Looks like they have all suddenly realised that the gravy train is killing the host (us) that they all feed off.
Talk of decoupling renewables from spinning reserves to better reflect cheap RE power, feels like someone was reading our forum
Rest assured I am sure they will find someway to mess it up but at least the headlines will give many people a little respite from the all the scare stores in the press of late.
For the past few months I've been convinced that the real gas supply issues just aren't big enough (yet) to produce the massive increase in prices, and that the prices are being driven up by the usual scoundrels that do this to profit from big changes in prices. The impact of the war in Ukraine and the reduction in Russian gas (which is not yet that big, and shouldn't really have an impact until the coming winter) shouldn't be having that great an effect yet.
An uncle used to be a trader in the City, he often said that the best days for him, in terms of making money, were when prices were very volatile. Didn't matter if things went up or down, just as long as they changed, as he made money either way. Worst days for him were when prices were stable, as the number of trades and the potential to earn big money decreased. I've long thought that this system generates a very strong incentive to try and make prices change a great deal, which makes me suspicious that some influence things deliberately in order to benefit.
25 off 250W Perlight solar panels, installed 2014, with a 6kW PowerOne inverter, about 6,000kWh/year generated
6 off Pylontech US3000C batteries, with a Sofar ME3000SP inverter
Ostensibly YES the high power prices are a function of a market scheme that was devised for times where there is excess generation.
Now those time have gone and the spinning reserve is generally CCGT the price paid to the generators is that paid to the last generator supplying - ergo normally a CCGT. They were always more expensive than renewables or nukes but since Mr Putin started playing fast and wild with the gas tap they are even more expensive and since the one fuel serves electricity production and domestic heating/ cooking across the majority of Europe then the sniff of reduced supply further increased costs as utilities and governments panic bought and tied up the available market supply - kind of a bull market but not in the true context.
Interestingly the European gas reserves are now back to where they should have been all the time 80% so the panic is over and the resource is starting to become readily available again so the price relaxes.
The problem is that all the governments seem t think strategic reserves are a cost burden and NOT what the name implies an insurance asset - take Rough storage - costs too much - loads of cheap gas - close it down! Mistake! The same mistake made all across Europe - strategic reserves are just that! they have a value far above the monetary aspect and guard against acts of god, acts of mad men etc etc.
Governments became blasé about the supply chain and now we are all paying the penalty, and a good thing too I think as long as they all wake up and swallow the hard truth then this could become a pivotal moment.
As I noted earlier this year if all the capable nations sought to be self sufficient for the basics necessary for a country to be autonomous then added value by producing the means to transfer some of the said resources to and from other countries then in times of crisis any given country or continent could be supplied to a greater of lesser extent by neighbours and the neighbours in turn by countries further afield. Better than that though the less capable countries could be assisted in real terms with basic supplies, allowing them to divert urgent funds to infrastructure projects to get them out of the loan poverty trap that many of them are in.
It would never be perfect but its a lot better than what we do now and it is a less monetarised system than presently employed and therefore likely to have a better (faster?) environmental benefit for the world we live in.
