Random Renewables Thread

slave1

Works well in other fora, a general thread for random thoughts...

Climate council says Ireland facing challenging winter (rte.ie)

For once a quite sensible list....putting them into play is a different matter

home energy upgrades such as attic insulation and draught proofing to be accelerated; for regular servicing of boilers; the installation of heating controls; and the simplification of the paperwork required to access SEAI energy upgrade grants.

Government-supported, low-cost-finance initiatives to be made available for the purchase of electric cars

congestion charges to discourage car use in urban areas

targets Vehicle Registration Tax on petrol and diesel cars, which it says should be increased to discourage their sale

mandatory for solar panels to be installed on all new residential, commercial and public buildings with further planning exemptions to allow bigger solar installations.

targets for onshore wind and solar electricity should be significantly increased.

Nothing on the list is new, all been done elsewhere so no reinventing of the wheel required, just do it!

the_amazing_raisin

The one thing I'd add to the list would be an increasing stamp duty for property sales below a certain BER rating. So the old and poorly insulated housing stock is less appealing to buyers

Grant an exemption or rebate to the stamp duty increase if the homeowner or buyer has been granted the deep retrofit application, so there's an incentive to start fixing up those old homes ASAP

I'd like to see the same done for rentals but tbh the cost would just be passed on to the tenants. Maybe combined with a rent freeze it would work

Congestion charges are good but need to be matched by public transport investment, particularly to satellite towns

Dublin council seems to have a crazed obsession with low building heights so people are going to be spread further and further out.

Park and ride is an option but if someone has to drive from Naas to Tallaght to get a bus then they're still gonna be creating a bit chunk of pollution, and just shifting the traffic jam onto the M7

There needs to be proper rail services into the commuter belts, with feeder buses to the stations, so those car journeys can be eliminated if possible

As for those wind energy targets, they need to be increased but there also needs to be an overhaul of the planning process. I'm not saying cut down on the checks, but why does any wind turbine company have to make multiple seperate applications to various state bodies, some of which take years to complete and block other applications being made

There should be a single "application board" with representation from An Bord Pleanala, ESB, EPA and Deperment of Marine/Environment/whoever else is needed. A wind energy company should make a single application to that board, its reviewed by the various bodies and a single decision is made

the_amazing_raisin

Btw, love the idea for a chitchat thread 😁

graememk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119578504#Comment_119578504

What are theses things called... trains? (Can you tell I'm from Donegal? :P)

We barely have buses!

twitcherdub

Advice on solar install on roof with asbestos tiles needed. Live in Ramleh Milltown Dublin and have been advised that renewable energy companies won't go near the install.

Is replacing the roof the only possibility?

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119579123#Comment_119579123

Buses? You mean you've got roads up there? 😜

Sorry, couldn't resist myself

Many years ago I used to get the Sligo train every week. There's only a single track there and one time the morning train **** the bed somewhere in Longford

So the breakdown train had to come along and drag the broken train off the tracks before another train could get through, throwing the entire timetable to bits that day

Needless to say I was not thrilled with Irish Rail's infrastructure

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119579156#Comment_119579156

Basically the issue with asbestos is that when it breaks down it emits carcinogenic particles

So you can imagine any kind of drilling or cutting is going to be hazardous and installers probably won't go near it

It needs to be handled and disposed of properly, I'm not sure a regular roofer is going to be equipped for that job, you'll probably need a specialist

That's going to add some serious cost I'm afraid, but personally I'd consider it a worthwhile investment for not getting lung cancer

graememk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119579167#Comment_119579167

:P something like that!

slave1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119579191#Comment_119579191

Yep, complete (not partial) removal by expert firm and regulated by HSA and others. After complete removal another firm will then have to put a new roof on. Big bucks.

the_amazing_raisin

Does anyone know what the required gap between solar panels and the party line on a shared roof?

By shared roof I mean a semi detached house, how close can I go to the neighbours roof?

It isn't an edge so doesn't seem to have the 50cm requirement, but there must be some requirement for a gap. I couldn't find it set down anywhere in the planning rules

EDIT: I should add that this is assuming the neighbours don't have concerns with me going as close as I can to their roof. They haven't said anything but if they were worried I'd probably sacrifice a few panels rather than piss anyone off

bullit_dodger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119580584#Comment_119580584

That's an interesting and apt question. I'm planning on going "right to the limit" there with some panel reconfigurations that I had in mind. Hadn't considered that there might be some regs prohibiting that.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119580683#Comment_119580683

I took a look at the proposed planning exemption and it only 50cm from an edge, nothing about party lines

I mean, there must be some requirement

Personally I wouldn't go right to the edge, just so if something fell off the rails it wouldn't land on the neighbours side

bullit_dodger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119580836#Comment_119580836

It was more that I'm on a semi-detached and I'm going right to the limit of "my half" of the roof

i.e. the middle of the overall roof , as it turns into their house if you follow. Their fairly decent to be fair, but I wouldn't take the mick either.

slave1

I would not encroach, I'd work to SEAI guidelines, even if your neighbour is sound and is okay with it there is nothing to stop a subsequent owner of the house telling you to move them..

bullit_dodger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119581319#Comment_119581319

hmm, not sure a subsequent owner would have any right to ask me to move anything even 1cm on my side of the middle line. SEAI guidelines of course only really come into play if you are looking to get the grant and have no real bearings (i think) on things here as this is non-grant work.

there may however be some planning regs but I haven't seen any which outline things like this, but of course the fact I haven't seen any doesn't mean they dont exist.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119581319#Comment_119581319

I wouldn't encroach either, but IS there a guideline. I can't find anything in the planning docs online, only the 50cm from edge rule. I hope they aren't counting a party line as an edge

graememk

To pivot towards heating a bit

As I've been watching a lot of heat geek videos lately this one has popped up

https://youtu.be/ogyGJr0s4y0

It's not overly flashy but full of information and explains why usually you need to oversize radiators for heatpumps.

Also to note about flow/return temperatures to allow condensing boilers

Anyone got a heat loss spreadsheet handy?

Tree

I think it's 20cm from a party line? Do I have my reference to hand? Of course not.

Ubbquittious

Great idea for thread ! Next there will have to be a beers.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119582189#Comment_119582189

I am 100% behind that idea 😁

paulbok

The restrictions on panel array sizes on a roof without needing planning need to be lifted asap.

Seemed to be progress earlier in the year on this, but someone advised here lately that it's stuck in the senate at the moment.

Once that's gone, more encouragement (low rate loans / grants/ joint ventures) for those with suitable large roof spaces such as farm sheds, warehouses, community centre, schools etc, to install large pv arrays, before committing arable land to ground mounted arrays.

Looking out my window here at a neighbours large slatted shed with the long side facing south, approx 30 deg pitch. rough calcs I'd estimate it'd easily fit 30kWh, 99.5% which would be exported. probably 3/4 times that shed roof space available on the boreen I live on alone.

slave1

The loans are a great idea, they did this in Scotland, no loan needed for PV though as SAAS basically provide this as cash neutral.

bullit_dodger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119583901#Comment_119583901

Don't think it really matters much to be honest. The current regulations of 12m^2 have been in place for years (15 years, more?) and nobody has ever come afoul of it. I've 24m^2 on my own roof - am I worried. Nope. SEAI signed off and everything. :-)

That said, if a Karen of this world was to complain about someone breaking the sq meterage, then yeah, in theory if the council did come out you might have to comply - which would be a shame. But is that likely to happen?

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119585317#Comment_119585317

There's always more Karens 😬

the_amazing_raisin

RTE news : Energia to hike gas prices by 39%, electricity by 29%

http://www.rte.ie/news/business/2022/0907/1321108-energia-price-hikes/

Ouch

One the good side, they aren't increasing the standing charge. It was already one of the highest so not sure they could justify it

Also they aren't increasing night rates for anyone on a smart meter. That's a bit of clever marketing for people who have batteries and EVs

Ubbquittious

Has anyone been told to remove panels due to the planning restrictions or heard of it happening to anyone?

jkforde

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119586383#Comment_119586383

i doubt it unless you are unfortunate enough to live beside a ####! and planning officers are busy enough with more serious (lack of ) enforcement issues!

con747

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119586383#Comment_119586383

A case in Limerick https://www.limerickpost.ie/2019/07/25/landmark-planning-decision-to-allow-limerick-solar-panels/ so not sure if that sets a precedent or not.

Gerry

Its disappointing with the talk of generators on the news to not see anyone putting in a small wind turbine and a battery. 1 or 2kw could charge a large battery for emergency use.. if emergency use is the concern.

on a larger scale since this is an emergency, why is there no talk of getting extra wind generation on line? again all about generators which need diesel from.. Russia

as well as this, no talk about expediting planning for any wind or solar farms.. it can be done for houses..

paulbok

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119585317#Comment_119585317

Wwwweeeeelllllllllllll,

I recently applied for retention on a recent refurb of an outbuilding that the panels are on, so had to add them as a part of the application, a separate item to the refurb (still on one application). Have 18 panels.

~3 months till decision, but my engineer nor anyone I spoke to in planning, doesn't expect any issue with the application.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119586815#Comment_119586815

It is annoying, but unfortunately those mini turbines aren't much use. You might get enough to charge a phone and a torch on a windy day but you won't be powering appliances from them

Regarding installing wind farms instead of fossil generators, I agree that it's backwards thinking but there's also a question of short term needs versus long term solutions

There's a lot of local obstacles to installing wind farms, not least the fact that mentioning a new turbine seems to trigger every Karen, tinfoil hat brigade and random local heritage group for hundreds of kilometres in every direction

Even if all those get removed, there's the question of production capacity. There's only a few companies that make the big turbines and they can only produce them at a certain rate

Now I'm sure if one or all of those companies decided to scale up production by a factor of 10 they could do it. With the right amount of investment they could probably do it pretty quickly

But, they aren't going to make that investment unless they know there's a pipeline of orders for the next 10-20 years to pay back that initial cost

If they only have orders for 2 years say, then the only economic solution is to charge an insane amount of money per turbine

The same kind of goes for wind turbine sites. All the good onshore sites already have turbines, so it's the more marginal sites that are next, or offshore turbines which are more expensive upfront. For those sites to be economical electricity prices need to stay high. But as more turbines come online, then supply increases and the price goes down (theoretically)

So it's a gamble as to whether any of your wind farms will pay off in the long run

This is where our government and the EU at large should be helping

For example, the EU could just roll out the money printer and pay the cost of increasing turbine production for the manufactures. I'm sure there'd be plenty of conditions attached, like they have to be built in Europe and the price per turbine cannot exceed a certain amount, etc.

Similarly in Ireland the government could get more aggressive in terms of providing loans and investment to wind farms. In this case the government absorbs the risk. It could be a raw deal for the taxpayer because if those turbines don't pay off then they'll be footing the bill. But then it's a political decision as to whether the government is willing to take that risk with taxpayers money for increasing renewable generation

And even best case there won't be enough renewables installed to get us through winter

So we're left in the bad situation that extra capacity needs to be found and the only available technology that can scale quickly is fossil fuels. It's a short term solution hopefully

Of course the fact that this was an entirely predictable situation and experts have been warning every government in Europe for years that they're too dependent on Russian gas and should be investing in renewables seems to be getting glossed over a lot

the_amazing_raisin

Also, sorry for the long post.

TLDR version, everyone in a position to make decisions is stupid and buy solar panels while you can

bullit_dodger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119587093#Comment_119587093

Nahh good post that raisin.

The idea of residential wind turbines comes up a lot on these formus. On paper it looks appealing. You bang in a small 1m turbine. Sure it might only do 500w as opposed to the 5Kw that you might have in panels, but it does it 24x7 (assuming the wind is there). What's not to like eh?

Unfortunately most of the time turbines do about 50-100 watts, if even. Here's a good vid (by a wind engineer) which explains why small turbines generally are pants.

(676) Wind Turbines for Home: Is it Worth It? - YouTube

Love wind me, and there are places in ireland where you can get a wind turbine to work for your home, but perhaps not in Cabra or Tallaght :-)

Ubbquittious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119586815#Comment_119586815

A lot of those boyos think they'll have it sorted as long as they have a bit of petrol and a cheap genny. It might get them out of a hole if they badly need to make a cup of coffee during a rolling blackout of a few hours, but with anything more serious they are stuffed.

I noticed if the power goes for more than about 12 hours here things go downhill rapidly. The mains water pressure will go within the first day, so you need some way of pumping water out of a stream and then pumping it into the tank in the attic. Your local friendly Telecom Eireann exchange will go into some fallback mode where it only supports voice calls made using a bakelite landline telephone machine. After a day it won't even support those anymore, if you are lucky some crew will show up with a genny to bring the exchange back online but they'll be run off their feet and it will be a while before they get around to it. Next to go is your mobile phone coverage. Though you will notice some deterioration of service within the first hours most likely.

Once you start running low on fuel rock up to the local shop where you'll find the pumps not working. The shop itself will be eerily dark because it has feck all windows, you may still be able to buy some non perishable items if you are lucky.

Gerry

Yeah I hear ya about small turbines. I think theres plenty of folks down the country who could make something slightly bigger work. Not necessarily to power everything, but to tick things along when you've already got solar and batteries that arent doing much in winter.

As for larger scale wind, again good info there. Probably more that the govt could do about the medium term there, but not any evidence of it yet.

the_amazing_raisin

I'll be honest, when I get solar installed I'll probably get a generator hook up installed as well. It's nice to have as a just in case

But as @Ubbquittious said you need somewhere to store fuel.

I reckon I'd probably use about 10.5l of fuel a day if I didn't cut down on my energy usage much. Realistically I'd be cutting down as much as I could but it's hard to avoid some high consumption when all of my heating and cooking is electric

So a couple of jerry cans could see me through a week or so of total power cuts probably. Of course if it's gotten that bad then the power is probably never coming on, in which case all those apocalypse preppers are going to be having the time of their lives

slave1

Would you not be better with a battery? 20kWh with ~ 16kWh usable should be more than enough to power an average home for a number of days during a grid failure, ~€2.5k via DIY route, plus you can use throughout the year and not just sitting there waiting for an event that may never arise

Ubbquittious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119588574#Comment_119588574

Anyone who has the hybrid inverter/battery system will be only laughing at the rest of us struggling, at least until we get a few dark days in a row. Particularly if they have a changeover switch and their own well. I have a small off the grid system with some batteries and 1kW inverter but you can't run a whole lot off that.

Things will get ugly fast if the grid goes down for more than a day or two. During lockdown the takeaways stayed open but they might not be able to this time. A sizeable cohort of society will be "losing their sh1t". A lot of people have no backup at all

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119588574#Comment_119588574

Oh yeah, absolutely batteries are better.

If I'm running off a generator next year then it pretty much means the **** hit the fan big time and it's time to resort to drinking my own pee

Unfortunately I've no solar or batteries yet, so I'm going to have to survive winter before I can afford them

I would like to point out that a lot is being made of power cuts this winter but there needs to be some realism applied

Gas storage in Europe is currently at 80%, so if there's no curtailment of demand and no additional supplies come online then there's enough in storage to last most countries until February or March of 2023

Of course our wonderful governments over the years neglected to build up any gas storage over the past few years, so we're depending on imports from the UK.

Hopefully Ms Truss doesn't decide to let the Paddys freeze to protect her own people. It's not like the UK has a history of doing that or anything

In any case, I don't think we're facing the end of days. It's going to be a tough winter and in general people are going to be a lot more reluctant to use energy where they can avoid it

I think there's some fairly obvious load shedding that could be done, for example subsidizing some industry to run at night to avoid that evening peak

As grim as it is, I think the idea of not running the Christmas lights this year is a good one. I mean they could probably switch them on for 3 days over Christmas to give some cheer while everyone is off work

Realistically, we might be looking at rotating blackouts during peak times for an hour or two. In which case a battery is going to be more useful.

But I can also see how all this talk might have people running scared. And I can't really blame any folks who worry about keeping the heating on getting a generator as a short term solution. Especially if they have any kind of medical equipment they need to run

the_amazing_raisin

Actually I'm going to rant some more 😂

I decided to go to the office today (God only knows why I bothered) and there's about 5 people on my floor out of probably 200-300 desks

All the lights are on and the heating is set to a balmy 23C

The other floors are a little busier but I'm pretty sure they could fit everyone in work today onto one floor of one building (there's 4 buildings total)

How big a waste of energy is that in the middle of a crisis?

Companies all over Ireland should be forced to use a desk allocation system and only heat the floors that are needed

After 5pm the office should be shut down and the heating set down to 16C or something just to stop any frost building up. Everyone should be told to piss off home and stop working

slave1

Didn't I read somewhere the EU were going to look for a 19C max setting for public offices, agreed on work space heat, my place is deserted on non-mandatory office days

bullit_dodger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119589053#Comment_119589053

I don't think you can mandate people to piss off home at 5pm. Many of us work flexible hours and if I need a defibulator to get out of bed at 8am, I can go in at 10am and work later and that helps. Others need to drop off/pick up the kids, so there's external factors that dictate the hours they work.

That said, there is no reason that temperatures need to be above 20C. The fact that you have yours at 23C is a bit bonkers. Someone needs to get onto your facilities manager and get that changed and probably "locked" so that your average employee can't move it beyond 21C. I'd have it set to 19C, but that's a personal comfort level.

My pet peve is the monitors. I often head home later in the evening from the office and I'd see 10-20 monitiors left on. Granted they aren't the juice sucking fiends their CRT brothers were 20 years ago, but still each one probably 50-100w and for nothing. Why someone cant reach for literally 2 seconds and hit the power button, beyond me.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119589209#Comment_119589209

True 5pm is a bit optimistic maybe. But we're supposed to have the right to switch off from 7pm or something so it's probably not unreasonable to lower the heating demand

Could do some automation with the desk sockets, just kill them all at night

There's a few desks around me with some "do not unplug" signs on the desktops. Facilities really should be bringing the stick out and tell teams to move that equipment into a lab where it belongs

bullit_dodger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119589368#Comment_119589368

It's worse that that mate - we've a "group policy" in active directory which sets the sleep timeout value on the monitors. The fact that someone has them on means that they've over ridden the value set in the registry. We give people the power to do that, but really they're just being kleps, on a number of fronts.

Gerry

Companies will get a short sharp shock with bills.

I've a question with trying to boot up a non hybrid pv system in the event of a power cut. feed it 220v mains from a car battery via an inverter. all is well until it decides to export. anyone tried this?

Thinking with a steady load it might work? or a load I could vary.. or if an eddi was in place.

Ubbquittious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119593012#Comment_119593012

I never tried it but I imagine because there is nowhere for the excess power to go the voltage will rise quickly and it will decide to cut out. It could in theory work if you designed a dump load that prevents the voltage rising too much. The eddi will do feck all because it's current sensor will be reading 0 all the time if there is nowhere to export to

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119593012#Comment_119593012

Can you set the export to 0 temporarily so it won't try and export anything?

the_amazing_raisin

What are people's thoughts on heat batteries like the Sunamp?

Are they worth the bother if you already have a decent hot water cylinder?

My main goal with it would be to store up heat either from excess solar or using night rate and then discharge it during the day in winter

EDIT: Probably worth mentioning that the house is heated with a heat pump already

the_amazing_raisin

Does anyone here have an induction hob? If so, do you know if it draws a constant load does it constantly switch on and off like an electric hob?

con747

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119600541#Comment_119600541

AFAIK you can get both but open to correction. I was gifted a single ring counter top one by a fellow boardsie and found it reduced electricity use by a good amount so will be buying a full size one in the sales. Cooking times greatly reduced.

Jonathan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119600541#Comment_119600541

Mine definitely has a duty cycle at lower heat settings.