⇑ Wind Power Installation Amplifies
The Growth Of Fossil Fuel Energies
“[A]s RES [renewable energy sources] increases, the expected decreasing tendency in the installed capacity of electricity generation from fossil fuels has not been found.” – Marques et al., 2018
In late 2012, a prophetic article appeared in the Los Angeles Times that warned:
“As more solar and wind energy generators come online, […] the demand will rise for more backup power from fossil fuel plants.”
Image Source: LA Times
Wind turbines cannot produce energy when the wind is not blowing. Consequently, wind power routinely needs to be backed up by reliable and immediately-available energy sources — which are often fossil fuels-based (gas, oil, coal).
So as wind power installation expands across the world, more fossil fuel plants will need to be built to back them up.
A new observational analysis using data from 10 European Union countries affirms the rather devastating conclusion that wind power installation “preserves fossil fuel dependency” because for every 1% increase in the installed capacity of wind power there is a concomitant ~0.25% increase in the need for more electricity generation from fossil fuels.
And, sure enough, the growth in natural gas production and consumption across the globe is expected to explode in the coming decades (EIA, 2016), nearly doubling in production (from 300 to nearly 600 billion cubic feet per day) between 2010 and 2040.
Currently, 1,600 new coal plants in 62 countries are planned or in the process of being constructed across the world, expanding the world’s coal-fired energy capacity by 43% in the coming years (New York Times, 2017).
There can be no long-term CO2 emissions reduction benefit to installing more and more wind power if the long-term net effect of doing so leads to the requisite construction of more fossil fuel energy plants.
Marques et al., 2018
♦ “The installed capacity of wind power preserves fossil fuel dependency. … Electricity consumption intensity and its peaks have been satisfied by burning fossil fuels. … [A]s RES [renewable energy sources] increases, the expected decreasing tendency in the installed capacity of electricity generation from fossil fuels, has not been found. Despite the high share of RES in the electricity mix, RES, namely wind power and solar PV, are characterised by intermittent electricity generation. … The inability of RES-I [intermittent renewable energy sources like wind and solar] to satisfy high fluctuations in electricity consumption on its own constitutes one of the main obstacles to the deployment of renewables. This incapacity is due to both the intermittency of natural resource availability, and the difficulty or even impossibility of storing electricity on a large scale, to defer generation. As a consequence, RES [renewable energy sources] might not fully replace fossil sources.”
♦ “The literature proves the existence of a unidirectional causality running from RES [renewable energy sources] to NRES [non-renewable energy sources] (Almulali et al., 2014; Dogan, 2015; Salim et al., 2014). This unidirectional causality proves the need for countries to maintain or increase their installed capacity of fossil fuel generation, because of the characteristics of RES [renewable energy sources] production.”
♦ “In fact, the characteristics of electricity consumption reinforce the need to burn fossil fuels to satisfy the demand for electricity. Specifically, the ECA results confirm the substitution effect between the installed capacity of solar PV and fossil fuels. In contrast, installed wind power capacity has required all fossil fuels and hydropower to back up its intermittency in the long-run equilibrium. The EGA outcomes show that hydropower has been substituting electricity generation through NRES [non-renewable energy sources], but that other RES have needed the flexibility of natural gas plants, to back them up.”
♦ “[D]ue to the intermittency phenomenon, the growth of installed capacity of RES-I [intermittent renewable energy sources – wind power] could maintain or increase electricity generation from fossil fuels. … The electrification of the residential, services and industrial sectors has been continuously pursued to diminish the consumption of fossil sources. Nevertheless, the increased electricity consumption intensity in the economy has been satisfied by fossil fuel burning, which has cancelled out the advantages of that shift.”
♦ “The installed capacity of wind power preserves fossil fuel generation to back up its electricity generation. In fact, the installed capacity of wind power has been deployed in large amounts to increase the exploitation of natural resources. But, the intermittency phenomenon, more noticeable in wind power, means that, unlike fossil fuels, the installation of this RES capacity does not correspond to growth by the same amount of electricity generation. On the one hand, this can cause a lack of energy in the grid, i.e., the excess of installed capacity does not correspond to the effective generation to satisfy the entire demand. … In short, the results indicate that the EU’s domestic electricity production systems have preserved fossil fuel generation, and include several economic inefficiencies and inefficiencies in resource allocation.”
♦ “[A]n increase of 1% in the installed capacity of wind power provokes an increase of 0.26%, and 0.22% in electricity generation from oil and natural gas, respectively in the long-run…. Natural gas plants are the most commonly used to manage the scarcity of RES electricity supply and the uncertainty of electricity demand. Indeed, the flexibility and storage facilities of natural gas plants allow the electricity production systems to effectively match the electricity demand with the electricity supply. Hence, this implies that the greater the electricity consumption peaks, the larger the capacity for generation from natural gas plants must be and, consequently, the longer and larger the capacity needed on stand-by status.”
To Grow Renewables’ Market Share,
More Fossil Fuel Plants Are Needed
“Paradoxically, in order for renewable technologies to continue growing their market share, they need to co-exist with fossil fuel technologies.”
In another new paper that lends support to the conclusions of Marques et al. (2018) above, Blazquez et al. (2018) (full paper available for download) find that renewable energy paradoxically becomes more and more costly to consumers the further it penetrates the market, and thus simultaneous growth in fossil fuel technologies is needed to keep the costs of renewable energy sustainable.
Moreover, Blazquez et al. (2018) conclude that “transition towards a full 100% renewable electricity sector is unattainable.”
Blazquez et al., 2018
♦ “However, promoting renewables –in liberalized power markets– creates a paradox in that successful penetration of renewables could fall victim to its own success. With the current market architecture, future deployment of renewable energy will necessarily be more costly and less scalable. Moreover, transition towards a full 100% renewable electricity sector is unattainable. Paradoxically, in order for renewable technologies to continue growing their market share, they need to co-exist with fossil fuel technologies.”
♦ “The paradox is that the same market design and renewables policies that led to current success become increasingly less successful in the future as the share of renewables in the energy mix grows. The renewable energy policy paradox results from the interaction between several factors, including: [1] the (almost) zero marginal costs of renewables, [2] the intermittent nature of renewables, [3] the interplay between price volatility and renewable technologies. The first feature above explains why renewables have priority of dispatch. The structure of renewable technologies, which have a high levelized cost of electricity but almost zero marginal cost of production, gives renewable energy priority in the order of dispatch. However, renewable technologies are often not the cheapest in terms of total cost, not marginal cost. This leads to a divergence between the true cost of the system and the evolution of price of electricity in wholesale markets, in markets with high penetration of renewable energy.”
♦ “To illustrate this point, we performed simple calculations for three European countries using Eurostat data which show a sharp decrease in wholesale prices that concur with high penetration of renewable capacity but also a surge in the final consumer price for the period 2008–2014. In Germany there was a simultaneous increase in the price of electricity to consumers of 41 percent, a decrease of the wholesale price of electricity of 50 percent and renewable penetration increased from 15.1 percent to 28.2 percent.”
♦ “In the longer term, investors will not reinvest or recapitalize electricity markets without sufficient guarantees on returns. These additional costs will eventually be borne by taxpayers or consumers. In Germany the feed-in tariff subsidy program has already cost more than $468 billion, and its total cost could exceed $1.3 trillion by the time it expires, according to 2015 estimates. German consumers paid an 18 percent surcharge on their monthly power bills in 2014 to finance renewables. This is more than a fivefold increase since 2009.”
♦ “Full decarbonization of a power sector that relies on renewable technologies alone, given the current design of these markets, is not possible as conventional [fossil fuel] technologies provide important price signals. Markets would collapse if the last unit of fossil fuel technologies was phased out. In the extreme (theoretical) case of 100 percent renewables, prices would be at the renewables marginal cost, equal to zero or even negative for long periods. These prices would not be capturing the system’s costs nor would they be useful to signal operation and investment decisions. The result would be a purely administered subsidy, i.e., a non-market outcome. This is already occurring in Germany as Praktiknjo and Erdmann [31] point out and is clearly an unstable outcome. Thus, non-dispatchable technologies need to coexist with fossil fuel technologies. This outcome makes it impossible for renewables policy to reach success, defined as achieving a specified level of deployment at the lowest possible cost. With volatile, low and even negative electricity prices, investors would be discouraged from entering the market and they would require more incentives to continue to operate.”
I believe we are observing Jevon’s Paradox in action…
How do you mean that? After all, Jevons paradox depends on efficiency gains. Jevons suggests: when the efficiency increases with which we use a resource (say energy), the more people will tend to consume of it. But in the case at hand, where is the efficiency gain?
Agreed that the original interpretation was related to the efficiency of consumption of a single fuel (coal). But I am applying the concept more broadly to include the interplay between multiple competing fuels. In this case, we have learned to use both wind and sunlight more efficiently than we could previously. Many people think this will result in a reduction in the use of coal, gas and oil. But Jevon argued that the efficient use of coal due to Watt’s invention lead to more application of coal and therefore more consumption and faster growth in the economy.
What I see is that by using sunlight and wind more efficiently coal, gas, and oil are more available for other uses, which their producers certainly will exploit. In other words, the development of those resources will add to the energy available for consumption rather than replace the consumption of other forms of energy.
We may see similar (or perhaps greater) effects as more-efficient transportation is realized through the use of electric vehicles. Many expect that electric cars will reduce the consumption of oil, but I think Jevon’s work argues against that eventuality. What most do not see is that electrification of more and more cars will INCREASE the amount of electricity needed by perhaps 50% or more. This could lead directly to an increase in both coal and gas consumption, at least in the short term.
But I do see both a race and a disconnect between deployment of solar panels and battery-electric vehicles: Approximately six solar panels are required to fuel the typical commuter car in many parts of the U.S. and they produce their electricity as the wrong time of the day. At some point I believe the batteries in the electric cars need to become an integral part of the grid before enough solar panels can be installed in order to fuel them.
We live in interesting times…
Thank you, for your interesting reply.
Looks more to me like the law of unintended consequences.
It just demonstrates the refusal of virtue signallers to think through the consequential outcome of their actions. They don’t care that their “we are saving the planet” actions are seen by the money men as the actions of useful idiots. They will of course evenually realise they are simply being used, but that will of course be the money mens fault.
This seems to be a particular clear case of Captain Obvious paper promotion?
Yes, as energy demand (read: max GW consumed at any moment) increases conventional power plants need to be built as well to cover that demand.
However, there is a difference between building up / increasing capacity and actually increasing the amount of kWh coming out of conventional power plants. Or in other words, an increase in capacity does not correlate with an increase of fossil fuel burned.
Dead wrong! Let’s assume consumption doubles until year X, but we get 80% of our electricity from renewables by then, fossil fuel power plants running only 20% of the time. Have the emissions increased from now to year X?
Constructing fossil fuel energy plants doesn’t really cause CO2 emissions to increase, burning fuel in them does.
Tell that countries that are already at this stage.
Easy fix, don’t trade electricity on the exchange by marginal costs, but by total costs.
yep, level playing field, no subsidies, no feed-in mandates.
Bidding the day before, big fines for non-supply, ie loss of contract. Just like a proper market.
Only political will and agenda driven funding can keep wind and solar afloat, because the world needs solid RELIABLE, REGULAR supply systems, not an unreliable erratic subsidy driven mess.
“Tell that countries that are already at this stage.”
Which fantasy land is that, seb. !!
” burning fuel in them does.
Seb STILL hasn’t figured out that coal and gas plants still have to consume resources and emit CO2 even when they are forced not to provide supply by mandates on the use of wind and solar. DOH !!
Question: how many fossil fuel power plants do you think are running on standby at any time in Germany?
Take week 17 with (at times) greater than 50% wind and solar on the grid:
https://energy-charts.de/power_de.htm?source=all-sources&year=2018&week=17
How many backups were on standby (meaning consuming fuel despite not contributing electricity to the grid) at 12:00 CET on April 25th when wind and solar provided 48.8 GW to the grid? Take an educated guess!
Enough to cover 100% of supply if that wind and solar.
There HAS to be.
[snip – no intelligence insults]
And seriously??? cherry-picking a period of ideal weather.. Even you are better than that, seb.
Except, you are NOT !!
How about you go back to say, week 6.
Or the middle of week 2
And where’s the daily or hour graph instead of the weekly one that smooths out all the fluctuations. ?
Either you didn’t understand the question or you are really believing that 48.8 GW of conventional power plant capacity was on standby, ready to jump in in case the wind and solar output suddenly would drop to 0 GW. Is that the case?
Ideal weather? I thought this was about standby power plants? When wind and solar aren’t providing much, conventional power plants are running. Why would there be a need for standby power plants (standby for wind/solar) in those situations?
The link is to an hourly graph. You can get quarter hourly data from the ENTSO-E platform (https://transparency.entsoe.eu/).
“When wind and solar aren’t providing much, conventional power plants are running.”
Of course they are.
That IS the back-up. DOH !!
And they have to be up and running even when wind and solar are lucky enough to provide some electricity.
If they weren’t ready on stand-by (and that means consuming fuel), then there would be no electricity when wind and solar cut out.
Your total LACK OF BASIC COMPREHENSION can only be a troll-like wilful endeavour.
A PRETENSE..
So China built many hundreds of coal plants in the last 15 years, and they lead the world in fossil fuel burned and CO2 emissions (accounting for 30% of total world emissions), but this does not mean that the increase in capacity in China even correlates with fossil fuel burned?
https://www.boell.de/sites/default/files/styles/fullsize/public/uploads/2015/11/china_national_industry.png?itok=WvH7pOSS&dimension1=ds_coal_atlas
Please use real-world examples rather than esoteric analogies that bear no resemblance to what is actually occurring. I, like most people here, just ignore them.
And fossil fuel infrastructure is being built and the fuel they produce is being used/burned either domestically or via exportation. So what does your statement have to do with this article?
“Constructing fossil fuel energy plants doesn’t really cause CO2 emissions to increase, burning fuel in them does.”
Economical IRRATIONALITY.. a seb strong suit.
Also highlight his TOTAL lack of understanding.
WHY the *** would you build a coal or gas fired power station if you are not going to use it to the best of its economic and functional ability.
Coal powered power stations are designed to deliver near rated output 24/7. This where they are most economical on both fuel and cost. That is how they should be used.
Forcing them to throttle back to make way for subsidy driven intermittent supply forces them to operate in uneconomic ways both financially and emission-wise..
Even worse, is making them sit idling, consuming coal just so they are available when the irregular, erratic, subsidised supply cuts out.
Using a political agenda to FORCE them to function in their most UN-economic way, and they will eventually leave the market.
Then there is NOTHING left to provide that 100% back-up that is ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL with wind and solar.
We do it all the time since consumption is not steady. Many conventional power plants have a very very low capacity factor because of this.
Here is a link to look them up:
https://energy-charts.de/percent_full_load.htm?source=gas&year=2018
And how would you achieve that without storage? The daily and seasonal consumption patterns don’t allow for an all coal power plant infrastructure to output 24/7 at their rated capacity. Besides, it’s gas power plants that are being built as peaker plants.
I’ll repeat my question from above. Do you think 40+ GW of coal power plant capacity sits around idling when solar and wind do their thing?
They are already “forced” to do that by the 20 to 30 GW difference in electricity consumption between day and night.
Yep, but it won’t be coal that will provide that backup. And the existence of such a backup does not mean that it runs 24/7 on idle. That would indeed be uneconomical.
Kenneth I would go one step further.
DNFTT.
Thanks. We hear you loud and clear. No need to keep repeating it.
Pierre, I will keep banging on about DNFTT because it is pointless to try and engage the Troll in any kind of meaningful discussion.
I don’t know, I would classify the first paragraph of his reply as trolling. So should we not feed Kenneth now? *confused*
That’s a completely different thing as what your article is about. The scenario I and the papers you are referring to are talking about is building conventional power plants to cover increasing peak consumption in case solar/wind do not provide energy at that moment while trying to increase solar/wind share. Since those peak situations without solar/wind are rare you would not use coal power plants for this, but natural gas power plants.
That’s what is meant by “an increase in capacity does not correlate with an increase of fossil fuel burned.” and I think you know that. Either you wouldn’t have tried to troll me with that China thing above … or you really think that Chinas build-up of coal power plants had something to do with renewables growing?
This a real-world example, just with extreme numbers to make it clear to you that you are wrong. You can also imagine a country with a 5% solar/wind share today that transitions to a 20% share in X years while electricity consumption (and peak usage) increased by 10%. Is that more “real” to you? Despite the capacity increase of fossil fuel power plants in this example, did the CO2 emissions increase or not?
Your article seems to emphasize that increasing electricity consumption along with increasing renewables on the grid is somehow increasing fossil fuel consumption. That is not the case. It is the capacity that increases.
What does the following quote mean to you?
“[A]n increase of 1% in the installed capacity of wind power provokes an increase of 0.26%, and 0.22% in electricity generation from oil and natural gas, respectively in the long-run
http://www.scidev.net/global/energy/news/green-energy-developing-world-renewable-energy.html
Developing countries that already have a high share of renewable energy in their power mix are unlikely to grow this share further due to skyrocketing demand for cheap electricity, a report warns.
The study by intergovernmental organisation the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) says that many developing countries made huge strides towards deploying renewable technologies over the past decade — but this rise is now levelling off. Instead, these countries are turning towards fossil fuels to meet the energy demands of their citizens, IRENA says.
“If there is a growing energy demand in an economy and if this additional demand is covered by fossil fuels, the relative share of renewables will decrease, even if there is no decrease in absolute terms for renewable energy,” she explains.
—
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-climatechange-summit-coal-idUSKBN0TY2TG20151215?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews
Less than a week since signing the global climate deal in Paris, Japan and South Korea are pressing ahead with plans to open scores of new coal-fired power plants, casting doubt on the strength of their commitment to cutting CO2 emissions. Even as many of the world’s rich nations seek to phase out the use of coal, Asia’s two most developed economies are burning more than ever and plan to add at least 60 new coal-fired power plants over the next 10 years. Officials at both countries’ energy ministries said those plans were unchanged.
—
http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2015/01/dutch-power-stations-use-more-coal/
Dutch energy companies are burning more coal than ever, despite efforts to produce more green and sustainable energy, according to research by news agency De Persdienst. It says coal-fired power stations in the Netherlands used over seven million kilos of coal in the first nine months of last year, a 15% increase on 2013 and a 36% increase on 2012.
—
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jun/08/five-g7-nations-increased-their-coal-use-over-a-five-year-period-research-shows
Five of the world’s seven richest countries have increased their coal use in the last five years despite demanding that poor countries slash their carbon emissions to avoid catastrophic climate change, new research shows.
Britain, Germany, Italy, Japan and France together burned 16% more coal in 2013 than 2009 and are planning to further increase construction of coal-fired power stations. Only the US and Canada of the G7 countries meeting on Monday in Berlin have reduced coal consumption since the Copenhagen climate summit in 2009.
The US has reduced its coal consumption by 8% largely because of fracking for shale gas. Overall, the G7 countries reduced coal consumption by less than 1% between 2009-2013, the Oxfam research shows.
It means that the author found out the obvious. Volatility causes power plants that can jump in faster to produce more electricity. The paper is paywalled, so I can’t check, but I am sure they found that other fossil fuel (or in case of Germany nuclear) power plants decreased their electricity generation accordingly.
Except world wide the share of renewables is increasing at an exponential rate.
@Coal:
Coal consumption went down each year since 2013 … is this the “global warming is not global since it’s cooling in some places” discussion all over?
There is ONE coal power plant currently build in Western Europe. One! Britain is phasing out coal until 2025. Also, cherry picking. 2009 was a recession year with around 10% less electricity demand as in the year before.
Click here (https://energy-charts.de/energy.htm?source=all-sources&period=annual&year=all) and find out for yourself how coal in Germany developed. From a maximum of 263.56 TWh in 2003 down to 215.72 TWh in 2017. If we weren’t closing down nuclear power plants that figure would have been around 130 TWh for the year 2017.
And the obvious is this:
“[A]s RES [renewable energy sources] increases, the expected decreasing tendency in the installed capacity of electricity generation from fossil fuels has not been found.” – Marques et al., 2018
“[D]ue to the intermittency phenomenon, the growth of installed capacity of RES-I [intermittent renewable energy sources – wind power] could maintain or increase electricity generation from fossil fuels. … The electrification of the residential, services and industrial sectors has been continuously pursued to diminish the consumption of fossil sources. Nevertheless, the increased electricity consumption intensity in the economy has been satisfied by fossil fuel burning, which has cancelled out the advantages of that shift.”
Yes, it’s quite obvious that wind and solar, because they only provide occasional energy at occasional times, cannot supplant reliably-available energy from fossil fuels. That’s why fossil fuels’ share is not decreasing…even in the EU.
And the absolute growth in fossil fuels (especially natural gas) is not only keeping pace, it’s cancelled out any supposed net reduction in emissions from fossil fuel burning.
Should clarify: do the CO2 emissions of the additional conventional capacity increase by the same percentage as the capacity increases in a scenario where the share of renewables (namely wind and solar) increases too?
Do you believe that is the case?
Too Close To Call.
And coming into the stretch, it’s Carbon Copy in the lead. But wait, look! Sea Breeze and Little Sunshine are coming up from behind.
http://i1.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2015/11/energy-consumption.jpg
(use your binoculars. They’ll be coming up over the horizon any century now)
Here’s an oldy but goody on relative costs. I doubt things have improved much since 1910.
http://halfwisehalfwit.blogspot.com/2010/01/why-spend-little-when-you-can-spend-lot.html
[Entire post snipped – Ageism, like racism, is not welcome here, SebastianH. Take your bigoted comments elsewhere.]
Wth … “ageism”?
It’s still a fundamental truth that a lot of skeptics are basing their opinions on old information. In this case 2009 numbers about costs of solar and wind. Better not look at what a 1 TB solid state drive cost back then, I doubt this improved much since 2009/2010 … right?
You referred to skeptics as behaving like “retirees” again. The age of the people who espouse views that you disagree with is immaterial, as is the color of their skin. It’s soft-core bigotry, and you peddle it so facilely that you don’t even know/remember you’re doing it. Bigotry is not welcome here.
Speaking of “old” information.
Have you found any empirical proof that enhanced atmospheric CO2 does ANYTHING except enhance the growth of the biosphere?
Or have you just given up looking !!
We are STILL WAITING !!!
“fundamental truth that a lot of skeptics are basing their opinions on old information”
Yet there you are relying on an erroneous assessment of CO2 warming from a guy 150 or so years ago…. and science, physics etc that you didn’t learn properly 5 or so years ago in junior high.
You should UP-DATE your knowledge, start by getting rid of all the anti-knowledge BS fed to you by your AGW priests….
.OOPS. Just noticed this. Instead of 1910 it should be 2010,
All of the above comments are fine.
In the end though, what is left is the fact that CO2 is a non toxic gas that trees and plants thrive on.
yep, and with well over 1000 new coal and gas fired power stations going ahead around the world, with an increase of some 40% in CO2 emissions worldwide, (a substantial amount going to create wind and solar equipment), the increase in this highly benefical trace gas should continue apace.
Even if the myths are true, and CO2 does have some small warming effect, that warmth will only bring us closer to the Holocene average, opening farmland in higher latitude as the continued growth of human population utilises that enhanced atmospheric CO2 to feed itself.
In your imagination … most current reports estimate we are at peak coal. Gas will be the only fossil fuel resource that will keep growing in the next decades.
Wind and solar have left the valley where producing new panels/turbines cost more energy than current installations could provide a long time ago.
“most current reports estimate we are at peak coal”
Roflmao. Yet another mindless fantasy from, seb.
We have been at peak coal for 100 years.
And there is MORE THAN EVER available.
Once all these idiotic feed-in and subsidies disappear, common sense will prevail, and coal and other fossil fuels will continue to rule
They are REALIABLE, CHEAP and PLENTIFUL and can SUPPLY ON DEMAND.
I should have written “peak coal consumption” to not cause a troll reflex reply by you, I guess …
So you admit you were attempting to troll.
With 1600 or so coal fired power station being built.. that would indicate to any sane person, that peak coal consumption is a LONG time in the future.
Still going to need one humungous amount of coal to make all those wind turbines and solar panels, isn’t it, naïve one.
I bow before the master …
Nope, not happening.
Are you sure? I wonder how countries without coal power plants are producing them?
With 1600 or so coal fired power station being built.
SebastianH is correct, AndyG55. It’s actually 2,400.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/2500-new-coal-plants-will-thwart-any-paris-pledges-ctx3t7thnf7
“More than 2,400 coal-fired power stations are under construction or being planned around the world, a study has revealed two weeks after Britain pledged to stop burning coal.”
“The new plants will emit 6.5 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide a year and undermine the efforts at the Paris climate conference to limit global warming to 2C. China is building 368 plants and planning a further 803, according to the study by four climate change research bodies, including Ecofys and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. India is building 297 and planning 149.”
“Rich countries are also planning new coal plants. The nuclear disaster at Fukushima has prompted Japan to turn back to coal, with 40 plants in the pipeline and five under construction.”
They don’t produce them. They import them from countries like China…who burn 50% of the world’s coal.
And in other news, Germany imported 91 million tonnes of crude oil in 2016 while it produced only 2 million tonnes from the country’s 50 oil fields. This is how it works, SebastianH.
“I wonder how countries without coal power plants are producing them?”
Roflmao… what a bizarrely idiotic question !!!
They are importing them, naïve one.
You think they magically appear out of thin air ??
I know you live in a little fantasy world of your child-mind’s own making..
but SERIOUSLY !!!!!
——
Nope, not happening.
SebastianH is correct, AndyG55.
It’s actually 2,400.
I apologise for under-stating the number of coal fired power stations being built.
Seb.. like a stopped clock, correct only ever by accident.
Ruinable Energy – The Ultimate Venture Capitalism?(**)
http://business.financialpost.com/opinion/lawrence-solomon-are-solar-and-wind-finally-cheaper-than-fossil-fuels-not-a-chance
(**)VENTURE CAPITALISM
You have two cows.
You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so that you get all four cows back, with a tax exemption for five cows.
The milk rights of the six cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman Island Company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who sells the rights to all seven cows back to your listed company.
The annual report says the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more.
Oops, link to definition is here.
http://halfwisehalfwit.blogspot.com/2013/03/an-old-story-updated.html
Where do you find these links? I have to congratulate you on digging these things up. Very impressive!
It amazes me that someone can publish a paper based on stating the obvious – there are times when there is no wind!
The paper also uses incorrect terminology by describing wind generation as renewable. Clearly that description is inconsistent with these generators increasing the consumption of fossil fuel.
Anyone with a little curiosity and access to the web can easily determine that wind and solar cannot produce enough energy over their life to enable system maintenance.
The sad aspect of Germany’s disastrous experiment with run-whenever-you-like generators is that subsidies encourage waste. The wind and solar industries have not developed technologically as they would have if there were no subsidies.
I am curious, any links where to start searching for this information? All I can find is that it takes months or a few years for energy payback. Or are you again equating money with energy? How about you tell us if Hinkley Point C will produce more energy than it consumes? At a price of close to 10 Pounds per MWh, how would that be possible?
Sorry, i meant to write close to 100 Pounds per MWh:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/07/18/hinkley-points-cost-consumers-surges-50bn/ (it’s currently subsidized with £92.50/MWh).
Windfarms receive less subsidies, so does that mean nuclear power plants consume more energy than they produce?
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/06/13/wind-power-fails-in-canada-a-23-year-life-span-not-likely-to-be-replaced/
OLD Canada wind power unlikely to be replaced.
Amazing that something so “free” is not economically feasible…
Waiting for MORE subsidies for the second time around. !!
CHEAP COAL FIRED POWER, from shuttered power station.
I don’t know a thing about crypto-currency, but if it can drive the RE-OPENING of closed coal power, all the better for the environmental level of CO2
http://joannenova.com.au/2018/05/gamechanger-chinese-crypto-miners-can-get-8c-cheap-electricity-in-australia-using-old-coal/
Well, Apple bought solar power for 8 cents per kWh as well, so … what is the point?
Besides, industrial users (at least in Germany) get a much lower rate for electricity. Below 8 cents per kWh is not uncommon.
RE-OPENING coal fired power stations, rather than build UNRELIABLES..
Poor seb, how that must hurt. 🙂
Germany already has the back-up to cover when wind/solar don’t work (for now anyway)
Apple RELIES on its connection to RELIABLE grid power for cloudy days or anything outside a 4-6 hour period each day. Notify us when the rely totally on solar. AS IF.
And again, as long solar (or wind) don’t produce more than 100% of the load regularly, it’s totally fine to buy solar power that would cover 100% of your consumption and still depend on the grid for electricity. If you do that, you effectively replaced what you would have consumed from conventional power plants with electricity produced by solar panels (or wind farms).
When states or countries reach that 100% threshold regularly, the interesting part of this energy transition begins. Finding and building storage solutions. According to a posting from a few months ago (about Mr. Sinn) that should happen once 50% to 60% wind/solar is reached. So, plenty of time for batteries and other solutions to come down in price …
“solar power that would cover 100% of your consumption “
But it can NEVER provide 100% of your consumption unless you only operate when it is available. DOH !!
Totally RELIANT on having that RELIABLE, REGULAR electricity supply available.
Start cutting them out of the market with ridiculous subsidies and feed-in rules, and that will disappear. Basic economics.
When that RELIABLE, ON-DEMAND supply is gone, you have NOTHING.
Then off you go into fantasy la-la land of battery storage… yet again… displaying your absolute lack of basic comprehension of physics.
“it’s totally fine to buy solar power that would cover 100% of your consumption ”
So, you are buying solar to cover 100% of your needs.
How does the RELIABLE supplier get paid, considering they are providing 100% of your electricity for probably 60-70% of the time?
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