantly change the quality of my lived experience, as far as I can tell that's not happening in the plan you posted.  Solar projects also being low height also often are hardly visible, unless they intersect with public footpaths.  However the density is quite high, and I would like to see smaller projects; spreading them further increases resilience, reduces impact and improves generation due to distributed weather impacts.

BESS should probably be located a few hundred meters from domestic dwellings, ideally within swichyards or substations.  Again the more distributed they are, the less impact they have and the more valuable they are.  Just plonk a small battery in every substation would be the best move in my view.

Posted by: @scalextrix

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Just plonk a small battery in every substation would be the best move in my view.

Except that the regulations don't allow that to happen...
which is doubly frustrating because we could then also solve the issue of phase imbalance.
That wastes over 10% of electricity, which is ethically unsustainable.

For legal, security and insurance purposes, all ground-mounted local substations are the property of the DNO.

and DNOs may not own, maintain or control any generation or storage assets.

The next-best option would be for the storage batteries to be within the home,
but then use a smart-control system which handles phase imbalance on the local LV cables.

That's technically possible. I've proved it...
... but there's no tariff system which could reward home-owners for allowing their storage battery to be used in that way.

The reason no such pricing system can be developed is because Ofgem isn't enforcing the full use of Smart Meter features.

The Energy companies only want to implement the functionality which benefits them...
... and the Regulator simply allows them to do so!

Large-scale commercial BESS poses a threat to the grid.
Its presence lowers resilience.

And I need to have a think how much it's wise to expand on that statement on an open public forum....

Posted by: @transparent

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For legal, security and insurance purposes, all ground-mounted local substations are the property of the DNO.

and DNOs may not own, maintain or control any generation or storage assets.

Seems a lease to a 3rd party to place a battery inside the boundary would solve that, but I'm sure there are "reasons" why that "cannot" be done.  Purely rhetorical 😜

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gzg8knp6go

Two nuclear plants extended a further year into 2028.  While I'm not a fan of nuclear in principle, sweating the assets we already have seems reasonable.

Seems like the nuclear sponge might be well and truly wrung out before we get Hinkley Point C though.

Better get them windmills built PDQ.

@scalextrix 

The more interesting energy news today being Norwegian hydro plants reservoirs are low and they may run into problems unless it rains really soon, and interconnects may stop sending electric to the UK.  The usual suspects are crying about calamity, but if Norway is in need of electricity imports, that's an opportunity for the UK grid to not curtail wind generators this winter.

That (MIS)information comes via the Telegraph and Ms WattLogic - she has a fevered anti-renewables angle on everything. She's a lobbyist. How she operates is she strings a few things together and omits what doesn't suit her lobbying.

This is the reality:

Northern Norway has no 'water shortage', it was marginally dryer in the south. However, Sweden, which interconnects with Norway a lot, has full reservoirs & high river levels & the other day as she pushed that story, it was peeing down in southern Norway. 😏

One thing we can be sure of is that whatever contracts say the Interconnectors from Europe will not supply UK if there is any sort of power shortage for home countries - whether Norway, Netherlands, France etc. Indeed EU will doubtless pressure for "EU First".

Works fine during normal winters but the resilience and marginal suppy will be insufficient if exceptional cold/dunkelflaute

French nuclear, Norway hydro, Netherlands wind etc all great but UK resilience is not good.

I would've thought further encouragement for households to install batteries (with or without solar) would make sense. It would help with grid balancing as well as build resilience at small cost to government.