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Greenpeace stop a coal train with a polar bear in the Retford area


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Some good comments posted, some bad, some uninformed.

 

Here are some facts, just some, and not the full picture, that would take a book !!

 

I'm a retired gas engineer, 40 odd years experience on the distribution (gas  mains) side.

 

1 Didcot closed last year as it had reached its EU imposed CO2 generation / coal burn limit. The station was quickly decommissioned. The generators where taken to Avonmouth docks and shipped to Germany, and are / have been installed in a newly built Lignite powered power station. Gen up on Lignite - its very dirty burning stuff. The Germans / Poles have millions and millions of tons of it. Why are we Brits so, so, stupid. The EU gives us a gun, we shoot our own foot.

 

2. Peak Load - A freezing cold winters evening roughly between 4pm & 7.30pm. Cookers, central heating, lighting, transport, you name it - it will be switched ON. Huge energy load, both Electricity & Gas. Green electricity (wind solar etc) just can't cope with base load, let alone peak load. Some say use gas at this time, OK but the gas grid is running flat out also. Gas storage in the UK is also far below what it should be. By the way we JUST about got through the last few winters without major interruptions so tight is the gas supply situation becoming. Many major gas loads can be shed at a moments notice, these are called interuptable customers, & they usually have back up power, i.e  diesel generators or oil fired dual fuel boilers. But you can't really interrupt a gas fired power station at peak load (shooting the other foot !!!!).

 

3. Gas supply, Contrary to Mr Salmond, North Sea gas output is declining. A huge £££Billion LNG (liquefied natural gas) import terminal was commissioned a couple of years ago. Gas will come from Qatar, Egypt and other politically stable and steady countries. A new pipeline links this terminal with the National Gas Grid, and has been busy this summer transporting imported gas from Milford Haven to Norfolk and thence via the interconnector pipeline to mainland Europe. Mainland Europe has huge Nat Gas storage facilities, probably it will help them over the coming winter when Putin shuts off their gas !!. (The UK doesn't import Russian gas - Yet - Though it is being considered)

Another point, a loaded LNG tanker on the high sea can be diverted to anywhere in the world to whoever bids the highest price. This has happened, loads bound for the UK diverted to Japan after Fukoshima. It will be interesting in January !!.

 

4. Tree Huggers, Quite simply all those demanding green energy rather than a mix of nuclear, coal and gas should be put on smart meters. When the power generation capacity falls short, they are the first to lose supply - and the last to get it back.

 

5. Al Gore.

 

531070_372749179482451_1995913147_n.jpg

 

'Nuff said about him.

 

Big, big problems looming.  I'm uncertain about global warming, and the climate has changed since Adam was a lad, though all the CO2 pumped upstairs by ourselves, Volcanoes and Cows farting is / has sure to have / had some affect on the world somehow, somewhere.

 

Green won't run our current way of life (but it helps). Gas could (for a while) but our (conventional) supply is limited, and I'm not so sure about Fracking, (one hell of a risk there to underground water etc), Tidal / Coal and Nuclear will be needed for a long, long time or it will be Goodnight Vienna.

 

Brit15

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The other big issue with power generation that is glossed over is that you really need to match the output to the demand in real time (or as close as possible). As the amount of solar and wind generation increases, this becomes more of a problem. Solar and wind generation is dependent on conditions, and so provides a variable output that is not coordinated with demand. Nuclear and hydro are very good for providing a base level, but are relatively difficult to throttle, so are best providing a fixed amount of power. This means that the more easily throttlable sources (oil, coal, and gas) have to be the ballancing factor. Gas power plants are the easiest to adjust output on (and can be started from effectively zero output as required), but coal and oil plants (and other plants that produce power by burning things) are also easier to adjust the output of than the other sources.

 

Actually hydro is very good for peak demand in the form of pumped storage.  Pumped storage is a smart way of using excess generation capacity to "store" energy for future use.

 

We have the environmental lobby to thank for the bizarre practise of using fossil fuels to chop down trees in the US, then pelletise them using fossil fuels, transport them to a port and load them on to a ship using fossil fuels, transport them thousands of miles across the Atlantic using fossil fuels, unload them from the ship and load onto a train using fossil fuels, transport them to Drax power station using fossil fuels to then burn them less efficiently than coal (which could be sourced locally). I haven't heard any cohesive argument about how this is better for the environment, but I'll bet that somebody is better off financially because of it.

 

The theory is that the CO2 out from burning is the same as the CO2 taken by the plant during its short growth.  The reality is somewhat different (as you point out), though I'd be amazed that even with transport etc if it was worse than coal!

 

Having spent too much of my working life wrestling with some of these issues, total mass and energy balances or life cycle assessments looking at a wide range of environmental factors are hard to do thoroughly and easy to "cheat" - they all basically boil down to what you include as part of the system (and what you compare them to).

 

The thing that started all this green energy panic, was Al Gores crappy film, and the suits jumped on the band wagon. To get to the bottom of this nonsense, you have to chase the money.

 

Not really, Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth was made nearly a decade after Kyoto!

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The main reason why most biomass comes from the US is that there's not enough in UK for demand
HSTFAN13
Lee          

 

Surely the whole point of burning biomass is to move towards being carbon neutral. How is the process that I described in my post in anyway carbon neutral and beneficial to the environment? It is sheer lunacy.

 

Apollo is right our energy supply is extremely tight and getting tighter. If we have another bad winter in the next few years, expect rolling blackouts and the economic madness of paying factories to be idle. Then watch excess winter deaths go through the roof.

 

The only realistic way for us to reduce our carbon dioxide emissions and keep the lights on is to go nuclear and put a tidal barrage across the Severn, and that would take years to come online anyway.

 

As an aside, there are people about to reach the age of 18 who have never experienced any global warming in their lifetimes.

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Plants, you know, those generally green things, take in CO2, and release oxygen. 45acre greenhouse in Lincs uses waste heat and CO2 from a sugar beat processing plant.  <snip>

 

Is there one in Lincolnshire, as well?  I know they grow tomatoes using the waste heat from Wissington sugar beet factory, but that is in Norfolk.

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I remember a suggestion that a tidal bore(s) was used in Scotland to produce a significant amount of energy, until it was realised that doing so would involve flooding half of the Scotland and the plan was abandoned.  However given recent events this may be a solution both to power problems and Scottish problems.

 

I hate to say this, but given the state of the world at the moment a direct action protest involving stopping a coal train seems fairly petty by comparison.

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The theory is that the CO2 out from burning is the same as the CO2 taken by the plant during its short growth.  The reality is somewhat different (as you point out), though I'd be amazed that even with transport etc if it was worse than coal!

 

The energy density of coal, especially anthracite is much higher than biomass and so burns with greater efficiency and more calories per gram. Biomass is full of other elements such as hydrogen, oxygen, sulphur and nitrogen resulting in gases that produce acid rain and particulates, though I will concede that advanced power stations with flue gas desulphurisation equipment such as Drax will burn these cleanly. Lignite burning has the same issues of a lower energy density and dirty exhaust as biomass compared to coal. That said a lot of the harmful smog in Asia is a result of biomass burning.

 

At the rate we are burning biomass, how much land will need to be given over to biomass production to sustainably satisfy demand? We have seen in the US growing corn to burn as bioethanol instead of to eat impacts food prices and it is the poorest who suffer.

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I seem to recall there was a power station in Norfolk that burnt chicken shite.  Perhaps Greenpeace should sponsor another one to burn all the bullshite their supporters have been posting on Facebook.  One clown even said Germany had abandoned nuclear (they still generated 15% last year by nuclear although they are reducing it) and were 95% solar!  Given 41% of German electricity comes from coal, of which roughly 20% comes from the filthy Lignite soft coal, plus any Northern European country relying on 95% solar would have some very long cold nights in the stone age to endure, I think he was a prime candidate to work at the bullshite power station.

 

Still, as I pointed out after posting the official German Government stats for their electricity mix, at least in a country running 95% solar all the oldies dying of hypothermia would reduce the population enough to reduce energy and resource consumption.  Perhaps that's their agenda.

 

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I seem to recall there was a power station in Norfolk that burnt chicken shite.  Perhaps Greenpeace should sponsor another one to burn all the bullshite their supporters have been posting on Facebook.  One clown even said Germany had abandoned nuclear (they still generated 15% last year by nuclear although they are reducing it) and were 95% solar!  Given 41% of German electricity comes from coal, of which roughly 20% comes from the filthy Lignite soft coal, plus any Northern European country relying on 95% solar would have some very long cold nights in the stone age to endure, I think he was a prime candidate to work at the bullshite power station.

 

Still, as I pointed out after posting the official German Government stats for their electricity mix, at least in a country running 95% solar all the oldies dying of hypothermia would reduce the population enough to reduce energy and resource consumption.  Perhaps that's their agenda.

 

Yes there is but they've converted it so it can burn a wider range of similar fuels

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Lee

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We have seen in the US growing corn to burn as bioethanol instead of to eat impacts food prices and it is the poorest who suffer.

The corn / ethanol / alternative fuel situation is entirely connected to farm subsidies and politics while it was 'branded' as an attempt to reduce US dependence on foreign sourced fossil fuels and as being greener since it is a biomass fuel. It is not universally available in the US. 

 

It does not take food out of anyone's mouth. The US overproduces corn, (much of which ends up as high fructose corn syrup and is a primary ingredient in relatively unhealthy cheap processed foods) and can overproduce even more.

 

A big concern with midwestern agriculture is the depletion of artesian water in the Ogallala Aquifer. Separately in California (where most of the fresh vegetables are grown) the recent extreme drought is critically stressing agriculture there.

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Actually hydro is very good for peak demand in the form of pumped storage.  Pumped storage is a smart way of using excess generation capacity to "store" energy for future use.

 

 

 

 

 

I agree that pumped storage is an ideal way of storing energy. There are however a few problems inusing them to balance renewables. We would need significantly more of them. Dinorwig the bigest is only 2GW and peak demand 60GW. Who would forward the capital cost for their construction. The finances worked for CEGB as the capital cost could be offset by savings accruing from running thermal plant overnight rather than shutting it down. Such savings only come with an intigrated system which was destroyed at privatisation.

 

The amount of energy available for generation at Dinorwig is limited by the size of the top lake. It is not as big as one would like.

 

If we wanted to replicate Dinorwig where would we build it. The best sites, Foyers, Cruachan, Festiniog and Dinorwig are taken. Dinorwig was a massive civil undertaking and most of it is hidden inside the mountain. I can see the protests if a particularly scenic spot was chosen. The problems are not insurmountable but will be expensive with huge capital outlay.

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Hi Jonny777,

 

you're right, it is Norfolk  http://www.britishtomatoes.co.uk/environment

 

Hi red death

 

Nobody took much notice of Kyoto, until Al Gore published his untruths. He was virtually bankrupt before then, afaik. If you think it is nothing to do with money, then here's some info http://www.fern.org/book/trading-carbon/carbon-desk-closures I guess Rockefellers are sweeping up the remains.

 

Best wishes,

 

Ray

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I agree that pumped storage is an ideal way of storing energy. There are however a few problems inusing them to balance renewables. We would need significantly more of them. Dinorwig the bigest is only 2GW and peak demand 60GW. Who would forward the capital cost for their construction. The finances worked for CEGB as the capital cost could be offset by savings accruing from running thermal plant overnight rather than shutting it down. Such savings only come with an intigrated system which was destroyed at privatisation.

 

The amount of energy available for generation at Dinorwig is limited by the size of the top lake. It is not as big as one would like.

 

If we wanted to replicate Dinorwig where would we build it. The best sites, Foyers, Cruachan, Festiniog and Dinorwig are taken. Dinorwig was a massive civil undertaking and most of it is hidden inside the mountain. I can see the protests if a particularly scenic spot was chosen. The problems are not insurmountable but will be expensive with huge capital outlay.

SSE plc/Southern and Scottish have put forward plans for a pump storage plant in Scotland but can't remember it's name at mo but should be on web

HSTFAN13

Lee

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. There are no 'clean' alternatives: hydro power is fish killing power, .

Do waves machine beat fish to death? Dam hydro power may take in a few but it's hardly mass slaughter, often the intakes are deeper than the majority of fish swim.

 

, wind power - is bird killing power. .

Only before they understood about birds regular flight paths, the RSPB are now consulted and have proved several cases of birds found dead near turbines as not being killed by them but are either road kill or otherwise killed birds dumped by protestors.
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What about small solar panels on top of your locos/units/wagons/coaches ? :)

HSTFAN13

Lee

 

No use if you model the London Underground....... (yes I know about the surface lines)

 

Cheers,

Mick

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We will likely see more civil disobedience on the topic of trying to arrest climate change.

 

I am in full accord with everyone who deplored the illegal trespass on the railway as a safety hazard. Notwithstanding the violation of boundaries intended to protect the public they seem to have safely halted and boarded the train and are all dressed in hi-viz and the exercise was clearly not as stupid as it might have been, while still wrong.

 

 

They only 'safely halted' the train because it was travelling at fairly low speed - if they had tried this stupidity out on a faster running line the outcome could have been very different - assuming one or two of them weren't hit by another train while acting so daft enough as to trespass on a railway line.

 

Having stopped the train they then proceeded to climb onto the wagons - again a fairly foolhardy exercise especially because of the way these wagons can be loaded (see my picture of a train unloading at Cottam which I posted earlier) this stuff is very small coal and because of the way it settles in the wagons it can be unsafe to walk on it.  Not only that but, as EDF's personal safety instructions require, you are ill advised to go anywhere near the stuff unless you are wearing proper safety specs because it can easily get into your eyes, especially if it is being moved around on a dry day, and cause permanent damage.

 

Basically they were a pack of naive idiots who thought they were doing something clever but in reality were putting themselves and others in danger and causing considerable disruption to train movements.  And as for their wearing hi-viz outfits I'll simply repeat what I say when training folk in on-track/lineside safety - I hold up a hi-viz vest and say 'this thing makes trains bounce off you' (because that is what some dumbos actually believe) 'whereas in reality all it does is let a Driver see you before he hits you'.  In other words any halfwit can put on h-v clothing but it does nothing to aid their knowledge of personal safety or anything else.

 

For their own sakes, and the safety of others who might be inclined to act in a similarly stupid fashion, I hope that NR, the train operator, and BT Police throw every book they can find at them.

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Do waves machine beat fish to death? Dam hydro power may take in a few but it's hardly mass slaughter, often the intakes are deeper than the majority of fish swim.

I was referring to dams. We have lots of 'clean' hydro-power here in the Pacific Northwest.

 

They devastate the salmon ecosystem. We have manually replaced the natural cycle of fish because the fingerlings get crushed by pressure in the turbines and they're not clever enough to choose the overflow instead. To compensate, fish are spawned in hatcheries near their natural spawning grounds then barged past the dam before being released.

 

More humourously (in a dark way) the adult fish returning up the fish ladder to spawn get decimated by sea lions that have figured out that the base of the fish ladder is a natural all-you-can-eat buffet. The circus around trying to fix the sea lion problem has been comical but that's another story.

 

Only before they understood about birds regular flight paths, the RSPB are now consulted and have proved several cases of birds found dead near turbines as not being killed by them but are either road kill or otherwise killed birds dumped by protestors.

That may well be true in the UK. From my understanding it's a problem in the US, but there are plenty of wind power supporters who will say it's not.

 

Certainly there are bigger threats to birds than wind power. Climate change is one, as is the use of pesticides that kill them directly or indirectly by killing their food source. Bird strike with wind turbines is a fact. Wind turbines (thankfully for our scenery) are still fairly limited but more of them will kill more birds.

 

I still feel that the model for renewable power is to invert the whole system with distributed rather than concentrated generation (power stations, wind farms etc) This is not an economically attractive option.

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SSE plc/Southern and Scottish have put forward plans for a pump storage plant in Scotland but can't remember it's name at mo but should be on web

HSTFAN13

Lee

Found it see link

http://sse.com/whatwedo/ourprojectsandassets/renewables/coireglas/

 

It is only 600MW yet will cost £800million and we still need to factor in the cost of wind or solar to run the pumps. To be anywhere balancing renewables and demand we need nearer 20GW of pumped storage

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Found it see link

http://sse.com/whatwedo/ourprojectsandassets/renewables/coireglas/

 

It is only 600MW yet will cost £800million and we still need to factor in the cost of wind or solar to run the pumps. To be anywhere balancing renewables and demand we need nearer 20GW of pumped storage

Yup that's the one

Yes quite expensive but in the long run(can't remember there lifespan(20-30 years maybe)though they could be repowered)it could be very valuable to the UK grid

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Lee

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I look at things and break them down into simple easy to understand things.

 

Where does the head of Greenpeace PR live............Huntingdon.

 

Where is the office............................Islington North London.

 

Mode of transport to the office................The car.

 

A daily 100 mile round trip, admittedly not in a gas guzzler but still 3 gallons of fossil fuel a day.

 

So remember, we must stop using fossil fuels so that there is more left for Greenpeace employees !

 

Simple really. :smoke:   

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