Bishop Hill The SNP's energy policy
Jun 11, 2014 Climate: WG3 Energy: grid Energy: wind So, the subsidies have flowed, the markets are rigged, the countryside has been besmirched with windfarms, the coal-fired power stations closed or switched to biomass and the rooftops have been tiled with solar panels.
And the result?
The Scottish Government has missed its greenhouse gas emissions target following a rise in pollution last year.
It means a massive turnaround will need to have been achieved in 2013 – a reduction of around 13.8% – to get back on track.
And Opposition Tory MSPs have urged the government to use nuclear power and allow shale gas drilling to help Scotland meet its self-set targets.
The scale of emissions across the country increased by 0.8% to a carbon dioxide equivalent of 55.665 million tonnes.
The target for 2012 was 53.226 million tonnes, while greenhouse gas levels in 2011 hit 54.252 million tonnes.
Reader Comments (30)
Such statistics are to be expected, with climate change fanatics in government.
Who is surprised? Evidence from other countries shows that massive increases in renewable energy generation result in increased emissions. Other things are needed to bring down emissions, such as replacing coal with gas and nuclear. It's obvious to all but greens and politicians.
And if the bean-counters consider they've reduced emissions to year ending March 2014, they'll no doubt thank Global Warming, because the year ending March 2014 was warmer than the 20-year average in all regions of Scotland.
http://www.tebs.uk.com/degree-days.php
Yet another failed policy, at great public expense. Not to mention the undermining of the power grid system.
I am not aware of one climate-centric policy that works.
I'm sorry, but I have no sympathy for anybody who defines carbon dioxide as "pollution". Will nobody rid us of this troublesome provincial government? Oh, hang on a minute....
Michael Hart beat me to it!
"The Scottish Government has missed its greenhouse gas emissions target following a rise in pollution last year."
Shock Horror and Surprise! A rise in "pollution" has resulted in more "pollution"!
If we could only reduce "pollution" we could have less "pollution".
Is it time to give up on the political class entirely and do an "Egypt" and request a coup by the military?
Well - I jolly wrll hope that the Scottish govrnment is going to fine itself heavily for missing that target...
What are the SNP for?
It's like every other populist party. Jump on the green bandwagon and make people feel pious and lo they get elected.
When the chickens come home to roost and people are paying for their piety they start complaining.
So best thing to do is to create a party that says that yes you can have all the green policies you want and no electricity, or live in the real world, frack like f*ck and build safe Thorium/nuclear power stations.
(You could also re-nationalize the energy companies and subsidize the gas/electricity prices.
You would be elected like a shot!)
I can hardly breathe here in Aberdeen today it is so bad. Cockenzie coal fired power station is closed, Longannet partly converted to run on the last straw. Peterhead CCGT is being converted to a CCS power consumption system. The number of wind turbines in and around Aberdeen is really beginning to make a mark on the landscape. I reckon that solar in Scotland never repays the energy used to make the devices and that energy used in manufacture is circulating as CO2 today awaiting for the sun to shine in 20 years time.
Solar Scotland
Meanwhile, China has probably churned out more CO2 since I began writing this email than Scotland has saved since 1990
China - the coal monster
This is all due to the tradition of the giving the gift of coal crossing the threshold every Hogmanay. All those lumps eventually end up in the grate to be burned.
Has anyone done the calculation to work out how much warmer the world is today as a result of the Scottish government missing its target?
Holyrood - An island surrounded on all sides by reality...
Bish: In this case, the news summary you cite is grossly misleading. You should read the data in the original report, especially if you intend to cite this information elsewhere.
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/0045/00452084.pdf
Scotland IS paying a high price to reduce their GHG emissions, but emissions have been REDUCED significantly over the long run. 2012 must have been a cold winter because the increase in emissions from residential systems were responsible for all of the rise in 2012 and negating falls in other sectors. Table B3 shows 30% reduction of GHG emission since 1990 (28% reduction in CO2). Trends for one year that could be due to weather are meaningless.
The important question is whether the benefits of emission reductions are worth the cost. Why is a 30% overall reduction still above target.
They have set up an ambitious target for 2013. Let's hope they will achieve it, my prayers go to them.
Nobody with a governmental climate policy would get my prayers. Only "Father forgive them, for they know not what they do."
Euan,
It was little over a year ago that Edinburgh College set up their 'solar meadow' in Eskbank....
http://www.scotsman.com/news/education/edinburgh-college-powered-by-new-solar-meadow-1-2908688
Their blurb here ....
http://www.edinburghcollege.ac.uk/welcome/news_and_events/news.aspx?id=23
...says "The site will generate the equivalent of the energy the campus requires to meet its electricity needs from renewable sources and reduce its carbon emissions by 300,000 kg per annum."
I have wondered how much power was _actually generated in this first year, they don't seem to publish any results.
Would this be worth a FOI request to find out?
'Solar meadow' is another of those eco-weasel phrases such as 'wind farm', intended to brainwash the gullilble into thinking it it is similar to raising a few cows or growing a field of waving corn.
"The site will generate the equivalent of the energy the campus requires to meet its electricity needs"
Frankly I don't believe a word of it. A possible translation is "The site is rated to produce the amount of energy the campus requires, when operating under perfect conditions of maintenance and weather conditions, in midsummer sunshine" - glossing over the fact that the maintenance won't be perfect (it will be neglected, to save money), midsummer only happens for a couple of days a year in Edinburgh, and half of every day (on average) is actually night.
A more honest translation would be "this thing won't actually achieve anything much, but we get to feel good about ourselves, and poor people get some money taken off them and handed to us, which will be jolly useful".
Nial, if you read my post you'll see that we reckon solar load factor in Scotland is about 7%. At that level you never get the energy used to make the panels back. All the CO2 associated with their manufacture is already in the atmosphere - decades ahead of when the energy from the panels gets used.
This is a total shambles and I gotta say I'm ultra hacked off that Universtities are going down this route. I no longer have a position at the UoAberdeen and am working up to sticking the knife in since they are bedecking all new buildings with solar.
It would be very interesting to get the generation stats from Edinburgh College - why not simply ask them first. FOI sounds like a bit of overkill. If you get the data I can help with analysing the financial and energy economics.
Would you invest in hydro in Holland?
Andrew Duffin - situation summarised beautifully..!
I wonder how much this vanity project COST..?
I will try to get hold of the data and let you know.
These panels are at least angled and oriented optimally so their performance is probably as good as can be expected. From memory the panels are completely surrounded by 'bunds' so they won't get as much advantage of any cooling breeze as they might.
There's some interesting reading on your web site.
Interestingly they said a year ago "As well as an annual electricity output of 560,000kWhrs – enough to power 170 homes"
http://www.scotsman.com/news/education/edinburgh-college-powered-by-new-solar-meadow-1-2908688
In a recent article they claim "The site contributes directly to the National Grid, and has generated 560,000kWh since its opening - enough energy to power the entire campus."
http://www.journal-online.co.uk/article/11339-solar_meadows_electric_vehicles_edinburgh_colleges_green_machines
So they're claiming they have generated what they predicted!
Nial - one would have thought that journalists at The Scotsman would have known that 'solar' and 'Scotland' are not words which go together particularly well - goodness knows, developers had enough trouble trying to make them viable in Southern Spain..!
But - hey - perhaps this Edinburgh college has special dispensation from The Almighty to shine little sunbeams directly onto their solar panels twentyfour hours a day...
This site claims to have some data http://www.variablepitch.co.uk/stations/2703/
Good find wp.
This page gives 'Reported Output'....
http://www.variablepitch.co.uk/stations/2703/output/
Which summing for the year gives 334 MWh, not the 560 MWh reported above.
Note the capacity factor they give isn't against the panel's rating but against a calculated figure, "To calculate the capacity factor for PV, we calculate how many hours (on average) the sun will be more than 12.5 degrees above the horizon (at the calculated location) and use that figure to calculate the potential output."
So the December 8% "capacity factor" is 8% of 45.6 MWh.
The percentage output of max rating is 4/627.25 = 0.64%, ie zero.
Calculating the monthly outputs against rated capacity you get...
9.4 %
11.2%
13.0%
4.9%
6.0%
6.4%
4.1%
2.2%
0.6%
0.8%
6.2%
Ie an average of 5.9%
Brilliant value for money that £1.2 million!
Nial, I'm commenting on multiple threads / sites today. Critically short of time. But I'm following along. There's material here for a good post - public subsidies to accelerate CO2 emissions...
Does anyone know what commercial electricity prices are like?
At 12p/KWh the £1.2 Million installation would have bought 10.10^6 KWh.
That's 29.9 times what the panels produced last year.
OK electricity prices will probably go up, and they are being paid ridiculous amounts for the small amount
generated but in any sane world this doesn't look like something you would put your own money into.
Euan, do we not need to get the word out to a wider audience? Would you consider an article for the Scotsman?
Nial, I've had a couple of posts on this:
Solar Scotland
White House goes Green – and into the Red
The second by Roger Andrews lays pretty bare how you can make this appear economic with massive subsidies. Roger is working on a second post looking into the subsidies and electricity prices in a number of countries, and so we are hopefully plugged into data.
An article for The Scotsman is certainly possible, do you have a way in there? If you want to email, go to the "Support Energy Matters" tab on my blog.
The companies selling energy storage solutions have to admit the problems that " wrong time electricity " causes to the national grid, in order to show the need for their product.
This University of Birmingham, Centre for cryogenic energy storage report on liquid air admits the failings of solar & wind power generation. http://www.liquidair.org.uk/files/potential-guide.pdf
page 10 "Balancing the electricity grid will become increasingly challenging as the proportion of
intermittent renewable generation continues
to rise. This is not simply a question of holding
power stations in reserve for when the wind
drops, but also being able to absorb excess
wind power when there is too little demand
– often at night – a role for which storage is
ideally suited. If such ‘wrong time energy’ is
stored and used to displace fossil generators
at peak times, CO2 emissions are reduced and
‘constraint’ (compensation) payments to wind
farm operators avoided.
However, current storage technologies –
including pumped storage, Compressed Air
Energy Storage (CAES) and grid batteries –
all suffer significant drawbacks. By contrast,
LAES has no geographical constraints,
contains no toxic or exotic materials, and is
expected to be long lasting (30+ years) and
low maintenance. Since it is built from proven,
large-scale components that are already
widely used in the industrial gas and power
generation industries, LAES is one of the few
technologies capable of providing plants of
50-100MW and 100sMWh in the near term "
& p 19 "Liquid air could integrate with a wide range
of generating plant to help balance the grid,
which will become increasingly challenging
as the proportion of intermittent renewable
capacity continues to rise. The same
could be also said for other forms of bulk
electricity storage such as pumped hydro
or compressed air (CAES), but liquid air has
several distinct advantages.
For example, wind farms could integrate
energy storage to absorb excess power
when demand is low and export it at peak
times. This would ‘firm’ the wind output,
making it more valuable to both the wind
farm operator and the grid; reduce the
likelihood of wasteful constraint payments;
and cut carbon emissions. In principle these
benefits could be provided by any form
of bulk storage, but pumped hydro and
CAES are geographically and geologically
constrained, whereas liquid air plants
are not. For example, the power from the
300MW Thanet Wind Farm off the Kent
coast joins the grid at the Richborough
electricity substation, where there are
plans to build a 40MW diesel peaking plant
for when the wind drops. This role could
be served by a LAES plant or Cryogenset
without resorting to fossil fuels, but in
the flat Kent countryside pumped storage is impossible "
I wrote: "The percentage output of max rating is 4/627.25 = 0.64%, ie zero."
Which is of course complete bollocks.
The installation is 627.2 Kw, so for an 'average' month the potential output is 627,200 * 30.4 * 24 = 457 MWh so an
output of 4 MWh is ~ 0.87 %.
So still almost zero.