UK Wind Record

[nowty]

We are also burning coal at present (14:45) but gas is very low. Why are we burning coal for the first time in 5 days when there is plenty of Wind and low gas?

Conserving gas ?, exercising / testing mothballed coal power stations ?

Lots of weird stuff going on at the moment, it's not normal times.

[nowty]

well I got that wrong didn't I - we're importing from everybody on the mainland, even France, this lunchtime!

I noticed that, its going to make the record harder tomorrow because they can't let the gas stations go below a min level to provide grid stability.

I think we will be OK tomorrow as today (18:00) we are around peak demand with loads of import going on and gas is around 11 GW with wind at 13 GW (metered only) so we would need another 4 GW or 5 GW of wind which would reduce gas to around 6 GW. I think that's workable.

Peak wind tomorrow is a little earlier at 3pm. Looking at gridwatch data from 3pm today demand was lower with gas at 7 GW and wind at 13 GW so thats a bit touch and go.

But the wind looks like staying record breaking for several hours and past 6pm so we should be ok.

That 20 GW on Energy Numbers has got to go.
https://energynumbers.info/gbgrid

[dan_b]

Some very weird things going on still though - >18GW of wind, and yet we're burning coal, oil, "other" and the dreaded "biomass" to make another 1GW of generation. We're then importing 3.6GW from Europe, whilst exporting 3.1GW to France!

[Oldgreybeard]

Some very weird things going on still though - >18GW of wind, and yet we're burning coal, oil, "other" and the dreaded "biomass" to make another 1GW of generation. We're then importing 3.6GW from Europe, whilst exporting 3.1GW to France!

It's all about profit. If exporting to France earns more revenue than the cost of importing from elsewhere in Europe, or the cost of generating using coal or biomass, then that's what the system will do.

The question we need to ask is whether it makes sense, both environmentally and in terms of UK energy security, to leave most of the decisions about generation to a free market. As we are seeing, doing this does lead to sub-optimal behaviour for everything except profits.

[nowty]

Some very weird things going on still though - >18GW of wind, and yet we're burning coal, oil, "other" and the dreaded "biomass" to make another 1GW of generation. We're then importing 3.6GW from Europe, whilst exporting 3.1GW to France!

Maybe using the UK as a bypass to get power to France or it's an arbitrage. Or even the arbitrage facilitates the bypass of power via the UK to France. We have seen this peculiar event before.

I might ask my energy trading friend later.

https://app.electricitymaps.com/map

[nowty]

The export to France is going to help the record today and maybe its going to be smashed.


Peak around 2 GW higher than last weeks record.



Peak is flat and lasts several hours during peak demand time.



Peak demand today is forecast to be about 1 GW higher than yesterday.

[Ken]

Its not just about profit, the overiding consideration way more important is stability and reliability of supply. There are limitations on the transfer of leccy by the size of transmission but more importantly is what happens if a fault occurs. That is the reason why some gas and sometimes coal are needed to give spinning reserve to the system and at everypoint in the system otherwise there is the danger of a blackout if the unknown happens. Synchronous generators/condensers and batts with special inverters will remove this necessity by 2025? but it would be nice if sorted by the end of 2023.

[Oldgreybeard]

Its not just about profit, the overiding consideration way more important is stability and reliability of supply. There are limitations on the transfer of leccy by the size of transmission but more importantly is what happens if a fault occurs. That is the reason why some gas and sometimes coal are needed to give spinning reserve to the system and at everypoint in the system otherwise there is the danger of a blackout if the unknown happens. Synchronous generators/condensers and batts with special inverters will remove this necessity by 2025? but it would be nice if sorted by the end of 2023.

Doesn't explain the simultaneous import from Europe and almost equal magnitude export to France, though. If anything that makes the system slightly less stable, because over 3GW is flowing into the UK and then back out again after having passed through our own distribution network.

[Stan]

19.7GW wind at 10.40am.

[Mart]

Its not just about profit, the overiding consideration way more important is stability and reliability of supply. There are limitations on the transfer of leccy by the size of transmission but more importantly is what happens if a fault occurs. That is the reason why some gas and sometimes coal are needed to give spinning reserve to the system and at everypoint in the system otherwise there is the danger of a blackout if the unknown happens. Synchronous generators/condensers and batts with special inverters will remove this necessity by 2025? but it would be nice if sorted by the end of 2023.

Doesn't explain the simultaneous import from Europe and almost equal magnitude export to France, though. If anything that makes the system slightly less stable, because over 3GW is flowing into the UK and then back out again after having passed through our own distribution network.

Could it be that demand and generation in the UK and the ability to move it internally, isn't matching exactly at the moment. So import in some areas, and export elsewhere. But not necessarily the same leccy (so to speak) using the UK as a way to get to France?

Obviously I'm totally guessing, and I'm ignoring the Irish imports, as that's probably down to high wind at the same time, so the UK can take advantage or transfer it (for arbitrage) to mainland Europe.

As I said a few days ago, I find this stuff so, so interesting. I also said France would want the leccy, but yesterday we were importing it, so clearly I can't work out the whys.