Hi Oliver, When I worked at National Grid I built a stochastic monte carlo model capable of simulating year long supply/demand balance at half hourly resolution, and a whole host of other variables the grid operator must plan for. It was initially designed for use in the 1-5 year ahead timescale, but is extendable further forward. However the further forward you go, the more it is at the mercy of assumptions about generator build, network build, interconnector build and behaviour, demand level and demand behaviour. And assumptions about how climate change affects the weather. Grid was uninterested in this work, which my managers didn't ask me to undertake, so I left for pastures new .
However, this apparatus isn't necessary to know that 2030 electricity net zero isn't possible.
Back of the envelope calculations show GB needs between 40 and 70TWh of storage (range depends on assumption of wind drought duration). And that's not going to happen by 2030. Essentially your argument.
In addition the grid would need to provide huge amounts of inertia that is currently provided for free by synchronised plant. By 2030 we are likely to have only 1 inertia providing plant left (Sizewell) but it could be a few more if the Government pretends that burning wood chips is net zero. Still nowhere near enough. The investment to build or convert enough synchronised compensators to produce the inertia is unrealistic by 2030.
If you'd like to discuss more, I'm now based in Bristol (for work).
That's absolutely fascinating, thanks - obviously I'm just an interested amateur on all this! The inertia thing is particularly interesting (though hopefully Hinckley is online soon after 2030 at least)
I was hoping for recipes, but I can try the freezing thing as well.
And yes, it's weird, the Severn Barrage has been talked about forever, I'm sure I remember it in books when I was a kid. If nothing else it would make getting to Cardiff easier too
Courgette recipe? I just chop and sautee with onion, add curry powder, then vegetable stock. Cook till everything soft. Put in blender. Curried courgette soup! (You can add cream if you want, I don’t normally bother). I make soup a lot. This week apple and parsnip.
Lord Marbury : You know, there are some marvelous flu remedies known in the certain remote parts of the subcontinent. Licorice root, for instance, combined with bamboo sap and a strong shot of whiskey. Ginger root, also, mixed with, uh, citrus peel.
Bartlett : And a strong shot of whiskey?
Lord Marbury : Actually, you can leave everything out except the shot of whiskey.
Another great read. When you consider the scale of the engineering required for green energy storage or for international interconnectors it again makes the problems associated with long term storage of nuclear waste seem trivial! Nuclear provides us with the energy capacity utilising a fraction of the engineering demands of this green energy. The problem is of course public acceptance of this physical reality.
Hilarious and well written bridge. I've been asking people that are so enthusiastic about wind for a long time how large the household battery is going to need to be in order to balance wind droughts. When you get to six tesla batteries per household the unrealistic cost begins to click with most people.
I don’t understand why politicians are not challenged far more on this. I only see Andrew Neil pushing the point and they’re all terrified of him!
Incidentally, I’ve just bought my first EV as it really suits our usage pattern. It has a 60kw battery and without the EV we currently use 7-12kw per day powering our house (gas heating is another 100kw), so it could power our house for a few days if required (in summer)
I think distributed storage from home and EV batteries could be a significant factor and helps smooth the loading but I can see a number of issues with EV battery warranty etc that need solving.
Tomorrow afternoon the U.K. has excess wind as Octopus are giving away another free hour. I can see a future where those savvy enough to store/use cheap and export expensive will be the winners and as usual those that can’t will pay for it.
My guess is that journalists are worried their audience will find it too nerdy and technical.
And I agree that car batteries can help smooth out shorter term fluctuations, though I'm not sure it helps with the "windless week in winter" thing because those EVs will need charging too at some stage
You’ve discussed four of the possible mitigations for wind intermittency: other energy sources, overcapacity, storage and interconnectors. But there’s also demand shifting, demand reduction, other forms of storage eg compressed air, plus how all of those interact, eg HVDC to Morocco for solar, floating offshore in areas with different prevailing wind patterns, etc.
Plus, what really matters is can we continue to meaningfully trend down on the amount of gas-fired back up we need each year? If I get punched in the goolies once a month, I’d rather it was once every two months, and then in due course once a year, and it’s all much better than being punched once a day. It’s much better if it was never, but every little helps.
I don't disagree that less backup is better (within reason, if it doesn't end up costing something crazy). My main beef with all this stuff is that I don't think that they were being clear about what they were claiming. If they said <5% gas, or average <50g/kWh or something explicit then that's fine. Like I said here https://bristoliver.substack.com/p/power-games it feels very Zero COVID all over again
I get where you’re coming from, but I worry that treating net zero as an asymptotic barrier removes the possibility of shooting for energy abundance. Could thin film solar and tidal and floating offshore and tons of new storage types give us 10x the energy we have now for much less £/kWh, and could we do cool things with it, and could it deliver be delivered at effectively 0g/kWh? I don’t know. But where we get to is partly determined by how we characterise the problem. (I’m pretty sure we could do fantastically cool things with a lot of extra energy)
By cosmic coincidence, Radcliffe and Maconie on BBC 6 Music were having a “contest” where listeners sent in musical names for a harvest competition. Elvis Parsley, Joan Courgette and the Black Artichoke Hearts, etc. And someone suggested Quice playing Little Red Courgette. (Wasn’t me not you, Oliver, apparently.). Just goes to show that things happen in clumps. You go years without a courgette joke and then..
The Energy Systems Catapult's report "Innovating to Net Zero" is a good read on this.
It helps understand why we're funding Drax's wood pellet burning and the capex to add carbon capture, and why nuclear of all sizes is still talked about despite its cost. We need lots of energy and will continue to burn stuff.
But 2030 zero-carbon electricity... It may be possible to run the grid from zero-carbon sources some of the time in 2030 if we can replace the inertia the gas plants provide at the moment. But it's not what anyone sensible would call a zero-carbon grid.
Interesting, thanks, I'll dig that one out when I get a chance .. like I say higher up I'm very much in enthusiastic amateur mode on all this, and I'm well aware people who actually know stuff do this for a living
Demand is currently hovering around 30GW so after the wind from the latest auction gets installed I guess we'll be able to run the country off wind and solar on a windy, sunny day. Maybe then they'll claim mission accomplished and ignore the difficult bit?
This is partly why I was annoyed before the election that nobody seemed bothered to pin this stuff down to understand what exactly they were claiming to be able to do. Anyone can move the goalposts after the event!
Reassuring how many of your Substack list I’m already subscribed to. Almost all in cheapskate mode, out of financial necessity (£5 a month x a lot = a LOT, basic maths), but can I suggest one more, that I do cough up for? Ian Leslie writes broadly and beautifully about… well, whatever his brain is wrestling with at the time - but it usually manages to engage mine as well. And, like Helen Lewis, the link collections at the end are a joy. Here’s a taster of Ian’s work, on the need for humanity to “make ourselves difficult to model” in the face of AI: https://www.ian-leslie.com/p/the-struggle-to-be-human?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
I do subscribe to Ian's stuff (as a freebie too). Not sure why I didn't specifically recommend it, I guess I maybe felt like everyone that was reading me was probably reading him already, but then the same's probably true of others on my list as well.
I did that exact thing with courgettes once. My most terrifying vegetable glut was parsnips, courtesy of having a Riverside box for a couple of years. Have you ever had parsnip cake? How about parsnip hash? Would you like grated parsnip on that? Absolutely cannot look a parsnip in the face any more. Anyway… this was interesting. I’d vaguely thought the answer was just ‘batteries yeah?’ so I’m disappointed but better informed I guess.
I seem to remember doing a nice back of the envelope on 800GWh/day requirement for a more electrified future, so yes 1TWh is a good starting point. If you are keen on shifting power from 1 time point to another instead of building 20X your peak demand to provide enough energy in the 2-week calm cold, you have to have a second tier combustion network. That costs £s and requires fuel (but we have much of the plant today). This is where the hydrogen lobby comes in. They will swear they have the solution. However, we can currently only store 2 weeks of gas as our current peak use. H2 requires 3X the volume at the same temp and pressure, so 5 days. The only problem is that while we can store 2-weeks worth of the supply we cannot access it fast enough to meet our peak needs.
It’s technically feasible to increase storage capacity and maximum discharge rate. However, Iike many other things it may not be politically feasible. And that is forgetting the fact that many of our wind farms are grid curtailed before you reach a substantial pipeline network.
Err - Unless you are really, really into a religiously pure net zero, what on earth is wrong with having some gas fired CCGT plants on very long term stand-by to cope with windless days or weeks? Also, I think everyone is underestimating the impact of HVDC interconnectors. This technology is only a decade or so old and as it matures it will allow far more regions to connect in a super grid. Then the key metric will be 'How many windless days are likely per year over the whole of Europe?' Hmmm- seems we could use a statistician here................
Hi Oliver, When I worked at National Grid I built a stochastic monte carlo model capable of simulating year long supply/demand balance at half hourly resolution, and a whole host of other variables the grid operator must plan for. It was initially designed for use in the 1-5 year ahead timescale, but is extendable further forward. However the further forward you go, the more it is at the mercy of assumptions about generator build, network build, interconnector build and behaviour, demand level and demand behaviour. And assumptions about how climate change affects the weather. Grid was uninterested in this work, which my managers didn't ask me to undertake, so I left for pastures new .
However, this apparatus isn't necessary to know that 2030 electricity net zero isn't possible.
Back of the envelope calculations show GB needs between 40 and 70TWh of storage (range depends on assumption of wind drought duration). And that's not going to happen by 2030. Essentially your argument.
In addition the grid would need to provide huge amounts of inertia that is currently provided for free by synchronised plant. By 2030 we are likely to have only 1 inertia providing plant left (Sizewell) but it could be a few more if the Government pretends that burning wood chips is net zero. Still nowhere near enough. The investment to build or convert enough synchronised compensators to produce the inertia is unrealistic by 2030.
If you'd like to discuss more, I'm now based in Bristol (for work).
That's absolutely fascinating, thanks - obviously I'm just an interested amateur on all this! The inertia thing is particularly interesting (though hopefully Hinckley is online soon after 2030 at least)
If you’ve had this experience, it’s the same with pumpkins. (And I know it’s not the point of your post but you can freeze cooked courgettes).
In terms of energy I wish they’d get on with tidal hydro.
I was hoping for recipes, but I can try the freezing thing as well.
And yes, it's weird, the Severn Barrage has been talked about forever, I'm sure I remember it in books when I was a kid. If nothing else it would make getting to Cardiff easier too
Courgette recipe? I just chop and sautee with onion, add curry powder, then vegetable stock. Cook till everything soft. Put in blender. Curried courgette soup! (You can add cream if you want, I don’t normally bother). I make soup a lot. This week apple and parsnip.
I thought this was going to be one of those recipes where you throw the courgette away midway through, but it sounds worth a try
No I save that for mushrooms. The recipe is “throw them out the window”.
Lord Marbury : You know, there are some marvelous flu remedies known in the certain remote parts of the subcontinent. Licorice root, for instance, combined with bamboo sap and a strong shot of whiskey. Ginger root, also, mixed with, uh, citrus peel.
Bartlett : And a strong shot of whiskey?
Lord Marbury : Actually, you can leave everything out except the shot of whiskey.
Another great read. When you consider the scale of the engineering required for green energy storage or for international interconnectors it again makes the problems associated with long term storage of nuclear waste seem trivial! Nuclear provides us with the energy capacity utilising a fraction of the engineering demands of this green energy. The problem is of course public acceptance of this physical reality.
Hilarious and well written bridge. I've been asking people that are so enthusiastic about wind for a long time how large the household battery is going to need to be in order to balance wind droughts. When you get to six tesla batteries per household the unrealistic cost begins to click with most people.
I didn't try reckoning it in those units, might give my A Level physics muscles a go later .. thanks
We are going to need new nuclear power stations aren’t we?
I didn't want to say it in as many words, but yes I think so.
I don’t understand why politicians are not challenged far more on this. I only see Andrew Neil pushing the point and they’re all terrified of him!
Incidentally, I’ve just bought my first EV as it really suits our usage pattern. It has a 60kw battery and without the EV we currently use 7-12kw per day powering our house (gas heating is another 100kw), so it could power our house for a few days if required (in summer)
I think distributed storage from home and EV batteries could be a significant factor and helps smooth the loading but I can see a number of issues with EV battery warranty etc that need solving.
Tomorrow afternoon the U.K. has excess wind as Octopus are giving away another free hour. I can see a future where those savvy enough to store/use cheap and export expensive will be the winners and as usual those that can’t will pay for it.
My guess is that journalists are worried their audience will find it too nerdy and technical.
And I agree that car batteries can help smooth out shorter term fluctuations, though I'm not sure it helps with the "windless week in winter" thing because those EVs will need charging too at some stage
You’ve discussed four of the possible mitigations for wind intermittency: other energy sources, overcapacity, storage and interconnectors. But there’s also demand shifting, demand reduction, other forms of storage eg compressed air, plus how all of those interact, eg HVDC to Morocco for solar, floating offshore in areas with different prevailing wind patterns, etc.
Plus, what really matters is can we continue to meaningfully trend down on the amount of gas-fired back up we need each year? If I get punched in the goolies once a month, I’d rather it was once every two months, and then in due course once a year, and it’s all much better than being punched once a day. It’s much better if it was never, but every little helps.
I don't disagree that less backup is better (within reason, if it doesn't end up costing something crazy). My main beef with all this stuff is that I don't think that they were being clear about what they were claiming. If they said <5% gas, or average <50g/kWh or something explicit then that's fine. Like I said here https://bristoliver.substack.com/p/power-games it feels very Zero COVID all over again
I get where you’re coming from, but I worry that treating net zero as an asymptotic barrier removes the possibility of shooting for energy abundance. Could thin film solar and tidal and floating offshore and tons of new storage types give us 10x the energy we have now for much less £/kWh, and could we do cool things with it, and could it deliver be delivered at effectively 0g/kWh? I don’t know. But where we get to is partly determined by how we characterise the problem. (I’m pretty sure we could do fantastically cool things with a lot of extra energy)
Only here for the post title.
Happy to help!
By cosmic coincidence, Radcliffe and Maconie on BBC 6 Music were having a “contest” where listeners sent in musical names for a harvest competition. Elvis Parsley, Joan Courgette and the Black Artichoke Hearts, etc. And someone suggested Quice playing Little Red Courgette. (Wasn’t me not you, Oliver, apparently.). Just goes to show that things happen in clumps. You go years without a courgette joke and then..
I guess it’s maybe also one of those Baader-Meinhof Effect things as well?
The Energy Systems Catapult's report "Innovating to Net Zero" is a good read on this.
It helps understand why we're funding Drax's wood pellet burning and the capex to add carbon capture, and why nuclear of all sizes is still talked about despite its cost. We need lots of energy and will continue to burn stuff.
But 2030 zero-carbon electricity... It may be possible to run the grid from zero-carbon sources some of the time in 2030 if we can replace the inertia the gas plants provide at the moment. But it's not what anyone sensible would call a zero-carbon grid.
Interesting, thanks, I'll dig that one out when I get a chance .. like I say higher up I'm very much in enthusiastic amateur mode on all this, and I'm well aware people who actually know stuff do this for a living
I'm all for the Loch Ness/ Ben Nevis thing, just so that I can see a bemused Nessie!!
Demand is currently hovering around 30GW so after the wind from the latest auction gets installed I guess we'll be able to run the country off wind and solar on a windy, sunny day. Maybe then they'll claim mission accomplished and ignore the difficult bit?
This is partly why I was annoyed before the election that nobody seemed bothered to pin this stuff down to understand what exactly they were claiming to be able to do. Anyone can move the goalposts after the event!
Reassuring how many of your Substack list I’m already subscribed to. Almost all in cheapskate mode, out of financial necessity (£5 a month x a lot = a LOT, basic maths), but can I suggest one more, that I do cough up for? Ian Leslie writes broadly and beautifully about… well, whatever his brain is wrestling with at the time - but it usually manages to engage mine as well. And, like Helen Lewis, the link collections at the end are a joy. Here’s a taster of Ian’s work, on the need for humanity to “make ourselves difficult to model” in the face of AI: https://www.ian-leslie.com/p/the-struggle-to-be-human?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
I do subscribe to Ian's stuff (as a freebie too). Not sure why I didn't specifically recommend it, I guess I maybe felt like everyone that was reading me was probably reading him already, but then the same's probably true of others on my list as well.
I did that exact thing with courgettes once. My most terrifying vegetable glut was parsnips, courtesy of having a Riverside box for a couple of years. Have you ever had parsnip cake? How about parsnip hash? Would you like grated parsnip on that? Absolutely cannot look a parsnip in the face any more. Anyway… this was interesting. I’d vaguely thought the answer was just ‘batteries yeah?’ so I’m disappointed but better informed I guess.
I think it can be batteries in time, but even with a steep exponential curve it's not going to be there by 2030 I think.
Curried parsnip soup is alright, but I wouldn't want to live off it.
I seem to remember doing a nice back of the envelope on 800GWh/day requirement for a more electrified future, so yes 1TWh is a good starting point. If you are keen on shifting power from 1 time point to another instead of building 20X your peak demand to provide enough energy in the 2-week calm cold, you have to have a second tier combustion network. That costs £s and requires fuel (but we have much of the plant today). This is where the hydrogen lobby comes in. They will swear they have the solution. However, we can currently only store 2 weeks of gas as our current peak use. H2 requires 3X the volume at the same temp and pressure, so 5 days. The only problem is that while we can store 2-weeks worth of the supply we cannot access it fast enough to meet our peak needs.
It’s technically feasible to increase storage capacity and maximum discharge rate. However, Iike many other things it may not be politically feasible. And that is forgetting the fact that many of our wind farms are grid curtailed before you reach a substantial pipeline network.
Err - Unless you are really, really into a religiously pure net zero, what on earth is wrong with having some gas fired CCGT plants on very long term stand-by to cope with windless days or weeks? Also, I think everyone is underestimating the impact of HVDC interconnectors. This technology is only a decade or so old and as it matures it will allow far more regions to connect in a super grid. Then the key metric will be 'How many windless days are likely per year over the whole of Europe?' Hmmm- seems we could use a statistician here................