Renewables Are Now Scotland's Biggest Energy Source

AmiMoJo writes Government figures revealed that Scotland is now generating more power from "clean" technologies than nuclear, coal and gas. The combination of wind, solar and hydroelectric, along with less-publicized sources such as landfill gas and biomass, produced 10.3TWh in the first half of 2014. Over the same period, Scotland generated 7.8TWh from nuclear, 5.6TWh from coal and 1.4TWh from gas, according to figures supplied by National Grid. Renewable sources tend to fluctuate throughout the year, especially in Scotland where the weather is notoriously volatile, but in six-month chunks the country has consistently increased its renewable output.

Comments

Too late

[Thanshin]

It's too late now. We'll have fusion in the next 50 years. It's a known fact since the sixties.

Re:Too late

[Vintermann]

Nuclear power has benefited from the near bottomless source of government funds that is called "dual use technology". You know what Sweden, India, Switzerland, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea have in common? They all pursued civilian nuclear power as a pretext for starting a nuclear weapons program. Yeah, that's right, even dumpy old Sweden wanted the bomb, and lied to the world and their own public about it. (They did change their minds, though). That's why everyone assumes Iran is lying. They know they lied.

Same with space exploration. Same with the internet. The way to get research funding in the US (and in lots of other countries) is to suggest that the technology has military relevance - with bullshit if necessary. "This kind of computer network will be very useful after a nuclear war! *snort*"

This is, IMHO, the real argument against nuclear power. Development of solar panels and windmills weren't funded for fifty years over clandestine military budgets. God knows where they'd been today if they were. With nuclear, on the other hand, there's every reason to think that the low-hanging fruit has been picked, and picked clean.

It will never work

[Anonymous Coward]

It will never work. Just give up.

Oh wait, it's starting to work.

Re:It will never work

[AmiMoJo]

Scotland gets a lot of income from North Sea oil, but that is eventually going to run out. That is why they are investing in renewable energy now. When the oil is gone they will be exporting their wind power, which geography has blessed them with.

The cost isn't that high, relative to other sources. Coal's costs are mostly external and somewhat hidden. Nuclear in the UK is a disaster. The old plants built by the government couldn't be given away, we had to pay people to take them. Recently they have been trying to build new ones, but no-one is interested. In the end only EDF agreed to build one if we paid them double for the energy it generates, guaranteed for the life of the plant, and if it is built by a Chinese company at rock bottom prices.

Re:Reading and comprehension

[pushing-robot]

It's still tortured reasoning; they're comparing all renewable sources combined to non-renewables individually. You might just as well say "Russian autos outselling Toyota Corolla, Honda Accord, Ford Fiesta".

Numbers in summary contradict headline

[wvmarle]

10.3TWh in the first half of 2014. Over the same period, Scotland generated 7.8TWh from nuclear, 5.6TWh from coal and 1.4TWh from gas,

So that's 10.3 TWh renewables vs 14.8 TWh from non-renewable sources.

Interesting numbers game. Certainly only by lumping all the renewables together, and splitting out the other sources, they could make it work. Not exactly a fair comparison. Nevertheless impressive that they are now at about 40% overall coming from renewable sources.

Re:Numbers in summary contradict headline

[Yoda222]

It could also be presented as 10.3 TWh of renewables vs 7 TWh of fossil vs 7.8 TWh of nuclear.

Or another way could be 7 TWh of fossil vs 18.1 of not fossil.

Or 7.8 of nuclear vs 17.3 of non nuclear.

decentralisation of energy supply

[rapiddescent]

One of the biggest challenges on Scotland has been the decentralisation of energy supply. The grid (high voltage power lines) was built to connect power stations that were usually less than 30 miles from cities and then smaller grid segments out to the less densely populated areas such as the highlands & islands.

The challenge Scotland now faces is that a large amount of renewable energy is being produced in the highlands and islands and coastal projects resulting in power having to be shipped "the other way" through the grid. So Scotland has had an enormous new power line from Beauly in the north to Denny in central region to help. The scandal is that a lot of Scotland's renewable energy is idle or switched off because there is not enough capacity in the grid to use it until the new line comes on board. Nearly every loch in Argyll has some kind of hydro power generation capabuility but it is switched off (except Cruachan)

The new wave power production systems are fabulous, especially the inter-connected wavenet squid system.

Re:Problems with renewable sources

[Kergan]

Looks prettier than Canadian tar sands imho. And I imagine less harmful than hydraulic fracking.

Re:Paid for by the English

[beelsebob]

None, Scotland gets 8% of the revenue for the UK, has 10% of the population, and pays 12% of the taxes. Scotland in fact (slightly) subsidises England.

'Decommissioning' is a made-up scenario

[TheRealHocusLocus]

The biggest hand waving always comes with decommissioning

Okay, I'll wave my hands about and gobble about 'decommissioning'.

People tend to increase over time. Energy use increases over time. Globally we are not even close to providing the whole world with a grid coverage and capacity that provides the comfortable existence we ourselves would not tolerate losing. Every renewable dream has us whizzing around in electric vehicles. But this could come true only if the future is nuclear. The renewable numbers just don't work out, even when you imagine a magical solution to the storage problem, and especially when you include ground transportation.

So where did this 'decommissioning fable' come from? When was it decided --- and by whom --- that ~60 or so years hence there must be a desolate public park at every site chosen for a gigawatt nuclear plant, today?

Suggest to anyone that a water or sewage treatment plant cannot cost what it costs, it must also gather funds to fund its own destruction and demise and people will shake their heads. But this is crazy! The sewage will always flow downhill to here. We're not going to move a water plant, tear the pipes out of the ground and route them somewhere else. Oh, it's soo much different.

But is it really? Who is telling us we will be using less energy in the future? Should we listen to them?

Decommissioning funds gathered for nuclear plants may seem like a great idea, but it has also become an awful idea. It does not make nuclear energy any safer. It has promoted technological sloth, dissuaded investors from supporting (and injecting R&D to improve) the only clean base load energy source on the table. It has handicapped nuclear from being THE cheapest source of energy. It has enabled the most short-sighted and fuck-stupid forms of corporate vandalism. This is because when anyone owns or acquires an aging nuclear plant, they are faced with a choice --- whether to re-invest and re-structure to replace aging components, as they would for any other source, or trigger its destruction and unlock the magic chest of decommission funding. Getting a little kick to the balance sheet by rendering a productive energy source into a blight on the landscape, something intentionally broken that cannot be fixed.

Such as the Kewaunee Power Station which went offline in 2013 despite that it is in good condition, has maintained a healthy balance sheet, perfect safety record, operating license extended to 2033 and had six months' fuel left in the reactor. All because Dominion is riding the natural gas 'glut' at this brief moment in time. When the glut peaks out Dominion will invest in some other, dirtier short-term solution.

We should be upgrading these plants and taking them to the next level as we do with every other utility. Given the gigawatt-year track record they have demonstrated It is ludicrous to assume that any nuclear plant operating today deserves to be destroyed rather than upgraded. There are too few of them and they are too precious.

Do not feed the vultures.

___
Please see Thorium Remix and my own letters on energy,
To The Honorable James M. Inhofe, United States Senate
To whom it may concern, Halliburton Corporate
Also of interest, Faulkner [2005]: Electric Pipelines for North American Power Grid Efficiency Security