Energy infrastructure

Akrasia

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119022408#Comment_119022408

I think flow batteries are going to find their feet at plant scale storage.

With a volatile energy market, any way to buy energy low, and sell it or use it when the price is high will make economic sense.

If you take enough peak load off the grid then the intermittent nature of wind and solar become less of a problem

Birdnuts

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119031248#Comment_119031248

Your wrong - Coillte have destroyed vast areas of blanket bogs etc. all over the country. Also ruined alot of old estates that had extensive native woodland that was then cleared to grow alien spruce monocultures

Birdnuts

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119031559#Comment_119031559

Some vote of confidence in current energy policies.....

gjim

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119034311#Comment_119034311

I also think that in theory flow batteries present the best prospects for longer term storage - far simpler in terms of infrastructure than hydrogen. My skepticism is purely based on being excited about this tech years ago when I first heard of it but seeing little or nothing in terms of actual production, except for prototype scale installations.

But I had a quick google just now and at least researchers are claiming great strides. Vandium redox - the most commonly touted and mature tech - costs well over $500 per kWh and struggles to achieve high round-trip efficiency. The continually falling prices of li-ion sort of killed interest in this particular flow-battery tech.

However with chlorine redox, these researchers - https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/03/15/membrane-free-chlorine-redox-flow-battery-for-stationary-storage/ - claim they can achieve 90% round-trip efficiency - which would be impressive - more than hydro at 80% - while costing an incredible $5 per kWh. $5m per GWh would be far cheaper than hydro even while offering the flexibility of being able to be sited anywhere.

But like I said, I'd need to see this stuff actually being deployed before getting too excited.

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119036539#Comment_119036539

By using oil and water they don't need a membrane so that's 30% of the cost saved off the bat.

$5 per kWh is insanely cheap and https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-28880-x#rightslink "In addition, the RuO2 catalyst for chlorine evolution reaction (CER) can also be replaced by tin, zinc, cobalt, and other cheap metal oxides partially"

$5 = £4 so for £2.4Bn , a tenth the price of Hinkley C, you could store 600 GWh or 8 days output from it but since you'd be using surplus wind and solar you completely under cut the strike price of 106.12£/MWh

gjim

"$5 per kWh is insanely cheap"

Yes but on reading over the paper again, I'm worried that we (and the author of the PV magazine piece) might be misreading the source. References to $5 per kWh seem to refer to "material costs" which I now suspect do not refer to the overall per kWh cost of such a battery - the original source paper (that you link to) says

"The total material cost for energy storage with the proposed CFB is estimated to be ~$5/kWh, which is the cheapest among all the current flow battery systems (Fig. 5Cand Table S5). In addition, the RuO2 catalyst for chlorine evolution reaction (CER) can also be replaced by tin, zinc, cobalt, and other cheap metal oxides partially30. Therefore, the proposed CFB design leaves significant space to meet the stringent target of ~$100/kWh for RFB applications"

Which I think could be interpreted that the $5 per kWh refers to something like the cost of the electrolyte and the catalyst materials. Which I guess makes sense - salty water, oil solvents and tin are cheap. But even if the total system cost 10 times that, it would be revolutionary. The other exciting aspect is that there seem to be huge number of avenues to explore in terms of research to improve many aspects of this design - they've just experimented with one combination of solvent and catalyst. It feels like a significant breakthrough.

Apogee

Bord Gáis Energy and Amarenco have signed a partnership that will see eight utility scale solar farms built in County Cork. The move will eventually lead to the creation of 40MW of power production, enough to power around 8,000 homes. Amarenco will build and operate the powerplants.

[...]

Bord Gáis Energy recently announced partnerships with Neoen and Obton, powered by Shannon Energy, to manage over 176MW of power from a combined 14 solar farms.

https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2022/0512/1297647-bord-gais-energy-and-amarenco-plan-eight-solar-farms/

The EU are throwing another 195 billion into the pot to accelerate the move away from Russian energy. This is all on top of already committed goals

Plans include

• a faster rollout of renewables from 40% to 45% of energy production
• Reduction in energy consumption through efficiency gains from 9% to 13%
• Switch to alternate suppliers
• Restart the EU solar industry
• Ramp up of green hydrogen production

https://www.irishexaminer.com/business/economy/arid-40871303.html

getoutadodge

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119054698#Comment_119054698

Yet still no word on the GRAZE Mitchelstown plant nor the Silvermines Hydro project. Is the EIB board holding them up or is the Irish side stalling both? Stalinesque five year plan announcements are all the rage but little action.

Apogee

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119055155#Comment_119055155

Has the Silvermines planning application been submitted yet? There is confusion in reports whether it was to be submitted first quarter of 2022 or 2023:

2022:

https://www.tipperarylive.ie/news/local-news/681596/650m-silvermines-hydro-electric-plant-to-go-to-planning-in-2022.html

2023:

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/energy-and-resources/planning-for-silvermines-hydropower-station-to-be-submitted-next-year-1.4705015

Though I suspect the Irish Times is wrong despite 2023 being repeatedly referenced in the article.

[edit] I can't see any evidence on TippCoCo planning database, though this project will possibly go direct to ABP?

A good vid on the progress of European interconnectors

https://youtu.be/2Ry38iWLJr0

Apogee

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118894302#Comment_118894302

Seems to be operational again

gjim

Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, they've found a few coppers down the back of the sofa to fund this $505m federal program to support the development of long term electricity storage technology as part of the "Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act".

$550m sounds like a lot but it's actually pretty small by US federal program measures. Biden's weak political position has effectively gutted his ambitious green energy plans.

Interestingly, hydrogen-tech is specifically excluded (there is a separate small hydrogen scheme).

Also interestingly, they identify the $5 per kWh storage price point as the long term goal - a number which also appears in the chlorine flow paper discussed above - https://rdcu.be/cNN9w - as the cost of materials per kWh for the technology.

Sam Russell

Looking at the Eirgrid dashboard over the last while, it is quite obvious that wind is quite accurately predictable, it is also extremely variable - like zero to 100% of demand. Some of the zeroes last up to a week as a blocking high sits over Ireland. When off-shore comes into play, there will be much more wind at the high end, and also the zeros will be fewer owing to the larger spread of the turbines.

However storage will become much more important as the coal is extinguished, and gas is put on the back burner. We have Turlough Hill which was a brilliant feat at the time just as Ardnacrusha was in the 1920s. It is a pity that neither can be replicated due to geography. However, grid scale storage using batteries appears to be one solution waiting for the cost of the appropriate technology to catch up.

However, the rush to EV cars might be an approach, where the batteries might be pressed into providing domestic backup to electric supplies when linked to a feed-in tariff, coupled to rooftop PV installations.

I think we should get there (assuming the future data centres are self powered or banned).

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119079580#Comment_119079580

We have Turlough Hill which was a brilliant feat

Silvermines due to go to planning..... soon?

https://silvermineshydro.ie/

josip

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119080018#Comment_119080018

Just to keep Silvermines in context it could provide 2GWh of the 90GWh or so needed. It will help, but were a high pressure to sit over us in the winter time, it alone would keep things going for 30-40 minutes. We need other solutions for the remaining 23 and a half hours and x days that the high pressure would hang around for.

Sam Russell

If we have a lull over Ireland lasting a week or so - winter or summer, we will need more than pumped storage, as that will only last a short while. The use of gas - or bio-gas - will be needed to provide a long term backstop to wind lulls. Solar would contribute in the summer, but not in the winter.

However, battery storage is current technology, available, and within a reasonable cost which could be predicted to reduce within a reasonable time frame. Harnessing the batteries in EV vehicles would appear to be a useful contribution, coupled with domestic PV, and domestic batteries.

gjim

Yeah, hydro isn't the answer for long-term (weekly or monthly) energy storage. Turlough hill is used more for intraday balancing from what I know - Silvermines will be the same. It isn't economic to tie up capital in facilities like these only to leave them effectively idle for weeks or months - waiting for a long low-wind production period before emptying them to generate a few GWh of electricity.

I think the solar PV projects currently being developed (and hopefully even more with RESS 2) will be helpful in this situation since solar radiance is correlated with high pressure in Ireland. This only requires intraday storage - which can be done economically with li-ion already.

Clearly, Ireland has a lopsided dependence on on-shore wind at the moment. It was reasonable to start the energy transition journey this way, given the price advantages of on-shore wind and Ireland's climate. But with a more balanced mix of sources (solar PV, offshore wind, li-ion batteries, imports over inter-connectors), the problem you identify becomes far less acute.

Apogee

Construction started at 23MW Taghart windfarm in Cavan:

https://twitter.com/StatkraftIE/status/1524719999113441284

Not yet listed under proposed/under construction section of the Wikipedia page cited earlier: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wind_farms_in_the_Republic_of_Ireland

Markcheese

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119080161#Comment_119080161

Honestly ... Everything else that we've currently got - so combined cycle gas - open cycle gas ,tarbert and maybe even moneypoint ... The more storage we have the less, and more predictably they would need to be used , and the less that gas peaker plants would be needed too ,

They're already built , and largely paid for , most have stocks of fuel included in case of emergency , ( diesel for the gas plants ) , with significantly reduced annual run times the could run on a reduced staffing too ...

josip

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119080580#Comment_119080580

Things usually aren't dimensioned based on average usage though, they're planned based on peak usage/maximum capacity.

So even if a gas station post Silvermines is used less often over the course of the year, if there's 1 week of that year where it is still at max generation, you will still require 3 shifts of permanently employed people.

Another point worth considering is that because the Silvermines won't solve anything by itself, you will still need another solution with at least 2 orders of magnitude more storage in the future. When that is available, whatever it is, the Silvermines will probably become redundant. You only need 1 of Turlough/Silvermines on the grid. Can the Silvermines deliver sufficient savings in that length of time so that it can recoup the capital investment in the project, cover OPEX and make an acceptable profit? Obviously somebody has done the business case for this and believes it to be the case. But more than likely they'll get a guaranteed price per GWh over x years eliminating any financial risk to them and the state carries the business risk of the venture.

Its early days yet so I wouldn't worry too much. we are not going for a zero carbon grid for 30 years, until 2050 and we still have to roll out 30GW of offshore, plus an additional GW or two of onshore, a few GW of solar, various storage solutions (hydrogen, pumped storage, batteries of various types etc) as well as interconnectors.

Storage is a problem for the latter half of the 30 yr period

gjim

"You only need 1 of Turlough/Silvermines on the grid. Can the Silvermines deliver sufficient savings in that length of time so that it can recoup the capital investment in the project, cover OPEX and make an acceptable profit? Obviously somebody has done the business case for this and believes it to be the case. But more than likely they'll get a guaranteed price per GWh over x years eliminating any financial risk to them and the state carries the business risk of the venture."

I'm not sure I agree with the first sentence - every little bit helps. This thing is likely to transfer at least 1GWh per day from low-demand times - when intermittent output is not being fully consumed - to peak demand times. Every time that happens with the current set-up, it's 1GWh less coming from gas. I'm using 1GWh to be conservative.

I also would be curious regarding the numbers but I'm pretty sure this facility wasn't part of the RESS process. And I haven't heard of other mechanisms for suppliers to be offered guaranteed prices? I'm not sure it would be a factor here - for example RESS 1 more or less arrived at a settlement price of 74 euro per MWh - far lower than peak wholesale costs. Because this facility is dispatchable, it should be able to command higher prices than that during the peaks without guarantees.

gjim

Josip's comment piqued my curiosity. I've no idea whether these back-of-the-envelop calculations are reasonable but here's an attempt to calculate the profitability of this venture.

Starting with the round-trip profitability. The eirgrid dashboard under "imbalance price" today shows a swing from -€45 (yes negative!) to €175 per MWh.

So if you bought at the low and sold at the high today, you'd make €220 per MWh.

But you'd never achieve this in practice as you only know the low and high with hindsight so there'd be some (intelligent) guesswork. And it's not clear how long these prices are sustained so you may not be able to fully charge the upper reservoir at the low price nor achieve the high price for all the electricity you sell back into the system. Also there are power and transmission constraints - I'm assuming like Turlough Hill, this would be around 300MW facility. And of course the 80% or whatever round-trip efficiency will impact the profitability.

But for the sake of argument, say the facility can make €60 per MWh round-trip. Assuming they achieve 1GWh per daily cycle, this is 60k per day or about €22m annual profit.

This paper suggests capex of about €500 per kW (power capacity) for pumped storage hydro - which means a 300MW facility would cost about €150m to build.

These numbers seem to stack up, just about. Ignoring opex and present value adjustments, this is looks to be roughly a 15% yield on investment. Or about seven years to break even on the investment. After that it's should be nearly all gravy. Of course there are risks with this venture - new storage systems and more diversity in the renewables mix will probably reduce the daily high to low price difference in the future. But it seems economically feasible.

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119080278#Comment_119080278

The ESB's 3TWh hydrogen storage scheme is about a month's worth of demand. It's more than the entire global output of lithium batteries over the last decade.

Even in winter solar is useful in Germany it's low hanging fruit because of the low cost.

Intel used 276,812,189 kWh last quarter. That's a lot of 40KWh battery - charges.

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119080911#Comment_119080911

Installing 3 times demand of wind and solar should provide 80% of our power and allow 20% from gas while staying within our 2030 targets.

From UK wind farm and Germany wind + solar charts.

Markcheese

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119082403#Comment_119082403

Where's the hydrogen storage planned for ? And how are they planning on keeping the hydrogen from leaking ?

Any idea what'll be used to pressureize the hydrogen out of the storage "vaults " ? Just water ?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119082455#Comment_119082455

There's almost no detail yet (that I've found). Definitely no technical details.

ESB are working with dCarbonX, an Irish company founded by the guys who had to resign from Providence Resources back in 2019 after a funding debacle.

dCarbonX have a nice website but little else from what I can see. SNAM from Italy have bought part of the company and are fronting some of the costs.

They are reportedly looking at 3 sites around the coast but outside of Kinsale I haven't found details on the other locations.

This will likely go the way of Silvermines as in we won't hear anything more until they have something to tell.

In an effort to speed up the move away from Russian gas, oil and coal, the EU is digging deep, primarily to fund the rapid expansion of renewables though there is a small % going to fossil fuels to assist a few of the countries in a more precarious position.

An EU ban on coal from Russia is due to start in August, and the bloc has pledged to try to reduce demand for Russian gas by two-thirds by the end of the year. Meanwhile, a proposed EU oil embargo has hit a roadblock from Hungary and other landlocked countries that worry about the cost of switching to alternative sources.

In a bid to swing Hungary behind the oil phaseout, the REPowerEU package expects oil-investment funding of around two billion euros (£1.7 billion) for member nations highly dependent on Russian oil.

Energy savings and renewables form the cornerstones of the package, which would be funded mainly by an economic stimulus programme put in place to help member countries overcome the slump triggered by the coronavirus pandemic.

Von der Leyen said the price tag included about 72 billion euros (£61 billion) for grants and 225 billion euros (£190 billion) for loans. There was a push to fund energy efficiency and renewables.

The European Commission also proposed ways to streamline the approval processes in EU countries for renewable projects, which can take up to a decade to get through red tape. The commission said approval times needed to fall to as little as a year or less.

It put forward a specific plan on solar energy, seeking to double photovoltaic capacity by 2025. The commission proposed a phased-in obligation to install solar panels on new buildings.

https://www.thejournal.ie/eu-plan-russian-gas-renewables-5767540-May2022/

The Russia/Ukraine war has done more to speed up sustainable options than any other single event, report or person. Its honestly incredible how much they are throwing at this to speed things up.

Markcheese

Hungary has 1 refinery - half of it's oil comes from Russia , the other half is piped in via Croatia - the pipe from Croatia has enough capacity for the refinery -

( I don't know what's the story with imports of refined product ) ..