Driving Too Slow...

[Anthony William Sloman]

On Thursday, January 27, 2022 at 12:39:55 AM UTC+11, Tom Gardner wrote:

On 26/01/22 12:24, Rick C wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 6:28:13 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 09:54, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 7:38:55 PM UTC+11, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 02:23, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:10:49 AM UTC+11, Dimiter Popoff
wrote:
On 1/25/2022 23:19, Rick C wrote:
On Tuesday, January 25, 2022 at 11:43:24 AM UTC-4, Dimiter
Popoff wrote:
On 1/25/2022 16:27, Martin Brown wrote:

<snip>

The nice thing about electric cars is that when everybody is using them,
their batteries could deliver something three times the capacity of the
whole grid (though only for a couple of hours).

I\'d be \"disappointed\" if I had left my car charging, I had to drive 200
miles (or uphill), and that it was only 50% charged.

My expectation would be that you\'d get paid for letting your car be used for grid storage, and you could opt out - briefly - if you needed to have it fully charged for a day or so. You\'d lose money by making the choice, but not a lot.

For every EV user who wanted to take a 200 mile trip today, there are
probably 100 who are only driving the average 30 miles and don\'t need to
charge at all because there is less energy from renewables. The \"EV grid\"
can be the first load that is shed when less power is available, which works
just like any power storage.

True, but so what? If I need and expect /my/ car to be fully
charged then other people cars are irrelevant.

The internet of things is is fully up to coping with a one or two day opt-out. The bureaucrats might be a bit slow to realise that they could offer the option.

You are using statistics for support, not illumination (cf a
drunkard leaning against a lamppost). Statisticians drown in
lakes of average depth 3\".

My cousin the statistician wouldn\'t. Statisticians understand that the mean and the median are rather coarse-grained measures.
The one\'s that calculate the likely frequencies of natural disasters do concentrate on the tails of the distributions.

Day/night alternation from solar power isn\'t a problem. The short answer
is that solar and windmills need to offer quite a lot of excess capacity
to cope with worst case situations. In Australia the plan seems to be to
use that excess capacity to make electrolytic hydrogen, liquify it and
ship it off in tanker loads to South Korea and Japan. It\'s a
thermodynamic nonsense, but it keeps the investors happy.

Large scale storage would be a game-changer in the UK. That would make
someone as rich as Croesus.

It will be a process, not unlike building a nuclear plant taking time and
money. The difference is it will be as profitable as planned from day one
and probably more so.

Grid scale storage is very different from building nuclear plant - as you seem to be aware in that \" it will be as profitable as planned from day one
and probably more so\". What you don\'t seem to have noticed is that you can install it in relatively small chunks. Nuclear only seems to works if you build big chunks of generating capacity - which is imposed more by public opinion and bureaucracy than any real necessity, but does seem to be generally true.

All you need are suitable technology or suitable geography.
Nobody has the technology (except pumped hydro), and the UK does not have the geography.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinorwig_Power_Station

It has been there - in the UK - since 1984. Scotland also offers sites. The Lake District (in England) might offer a few as well.

Grid scale batteries are a suitable technology.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanadium_redox_battery

The Wikipedia data is a bit old - somebody in Australia seems to have signed a contract for a respectable installation - but the technology is still has to move into high volume production.

<snip>
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Anthony William Sloman]

On Thursday, January 27, 2022 at 12:47:11 AM UTC+11, Tom Gardner wrote:

On 26/01/22 12:13, Rick C wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 4:38:55 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 02:23, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:10:49 AM UTC+11, Dimiter Popoff wrote:
On 1/25/2022 23:19, Rick C wrote:
On Tuesday, January 25, 2022 at 11:43:24 AM UTC-4, Dimiter Popoff wrote:
On 1/25/2022 16:27, Martin Brown wrote:

<snip>

Hasn\'t that cost already been paid for? Do people factor in the cost of the
supplementary power to add to nuclear? Well, they do when it comes to a free
market and peak rates go through the roof! I think someone in this group
posted a link to show what the local utilities pay for power at peak times
and it is astronomical because of the need for peaking plants that run for
such a short time because nuclear can not be ramped up and down.

Nope, it is because renewables ramp up and down uncontrollably.

Renewables may ramp down uncontrollably, but the peak power they deliver is entirely controllable. Solar cells can be manipulated to deliver the peak current desired at a higher voltage than the value that optimises power extraction, and windmills have variable pitch sails.

The astronomical cost is because it that capacity is only
needed for /relatively/ short times. But it is /needed/ and
cannot be ignored.

Bill also made that point.

And I did make the point that the cost only looks astronomical because the peaking plants only get paid for when they are in use - they exist the whole year round, and have to get paid enough when they are working to cover a whole year\'s interest on capital, staff salaries and maintenance.

Peaking plants are a sensible investment.

<snip>

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[whit3rd]

On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:08:24 AM UTC-8, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:

On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:47:11 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 12:13, Rick C wrote:

posted a link to show what the local utilities pay for power at peak times
and it is astronomical because of the need for peaking plants that run for
such a short time because nuclear can not be ramped up and down.

Nope, it is because renewables ramp up and down uncontrollably.

... before there were significant renewable generation facilities roaming the earth, peaking plants were used to handle the inherent mismatch between nuclear facilities and the variable loads.

The astronomical cost is because it that capacity is only
needed for /relatively/ short times. But it is /needed/ and
cannot be ignored.

Yes, they are needed to provide the extra power that you can\'t get from nuclear plants to match the variation in loads.

There\'s other options; an aluminum mill, for example, can buy and use irregular power (i.e.
only during peaks), or a hydroelectric dam can throttle its flow rapidly. The Tesla peak-power
success is available now, and for the future, flow batteries seem poised to lower those prices.

Traditionally, incandescent lighting was tolerant of fluctuations, and gave the grid a lower
power usage when voltages dropped; switchmode power and AC motors do NOT share that
beneficial effect, so the grid stability is more of a problem these days.

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 27/01/22 01:13, Anthony William Sloman wrote:

On Thursday, January 27, 2022 at 12:39:55 AM UTC+11, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 12:24, Rick C wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 6:28:13 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 09:54, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 7:38:55 PM UTC+11, Tom Gardner
wrote:
On 26/01/22 02:23, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:10:49 AM UTC+11, Dimiter
Popoff wrote:
On 1/25/2022 23:19, Rick C wrote:
On Tuesday, January 25, 2022 at 11:43:24 AM UTC-4, Dimiter
Popoff wrote:
On 1/25/2022 16:27, Martin Brown wrote:

snip

The nice thing about electric cars is that when everybody is using
them, their batteries could deliver something three times the
capacity of the whole grid (though only for a couple of hours).

I\'d be \"disappointed\" if I had left my car charging, I had to drive
200 miles (or uphill), and that it was only 50% charged.

My expectation would be that you\'d get paid for letting your car be used for
grid storage, and you could opt out - briefly - if you needed to have it
fully charged for a day or so. You\'d lose money by making the choice, but not
a lot.

I would hope so too, but I until I can kick the tyres...

Still wouldn\'t help with the \"your mother has A Fall\" scenario.

For every EV user who wanted to take a 200 mile trip today, there are
probably 100 who are only driving the average 30 miles and don\'t need to
charge at all because there is less energy from renewables. The \"EV
grid\" can be the first load that is shed when less power is available,
which works just like any power storage.

True, but so what? If I need and expect /my/ car to be fully charged then
other people cars are irrelevant.

The internet of things is is fully up to coping with a one or two day
opt-out. The bureaucrats might be a bit slow to realise that they could offer
the option.

Here the POTS is being aggressively replaced by VOIP, which
requires a modem in the customer premises. When the power is
out, so is the phone.

BT/OpenReach statement is \"you can use your cellphone
instead\", which is fine - except for those places that
don\'t have reception and for \"emergency buttons\" worn
by the elderly in case of A Fall.

I\'ve seen reports that BT will grudgingly add batteries
(or similar), if you can force them to recognise you
don\'t have cellphone reception. No answer to the emergency
button issue.

I imagine lots of IoT applications will be ignored.

You are using statistics for support, not illumination (cf a drunkard
leaning against a lamppost). Statisticians drown in lakes of average depth
3\".

My cousin the statistician wouldn\'t. Statisticians understand that the mean
and the median are rather coarse-grained measures. The one\'s that calculate
the likely frequencies of natural disasters do concentrate on the tails of
the distributions.

Oh yes indeed. A salesman/snakecharmer likes the mean because
it can conceal a multitude of sins. Somebody responsible for
continuity/reliability will insist on the CDF. I used the
95% percentile as a quick indication of getting close to an edge.

Day/night alternation from solar power isn\'t a problem. The short
answer is that solar and windmills need to offer quite a lot of
excess capacity to cope with worst case situations. In Australia the
plan seems to be to use that excess capacity to make electrolytic
hydrogen, liquify it and ship it off in tanker loads to South Korea
and Japan. It\'s a thermodynamic nonsense, but it keeps the investors
happy.

Large scale storage would be a game-changer in the UK. That would make
someone as rich as Croesus.

It will be a process, not unlike building a nuclear plant taking time
and money. The difference is it will be as profitable as planned from day
one and probably more so.

Grid scale storage is very different from building nuclear plant - as you
seem to be aware in that \" it will be as profitable as planned from day one
and probably more so\". What you don\'t seem to have noticed is that you can
install it in relatively small chunks. Nuclear only seems to works if you
build big chunks of generating capacity - which is imposed more by public
opinion and bureaucracy than any real necessity, but does seem to be
generally true.

Rolls Royce is aggressively pushing its small modular reactors
that are build in a factory and dropped into a hole onsite.

You can guess where they have developed and proved that technology!

All you need are suitable technology or suitable geography. Nobody has the
technology (except pumped hydro), and the UK does not have the geography.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinorwig_Power_Station

I remember watching CEGB newsletters about that as it was being
built. My father didn\'t wangle a visit to that \"largest manmade
cavern in Europe\"; I\'ve never forgiven him

I\'ve been to the slightly smaller one in Scotland, Cruachan.

Their capacity is tiny, suitable only for black starts and
World Cup halftime.

It has been there - in the UK - since 1984. Scotland also offers sites. The
Lake District (in England) might offer a few as well.

I suspect Scotland will be limited to flooding very large
areas a few metres deep, due to the lack of elevation.

The SNP would have a field day, and it would probably
reduce the United Kingdom of Great Britain (without NI)
to England and Wales.

As I\'m sure you are aware, here 1000ft/300m is classed as
a mountain, and there aren\'t many of those peaks.

Grid scale batteries are a suitable technology.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanadium_redox_battery

Let\'s hope that, or similar, can be shown to be reliable.
But until someone can give a price and I can kick the tyres...

There seem to be hope for compressing/expanding gas, but
I haven\'t followed the technology.

The Wikipedia data is a bit old - somebody in Australia seems to have signed
a contract for a respectable installation - but the technology is still has
to move into high volume production.

Contracts are easy; look at the penalty clauses

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 27/01/22 01:27, Anthony William Sloman wrote:

On Thursday, January 27, 2022 at 12:47:11 AM UTC+11, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 12:13, Rick C wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 4:38:55 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 02:23, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:10:49 AM UTC+11, Dimiter Popoff
wrote:
On 1/25/2022 23:19, Rick C wrote:
On Tuesday, January 25, 2022 at 11:43:24 AM UTC-4, Dimiter Popoff
wrote:
On 1/25/2022 16:27, Martin Brown wrote:

snip

Hasn\'t that cost already been paid for? Do people factor in the cost of
the supplementary power to add to nuclear? Well, they do when it comes to
a free market and peak rates go through the roof! I think someone in this
group posted a link to show what the local utilities pay for power at
peak times and it is astronomical because of the need for peaking plants
that run for such a short time because nuclear can not be ramped up and
down.

Nope, it is because renewables ramp up and down uncontrollably.

Renewables may ramp down uncontrollably, but the peak power they deliver is
entirely controllable. Solar cells can be manipulated to deliver the peak
current desired at a higher voltage than the value that optimises power
extraction, and windmills have variable pitch sails.

If you vastly over-provision the installed capacity, that
will reduce the probability of outages. But see the /excellent/
https://withouthotair.com/ for a discussion of the UK alternative.
In particular he insists the numbers add up (\"numbers not
adjectives\"), and gives several alternative mixes for the UK in
the future.

(Excellent => lauded by _everybody_ from Big Energy to Greens
to politicians)

The astronomical cost is because it that capacity is only needed for
/relatively/ short times. But it is /needed/ and cannot be ignored.

Bill also made that point.

And I did make the point that the cost only looks astronomical because the
peaking plants only get paid for when they are in use - they exist the whole
year round, and have to get paid enough when they are working to cover a
whole year\'s interest on capital, staff salaries and maintenance.

Yup.

IMHO those costs should be included in the cost of the
renewable energy. They shouldn\'t be conveniently ignored
by the renewable energy salesmen and lobbyists.


> Peaking plants are a sensible investment.

Yup.

Grid scale storage will be too - when the technology is
not only available (in the location) but also proven.
People will make /lots/ of money from it.

 

[Martin Brown]

On 27/01/2022 05:36, whit3rd wrote:

Traditionally, incandescent lighting was tolerant of fluctuations, and gave the grid a lower
power usage when voltages dropped; switchmode power and AC motors do NOT share that
beneficial effect, so the grid stability is more of a problem these days.

It is worse than that. Switched mode and LED lamps draw ever more
current as their input voltage falls to maintain constant power output.

I only noticed that the other phase in my village had gone down when I
went to boil the kettle pure 3kW resistive load and it took forever!

Computer and LED lighting was fine on 208 volts instead of nominal 240
my few remaining filament bulbs were noticeably dim, visibly orange and
got even dimmer with the kettle on.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

 

[Anthony William Sloman]

On Thursday, January 27, 2022 at 8:30:06 PM UTC+11, Tom Gardner wrote:

On 27/01/22 01:27, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, January 27, 2022 at 12:47:11 AM UTC+11, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 12:13, Rick C wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 4:38:55 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 02:23, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:10:49 AM UTC+11, Dimiter Popoff
wrote:
On 1/25/2022 23:19, Rick C wrote:
On Tuesday, January 25, 2022 at 11:43:24 AM UTC-4, Dimiter Popoff
wrote:
On 1/25/2022 16:27, Martin Brown wrote:

<snip>

The astronomical cost is because it that capacity is only needed for
/relatively/ short times. But it is /needed/ and cannot be ignored.

Bill also made that point.

And I did make the point that the cost only looks astronomical because the
peaking plants only get paid for when they are in use - they exist the whole
year round, and have to get paid enough when they are working to cover a
whole year\'s interest on capital, staff salaries and maintenance.

Yup.

IMHO those costs should be included in the cost of the
renewable energy. They shouldn\'t be conveniently ignored by the renewable energy salesmen and lobbyists.

Who on earth are they selling to and lobbying?

In Australia the debate is between he people who make a lot of money out of digging up coal and want the government to keep them in business, and the energy utilities who want to keep on putting solar farms and windmills because that lets them produce energy more cheaply than burning coal. The energy utilities have got a whole lot of legacy power stations, and quite bit of dispatchable hydro power and a grid that covers the eastern half of the continent, so they haven\'t been under pressure to add new peaking plants, but they are starting to buy grid scale batteries.

Peaking plants are a sensible investment.
Yup.

Grid scale storage will be too - when the technology is not only available (in the location) but also proven.
People will make /lots/ of money from it.

The Tesla grid scale battery in South Australia made a lot of money - unexpectedly - by taking over the short term phase and voltage regulation of the South Australian segment of the east coast grid. About 70% of it\'s capacity seems to be devoted to that and makes ten times as much money as the. other 30% which buys up excess capacity when it is cheap and sells it back when the market will pay more.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hornsdale_Power_Reserve

More seems to have been bought recently, and even more is being bought by utility generators in other eastern states.

The technology does look to have been proven. Vanadium flow batteries would probably be even better, but they aren\'t yet being produce in volume, though

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanadium_redox_battery

lists nine grid-scale examples. They clearly work, but people do still seem to be thinking about tweaking the technology to make them work better, and the people who sell them do seem to feel the need to set up demonstration systems.

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2021/09/03/vsun-reveals-redox-flow-battery-tech-in-australia/

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[server]

On Wed, 26 Jan 2022 21:36:25 -0800 (PST), whit3rd <whit3rd@gmail.com>
wrote:

On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:08:24 AM UTC-8, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:47:11 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 12:13, Rick C wrote:

posted a link to show what the local utilities pay for power at peak times
and it is astronomical because of the need for peaking plants that run for
such a short time because nuclear can not be ramped up and down.

Nope, it is because renewables ramp up and down uncontrollably.

... before there were significant renewable generation facilities roaming the earth, peaking plants were used to handle the inherent mismatch between nuclear facilities and the variable loads.

The astronomical cost is because it that capacity is only
needed for /relatively/ short times. But it is /needed/ and
cannot be ignored.

Yes, they are needed to provide the extra power that you can\'t get from nuclear plants to match the variation in loads.

There\'s other options; an aluminum mill, for example, can buy and use irregular power (i.e.
only during peaks),

Can it? A lot of proceses take days or weeks to start up and shut
down.



--

I yam what I yam - Popeye

 

[Martin Brown]

On 27/01/2022 15:35, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Wed, 26 Jan 2022 21:36:25 -0800 (PST), whit3rd <whit3rd@gmail.com
wrote:

On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:08:24 AM UTC-8, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:47:11 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 12:13, Rick C wrote:

posted a link to show what the local utilities pay for power at peak times
and it is astronomical because of the need for peaking plants that run for
such a short time because nuclear can not be ramped up and down.

Nope, it is because renewables ramp up and down uncontrollably.

... before there were significant renewable generation facilities roaming the earth, peaking plants were used to handle the inherent mismatch between nuclear facilities and the variable loads.

The astronomical cost is because it that capacity is only
needed for /relatively/ short times. But it is /needed/ and
cannot be ignored.

Yes, they are needed to provide the extra power that you can\'t get from nuclear plants to match the variation in loads.

There\'s other options; an aluminum mill, for example, can buy and use irregular power (i.e.
only during peaks),

Can it? A lot of proceses take days or weeks to start up and shut
down.

I think they can vary their load to some extent on the electrolysis side
without allowing the furnace pots to cool. Making less aluminium but
still fully operational. Sudden power disconnects can do a hell of a lot
of damage as a precursor leap year failure to Y2k demonstrated in 1996.

http://www.sysmod.com/ieismelt.htm

Chloralkali electrolysis plants are the dynamic dump load of choice in
the UK - they really can switch the process on and off quickly and get a
very favourable tariff as a result. They don\'t need to generate much
heat since many are aqueous brine to make bleach and sodium hydroxide
directly.

Manufacture of sodium metal requires molten anhydrous eutectic salt and
they do need enough supply to keep them molten or there is big trouble.

They are the ultimate load balancer for the UK national grid.

The last remaining UK aluminium smelter is sat next to a hydro electric
plant but with electricity prices as they are the electricity is worth
more than the aluminium it could manufacture!

https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/europes-power-crunch-sparks-aluminium-smelter-meltdown-andy-home-2022-01-06/

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

 

[server]

On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 16:18:21 +0000, Martin Brown
<\'\'\'newspam\'\'\'@nonad.co.uk> wrote:

On 27/01/2022 15:35, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 26 Jan 2022 21:36:25 -0800 (PST), whit3rd <whit3rd@gmail.com
wrote:

On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:08:24 AM UTC-8, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:47:11 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 12:13, Rick C wrote:

posted a link to show what the local utilities pay for power at peak times
and it is astronomical because of the need for peaking plants that run for
such a short time because nuclear can not be ramped up and down.

Nope, it is because renewables ramp up and down uncontrollably.

... before there were significant renewable generation facilities roaming the earth, peaking plants were used to handle the inherent mismatch between nuclear facilities and the variable loads.

The astronomical cost is because it that capacity is only
needed for /relatively/ short times. But it is /needed/ and
cannot be ignored.

Yes, they are needed to provide the extra power that you can\'t get from nuclear plants to match the variation in loads.

There\'s other options; an aluminum mill, for example, can buy and use irregular power (i.e.
only during peaks),

Can it? A lot of proceses take days or weeks to start up and shut
down.

I think they can vary their load to some extent on the electrolysis side
without allowing the furnace pots to cool. Making less aluminium but
still fully operational. Sudden power disconnects can do a hell of a lot
of damage as a precursor leap year failure to Y2k demonstrated in 1996.

http://www.sysmod.com/ieismelt.htm

Chloralkali electrolysis plants are the dynamic dump load of choice in
the UK - they really can switch the process on and off quickly and get a
very favourable tariff as a result. They don\'t need to generate much
heat since many are aqueous brine to make bleach and sodium hydroxide
directly.

Manufacture of sodium metal requires molten anhydrous eutectic salt and
they do need enough supply to keep them molten or there is big trouble.

They are the ultimate load balancer for the UK national grid.

The last remaining UK aluminium smelter is sat next to a hydro electric
plant but with electricity prices as they are the electricity is worth
more than the aluminium it could manufacture!

https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/europes-power-crunch-sparks-aluminium-smelter-meltdown-andy-home-2022-01-06/

Energy costs and supply intermittents drive energy-intensive things to
imports, usually from countries that burn coal.

That sort of thing is, in the long term, a worldwide income equalizer.
And a good source of CO2.



--

I yam what I yam - Popeye

 

[Cydrome Leader]

whit3rd <whit3rd@gmail.com> wrote:

On Saturday, January 22, 2022 at 11:11:07 PM UTC-8, Cydrome Leader wrote:
Anthony William Sloman <bill....@ieee.org> wrote:

With the right working fluid, and the right design, heat pumps can work
anywhere or at least anywhere where anybody lives.

Dear Dumbass, go ahead and name two brands of heatpumps that provide at least
100kBTU of heating capacity with outdoor temps of negative F. Be sure to hand
over the name of the authorized installers... zip code 60601.

Firstly, fluids like ammonia have triple points well below 0 F (below -50, even)
so heatpumps for that range are well-known. Second, you ask for brand names?
Why ask an Australia resident, if your zip code is 60601?

Bill was right. Heat pumps CAN work. Your local market for installers is a
different matter entirely.

Oh what\'s that? Heat pumps don\'t universally work everywhere and have constraints
that makes them effectively useless for heating outside of a hot ass prison
colony?

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 27/01/22 14:21, Anthony William Sloman wrote:

On Thursday, January 27, 2022 at 8:30:06 PM UTC+11, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 27/01/22 01:27, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, January 27, 2022 at 12:47:11 AM UTC+11, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 12:13, Rick C wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 4:38:55 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner
wrote:
On 26/01/22 02:23, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:10:49 AM UTC+11, Dimiter
Popoff wrote:
On 1/25/2022 23:19, Rick C wrote:
On Tuesday, January 25, 2022 at 11:43:24 AM UTC-4, Dimiter
Popoff wrote:
On 1/25/2022 16:27, Martin Brown wrote:

snip

The astronomical cost is because it that capacity is only needed for
/relatively/ short times. But it is /needed/ and cannot be ignored.

Bill also made that point.

And I did make the point that the cost only looks astronomical because
the peaking plants only get paid for when they are in use - they exist
the whole year round, and have to get paid enough when they are working
to cover a whole year\'s interest on capital, staff salaries and
maintenance.

Yup.

IMHO those costs should be included in the cost of the renewable energy.
They shouldn\'t be conveniently ignored by the renewable energy salesmen
and lobbyists.

Who on earth are they selling to and lobbying?

Politicians and companies that give them money when they buy
their plant.

Organisations like Greenpeace (and to a lesser extent Friends
of the Earth) target people that give them donations.

I\'m not a fan of Greenpeace; they use disreputable tactics
to push their points.

In Australia the debate is between he people who make a lot of money out of
digging up coal and want the government to keep them in business, and the
energy utilities who want to keep on putting solar farms and windmills
because that lets them produce energy more cheaply than burning coal. The
energy utilities have got a whole lot of legacy power stations, and quite
bit of dispatchable hydro power and a grid that covers the eastern half of
the continent, so they haven\'t been under pressure to add new peaking plants,
but they are starting to buy grid scale batteries.

Peaking plants are a sensible investment.
Yup.

Grid scale storage will be too - when the technology is not only available
(in the location) but also proven. People will make /lots/ of money from
it.

The Tesla grid scale battery in South Australia made a lot of money -
unexpectedly - by taking over the short term phase and voltage regulation of
the South Australian segment of the east coast grid. About 70% of it\'s
capacity seems to be devoted to that and makes ten times as much money as
the. other 30% which buys up excess capacity when it is cheap and sells it
back when the market will pay more.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hornsdale_Power_Reserve

More seems to have been bought recently, and even more is being bought by
utility generators in other eastern states.

Yes, but I regard that as a technically interesting niche market.

The massive grid-scale storage domain interests me more in the
context of using renewable to ditch fossil fuels.

The technology does look to have been proven. Vanadium flow batteries would
probably be even better, but they aren\'t yet being produce in volume, though

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanadium_redox_battery

lists nine grid-scale examples. They clearly work, but people do still seem
to be thinking about tweaking the technology to make them work better, and
the people who sell them do seem to feel the need to set up demonstration
systems.

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2021/09/03/vsun-reveals-redox-flow-battery-tech-in-australia/

Let\'s hope something is /proven/ before too long.

 

[Cydrome Leader]

Anthony William Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote:

On Tuesday, January 25, 2022 at 4:09:39 PM UTC+11, Cydrome Leader wrote:
Anthony William Sloman <bill....@ieee.org> wrote:
On Monday, January 24, 2022 at 4:58:51 AM UTC+11, Cydrome Leader wrote:
Anthony William Sloman <bill....@ieee.org> wrote:
On Sunday, January 23, 2022 at 6:20:38 PM UTC+11, Cydrome Leader wrote:
Anthony William Sloman <bill....@ieee.org> wrote:
On Saturday, January 22, 2022 at 6:41:48 PM UTC+11, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
On Saturday, January 22, 2022 at 1:01:18 AM UTC-5, Jasen Betts wrote:
On 2022-01-21, John Larkin <jlarkin@highland_atwork_technology.com> wrote:
On Fri, 21 Jan 2022 20:46:49 -0000 (UTC), Cydrome Leader <pres...@MUNGEpanix.com> wrote:
John Larkin <jlarkin@highland_atwork_technology.com> wrote:
On Wed, 19 Jan 2022 19:30:11 -0500, \"Tom Del Rosso\" <fizzbin...@that-google-mail-domain.com> wrote:
jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

snip

You didn\'t factor in the transportation cost of the electricity. The losses are not large, but it starts eating into the CoP margin. The real issue is the cost of the installation. A heat pump requires backup heat for when it\'s not very effective such as low temps but also for removing ice from the coils. To do that they run it in air conditioner mode and run the backup heat to keep the house from cooling off.

Actually, they don\'t or at least they don\'t have to. In Australia most
air-conditioning systems as touted as \"reverse cycle systems\". You can run
the compressor in reverse so it while it can cool the house in summer, it.

Oh really? How do they run the compressor in reverse? flip the leads? Let\'s
all take notes as the guru of heat pumps enlightens us once again.

There are all sort of options. Using a pair of valves to flip the
intakes and outlets would work. If the compressor is being spun by a
synchronous motor you could use electronics to make it spin in the
opposite direction. I haven\'t dismanted my Mitsubishi reverse cycle
air-conditioner to find out how they do it - it would invalidate my
guarantee if I did, and I don\'t really need to know. Cydrome Leader does
- he\'s advanced enough fatuous misconceptions to make it clear that he
hasn\'t got a clue.

Well, the expert has spoken. There might be a synchronous motor in the
compressor and some magic electronics to spin it the other direction.

Thinking about what the compressor has to do with the gas stream it is compressing suggests that it wouldn\'t be a good idea to run it in reverse.
The electronics to do that would be pretty trivial - you wouldn\'t need to add any extra parts or compromise the reliability.

Ignore the reversing valve I mentioned originally, that must be one of my misconceptions about parts extra parts to fail in the heating or cooling months.

Mechanical parts do fail more frequently than well-designed electronics.
They do wear.

Surprise, heat pumps are almost entirely mechanical, and not even slightly
user servicable.

But their control systems contain the usual amounts of electronics. it\'s a lot
easier and cheaper to set up a user-interface with an LCD display, and put the
valve actuators next to the valves, and control them over some kind of serial
link.

yeah, check. The standard failure mode for AC or heat pump units is a serial link
problem.

And for the audience, no, they do not reverse the spin on a motor to switch
from heating to cooling or vice versa.

They could have done. It isn\'t exactly difficult. Thinking about the gas volume
changes through the compressor suggests that it wouldn\'t have been good way to
go, but bad engineers get all sorts of silly ideas into their heads, and it can
be difficult to change their minds.

Really? Name the type of compressor you\'d use that switches pumping direction
with the flip of the motor rotation and is suitable for standard refrigerants.

Here\'s a casual heat pump repair video skillfully trimmed to 16 minutes

But who wants to spend 16 minutes watching a video? And US air-conditioning
systems are sold into a relatively impoverished mass market. People from
better-off countries are more interested in learning about more up-market
systems - not something that has been minimally adapted from a gas-fired ducted
air home heating system (which seems to be what Rick C wants to talk about).

Some people like to learn, unlike you. You don\'t know anything at all about air
conditioning, so stop pretending. It\'s not fooling anyone.

 

[John Larkin]

On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 09:20:42 +0000, Tom Gardner
<spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

Here the POTS is being aggressively replaced by VOIP, which
requires a modem in the customer premises. When the power is
out, so is the phone.

Our company phone system only requires each phone to have an internet
connection. People can take them home and work from there
transparently. All the usual buttons and things work anywhere.

When the power is out, nothing else will happen, so we take a walk or
go home. We have a contingency plan to keep all the ice cream treats
from melting.



--

If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end with doubts,
but if he will be content to begin with doubts he shall end in certainties.
Francis Bacon

 

[Rick C]

On Thursday, January 27, 2022 at 1:36:28 AM UTC-4, whit3rd wrote:

On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:08:24 AM UTC-8, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
On Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 9:47:11 AM UTC-4, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 26/01/22 12:13, Rick C wrote:

posted a link to show what the local utilities pay for power at peak times
and it is astronomical because of the need for peaking plants that run for
such a short time because nuclear can not be ramped up and down.

Nope, it is because renewables ramp up and down uncontrollably.
... before there were significant renewable generation facilities roaming the earth, peaking plants were used to handle the inherent mismatch between nuclear facilities and the variable loads.
The astronomical cost is because it that capacity is only
needed for /relatively/ short times. But it is /needed/ and
cannot be ignored.

Yes, they are needed to provide the extra power that you can\'t get from nuclear plants to match the variation in loads.
There\'s other options; an aluminum mill, for example, can buy and use irregular power (i.e.
only during peaks), or a hydroelectric dam can throttle its flow rapidly. The Tesla peak-power
success is available now, and for the future, flow batteries seem poised to lower those prices.

Yes, you can do many things to supplement nuclear to make it viable without peaking plants. But that doesn\'t alter the fact that nuclear power generation has similar problems to renewables, just the other side of the coin, the inflexibility to supply variable loads rather than needing to adapt variable supply to loads.

BTW, how would it work to tell an aluminum mill when they can operate? In the UK they have to pay large electric consumers to stop consuming. That sounds like more of an emergency stop gap measure than a practical back fill for nuclear.

Traditionally, incandescent lighting was tolerant of fluctuations, and gave the grid a lower
power usage when voltages dropped; switchmode power and AC motors do NOT share that
beneficial effect, so the grid stability is more of a problem these days.

Is former incandescent lighting really much of a load in the grand scheme of things? I think I\'m burning maybe 50 watts total for lighting at any one time and that\'s typically off peak. Where are these motors you are referring to? Are you talking about industrial motors? Again, I can\'t think of anything in my home that uses any real amount of power in the grand scheme of things other than perhaps the heat pump. Is that the sort of motor you mean? Weren\'t they always like that?

--

Rick C.

+-+-- Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
+-+-- Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 27/01/22 21:46, John Larkin wrote:

On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 09:20:42 +0000, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:


Here the POTS is being aggressively replaced by VOIP, which
requires a modem in the customer premises. When the power is
out, so is the phone.

Our company phone system only requires each phone to have an internet
connection. People can take them home and work from there
transparently. All the usual buttons and things work anywhere.

When the power is out, nothing else will happen, so we take a walk or
go home. We have a contingency plan to keep all the ice cream treats
from melting.

Oh, not having to use a phone is a blessing.

But not being able to summon help when necessary is
a curse. And that\'s more likely to happen to the elderly.

When in her 90s, my mother (and I!) both relied on her
emergency button. She pressed it very rarely - once she
was in bed having a heart attack, once she had slipped
gently to the floor and stayed there.

Using a cellphone was not possible - I even had trouble
teaching her to tune an FM radio! Plus in the basement
kitchen the 60cm thick walls meant there was no coverage
even in the centre of a city.

 

[server]

On Fri, 28 Jan 2022 00:19:07 +0000, Tom Gardner
<spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 27/01/22 21:46, John Larkin wrote:
On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 09:20:42 +0000, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:


Here the POTS is being aggressively replaced by VOIP, which
requires a modem in the customer premises. When the power is
out, so is the phone.

Our company phone system only requires each phone to have an internet
connection. People can take them home and work from there
transparently. All the usual buttons and things work anywhere.

When the power is out, nothing else will happen, so we take a walk or
go home. We have a contingency plan to keep all the ice cream treats
from melting.

Oh, not having to use a phone is a blessing.

But not being able to summon help when necessary is
a curse. And that\'s more likely to happen to the elderly.

When in her 90s, my mother (and I!) both relied on her
emergency button. She pressed it very rarely - once she
was in bed having a heart attack, once she had slipped
gently to the floor and stayed there.

Using a cellphone was not possible - I even had trouble
teaching her to tune an FM radio! Plus in the basement
kitchen the 60cm thick walls meant there was no coverage
even in the centre of a city.

Our real landline, from AT&T, was unreliable and got to be crazy
expensive... a zillion fees for extras like long distance. Remember
long distance?

We got Comcast internet and cable TV and they threw in the equivalent
phone service, our old phones and our old phone number, for free.

Comcast keeps increasing the internet speed, probably to compete
against fiber and microwave options. It\'s 130+40 mbits now.



--

I yam what I yam - Popeye

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 27/01/22 09:20, Tom Gardner wrote:

On 27/01/22 01:13, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
The internet of things is is fully up to coping with a one or two day
opt-out. The bureaucrats might be a bit slow to realise that they could offer
the option.

Here the POTS is being aggressively replaced by VOIP, which
requires a modem in the customer premises. When the power is
out, so is the phone.

BT/OpenReach statement is \"you can use your cellphone
instead\", which is fine - except for those places that
don\'t have reception and for \"emergency buttons\" worn
by the elderly in case of A Fall.

I\'ve seen reports that BT will grudgingly add batteries
(or similar), if you can force them to recognise you
don\'t have cellphone reception. No answer to the emergency
button issue.

I imagine lots of IoT applications will be ignored.

More info, on comp.risks - the one usenet group all engineers
should read. https://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/33/04/#subj12.1

UK\'s Telecomm Provider(s) Switching to Digital Phone Lines

Openreach the provider of the UK\'s telecomm\'s infrastructure is switching to
\'Digital Voice\' which appears to be replacing the copper wired analogue
exchange to residence connection with one based on broadband technology.
See https://www.bt.com/help/landline/digital-voice-migration. The
changeover will be done by 2025. It looks like they are migrating the
entire country onto VOIP. Also, the way handsets connect to the service
inside the house is changing to one using DECT.

The consequences include:

1. Householders having to re-arrange their domestic phone systems—to
establish a connection to their router. Or replace their handsets with a
Digital Voice compatible one.

2. However, BT Digital Voice appears to only work with the routers (Smart
Hub 2) they provide!

3. BT state that if consumers have a monitored alarm that\'s connected to
their landline (like a health pendant or monitored burglar alarm) they\'ll
need to speak to their alarm provider before moving to Digital Voice.
Apparently these systems will stop working.

4. Oh and if there\'s a power cut or your broadband fails, you\'ll be unable
to make calls using Digital Voice, including calls to 999

5. Some areas have no broadband services / or they fail often

Risks: very limited news / announcements about the programme, issues over
requiring householders to change their equipment / undertake technical
re-configuration with limited / little support. Elderly / vulnerable
residents a risk.

 

[Joe Gwinn]

On Fri, 28 Jan 2022 10:03:49 +0000, Tom Gardner
<spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 27/01/22 09:20, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 27/01/22 01:13, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
The internet of things is is fully up to coping with a one or two day
opt-out. The bureaucrats might be a bit slow to realise that they could offer
the option.

Here the POTS is being aggressively replaced by VOIP, which
requires a modem in the customer premises. When the power is
out, so is the phone.

BT/OpenReach statement is \"you can use your cellphone
instead\", which is fine - except for those places that
don\'t have reception and for \"emergency buttons\" worn
by the elderly in case of A Fall.

I\'ve seen reports that BT will grudgingly add batteries
(or similar), if you can force them to recognise you
don\'t have cellphone reception. No answer to the emergency
button issue.

I imagine lots of IoT applications will be ignored.

More info, on comp.risks - the one usenet group all engineers
should read. https://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/33/04/#subj12.1

UK\'s Telecomm Provider(s) Switching to Digital Phone Lines

Openreach the provider of the UK\'s telecomm\'s infrastructure is switching to
\'Digital Voice\' which appears to be replacing the copper wired analogue
exchange to residence connection with one based on broadband technology.
See https://www.bt.com/help/landline/digital-voice-migration. The
changeover will be done by 2025. It looks like they are migrating the
entire country onto VOIP. Also, the way handsets connect to the service
inside the house is changing to one using DECT.

The consequences include:

1. Householders having to re-arrange their domestic phone systems—to
establish a connection to their router. Or replace their handsets with a
Digital Voice compatible one.

2. However, BT Digital Voice appears to only work with the routers (Smart
Hub 2) they provide!

3. BT state that if consumers have a monitored alarm that\'s connected to
their landline (like a health pendant or monitored burglar alarm) they\'ll
need to speak to their alarm provider before moving to Digital Voice.
Apparently these systems will stop working.

4. Oh and if there\'s a power cut or your broadband fails, you\'ll be unable
to make calls using Digital Voice, including calls to 999

5. Some areas have no broadband services / or they fail often

Risks: very limited news / announcements about the programme, issues over
requiring householders to change their equipment / undertake technical
re-configuration with limited / little support. Elderly / vulnerable
residents a risk.

Same thing is happening here, in the Boston area. Verizon (the legacy
telco and now an ISP) is dropping copper land lines as fast as
possible.

They do have a battery-box option that costs extra, but seems to be a
good deal, as it allows one to use commodity rechargeable lead-acid
SLA batteries of the sort used for burglar alarms and UPS units.

But getting real technical details out of Verizon is like pulling
teeth.

We also have COMCAST (Xfinity), so at least Verizon has competition.

Joe Gwinn

 

[Dimiter_Popoff]

On 1/28/2022 22:04, Joe Gwinn wrote:

On Fri, 28 Jan 2022 10:03:49 +0000, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 27/01/22 09:20, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 27/01/22 01:13, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
The internet of things is is fully up to coping with a one or two day
opt-out. The bureaucrats might be a bit slow to realise that they could offer
the option.

Here the POTS is being aggressively replaced by VOIP, which
requires a modem in the customer premises. When the power is
out, so is the phone.

BT/OpenReach statement is \"you can use your cellphone
instead\", which is fine - except for those places that
don\'t have reception and for \"emergency buttons\" worn
by the elderly in case of A Fall.

I\'ve seen reports that BT will grudgingly add batteries
(or similar), if you can force them to recognise you
don\'t have cellphone reception. No answer to the emergency
button issue.

I imagine lots of IoT applications will be ignored.

More info, on comp.risks - the one usenet group all engineers
should read. https://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/33/04/#subj12.1

UK\'s Telecomm Provider(s) Switching to Digital Phone Lines

Openreach the provider of the UK\'s telecomm\'s infrastructure is switching to
\'Digital Voice\' which appears to be replacing the copper wired analogue
exchange to residence connection with one based on broadband technology.
See https://www.bt.com/help/landline/digital-voice-migration. The
changeover will be done by 2025. It looks like they are migrating the
entire country onto VOIP. Also, the way handsets connect to the service
inside the house is changing to one using DECT.

The consequences include:

1. Householders having to re-arrange their domestic phone systems—to
establish a connection to their router. Or replace their handsets with a
Digital Voice compatible one.

2. However, BT Digital Voice appears to only work with the routers (Smart
Hub 2) they provide!

3. BT state that if consumers have a monitored alarm that\'s connected to
their landline (like a health pendant or monitored burglar alarm) they\'ll
need to speak to their alarm provider before moving to Digital Voice.
Apparently these systems will stop working.

4. Oh and if there\'s a power cut or your broadband fails, you\'ll be unable
to make calls using Digital Voice, including calls to 999

5. Some areas have no broadband services / or they fail often

Risks: very limited news / announcements about the programme, issues over
requiring householders to change their equipment / undertake technical
re-configuration with limited / little support. Elderly / vulnerable
residents a risk.

Same thing is happening here, in the Boston area. Verizon (the legacy
telco and now an ISP) is dropping copper land lines as fast as
possible.

They do have a battery-box option that costs extra, but seems to be a
good deal, as it allows one to use commodity rechargeable lead-acid
SLA batteries of the sort used for burglar alarms and UPS units.

But getting real technical details out of Verizon is like pulling
teeth.

We also have COMCAST (Xfinity), so at least Verizon has competition.

Joe Gwinn

We moved to broadband (coaxial cable TV) nearly 20 years ago here.
Was our choice, phone got VOIP - a normal phone plugged into a
cable modem. Prior to that all we had was a twisted pair muxed between
3 neighbouring houses...14400 bps was possible on a very good day so
we were just happy when the coaxial cable reached us.
I don\'t know if the battery backup would be very useful in your
area, here it would not be useful at all. Even if the cable modem and
everything is powered when there is a blackout in the area
some of the amplifiers/buffers/whatever the boxes in the streets
are just lose power and that is it. In fact if the net stops
I first check (using the mobile internet) for blackouts in the vicinity.