Why can't we have cheap electricity like Norway

Paddy Samurai

The county capital, 40 miles west of Oslo in Norway, extracts most of the heat needed to insulate its houses, offices and factories against the biting Nordic cold from the local fjord, or more precisely from the water held within it.
Averaging 8C throughout the year - it's literally cold enough to take your breath away. So cold, in fact, that open water swimmers classify it as freezing.
But somehow, an open-minded district heating company, backed by an environmentally-conscious city council, together with a large measure of Glaswegian nous, have built a system to meet the heating needs not just of Drammen's 65,000 residents, but its businesses as well.

Instead of all these windfarms why don't we try this ,or are there vested interests that the current system suits

And if it works in Drammen, it can work anywhere there is a constant supply of water, standing or flowing.

That should'nt be a problem for us ,as not only are we are a Island ,but we have plenty of lakes and rivers.

The potential is clearly huge. For example, the company calculates that the Thames river could generate 1.25GW of capacity, enough to heat 500,000 homes.

I wonder how many homes the river shannon ,liffey etc could heat?.

I know it would cost to set it up but the savings due to reduced cost of heat seem huge.

One unit of heat costs 1 pence to generate, compared with 3p for biomass, 5p for gas and almost 8p for oil, according to Star

It boggles the mind why we don't follow the example of countries like norway were they seem to be intersted in reducing costs for their people rather than trying to pander to big business and increase costs to the ordinary people.


http://www.bbc.com/news/business-31506073

darkpagandeath

Nope not to big business just vested interest or your mates greasing each others palms. Tbh though Ireland is perfect for windfarms.

The_Valeyard

Would have thought we could harness the potential of tidal power, considering the west coast.

SEPT 23 1989

Enough of this bloody hippy nonsense just build a nuclear power station

Sheep Lover

SEPT 23 1989 wrote: »

Enough of this bloody hippy nonsense just build a nuclear power station

Let's burn the homeless for a bit of heat.

Lollipops23

SEPT 23 1989 wrote: »

Enough of this bloody hippy nonsense just build a nuclear power station

Said the some dude as they were drawing up building plans for Chernobyl

dpofloinn

For the same reason that we can never have nice things, some greedy bastard (s) along the way will need some financial ''persuasion'' then we will need to spend 3 times the initial set up cost on feasibility studies and so on until it is so over cost that it would be completely un viable

SEPT 23 1989

Lollipops23 wrote: »

Said the some dude as they were drawing up building plans for Chernobyl

its come a long way since Chernobyl was built in the 70's

Augmerson

The Irish taxpayer and the Irish consumer are there to be milked and ripped off. Cheap doesn't enter the equation.

ScumLord

Paddy Samurai wrote: »

It boggles the mind why we don't follow the example of countries like norway were they seem to be intersted in reducing costs for their people rather than trying to pander to big business and increase costs to the ordinary people.

I don't see how it boggles your mind that we don't have the same plant that the Norwegians only recently opened. If these were common place and we were stubbornly holding onto fossil fuels then you'd have a point but expecting us to copy the norwegians entirely new type of plant over night is a bit much.

It also looks like it's a communal heat system rather than providing power, it's their solution to their own problem. That doesn't mean it's going to work for the entirely different needs we'd have here in Ireland.

The Backwards Man

That's not electricity, that's central heating. Norway gets its electricity from hydroplants and still has one of the biggest carbon footprints on the planet, we get our heating from turf.

Lapin

Norweigan ESB might be cheaper than a spud bit a pint of beer in the place costs around €47.95.

Fuk that.

jimgoose

Because you touch yourself at night.

imitation

First off Norway has huge natural resources, irelands natural resources are far more limited. So apart from a few dairy cows, the main source of government income is the edumacated work force.

Second thing is the norweigen government isnt all that interested in making everything cheap, just ask a norweigen about the price of a pint.

Finally a big ass centralized heated water system makes perfect sense some place where you can have -20c winters and the population is centralized. Probably make less sense in ireland with its ribbon developed housing and 6 c winters.

Robbo

A district heating system wouldn't exactly fit well with our love for building rural one off houses so you can be a heavily subsidised Rugged Individualist. Also you can be damn sure that someone would object to the pipes, citing completely made up health concerns which only magically disappear through a topical application of cash.

pillphil

1.21 GIGAWATTS?

scriba

Even if our government decided to invest in something like this, it would be "tendered" to a government favourite, go massively over budget as consultants wade in, get bogged down in endless planning issues, and when finally built, no longer be fit for purpose.

Re nuclear, I wouldn't trust an Irish version of a nuclear power plant.

emo72

Whoever is going around asking questions about why we can't have cheap things, could you kindly knock it off? The plebs will start to question things and it will unravel our little hooley.

Now if only we could tax water.......

jimgoose

Robbo wrote: »

A district heating system wouldn't exactly fit well with our love for building rural one off houses so you can be a heavily subsidised Rugged Individualist. Also you can be damn sure that someone would object to the pipes, citing completely made up health concerns which only magically disappear through a topical application of cash.

Are you referring to the ESB supply to remote areas? Because I can't think what other "heavy subsidy" you might be referring to. If that is so offensive, I'll replace that with a 500HP Cat generator and draw the diesel to it.

nokia69

its still a few years away for us in Ireland but I think solar PV is about to be massively disruptive to the traditional electricity industry

Zen65

Paddy Samurai wrote: »

Instead of all these windfarms why don't we try this ,or are there vested interests that the current system suits

You're confusing a district heating system with an electricity generating power plant. They are not the same. Not by a long shot.

One might ask why do we not have district heating in Ireland? That was tried in Ballymun, but was not extremely successful. It requires a concentration of dwellings to make it viable, such as high-rise accommodation.

Eventually solar will be cheap enough to become commonplace in Ireland and that might be a game-changer. There's no guarantee however that solar will reduce the price of energy; capital costs and stranded costs for standby thermal power have to be dealt with by the market, or else nobody would ever invest in electricity generation.

whiskeyman

There's Norway our electricity bills can be Oslo as theirs...

they can a fjord so much more I guess...





:pac:

For Forks Sake

jimgoose wrote: »

Because you touch yourself at night.

Now , if that energy could be harnessed in some way....

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Why can't we have cheap petrol like the USA?

Why can't we have cheap jewellery like the UAE?

Why can't we have.....

darkpagandeath

Bodie Bumpy Wood wrote: »

Why can't we have cheap petrol like the USA?

Why can't we have cheap jewellery like the UAE?

Why can't we have.....

We could have cheap Electricity, But that would take the government ignoring the people saying windfarms cause cancer or keep you awake ruin the view and all that.

Renegade Mechanic

SEPT 23 1989 wrote: »

its come a long way since Chernobyl was built in the 70's

And irresponsible switching off of safety systems for even more irresponsible max output experiments is a rare occurrence too.
I remember hearing somewhere that the reason a nuclear plant can't be built in Ireland is because of just how powerful they are. There isn't enough demand across the entire isle for one.

I dunno whether its true or not but even if it is, whose to say we cant build one anyway and send a few cables to Britain?

yoke

SEPT 23 1989 wrote: »

its come a long way since Chernobyl was built in the 70's

yeah, all the way to Fukushima

darkpagandeath

yoke wrote: »

yeah, all the way to Fukushima

Dam them natural disasters...... :rolleyes:

al22

Any cheap energy (wind, nuclear) can be used to separate water (plenty of it) into oxygen and hydrogen. To fill a small containers with a liquid hydrogen and distribute a liquid hydrogen to houses and instead of petrol.

There are a small units installed in a private/other houses, the size of a less than washing machines. Holds about 8 containers with a liquid hydrogen and it burns providing heat and electricity to many individual houses.

Same electric engine cars, 6-8 containers with liquid hydrogen and other equipment tales about the half of a car boot. Generate electricity to run a car.

Exaust - clean ordinary water. Can be used again. No fumes, it is a clean technology.

Hunreds of a petrol statios can exchange empty container for a filled with liquid hydrogen. Any woman (and man) can easily replace empty containers with a full ones.

Already works in Japan and some places in Asia. Japan is too far from Ireland. :-)

nokia69

al22 wrote: »

Any cheap energy (wind, nuclear) can be used to separate water (plenty of it) into oxygen and hydrogen. To fill a small containers with a liquid hydrogen and distribute a liquid hydrogen to houses and instead of petrol.

There are a small units installed in a private/other houses, the size of a less than washing machines. Holds about 8 containers with a liquid hydrogen and it burns providing heat and electricity to many individual houses.

Same electric engine cars, 6-8 containers with liquid hydrogen and other equipment tales about the half of a car boot. Generate electricity to run a car.

Exaust - clean ordinary water. Can be used again. No fumes, it is a clean technology.

Hunreds of a petrol statios can exchange empty container for a filled with liquid hydrogen. Any woman (and man) can easily replace empty containers with a full ones.

Already works in Japan and some places in Asia. Japan is too far from Ireland. :-)

never going to happen on a large scale, hydrogen is a very bad way to store energy

BoJack Horseman

Renegade Mechanic wrote: »

I remember hearing somewhere that the reason a nuclear plant can't be built in Ireland is because of just how powerful they are. There isn't enough demand across the entire isle for one.

Well, reactors can be as big or small as you want.

But some are quite large alright.

2 new reactors are being commencing in the UK in a few years.
They will produce equivalent to 80% of ROI demand.