Spirit of Ireland - A bright spark in today's economic gloom?

Heroditas · 12-04-2012 1:29pm

Dan Jaman wrote: »

And?
So what's missing in this scenario?

Pumped storage - that's what makes wind work.
I don't know why I'm even bothering to reply to someone who is out to do nothing but wield a hatchet on the idea. Jeez, it's like arguing with retards.

If SoI is such a no-brainer, why aren't all the energy companies like BGÉ, ESB, Viridian etc all crawling over it or doing something similar?

valamhic · 12-04-2012 5:19pm

Dan Jaman wrote: »

And?
So what's missing in this scenario?

Pumped storage - that's what makes wind work.
I don't know why I'm even bothering to reply to someone who is out to do nothing but wield a hatchet on the idea. Jeez, it's like arguing with retards.

Pumped storage is not hydro power. It is a net consumer of electricity. It is only deployed as a small part of traditional generating system usually all owned by one company. It has not been used in any country where wind is mature technology such as Denmark, Germany of Spain and is not under consideration in Scotland where massive wind expansion is planned. Poyry the Welsh consultancy are not enthusiastic. It can provide two functions 1) to collect surplus night generation power and store it until peak demand at evening on a daily basis or 2) to be used as a permanent store or emergency situations such as a break downs of transmission lines or sudden unexpected peak in demand . It cannot be used for purposes 1) and 2) only 1) or 2).
There seems no large scale plans anywhere in Europe to use PS exclusively for making wind more viable. Spirit of Ireland have ideas but there is no detail about water capacity of head height. The suggestion from Spirit of Ireland is not a true wind PS system. Its a PS system in which the water is pumped up the hill by the standard electricity grid using conventional plant to do the pumping. They then attempt to claim that if there are wind farms on the system, these can be counted as firm @ feed in capacity. But the contribution to adequacy of wind energy is its credit capacity and this is tiny. A true wind PS system would run empty a time = to the wind dying down + capacity of the PS x its supply to demand and it would remain empty until the next windy period. Calm periods in Ireland can last up to 2 months and more. Any advantage from a true wind PS facility would only happen when the wind generation was capable of filling the top store at equal or greater than PS output. As the wind could be used directly at these times, the contribution is small over a long period of say a year. The interest and principle on such a facility would always be greater than the market price of power and it would therefore be a very expensive subsidized load on taxpayers and consumers. I other words it is an unaffordable novelty.
Moreover, there is actually no need for PS at all, a little such as Turlough Hill does no harm and maybe a little good, But it is now only topical because governments are slowly but surely coming to realise that they are getting nothing in return for investment in wind and PS is proposed to stave off the tough questions. A few open cycle gas turbines can do the same job at a fraction of the cost and when you count the carbon cost of building the pumped storage facility, gas is the more environmental friendly option. In Ireland we are seeing a gross inflation of the number of concerns feeding from the trough of our ESB bills and this is not sustainable in the long term

rainbowdash · 12-04-2012 5:34pm

Dan Jaman wrote: »

And?
So what's missing in this scenario?

Pumped storage - that's what makes wind work.
I don't know why I'm even bothering to reply to someone who is out to do nothing but wield a hatchet on the idea. Jeez, it's like arguing with retards.

No need to call people retards. There is nothing new in the concept being proposed, if it was viable everybody from Oil companies to power generation companies would be all over it investing and developing it all over the world.

There is a sea water pumpe storage system functioning in Japan for years, why did they not build any more of them if its so smart?

Its an alternative energy concept which may perform some function, but there are plenty of other ideas out there, like use wind power to compress air into empty oil and gas fields deep under ground, then use the compressed air energy to drive turbines and create steady power.

All nice ideas, along with others like wave generation, tide generation etc. but the problem is they will all mean more expensive energy for us all.

patgill · 12-04-2012 10:17pm

rainbowdash wrote: »

No need to call people retards. There is nothing new in the concept being proposed, if it was viable everybody from Oil companies to power generation companies would be all over it investing and developing it all over the world.

There is a sea water pumpe storage system functioning in Japan for years, why did they not build any more of them if its so smart?

Its an alternative energy concept which may perform some function, but there are plenty of other ideas out there, like use wind power to compress air into empty oil and gas fields deep under ground, then use the compressed air energy to drive turbines and create steady power.

All nice ideas, along with others like wave generation, tide generation etc. but the problem is they will all mean more expensive energy for us all.

Did somebody mention Japan ?

Japan has over 15 GW of pumped hydro capacity and every watt of capacity is being squeezed out of it at the moment simply to keep the lights on.

NPower described one particular Irish glacial valley as God's gift to Ireland.

If its such a good idea why are more companies not interested ?

Every engineering, geologic and environmental company who have looked at the S of I project agrees that our west coast glacial valleys are both superbly suited for pumped hydro and unique to Ireland and Peru.

The energy regulator is in possesion of over 4GW of expressed interest in building pumped hydro in Ireland, almost all of the sea water variety.

one measure of the extent of utilization of pumped storage capacity is the percentage of the total electric capacity that is provided by pumped storage. Austria stands out as the country having the highest percentage of pumped storage capacity on its electric system. Pumped storage provides approximately 17 percentof Austria’s total generation capacity. Austria is followed by Switzerland, Spain, Italy and Japan, all with pumped storage capacities of approximately ten percent of their generating capacity. The USA lags well behind with only 2.5 percent of its generation capacity being provided by pumped storage. Japan is far ahead of all other countries in the advancementof pumped storage technology and its utilization. Some pumped storage projects in Japan are operated nearly 24 hours each day. The use of variable speed units in Japan provides load ramping capability in the pumping mode and contributes to the versatility and effective use of pumped storage

http://www.scribd.com/six11/d/25835943-Pumped-Storage-Hydroelectricity

pljudge321 · 12-04-2012 10:20pm

valamhic wrote: »

Judge is more or less right in this account except in one important area and word used. That word is "Resource". He says wind is a resource for producing electrical energy for incorporation on the grid. Wind is a resource for powering yachts/sailing ships and it can be a resource to provide heat if separately wired independently of the grid and for flying kites. It is not (and can never be) a resource when it is connected to the mains electricity grid. That is why it is a failure all over the world. We hear about Ireland's wind resource, but its not a resource at all. On the grid it is a cockoo. Consumers are forced and tricked into thinking its a resource. Google "Spain cuts subsidies to renewables, Minister Soris on TV". They thought it was a resource, but they are still using the same conventional power as before and the bill has run up to 24 billion. Mr Soris said he regretted pulling the subsidies, but continuing them would drive them into a bailout. Then he recommended that the rest of Europe continue with wind mills and to catch up with Spains level of renewables. (after him cutting subsidies). Now lets look at the word "renewable"

Right your spouting pure nonsense on this point, 15% of our electricity generated last year came from wind. In 8 years time we will be up to around 40%. You can argue the economic benefits of doing this but you can't argue the cold hard numbers.

valamhic wrote: »

For any form of power to turn a generator, it has to do just that...

Wind has a capacity credit of around 0.3. This value goes down as overall wind penetration goes up, but again arguing that it has no capacity credit at all is ludicrous. Also cite your studies if your able.

Dan Jaman wrote: »

And?
So what's missing in this scenario?

Pumped storage - that's what makes wind work.
I don't know why I'm even bothering to reply to someone who is out to do nothing but wield a hatchet on the idea. Jeez, it's like arguing with retards.

Explain how pumped storage "makes wind work". Its working fine by itself as is.

valamhic wrote: »

Pumped storage is not hydro power. It is a net consumer of electricity. ..

Pump back hydro dams are both. Most of the new pumped hydro schemes involve retro fitting existing hydro dams. Also nearly every pumped storage facility provides both those facilities.

Heroditas wrote: »

If SoI is such a no-brainer, why aren't all the energy companies like BGÉ, ESB, Viridian etc all crawling over it or doing something similar?

Hats off for the most succinct argument against the viability of this scheme.

pljudge321 · 12-04-2012 11:02pm

patgill wrote: »

Did somebody mention Japan ?

Japan has over 15 GW of pumped hydro capacity and every watt of capacity is being squeezed out of it at the moment simply to keep the lights on.

NPower described one particular Irish glacial valley as God's gift to Ireland.

If its such a good idea why are more companies not interested ?

Every engineering, geologic and environmental company who have looked at the S of I project agrees that our west coast glacial valleys are both superbly suited for pumped hydro and unique to Ireland and Peru.

The energy regulator is in possesion of over 4GW of expressed interest in building pumped hydro in Ireland, almost all of the sea water variety.

Japan has loads of pumped hydro because they have loads of nuclear plants. And a significant amount of that pumped hydro is of the pump back dam variety which makes the capital expenditure more justifiable.

Look at the graph on page 7 http://hmrc.ucc.ie/econdocs/Pdf/12-Deane.pdf. Notice how closely correlated the level of installed nuclear is against the level of installed PH. Also notice how it levels off once the 90's start. That's when highly efficient flexible gas plants started being built everywhere. These plants eliminated the need for expensive oil fired peaking plants. This removed the massive price differential between the base load and the peak load which made PH economically viable.

Capt'n Midnight · 13-04-2012 12:45am

patgill wrote: »

The energy regulator is in possesion of over 4GW of expressed interest in building pumped hydro in Ireland, almost all of the sea water variety.

compare that to expressed interest in wind power

patgill · 13-04-2012 2:17am

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

compare that to expressed interest in wind power

How long is a piece of string, we could also compare it to expressed interest in OCGT, CCGT or CHP, unfortunately nuclear is presently of the table in Ireland.

Similar situation worldwide.

patgill · 13-04-2012 2:25am

pljudge321 wrote: »

Japan has loads of pumped hydro because they have loads of nuclear plants. And a significant amount of that pumped hydro is of the pump back dam variety which makes the capital expenditure more justifiable.

Look at the graph on page 7 http://hmrc.ucc.ie/econdocs/Pdf/12-Deane.pdf. Notice how closely correlated the level of installed nuclear is against the level of installed PH. Also notice how it levels off once the 90's start. That's when highly efficient flexible gas plants started being built everywhere. These plants eliminated the need for expensive oil fired peaking plants. This removed the massive price differential between the base load and the peak load which made PH economically viable.

I think I might enjoy this conversation.

Have you noticed how the cost of gas has moved over the last decade.

Talk later.

luohaoran · 13-04-2012 9:06am

@ Pat

Pat since you are back on here, perhaps you can answer my earlier question.

What is the current licensing arrangement for owners of windfarms, be they Irish citizens, or foreign companies, running them.
In other words , how much of the energy generated from Irish wind, returns to the Irish tax payer?

Maybe you could compare it to the Shell/Rossport arrangement?

I am very much in the SoI camp, my #1 point in favour, is keeping our money circulating in the Irish economy, but I am concerned that joint ventures with multinationals may have a significant cost in terms of money leaving the country. Whether its avoidable or not is a separate argument, but I'd like to know the liability.

patgill · 13-04-2012 10:02am

luohaoran wrote: »

@ Pat

Pat since you are back on here, perhaps you can answer my earlier question.

What is the current licensing arrangement for owners of windfarms, be they Irish citizens, or foreign companies, running them.
In other words , how much of the energy generated from Irish wind, returns to the Irish tax payer?

Maybe you could compare it to the Shell/Rossport arrangement?

I am very much in the SoI camp, my #1 point in favour, is keeping our money circulating in the Irish economy, but I am concerned that joint ventures with multinationals may have a significant cost in terms of money leaving the country. Whether its avoidable or not is a separate argument, but I'd like to know the liability.

luohaoran,

Thats a very good question, I will return to it later today as time permits, however the following link might interest you.

http://www.energyco-ops.ie/

Heroditas · 13-04-2012 10:09am

luohaoran wrote: »

@ Pat

Pat since you are back on here, perhaps you can answer my earlier question.

What is the current licensing arrangement for owners of windfarms, be they Irish citizens, or foreign companies, running them.
In other words , how much of the energy generated from Irish wind, returns to the Irish tax payer?

Maybe you could compare it to the Shell/Rossport arrangement?

I am very much in the SoI camp, my #1 point in favour, is keeping our money circulating in the Irish economy, but I am concerned that joint ventures with multinationals may have a significant cost in terms of money leaving the country. Whether its avoidable or not is a separate argument, but I'd like to know the liability.

If you own a wind farm and sell electricity into the pool, you keep all the proceeds for yourself.
You also get paid capacity payments when the wind farm is able to generate.
You then pay tax on the money earned, same as any other business.
As far as I'm aware, there are no licensing agreements bar a generation licence. this is costly and cumbersome though, which is why many of the smaller wind farm owners enter into power procurement agreements with the likes of Electric Ireland, Airtricity etc.... the power companies guarantee the wind farm owners a fixed price. and handle all the transactions on their behalf.

Essentially though, if the wind farm is foreign-owned, all the money will leave the country bar any tax applied to the profits - however, the taxes levied on electricity are nothing compared to those applied to drilling rights.

blowtorch · 13-04-2012 12:09pm

I've been wondering - Windfarms in Ireland - how many are actually putting electricity into the National Grid. And do we have a similar situation to http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/windpower/8770937/Wind-farm-paid-1.2-million-to-produce-no-electricity.html ?

Was listening to George Hook yesterday and he had someone on about these 1000+ pylons between Kildare and Cork. The guest said something about all of these windfarms needing this extra addition to the grid so that they could distribute the power they generated - so is it a case that windfarms are not running to capacity and only supplying a small proportion of the electricity they can generate?

pljudge321 · 13-04-2012 12:43pm

blowtorch wrote: »

I've been wondering - Windfarms in Ireland - how many are actually putting electricity into the National Grid. And do we have a similar situation to http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/windpower/8770937/Wind-farm-paid-1.2-million-to-produce-no-electricity.html ?

Was listening to George Hook yesterday and he had someone on about these 1000+ pylons between Kildare and Cork. The guest said something about all of these windfarms needing this extra addition to the grid so that they could distribute the power they generated - so is it a case that windfarms are not running to capacity and only supplying a small proportion of the electricity they can generate?

We only have to curtail wind output a very small amount of the time at current. It only happens if wind gets up to around 50% of instantaneous electricity production. The upgrades to the grid to 2025 are with the aim of letting us get to up 70% instantaneous production and more often.

In short answer no, the vast majority of the energy they generate gets into the grid. The long wait for wind farm connections is because the system was not designed for significant levels of in-feed from wind farms. This is why they bundle wind farms into groups before checking which lines will need to be upgraded.

Aidan1 · 13-04-2012 3:47pm

It only happens if wind gets up to around 50% of instantaneous electricity production

To be fair, it also happens from time to time in particular areas if there is a lot of capacity behind a grid constraint, and units have to be powered off to protect the grid (Donegal being a case in point). Your general point is entirely true though, the vast majority of the electricity generated from wind farms makes its way onto the grid, because they have priority access (dispatch) under EU law. Pumped hydro does not, because it's not renewable.

Also, it should be said that while wind is a key reason why the grid is being built out, there are also issues around reinforcing the existing grid and allowing better use of conventional generation capacity - there is more capacity in the Cork harbour region than can be exported out of there for example, something that will become more important when Moneypoint enterrs its twilight years.

Capt'n Midnight · 13-04-2012 5:38pm

patgill wrote: »

How long is a piece of string, we could also compare it to expressed interest in OCGT, CCGT or CHP, unfortunately nuclear is presently of the table in Ireland.

Similar situation worldwide.

cba looking it up , it's on ESB / SONI site somewhere and it's about 6 times our peak capacity

there is also about 300MW tidal for NI in the next few years

valamhic · 14-04-2012 11:10am

Ten years ago the Spaniards were told to develop massive solar and wind energy. It will cut reliance of imported fuel and provide the energy to create a successful economy with great employment opportunities for the people, they were told. Government swallowed the entire hype from the renewable energy lobby. They directed conventional generators to carry the renewable day-to-day running costs on their balance sheets as a government backed debt. They clearly believed the day would come when wind and solar would deliver and saving would be made on imported fuel.
Early this year, the debt had accrued to 24,000,000,000 euros. The Energy Minister announced that he was cutting subsidies to all future wind farms (solar is already cut out). He then when on to recommend that the rest of Europe play catch-up and continue installing wind mills. Now Spain is near a bail-out, the employment promised never arrived (25% unemployment now). Last months increases in electricity amounted to 7% and 5% for gas. They are still importing as much fossil fuel as ever (taking the reduced industrial activity into account). Meanwhile the Minister said jobs were being lost to France due to high power costs. Still, we Irish don't mind this minor detail, we are ploughing ahead with a massive wind programme. So its near time to consider getting out.

BluntGuy · 16-04-2012 2:11pm

valamhic wrote: »

Early this year, the debt had accrued to 24,000,000,000 euros.

Of which a relatively small (but admittedly still significant) amount is due to the electricity generation.

the employment promised never arrived (25% unemployment now).

Tens of thousands of jobs are supported by the Spanish wind industry.

Still, we Irish don't mind this minor detail, we are ploughing ahead with a massive wind programme. So its near time to consider getting out.

How should we reduce our dependence on fossil fuels in the absence of wind programmes then?

luohaoran · 16-04-2012 5:43pm

Heroditas wrote: »

If you own a wind farm and sell electricity into the pool, you keep all the proceeds for yourself.
You also get paid capacity payments when the wind farm is able to generate.
You then pay tax on the money earned, same as any other business.
As far as I'm aware, there are no licensing agreements bar a generation licence. this is costly and cumbersome though, which is why many of the smaller wind farm owners enter into power procurement agreements with the likes of Electric Ireland, Airtricity etc.... the power companies guarantee the wind farm owners a fixed price. and handle all the transactions on their behalf.

Essentially though, if the wind farm is foreign-owned, all the money will leave the country bar any tax applied to the profits - however, the taxes levied on electricity are nothing compared to those applied to drilling rights.

ok, thanks.
So it would logically follow that maintaining ownership of the wind farms is high priority, if keeping the money in the Irish economy is a priority.
Which begs my next question,... When , say a big Danish turbine manufacturer goes into partnership with, say an Irish collective, for the supply of turbines, does a certain amount of equity get given away, i.e. a percentage ownership of the resulting wind farm? I'm assuming that very few Irish based interests have the financial wherewithall to either borrow or pay for the hardware and installation.

And, coming at this from the other angle, does the Irish state have the ability to set the prices, specifically for wind production, such that Irish wind energy prices are favorable to Irish consumers of electricity? Thus garnering a net gain for Ireland inc, irrespective of wind farm ownership? (Or more precisely could they tweak the existing arrangement to allow for this?)
Yes I did read some info on the pricing system, but I didn't see enough detail to answer the above.

luohaoran · 16-04-2012 5:51pm

patgill wrote: »

luohaoran,

Thats a very good question, I will return to it later today as time permits, however the following link might interest you.

http://www.energyco-ops.ie/

Thanks Pat, the SOI page on that site had some info that I wasn't aware of , and served as an encouraging update on the SOI status.

BluntGuy · 16-04-2012 6:20pm

I took a look through the thread, just a note about some recent posts which caught my attention.

Dan Jaman wrote: »

And?
So what's missing in this scenario?

Pumped storage - that's what makes wind work.
I don't know why I'm even bothering to reply to someone who is out to do nothing but wield a hatchet on the idea. Jeez, it's like arguing with retards.

Dan Jaman wrote: »

Ah, I see the NIMBYs have changed their tactics and tried to bring in some technical idiots.

Any more crap like that will get bans.

Fabo wrote:

its very funny reading these comments. how ordinary people can be spoofed by a complete waffler like pat gill who could hardly answer any of the questions without stuttering and waffling (reminiscent of a certain taoiseach who also bluffed the irish peasants)

Pat Gill posts here and as such will be shown the same level of basic respect any other poster is shown - that is not being personally insulted. Attack his opinions all you like, but personal insults are not acceptable here.

Thanks,

Heroditas · 16-04-2012 9:42pm

luohaoran wrote: »

ok, thanks.
So it would logically follow that maintaining ownership of the wind farms is high priority, if keeping the money in the Irish economy is a priority.

It would indeed.

luohaoran wrote: »

Which begs my next question,... When , say a big Danish turbine manufacturer goes into partnership with, say an Irish collective, for the supply of turbines, does a certain amount of equity get given away, i.e. a percentage ownership of the resulting wind farm? I'm assuming that very few Irish based interests have the financial wherewithall to either borrow or pay for the hardware and installation.

I suppose it depends on the partnership and whether they have the financial clout but, yes, I would wager that very few Irish interests would have the money to pay for the turbines and installation.
Even a single turbine is a significant investment - building 20MW of them is a huge amount of money unless it's the likes of the utilities doing it.

luohaoran wrote: »

And, coming at this from the other angle, does the Irish state have the ability to set the prices, specifically for wind production, such that Irish wind energy prices are favorable to Irish consumers of electricity? Thus garnering a net gain for Ireland inc, irrespective of wind farm ownership? (Or more precisely could they tweak the existing arrangement to allow for this?)
Yes I did read some info on the pricing system, but I didn't see enough detail to answer the above.

Tricky one.
There would be an outcry if the government/CER started interfering to such an extent. There are very strict rules regarding pricing and this could be deemed to be too much interference in an open market.
Despite what many people say, the Single Electricity Market has been hailed as a prime example of how an electricity market can work very well.
Too much interfering could undo a lot of that work.
Even despite this, there is constant battling behind the scenes between the CER and various lobbying groups and the energy companies.

luohaoran · 17-04-2012 8:47am

So, even if we had the whole island covered in wind turbines, and fossil fuel prices had gone through the roof, the higher price of electrical energy would feed directly into the pockets of the owners, and not into a cheaper green fuel for the Irish people. (with the exception of our staggeringly low corporation tax)
OMG.

I can only assume that the cunning Irish politician has planned for all this, and his next step is to raise the taxes paid by companies producing electricity from Irish renewables. (Once the gear has been installed, hehehe!)
Great! No worries! (Poor corporate suckers)
:rolleyes:

Heroditas · 17-04-2012 9:33am

luohaoran wrote: »

So, even if we had the whole island covered in wind turbines, and fossil fuel prices had gone through the roof, the higher price of electrical energy would feed directly into the pockets of the owners, and not into a cheaper green fuel for the Irish people. (with the exception of our staggeringly low corporation tax)
OMG.

Theoretically, if 99.9% of demand was met by wind and the remaining 0.1% was generated by a fossil-fuel plant and the electricity from the fossil fuel plant was €90 per MWh ... all the wind farms would benefit from that higher price (clearing price).

However, we're currently benefiting from the older plants being taken out of the system and not being called on to generate because of the wind farms.
The likes of the Endesa owned plants have been idle for a number of years now.
They still get paid capacity payments though because of their ability to generate when called upon, despite the fact that they're not really needed.

Meanwhile, the turf burning plants benefit from large subsidies (subsidies which are being phased out over the next few years) while they are the "dirtiest" generators in the system.
This falls under the "security of supply" remit.

So on one hand we're trying to cut CO2 emissions and maintain security of supply while at the same time pumping out CO2 while burning turf to maintain that same security of supply.
Kind of analogous to pulling in different directions, isn't it?

Fabo · 06-05-2012 2:18pm

great wind speeds alright :

06/05/12 (watch out for the prediction that wind will rise later in the day)

http://www.eirgrid.com/operations/systemperformancedata/windgeneration/

05/05/12: (look how they had to adjust forecast suddenly to show slump in wind)

http://www.eirgrid.com/operations/systemperformancedata/windgeneration/

03/05/12:
http://www.eirgrid.com/operations/systemperformancedata/windgeneration/

02/05/12:
http://www.eirgrid.com/operations/systemperformancedata/windgeneration/

01/05/12:
http://www.eirgrid.com/operations/systemperformancedata/windgeneration/

wind turbines what a load of hippie nonsense (and you and i are paying for them).

and when they do provide energy, its to meet a demand thats not there, its like building a car without wheels and compensating the company for there being no demand for their product. and we are still buying the same amount of gas and oil as we ever were.

scam ?

this is the greatest ever pulled ! credit where credit is due !

patgill · 06-05-2012 3:09pm

luohaoran wrote: »

So, even if we had the whole island covered in wind turbines, and fossil fuel prices had gone through the roof, the higher price of electrical energy would feed directly into the pockets of the owners, and not into a cheaper green fuel for the Irish people. (with the exception of our staggeringly low corporation tax)
OMG.

I can only assume that the cunning Irish politician has planned for all this, and his next step is to raise the taxes paid by companies producing electricity from Irish renewables. (Once the gear has been installed, hehehe!)
Great! No worries! (Poor corporate suckers)
:rolleyes:

luohaoran,

Apologies gor the delay in getting back to you, I couldn't disagree with much of what Heorditas has written.

It all comes down to who owns the wind farm. I suggest reading the following Feasta document titled Aggresive Mutuality as an example of how it could work

Could it work in practice ? West Clare Renewables suggests it can work very well

valamhic · 16-06-2012 10:18pm

pljudge321 wrote: »

Japan has loads of pumped hydro because they have loads of nuclear plants. And a significant amount of that pumped hydro is of the pump back dam variety which makes the capital expenditure more justifiable.

Look at the graph on page 7 http://hmrc.ucc.ie/econdocs/Pdf/12-Deane.pdf. Notice how closely correlated the level of installed nuclear is against the level of installed PH. Also notice how it levels off once the 90's start. That's when highly efficient flexible gas plants started being built everywhere. These plants eliminated the need for expensive oil fired peaking plants. This removed the massive price differential between the base load and the peak load which made PH economically viable.

Japan's pumped storage is 250 meters diameter and located on the edge of a cliff at the sea's edge. Its really a glorified swimming pool. The looney's in Spirit of Ireland want to draw sea water several miles inland. Its a crazy nutty suggestion. The canal taking the sea water in would be the size of a large river with a drop of 1 meter per kilo meter towards the facility.
The bottom would need 6 " of concrete and a 2 " rubber membrane to stop sea water getting into ground water. This water would be toxic to all that touch it.
Nutters: worse still are the idiots who listen to them. No wonder Europe is bankrupt.

Waestrel · 16-06-2012 10:46pm

valamhic wrote: »

Japan's pumped storage is 250 meters diameter and located on the edge of a cliff at the sea's edge. Its really a glorified swimming pool. The looney's in Spirit of Ireland want to draw sea water several miles inland. Its a crazy nutty suggestion. The canal taking the sea water in would be the size of a large river with a drop of 1 meter per kilo meter towards the facility.
The bottom would need 6 " of concrete and a 2 " rubber membrane to stop sea water getting into ground water. This water would be toxic to all that touch it.
Nutters: worse still are the idiots who listen to them. No wonder Europe is bankrupt.

Strong language. Looneys, idiots etc. Why? Are your grand schemes so much more practical?

patgill · 16-06-2012 10:57pm

valamhic wrote: »

The bottom would need 6 " of concrete and a 2 " rubber membrane to stop sea water getting into ground water. This water would be toxic to all that touch it.
Nutters: worse still are the idiots who listen to them. No wonder Europe is bankrupt.

Val,
Tomorrow is Fathers day and maybe the childer might buy you a copy of http://www.journals.elsevier.com/geotextiles-and-geomembranes/

Since when is sea water toxic ?

Markcheese · 08-07-2012 7:05pm

No idea wether it'd work or not , I'm sure if they ever get round to build it they'll have a good idea

Main thing for me would be , it'd private money building it , not some political football....if it gets built the money gets spent in the west.... If it works brilliant , if not it's not a loss to the taxpayer...

Capt'n Midnight · 08-07-2012 8:23pm

Markcheese wrote: »

Main thing for me would be , it'd private money building it , not some political football....if it gets built the money gets spent in the west.... If it works brilliant , if not it's not a loss to the taxpayer...

Bait and switch

as others have pointed out many of the costs of similar projects are pitched at a low value in the hope of a govt. bail out when the project is half way through

Markcheese · 09-07-2012 7:41am

Kind of depends on the backers , if the 3 or 4 billion you've invested in a longterm project could be wiped out by a gov bailout you'd do some pretty serious checking on the engineering and economics....
How did things like the Chunnel get funded ?

Capt'n Midnight · 09-07-2012 11:30am

Imagine someone like Sony or Nissan indirectly investing in a Sakhalin tunnel, with the Japanese govt. picking up the tab.

They loose out on the tunnel investment, but win on the subsidised exports, trains are much faster than ships and a lot cheaper than aircraft.

trap4 · 19-01-2013 6:45pm

So now Belgium is planning a (kind of) upside down Spirit of Ireland - http://dvice.com/archives/2013/01/belgium-wants-t.php

patgill · 19-01-2013 9:00pm

trap4

Worldwide over a $100 billion is being invested in the nascent electricity storage industry between now and the end of the decade.

The age of oil is now drawing to a close and this will have large ramifications for our economic future because for the first time in centuries Ireland will be competing on an equal footing.

We had very little coal with which to do battle in the age of steam.

We had very little oil with which to compete in the age of oil.

But in the age of electricity we have enormous domestic resources, wind wave and biomass along with strong interconnection and storage facilities will change Irelands economic potential totally.

valamhic · 20-01-2013 8:42pm

Who says oil is drawing to a close? All the world's ships are still using it, all aircraft are using it, all farming is using it. Land based bio fuel was hailed as the replacement, now the EU are forced to ban it because its not green at all, just used more fuel oil to produce than it gives output.

Wave energy is just another form of wind energy.

Republic of Ireland was told to install wind farms and there would be happy days. Now we have wind capacity of 1,900 mw with average demand about 3,400 mw. Thats well over 50%. We have no savings in fuel or emission savings and the forth highest electricity prices in the world.

valamhic · 20-01-2013 8:51pm

electricity was always paid for in a 2 monthly bill. There were some who did not pay through negligence etc. Now thousands are in arrears because we have to pay for the traditional system and wind in duplication. Wind cannot be fed into a grid 100% and its being curtailed big time and still paid for by consummers. Night time demand in Ireland is about 1800 mw , which is 100 mw less than wind capacity, yet the hot fossil plant is still running the same as ever. The latest thing is to install automatic disconnection machines in homes, aka pre payt meters and they tell the people that its a great idea. Some people think it is, not able to see that if there was no wind , they could afford to pay in the traditional way.

Wind is not a resourse, it cannot be used to generate mains power

valamhic · 20-01-2013 8:57pm

Pat Gill spends his time trying to put out "happy talk" about wind energy, pumped storage etc. He always has some new wonderful renewable idea to announce and utopia is always just around the corner. But like the end of the rainbow, it never arrives, instead we see increases in power charges. Electricity generation accounts for 25% if Ireland's use of energy. There is still 75 % to come from elsewhere. Electric cars were muted as a great idea, but there is a charging point in Bailieboro and I never saw a car being charged. Pat is all drugged up on increasing the amount of power generation, he never says what we are to do with it. Why do we need all this power, we need jobs and growth but we are fed higher energy prices to drive industry out.

nokia69 · 21-01-2013 12:12am

valamhic wrote: »

Who says oil is drawing to a close? All the world's ships are still using it, all aircraft are using it, all farming is using it. Land based bio fuel was hailed as the replacement, now the EU are forced to ban it because its not green at all, just used more fuel oil to produce than it gives output.

Wave energy is just another form of wind energy.

Republic of Ireland was told to install wind farms and there would be happy days. Now we have wind capacity of 1,900 mw with average demand about 3,400 mw. Thats well over 50%. We have no savings in fuel or emission savings and the forth highest electricity prices in the world.

oil production has peaked, we are now in the plateau which could last for ten years or more, but after that we will start to see production declines

when the tar sands in canada are the low hanging fruit then you should know that the oil is running out

BTW I'm no fan of wind energy or spirit of Ireland, its pie in the sky stuff

nokia69 · 21-01-2013 12:22am

valamhic wrote: »

Pat Gill spends his time trying to put out "happy talk" about wind energy, pumped storage etc. He always has some new wonderful renewable idea to announce and utopia is always just around the corner. But like the end of the rainbow, it never arrives, instead we see increases in power charges. Electricity generation accounts for 25% if Ireland's use of energy. There is still 75 % to come from elsewhere. Electric cars were muted as a great idea, but there is a charging point in Bailieboro and I never saw a car being charged. Pat is all drugged up on increasing the amount of power generation, he never says what we are to do with it. Why do we need all this power, we need jobs and growth but we are fed higher energy prices to drive industry out.

Electric cars are a great idea, just because you never saw one being charged at the local charge point does not make them a bad idea

most people with electric cars charge them at home, its only on a long trip that they would need a public charge point

right now the best car in the world is the Tesla model S, have a look at the videos on youtube, right now its too expensive for the average person but give it ten years and the price will drop, electric cars will slowly become more popular but it will take years before they become common place

I could also see natural gas cars sell well in the years ahead

antoobrien · 21-01-2013 11:14am

nokia69 wrote: »

oil production has peaked, we are now in the plateau which could last for ten years or more, but after that we will start to see production declines

With all due disrespect to that statement that claim has been made every few years for as long as I can remember. In the late 80s we were supposed to be running out of oil before 2033 (the inspiration for the Mad Max films).

How much of the current "plateau" is down to the wells running dry and how much is down to controlling the output of the wells?

Lets not forget that the oil companies & nations with reserves will not produce "too much" oil, which would force prices down. OPEC regularly set limits on how much oil will be produced and what price they think it should be.

4.legs.good · 21-01-2013 12:29pm

US production was set to have "peaked" yet are now on course to surpass Saudi Arabia thanks to new drilling technologies.
While gas across the puddle is now 4-5x cheaper thanks to fracking and US economy shows signs of growth and jobs returning from places like China, while we here in Ireland are now what 5 years in a recession?

2012 is over and gone please stop with the end of the world crap, this thread is years old yet SOI is still on the same shelf as Steorns perpetual energy machine

Dan Jaman · 21-01-2013 12:56pm

I see the oil company shareholders are popping out of the woodwork.

antoobrien · 21-01-2013 1:10pm

Dan Jaman wrote: »

I see the oil company shareholders are popping out of the woodwork.

No - just people that don't buy into the end of the world rubbish that's being spouted by greens & wind energy shareholders.

Capt'n Midnight · 21-01-2013 2:17pm

valamhic wrote: »

Who says oil is drawing to a close?

no one.

What people are saying is that cheap oil is gone

Wave energy is just another form of wind energy.

and wind is another form of solar energy - what's your point ? (and it better refence the fact that much of the wind here arrives after a few thousand km of making wave power on the ocean that acts like storage because of how long it will take those waves to arrive across the ocean)

and besides we aren't using wave and no plans to do so in the short term. If we did we'd have something like 50KW/m to tap into and a lot of the cost of wave can be offset against reduced costs of costal defences

Tidal is a different kettle of fish being predictable yonks in advance and yes 300MW of it is in the pipeline for Northern Ireland.

Republic of Ireland was told to install wind farms and there would be happy days. Now we have wind capacity of 1,900 mw with average demand about 3,400 mw. Thats well over 50%. We have no savings in fuel or emission savings and the forth highest electricity prices in the world.

Renewables produced as much energy as coal according to the most recent figures.

and if you are comparing nameplate capacity to average wind generation then you don't understand the technology, or do you always drive your car over the speed limit ?

electricity costs are because of deregulation and fossil fuel costs.
before that we had the third cheapest cost of electricity in the EU and that was without having any interconnection or economies of scale. Our energy market is the size of Birmingham and no EU companies have entered it. In short our costs have gone up in order to make it attractive for private companies to fund construction (and financing at commercial rates , and paying dividends to shareholders) of new power stations.

Capt'n Midnight · 21-01-2013 2:26pm

antoobrien wrote: »

How much of the current "plateau" is down to the wells running dry and how much is down to controlling the output of the wells?

Lets not forget that the oil companies & nations with reserves will not produce "too much" oil, which would force prices down. OPEC regularly set limits on how much oil will be produced and what price they think it should be.

Please explain Shell and other big companies reducing their proven reserves (wiped a couple of billion off the balance sheet)

Please explain why several OPEC countries haven't changed their reserve figure despite no new discoveries and extracting 9 billion barrels from them

you have to remember that a lot of the OPEC countries have reasons to want cheap oil, for their overseas investments or look at how Dubai is diversifying like crazy.

It's like whale hunting.

One argument says that whale hunters won't kill all the whales because then be out of a job. The companies involved in whale hunting are in the business of making money, and the best return on investment would be to kill off as many whales as you can before you need to replace old ships and then use the money to fund other parts of the business.

EROEI is the name of the game and it's dropping like a stone. I can see a day when we'd use renewables to extract fossil fuel

antoobrien · 21-01-2013 3:06pm

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Please explain Shell and other big companies reducing their proven reserves (wiped a couple of billion off the balance sheet)

Accounting rules changes

Capt'n Midnight · 21-01-2013 3:33pm

antoobrien wrote: »

Accounting rules changes

fair enough if they had announced the changes when the rules changed (did they change?)

unless you are referring to the rule "don't get caught"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2004/jul/29/oilandpetrol.news

Earlier this year, the oil giant admitted it had overbooked proven reserves in its oil fields by 4.5bn barrels, around 23% of its total, wiping billions of pounds off its market value. It subsequently downgraded its reserves a further three times.

and if it's a rule change please explain this
http://www.economist.com/node/3387223

Consider Ormen Lange, a North Sea gas field shared by half a dozen oil giants. Though all have access to the same geological data, each firm has booked a different proportion of its stake as “proved”—ranging from Shell's estimate, revised, post-scandal, to about 20% (down from over 60%) to BP's at over 80%.

From this the definition of proven reserves depends on the price. Fuel that cannot be extracted at the current price is not a proven reserve. As the price goes more fuel can be extracted at the higher price. THIS IS NOT THE SAME AS MORE OIL.
http://books.google.ie/books?id=6VFoLRcyt3sC&pg=PA55&lpg=PA55&dq=Similarly,+producers+will+try+to+convert+their+2P+reserves+into+1P+reserves+by+virtue+of+the+certification+process,&source=bl&ots=YE8BaUKEBJ&sig=dBVmJzC0c2ZVdBufyuH83KLbsYU&hl=en&sa=X&ei=vVD9UNe5FYLRhAf8soHAAw&ved=0CDYQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=Similarly%2C%20producers%20will%20try%20to%20convert%20their%202P%20reserves%20into%201P%20reserves%20by%20virtue%20of%20the%20certification%20process%2C&f=false

Capt'n Midnight · 21-01-2013 3:34pm

back on topic

the Dogger Bank would be an interesting place to use that Belgian pumped storage thingy

antoobrien · 21-01-2013 4:42pm

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

fair enough if they had announced the changes when the rules changed (did they change?)

SEC changed the rules in 2009.

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

and if it's a rule change please explain this
http://www.economist.com/node/3387223

Just as in science knowledge is always changing, the methods used to measure reserves are also evolving (I won't claim to say that they are right/wrong and I won't try to debunk any scepticism), so the amounts recorded change. Tbh I'd be different if the amounts didn't change as they are estimates and they have to take into account new extraction techniques that may not have been available when previous estimates were produced.

I can't comment directly on that case because I don't know anything about it but it could be something as simple as Shell & BP having access to different reservoir within the field (i.e. not one continuous reservoir) of different size.

Anyhow the perceived expansion of reserves is explained in this paper on “Reserves Growth:

Estimates of the volumes that will ultimately be produced from reservoirs and fields tend on average to increase substantially over time. Rather than the discovery of new fields, it is this phenomenon — the increase of estimates of ultimate recovery from a field or group of fields over time due to the extension of proved reservoir area(s)

Spirit of Ireland - A bright spark in today's economic gloom?

Comments