SamuelCZ wrote:
Solar + insulation have to be done by professionals
With the current surge in demand, many turnkey solar installation companies in Czechia (and probably elsewhere) claim to be professionals but really aren’t, offering solutions that work fine but are massively overengineered and cost twice as much as a properly designed system.
The CEGB did own the whole thing for the purpose of this discussion – they owned the generation.
I paid the bills to Seeboard – south eastern electricity board.
So there was no need to have silly internal pricing, with one company selling to another for almost nothing, and creating unsustainable “investment” opportunities.
SamuelCZ wrote:
Stop voting for conservative clowns who have agenda against solar + wind, stop voting for lefty clowns who have an agenda against nuclear
He he, who is left then, some “green party” that is against everything ?
gallois wrote:
The majority of consumers were served by a number of electricity boards which were regulated by a an electricity council.
It actually was an excellent system.
Yes, the good old times 
That was probably very similar to what we had (pre 1995 or something). It worked just fine as I remember it. I wouldn’t call it an excellent system though. Lots of outages, high prices all year round etc. Today outages are something that never happens, and if they do, they are planned and communicated up front, or some digger cuts a local wire. Hurricanes is also a thing.
This new free market system has served us well the last 20+ years with an excellent service and perhaps the lowest prices in the world. Right now though, not so much It’s the hot topic in the news, everywhere. How to fix it? I don’t think it can be fixed, there is nothing inherently wrong with it, what we see are symptoms. The only thing that can be done in a pan European scale, is more nuclear power and a reversal of wind power. It will get worse before it gets better.
In the mean time we can have fun with lots of cool home systems. Cool automated systems of batteries, switches, solar and so on, all working together. And let’s not forget the good old wood fireplace: 100% carbon neutral also
The problem isn’t really households. Households will get by with some combination of these new gadgets. Going off grid is also a real possibility, which more and more people do. The problem is the industry. Lots of industries are dependent on (lots of) relatively cheap and stable electricity prices. The real price for wind, which we will see more and more, is incompatible with the entire industrial sector. This problem can wipe out entire industries, to be replaced with nothing.
Obviously the UK system and the Norwegian system were much the same before privatisation. But the UK were also the opposite in many respects. The system in the UK was incredibly reliable. Probably the best in the world.
Power cuts were very very rare except during a period of industrial unrest in the 70s when a 3 day week was imposed.
Privatisation did bring the price of electricity down for a short time. But no one had responsibility for the future security of energy supply and no one wanted to spend money on the reserve. The grid had to point out to the politicians that it not only had to transport the electricity to meet demand they also had to synchronise the frequency and provide reactive load which someone would have to pay for somewhere along the line. I doubt if the energy minister (Cecil Parkinson, charming man) ever understood what was needed or brushed it off as it will be alright on the night.
We are where we are now and we have 3 issues to deal with all over Europe. First how to secure the electricity supply in the short term. Nuclear cannot fit this bill except possibly in France if EDF can safely restart its plant. So that just leaves 4 measures. Renewables such as wind or solar, interconnectors (but where are we going to connect to with everyone suffering the same problems) or gas (and Russia has made that an expensive or difficult option). The 4th and perhaps simplest and quickest and cheapest short term method is to reduce demand.
The second issue we face is future energy security. Nuclear can fill the role here but according to the UK dept of energy it will take about 10 years for a new nuclear power station to come on stream if the go ahead were to be given now and at a cost of £30 billion. Hinckly Point, the station now under construction is already 5years late and running over budget.
The third issue is reponsibility for long term energy planning, making sure that all eggs are not put in the same basket and meeting both the technical needs and the reserve/security needs. At the same time they need to provide a market where energy costs can not be manipulated by the few(Ie the job the National Grid used to do for the UK and EDF used to do for France.)
IMO it doesn’t matter whether its a privatised industry there needs to be an independent body of people who both know what they are doing and have foresight. The politicians need decide what they want (eg electric vehicles, environmental measures) give them the tools and authority to plan and facilitate the future. Then the politicians should butt out, except for following the plan which needs to be updated annually including where necessary financing projects.
This video is a bit tongue in cheek but it hits the nail on the head on why air source heat pumps are not going to work for most houses. It’s pretty obvious to anyone who has used one…
You have to start with a well insulated building, and that is viable only up to a point. Most of the existing housing stock has already had the obvious stuff done decades ago e.g. loft insulation, cavity wall insulation, double glazing.
The real thing for heat pumps is underfloor heating, which is a challenge to install, and a long term downside is a loss of access to the floor cavity, in case of electrical or plumbing problems.
Peter wrote:
You have to start with a well insulated building, and that is viable only up to a point. Most of the existing housing stock has already had the obvious stuff done decades ago e.g. loft insulation, cavity wall insulation, double glazing.
@Peter, that might be true for the properties with owners living in them. For the rented properties it is a completely different story – I lived in those for more than decade and a half. Most of those were not good in terms of insulation and energy efficiency due to basic things like popped double glazing or large cracks between the door and the door frame.
Sure, I know; my point is that even with a good example of a house an air sourced heat pump will struggle to work, and will be near-useless in the winter.
I have just stood next to one and it was de-icing itself (maybe 10% of the time) by going into reverse cycle, and the OAT is +16, with a high humidity but not that unusual for N Europe
EGKA 090850Z 26009KT 9999 FEW011 SCT025 16/15 Q1006
That particular heat pump has some amazing data sheet COP but it is never more than around 2-3, and falls below 1 once the average of day+night temp falls below about +5C. Much of that loss is due to evaporator icing. The data sheet does not talk about that; they probably test with dry air. Below that, yes, it will “do something”, but is no better than putting the electricity into a fan heater
Peter wrote:
and will be near-useless in the winter.
So I thought before. But after we moved last Christmas to a new house with heat pump installed, it’s very obvious that this is utter nonsense. It works all the way down to -20 deg C, probably more, but we didn’t see colder temperatures last winter. If it doesn’t work, there is something wrong with it, and that needs to be fixed. But, heating up the house in -20 requires more than the heat pump is capable of. We top it up with floor cables and wood.
So, what is the missing detail?
