Wednesday
Oct172012
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Lordly questions
Oct 17, 2012 Energy: grid House of Lords From Today's Moderator
Energy: Self-sufficiency
Question
2.52 pm [15 October 2012]
Asked by Lord Ezra
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether the UK could again become self-sufficient in energy
....will [my noble friend] confirm that there will be adequate electricity supplies and generating capacity, in view of the recent report of Ofgem that stated that there might be a reduction in capacity in the next four years?
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201213/ldhansrd/text/1210150001.htm#12101518000364
Update: date corrected, 9.35pm, 17.10.12. TM]
Reader Comments (54)
Presumably Lord Ezra is Derek Ezra, the former chairman of the National Coal Board?
And here is the answer:
Baroness Verma: My noble friend is absolutely right that we need to try to maximise the economic recovery of oil and gas from the UK continental shelf, and our most recent licensing round has been the most successful ever. We are committed to working with industry to create a new world-leading, cost-effective UK carbon capture and storage industry, and policies such as the Green Deal and the introduction of smart meters will reduce our energy demand and ensure more efficient use of the fuel that we use. Our ongoing work is to achieve renewable targets which significantly increase the proportion of clean domestic energy in the mix. Ofgem's recent report provides a comprehensive analysis of the security of supply. We are looking at it very carefully and will respond formally by the end of the year.
You are all doomed.
Lord Ezra represents an organisation called "The Micropower Council" promoting micro-generation from solar, "micro-wind" and so on. So if the future is a system where central energy supplies are expected to be shonky and the users will be expected to make up the shortfall then his organisation will become more important I guess.
"We are looking at it very carefully and will respond formally by the end of the year."
Oh f**k what do we do?!!
Can somebody explain how the introduction of "smart" meters will reduce demand in any significant way?
I can see how they can significantly reduce availability by cutting you off, but not have they can reduce demand.
Is anyone else irritated by the extremely short posts that have been appearing recently, that when you click on to expand are STILL rather short. Makes reading the blog unnecessarily complicated.
I fully support truncating long posts, but this all seems rather silly.
This is not reducing demand; it is reducing supply. Our lords and masters will call it reducing demand and will claim credit for reducing energy bills, always assuming by that time they give a damn what anybody thinks.
They will be lying.The demand for energy will be as great as ever. The government intends to ration the supply and call it "reducing demand".
The only way of (possibly) preventing this will be a concerted effort to get the facts to MPs and the media by whatever means possible, in the hope that the message might get through before it's too late.
TerryS Oct 17, 2012 at 1:33 PM
"Cutting you off". That's exactly how they mean to do it. Did you not see Steve Holliday's (Chief Exec of National Grid) comments on Today back in March?
(From the telegraph) "People will have to "Change their behaviour". "The grid is going to be a very different system in 2020/2030," he said "We keep thinking we want it to be there and provide power when we need it. it is going to be much smarter than that. We are going to change our own behaviour and consume it when it is available and available cheaply."
So, we don't get to choose when we cook our Christmas dinner? Or do anything else of course. Sounds like a nice free society to live in.
Would someone shake the noble Baroness warmly by the throat, and explain to her in words of one syllable, so that she can understand:
Carbon capture and storage won't work.
Not now.
Not next year.
Not ever...
Oct 17, 2012 at 1:33 PM | TerryS
I can see how they can significantly reduce availability by cutting you off, but not have they can reduce demand.
There are 26 million electricity meters in the UK.
There are 26 million little discs going round and round 24/7, (fridges, standby lamps, 3:00 am kettles etc.) and this is the "demand" that National Grid observe.
So, when you have a smart meter in place of your steam driven meter, it will see the same demand as before.
So if the Commissioners in the Central Reduce Demand Commission send a signal to instruct your smart meter to disconnect your demand, then hey presto, demand is reduced.
Oct 17, 2012 at 1:41 PM | Mike Jackson
The means of "supply" is disappearing and they cannot admit to their earlier mistakes and dithering that has brought us to this situation, therefore, the only way that grid stability can be maintained by NG is to reduce demand when supply fails (no wind).
NG pay big businesses to reduce their demand in times of peril but the peasants have to cut off at such times.
IIRC, the lady from Drax told the numpties that there is a demand swing of 17 GW when the peasants start getting up in the morning, so it is going to very handy for NG to be able to kill this huge demand when necessary.
Peasants, Brownedoff? Do you mean plebs?
I'll copy over what I put ont he other post as it seems relivant.
Diversion tactics, there is only one way our overlords can make consumers change their ways yes you can try and price them into oblivion but this will lose you votes. Install smart meters that are able to control what is powered in a serfs home and then supply a licence to them, priced accordingly of course, if you have the correct licence you can run your washing machine, tumble dryer and dish washer at 5pm local time but if you don’t have the correct license it is the choice of only one appliance between midnight and 6am.
Simple really.
The current Private Eye has a cartoon showing two MPs. One asks: Do you think the public will be consulted about future energy policy? The other: No - they're likely to be kept in the dark.
Only "likely"?
There are three components to power for the people (unfortunate phrase, I know): Supply, Demand, and Usage. when the demand is too high for the supply then the powers-that-be will cut your usage until they balance the equation of what they then claim is demand against supply.
And doesn't Baroness Verma realise that it's no good trying to ensure supply if a third of it is used to drive CCS - if it could ever be shown to work. We really are ruled by the pathetic.
Oct 17, 2012 at 2:28 PM | Peter Dunford
No, I went to a Grammar School founded in 1548 for peasants.
We would have got whacked for using such a sloppy abbreviation as "plebs".
De gustibus non est disputandum.
I have today received a letter from G4S Utility and Outsourcing Services headed "Urgent Gas Meter Replacement Required!".
It goes on to say "Your gas meter has reached the end of its usable life, and is no longer certified for use in your home. So it is essential that we exchange your meter as soon as possible. G4S are working on behalf of Scottish Power, your energy supplier to replace your meter free of charge." .... "Please note that access to your property is required to complete this work even if your gas meter is located outside [it is]. This is so that household appliances can be tested as part of the gas safety checks."
Further to the above, Private Eye also has a story about "headless-chicken ministers ... endorsing the subsidy of ever more ludicrous and expensive ways of squaring the circle between their green dreams of "decarbonisation" and the nation's need for reliable electricity". The example they choose is the subsidy provided to enable the Drax power plant to convert to wood burning - "forests must fall in distant, fertile lands to be burned in Yorkshire - and electricity consumers must subsidise the whole crazy process."
Yes, but is it any more crazy than the (vastly greater) subsidies given to environmentally disastrous wind farms that produce no power when the wind doesn't blow? But then of course Private Eye regards someone who has drawn attention to that as a "batshit anti-environmentalist" - link.
"So if the Commissioners in the Central Reduce Demand Commission send a signal to instruct your smart meter to disconnect your demand, then hey presto, demand is reduced."
Precisely. The consumir demand and the demand on production are diferent things where you can shut up the consumer.
Narrative is reality.
Brownedoff
Doesn't alter the facts.
Cutting off domestic supplies as and when the load requires it — or for any other "good" governmental reason — is not "reducing demand". Except possibly in Newspeak.
In a modern civilised society there is no excuse for not being able to supply energy 24/7. The fact that the muppets have so f***ed up that within the next three years the UK (and maybe France and Germany if they're not careful) may well have to return to the living standards of the Victorians is no excuse for letting them get away with trotting out whatever lies the civil servants at DECC feed to their useless ministers.
And at the end of the day, guess who is going to suffer. That's right
the old
the poor
the sick
And guess who will drift blithely on totally unaware of what is happening in the sewage-ridden water-less and powerless (in every sense) slum at the other end of town.
the politicians
the civil servants
the Porritts & Goldsmiths & Monbiots
the rest of the idiot greenies.
And it's not until the politicians and the civil servants and the media that have not so far drunk the Kool-Aid wake up to the implications that anything is going to change.
Is anyone really going to put with being cut off at the whim of government?
I will have a generator. It will annoy my neighbours. It will be my human right.
> I will have a generator. It will annoy my neighbours.
You can get a natural gas generator that will automatically switch on when your supply switches off. The main benefit of them is that you don't have to store petrol/diesel at home.
It wont annoy your neighbours because they will just come and visit you during blackouts.
re TerryS
Just look at the specifications for meters currently being installed. Most don't contain functionality to remotely control appliances, but then most appliances and wiring don't support that either. What they do allow is remote disconnect, and multiple tariff tables. That will allow new, innovative tariffs (read: expensive) to be introduced and reduce demand. To zero if you get behind on your payments.
I'm all for Smart Meters unilaterally interrupting demand.
The industry should Field Trial at the Houses of Parliament; and, at the homes of all those working in the Houses of Parliament.
Oct 17, 2012 at 3:40 PM | Mike Jackson
Cutting off domestic supplies as and when the load requires it — or for any other "good" governmental reason — is not "reducing demand". Except possibly in Newspeak.
It is and it is in Plain English - no need to invoke Newspeak.
In a modern civilised society there is no excuse for not being able to supply energy 24/7.
There is an "excuse" and it is called the Climate Change Act 2008.
And it's not until the politicians and the civil servants and the media that have not so far drunk the Kool-Aid wake up to the implications that anything is going to change.
I think this sentiment was first uttered by a plebeian on the Episcopus MonsMontis blog just before Nero committed suicide in June AD 68.
We are still waiting for the solution.
It is really encouraging to know that in Baroness Verma, our power supply is in such capable and experienced hands. As far as I can gather, all the noble lady has succeeded in achieving is standing and losing in two parliamentary elections.
Will this cause a run on small (3 to 5kW) diesel generators?
I have to say it is quite interesting being the only house in the village with lights when the main power cable was cut by a forest fire (power cables are now underground so it might not happen again).
the introduction of smart meters will
INCREASE PRICES (AND PROFITS) AND THUS
reduce our energy demand
terryS: Smart Meters do serve a usefull function for me. Even though no appliances are controlled by the smart meter, I can see if usage is higher than it should be. In one case, an incandesent light was left on in the attic, and in another, the AC fan was set to "ON", not "Automatic".
In conjunction with another seperate system, I can control power usage remotely, by comparing my smart meter daily usage with my automatic schedules, and adjust according to weather and use.
Using both systems, I have reduced power consumption bewteen 20-80%, depending on the season. Over the year 2012, we have used 35% less than our neighbours (the smart meter will give usage compared to neighbours in the area, of 20-100 homes). We also have all LEDs/CFLs, smart thermostats, smart power bars, solar powered attic fans etc....
Is it worth it? To a techno geek like me, yes. But my payback time will be a decade or more. Upfront investment was about 10K USD.
The take home message? Smart meters and smart homes are for those who can afford it and know how how to use it. While power consumption is reduced, it is not to the extent that would make a marked difference to the grid. For example, based on my example, if 25% of the households were to move to a smart system, less than 10% savings would occur. And 25% penetration would be remarkable, and hugely expensive.
I've just patented a new home generation system. It's a man-sized hamster wheel. You go down the Job Centre and hire an unemployed climate science graduate to work it.
"So, we don't get to choose when we cook our Christmas dinner? Or do anything else of course. Sounds like a nice free society to live in."
Hot showers and baths might also get listed as being as bad as Nuclear-power and DDT on steroids [as well as being a sign of low moral fibre].
Fortunately, I think the sun will go supernova before the National Grid has to ever cope again with the half-time power surge associated with England playing in a World Cup Final.
I have what I call an ecometer, gives me a readout of gas / elec usage, current hour, prev 28 days, prev 12 months plus a traffic light red/yellow/green general guide to current load and I have used the data it gives me to check energy usage. It was fitted as part of a trial by npower, cost me nothing. Trial been over for at least 12 months npower don't want it back as its no longer supported by the manufacturer but the only difference to the info it gives me is it no longer supports an estimate of current usage cost. I reckon I reduced annual power use by around 20% over past 2 years. Very useful to keep track of likely future bill costs.
I would love to explain this to my MP but there is a problem
I don't know enough words of one syllable!
So, having now been made aware of natural gas generators (thanks, TerryS), I find that they're four grand plus VAT (might be able to swing that last bit as I work from home and need a PC, I suppose). This must be the 500,000 green jobs figure so arbitrarily thrown out by the yoghourt-knitters - making more generators to compensate for power failures or 'demand management'. Except that the Chinese will no doubt see the opportunity too and only the fitters will then be UK-based. Just like windmills. And solar panels.
I'm beginning to see a bit of a pattern developing here.
@ Les Johnson,
It is nice that you are technically capable of using these meters to monitor your usage, and take action to reduce it. You are what used to be called a "useful idiot", for spreading the word about how the future is going to be so wonderful and equitable and happy.
I feel some civil disobedence is in order.
I will refuse to have one of these "smartmeters" in my house.
If enough people refuse the Government (and the damned Greens) will be f****d.
As I understand smart meters, they can be programmed to cut your power off when you exceed a preset level therefore if you ARE cut off it's 'your own damned fault' for running excessively high loads..... the Government sit pretty claiming THEY didn't cut you off, you did it to yourself.
The link gives me a 404, and as for the date 2.52 pm [15 October 2102] of the question asked by Lord Ezra, I suppose I will have to wait another 90 years to see it in Hansard. [Date now corrected. Thanks. TM]
Dave_G
Electricity meters in France (our holiday home) are set to trip at certain levels. Very low to begin with, kettle + hairdrier would do it. You then had to go to the local EDF to have it increased, they would then modify your tariff.
Oct 17, 2012 at 8:49 PM | Pharos
Here is the LINK
Scroll down to Column 1256.
Simon Abingdon (and others)
DO NOT AGREE to having a smart meter fitted whatever your supplier says. The law says they MUST fit a smart meter but IF a time and date can not be agreed, they will not fit it (unless the law is changed).
Beware of the Natural Gas generators some of them have Guarantees as low as one year or 500 hours. The mess that is our energy policy could use that guarantee up in short order.
For those who point out that Smart Meters have helped them; I don't care if they give free ten pound notes now and again, if they allow my supplier to cut off my supply then it will be over my dead body.
If you cut off power at the meter it is only a matter of time before you get this:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/energy/2012/07/pictures/120731-india-power-outage-blackout-energy/#/india-power-outage-tangled_57535_600x450.jpg
People will find a way.
Michael Hart: "Hot showers and baths might also get listed as being as bad as Nuclear-power and DDT on steroids [as well as being a sign of low moral fibre]."
Showers are still allowed (although "hot", I'm not so sure about), as per this useful guide to our low-carbon future by Prof. Kevin Anderson of the Tyndall Centre:
http://www.neweconomics.org/blog/2012/10/01/50-months-kevin-anderson
"I’ve cut back on washing and showering – but only to levels that were the norm just a few years back."
The norm for whom, I wonder.
This is not reducing demand; it is reducing supply. ..... The government intends to ration the supply and call it "reducing demand".
It might be of interest to note that this has already happened in the water industry. Water reservoirs ceased being built some time ago, and now, whenever there is a natural dry spell, everybody is required to stop using their normal water allocation. Most people have accepted that as normal. I don't know why, as there is no difficulty in storing enough water to run this country through the driest sumer. It's just that there is an EU requirement to use 20% less water....
Re: Les Johnston
20-80% seems fantastic.
I've gone over my last years bills and I used a little over 20kwh per day. In order to reduce this by 80% to to 4kwh I would be restricted to cooking one meal a day and running a fridge and freezer (no lighting or heating allowed). When you take into account all the computer equipment I use (about 14kwh per day) there is very little scope in the 20kwh to make any significant savings (I have no intention of saving electricity by turning of my computers and the vast majority of households wouldn't have this as an option).
If introducing smart meters into households made significant savings we would be bombarded with the information. There are enough installed now for electricity companies to do a comparison of usage before and after.
I am amused to note that here in NZ, when our fledgling Parliamentary democracy was experimenting in the mid-19th century with the form it should take, it was decided that an Upper House was not only a luxury the young country could not afford, the requisite number of adequately sentient persons to inhabit the thing could not be found.
It seems the UK still has the same problems!
It might be of interest to note that this has already happened in the water industry. Water reservoirs ceased being built some time ago, and now, whenever there is a natural dry spell, everybody is required to stop using their normal water allocation.
That is the most excellent comment I have ever read on the subject - thank you!
I will be using this!
If we reduce electricity use to zero we can guarantee 100% self sufficiency in it.
It needs a policy of non-cooperation, a public test, a refusal by consumers to pay bills of any sort to the utilities...................but, problem is: that's why they [utilities] love direct debit so much.
On a wider prospect, we should think of non-cooperation with all forms of government - from your council tax and TV license to income tax returns etc.
And, do not vote for the consensus political parties - Lav/Lib/Tory, a vote for them is a vote for the EU.
Smart meters will save the planet!
Energy supplies in UK are now being affected by renewable (aka uncontrollable) generation. Neither wind nor sun can be controlled and, as the wind farms extend out to sea, it is now inevitable that the supply of electricity will vary wildly across the system. Filling the gaps in supply created by these variations is costly and inefficient. It will be easier and cheaper to reduce demand. Power cuts and voltage reductions (dimming) will not be politically acceptable. The alternative is the Smart Meter.
Demand reduction and control of demand are the secret weapons in the ‘War on Climate Change’. Introduced by Labour and supported by both Liberal and Conservatives, the Smart Meter is portrayed as to giving ‘power to the people’ by providing them with information about their consumption and the costs of energy at different times and from different suppliers. By cutting their supplies off for themselves in order to save money, they reduce the likelihood of power cuts and, of course, earn carbon credits for the wind-farmers for as long as carbon trading survives,
The ostensible purpose of the Smart Meter is to allow customers to see not only how much energy they are using, but also how much it is costing. In future, the suppliers will be able to vary the price of energy, probably half-hourly and to provide incentives and penalties to prompt customers to behave as best suits the local supply conditions, and, of course, the accounts of the supply company. When the weather is calm and bitterly cold, electricity will be at a very high premium. The meter will display the cost: the householder will reach for more warm clothes and the factory will shut down for the next few days or go bust.
The Smart Meter also enables the supplier to cut off people who run up bad debts. This is the official tale supporting the cut-off facility. Individual customers who are not compliant with the needs of the supplier or who seem, regardless of cost, to be using excessive amounts of energy at undesirable times could be cut off. If enough people do not switch supplies off for themselves, energy rationing will be inevitable. If demand outruns supply and if very high prices do not constrain it, then supplies must be interrupted. Whole sectors of the network could be cut off at a moment’s notice. The people would have only themselves to blame – not the Government nor the suppliers.
Of course, this is portrayed as a ‘win-win’ situation. The suppliers will be able to maximise their profits. The customers, ‘simply’ by changing their lifestyles, will be able to control, even reduce, their energy bills by switching everything off. More ‘natural’ habits, such as going to bed at sunset and getting up at dawn would be promoted on health grounds – tuning your circadien cycle to nature will be demonstraed to prolong active life etc. etc.. We might even revert to medieval time-keeping which divided the daylight period into unequal hours that varied in length by the season and which were marked by striking bells. Because energy is measured in KWH, varying the length of the hour could be 'sold' as a fairer' way of measuring time and of seeming to match supply and demand - but that is looking too far ahead.
New smart white goods will come on the market to make this way of life more tolerable. Of course they will be more expensive because they will be able to turn on and off as energy prices vary. Some will have batteries to store energy bought when it is cheapest and used when it is needed. Such devices are unlikely to be cost effective but neither are many of the energy-saving remedies being promoted today.
The switchover from conventional to smart meters will be a moral imperative. ‘We are all in this together’. Although people will be able to opt out, the moral pressure could build and those so anti-social as to ignore the offer of Smart Meters at changeover time could be named and shamed as as sociopaths and charged for post-change-over requests.
The whole country is due to be ‘converted’ by 2020 or even earlier if the Coalition has its way. The cost is merely £11 billion – to be added to our energy bills. Few, if any, oppose this measure, although few understand its implications.
Come the day when our coal, gas and nuclear power generation has been shut down to save the planet for future generations, and when, especially, Scotland has led the way by going 100% uncontrollable, frequent cuts will be necessary if essential services are to be maintained in the cold calm weeks, months or years that are in store for us. Whatever happens, by turning off the telly and watching our Smart Meters instead, we shall be certain of saving at least some money.
The answer was to a different question.
It's a shame that a Clarity Act cannot be created that forces clear answers and clear questions in Parliament. One available to sweep the globe.
Jockeying: insinuating that I know something, that you know the answer isn't very good, that I'll back off for now, but be prepared later, perhaps by backpedalling, so you continue to look good and I look good, and we all get along and nobody gets hurt.