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UK Renewable Energy Capacity Surpasses Fossil Fuels For First Time (theguardian.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: The capacity of renewable energy has overtaken that of fossil fuels in the UK for the first time, in a milestone that experts said would have been unthinkable a few years ago. In the past five years, the amount of renewable capacity has tripled while fossil fuels' has fallen by one-third, as power stations reached the end of their life or became uneconomic. The result is that between July and September, the capacity of wind, solar, biomass and hydropower reached 41.9 gigawatts, exceeding the 41.2GW capacity of coal, gas and oil-fired power plants.
Imperial College London, which compiled the figures, said the rate at which renewables had been built in the past few years was greater than the "dash for gas" in the 1990s. However, the amount of power from fossil fuels was still greater over the quarter, at about 40% of electricity generation compared with 28% for renewable sources. In total, 57% of electricity generation was low carbon over the period, produced either by renewables or nuclear power stations. In terms of installed capacity, wind is the biggest source of renewables at more than 20GW, followed by solar spread across nearly 1m rooftops and in fields. Biomass is third.
Imperial College London, which compiled the figures, said the rate at which renewables had been built in the past few years was greater than the "dash for gas" in the 1990s. However, the amount of power from fossil fuels was still greater over the quarter, at about 40% of electricity generation compared with 28% for renewable sources. In total, 57% of electricity generation was low carbon over the period, produced either by renewables or nuclear power stations. In terms of installed capacity, wind is the biggest source of renewables at more than 20GW, followed by solar spread across nearly 1m rooftops and in fields. Biomass is third.
Found it:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-...
And my comment:
A GBP1bn wind-farm.
"It can generate 659 megawatts"
Current price paid on the energy markets per megawatt-hour: GBP65.36
(Source: https://www.apolloenergy.co.uk... - year ahead electricity price for 2018)
GBP1bn will therefore take 1,000,000,000 / 65.36 =
15,299,877 hours to pay back, at full generative capacity.
15,299,877 hours = 637,495 days = 1,746 years.
So... if this windfarm is able to run at full capacity, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, until the year 3764, without any further ongoing costs, then it might just pay back the amount it cost to build.
The Li-Ion battery prices are following a 7 year half life curve. We are at the cusp 100 $/kWh at pack level magic number right now. Tesla claims it is at 120$/kWh at pack level and below 100$/kWh in cell level. Others are close or ahead. Even at this price, batteries can stabilize the grid and take care of sudden changes in wind or solar generation. It has already saved Southern Australian grid several million dollars in the spot market for electricity. And with some financial engineering and capitalization of revenue streams, solar panel companies are viable in many places where the utility prices are high.
What I'm hearing you say is that companies have been using battery storage for high frequency trading on the energy market, and somehow that is a good thing.
We went for over 100 years without needing grid stabilization on the microsecond scale. It isn't something that is really needed. Electric grids in most developed countries are more than reliable enough. HFT in the energy markets is about as useful as HFT in stock markets- not very much.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.