I do like the idea of stopping burning fossil fuels.
Today December 3rd the temperature is -1 degree C in Nottinghamshire and there is a heavy mist beneath a cloudy sky. Sunlight is obliquely delivered over less than 8 hours. There’s virtually no wind.
Across the country we’ve all got the heating on.
Solar and BESS systems don’t function at low temperatures.
BESS units and inverters draw in electricity to keep them warm! (noisily)
So in our 4 months of low, short-duration light and maximum energy needs, where is the massive amount of green energy we need in winter coming from for our domestic heating and (slowly) increasing number Ev’s?
Bio digesters maybe (as a small percentage).
Nuclear? seemingly clean but 10,000 years of dirty inside its deep cement casing.
I can’t see a clear green answer.
Then there’s the opposite issue.
In summer, such as it is, we get longer days and can overproduce energy from solar. In May 2023 we paid the Netherlands to take our excess solar. And we are building more Solar sites with even bigger batteries.
Intuitively the total sum game here feels wrong.
I very much doubt the planned extra batteries could store enough energy in September to power Britain in January and February. Am I wrong?
So by what means is the long-term steady base load/ green energy supply going to be produced? Will ‘solar sites’ be redundant and closed in winter?
Based on an oversimplified emergency that proposed quick easy solutions in solar and wind, the gold rush races on to build more solar systems at a massive scale to cash in quickly before the penny drops that the whole system has not been properly thought through.
I can foresee several reasons why the rush to solar will create problems of excess supply to a highly resistant public. Not all houses and flats are suitable for (noisy) heat pumps. The majority of car owners don’t own a drive on which to charge their Ev at reasonable rates. Not all Ev owners will replace with another Ev today.
Then there’s the problem of fires involving stationary Ev’s (Luton airport and others).
Insurance – will continue to increase for all of us.
The uptake of Ev’s has already slowed. Range anxiety and price are big issues. Given the very high cost of replacing battery packs in used Ev’s, I’d expect huge steep discounts on second-hand vehicles and perhaps early scrappage.
The energy density of alternative jet ship and truck fuels are nowhere near sufficient to meet present volumes. Alternative fuels are currently not up to the job of moving massive numbers of people and goods.
So are governments going to stop leisure air travel? Will they insist we all fit heating systems we don’t want that will cost substantially more to retrofit and run?
Not a vote winner.
In 20 years time (hopefully) new more compact energy tech will be available. What will happen then with all the massive solar sites at a point where they need to swap out their panels… or walk away because they’re no longer viable as subsidies and false market pricing are long gone?
Doing something, trumps doing nothing, but I suspect we are building up a wall of problems for our children. I don’t think we’ve got the green solution at a scale that’s politically acceptable and free of foreign influence.
A member of the Solar Alliance Campaign