Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages • Hacker News Board

Re: Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages

#251

Post by chiph » Sun, Sep 25, 2022, 6:54 PM UTC

mijoharas wrote: post #231

izacus wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Well if they're reliable, why is France in this world of hurt right now? This an exceedingly intellectually lazy argument which shows that you're either horribly biased (and never engaged with the reading material properly) or didn't even spend a minute thinking through what you're asking. It's somewhere on the level of "well, why is there snow in New York if global warming is happening HUUUUH?!". (Not to mention t…

I don't think that's fair. If almost 40% of french nuclear is offline right now[0][1] then I think it's reasonable to ask questions about reliability. Could you explain how the position is lazy? (Note: I'm in favour of nuclear power) [0] https://twitter.com/BurggrabenH/status/1567971418255532035 [1] Our forecast is for 59% utilisation or 315TWh based on EDF's guidance.

The French reactors were taken offline for scheduled maintenance and repairs. Those hours don't count against reliability metrics because the plants weren't expected to be operating.

The argument is lazy because it's false equivalence. A power plant failing suddenly is not the same thing as a power plant being taken offline to fix a known issue.

edit: EDF has announced that they will be restarting their nuclear plants by winter. How this plays into the Russian gas shortage is that France also generates a lot of electricity off natural gas. By working to get the nuclear plants running by winter they won't need to run their natural gas generation plants, leaving more gas to be used for industrial purposes & home heating.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7BlzKHfxPk

Re: Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages

#252

Post by Gud » Sun, Sep 25, 2022, 6:54 PM UTC

maCDzP wrote: post #174

As a Swede that just went though an election with electricity prices being discussed this is very interesting. Prices in Sweden are at an all time high. I don’t remember this analysis being talked about. The problem was cast mostly as a domestic issue - that’s my take at least. In hindsight I think it was only the left that had a solution that maybe would address this for Sweden at least. They wanted to have domestic…

The left created this mess to begin with. They shut down multiple functioning nuclear power plants in the south of Sweden where the energy is needed the most.

Re: Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages

#253

Post by autokad » Sun, Sep 25, 2022, 6:54 PM UTC

locallost wrote: post #211

I read the whole thread. At one point he goes on and on how France is shaky because their nuclear plants are offline caused by corrosion issues etc. On the very next tweet he blasts Germany for prematurely shutting down "the most reliable energy source nuclear". Well if they're reliable, why is France in this world of hurt right now? I agree about one thing, and that it really is a perfect storm of issues, and that t…

you have to ask yourself what 'reliable' means. Its my understanding that nuclear is called 'reliable' due to the availability of the fuel source as well as the constant electricity output it produces (its very stable / constant ).

That speaks nothing to the 'reliability of keeping plants online' that you are referring to. even if the reliability referred to by the author was claiming they are easy to keep online, that doesn't except France from the need of keeping good maintenance of the plants.

Now the 2nd part on your claim about renewables. most claims in output and gains in renewables include hydro electric (which is kind of weird since the super green crowd villainised hydro electric ), which is a great solution but unfortunately most of the best opportunities for hydro electric have already been exploited. wind and solar makes sense in certain situations, but in most it doesnt.

renewables should be part of the planning as much as possible, but they are not in a position to help Europe in its current situation. Germany's decision to shut down nuclear power plants just after fukushima because it was the social media hip thing to do at the time, has been a disastrous decision.

Re: Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages

#254

Post by kennend3 » Sun, Sep 25, 2022, 6:54 PM UTC

Gwypaas wrote: post #241

kennend3 wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who is also "pro-nuclear" it is upsetting to see this take place. The "anti-nuclear" camp has won, but based on what sort of logical argument? Fear? what about Chernobyl? It is one thing to be "anti-nuclear" but they failed to provide alternatives. "WIND" or "Solar" is not going to replace 3,500 MW of nuclear power without damaging a LOT of land. Now millions face rolling blackouts and energy shortages whe…

Simply cost. If the plants started in the early 2000s would have been delivered on time and budget they would be a huge part of the transition today. Now nuclear costs 3-5x more compared to renewables and is simply not relevant. > "WIND" or "Solar" is not going to replace 3,500 MW of nuclear power without damaging a LOT of land. If land use is what you measure impact based on a much better target is the beef industry…

what·a·bout·ism /ˌ(h)wədəˈboudizəm/ noun BRITISH the technique or practice of responding to an accusation or difficult question by making a counteraccusation or raising a different issue.

what does "beef" have to do with converting land to wind farms?

perhaps you could respond back with how solar panels are not actually very environmentally friendly? They produce a lot of toxic chemicals to manufacture.

Tell us, to replace 3,500 MW of nuclear power, how many acres of land must be converted to wind/solar? what is the environmental/social impact of doing this?

How much power is produced in a cold / dark winter via solar/wind vs nuclear.

Re: Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages

#255

Post by mijoharas » Sun, Sep 25, 2022, 6:55 PM UTC

izacus wrote: post #239

mijoharas wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's fair. If almost 40% of french nuclear is offline right now[0][1] then I think it's reasonable to ask questions about reliability. Could you explain how the position is lazy? (Note: I'm in favour of nuclear power) [0] https://twitter.com/BurggrabenH/status/1567971418255532035 [1] Our forecast is for 59% utilisation or 315TWh based on EDF's guidance.

For starters: to compare reliability (which is a statistic), you need to first look at more than a single anecdotal time sample. This is like... highschool level stuff. (Which is also the reason why I have very little will to refute your points, because they seem to be done from either dishonesty or ignorance. Anyone on HN is old enough to understand why anecdotal single sample evidence is not a way to refute statist…

Ok, this is ridiculous, given your position, I'm not going to spend long on this but:

> Just like a single exploding windmill in Denmark doesn't change much about reliability of wind power

First off, you realise France has 56 nuclear power stations? I'm wondering where you're getting "single sample" and "single windmill" from

If, over a year, 40% of windmills in Denmark weren't producing power, it would make a hell of a lot of sense to question the reliability of Danish windmills.

I don't know why you pulled out the straw man of saying the person was questioning all of nuclear power, but they had a very reasonable fact-based question.

I'd be very happy to listen to any data or explanations you could bring, but frankly you don't seem to be discussing things in good faith right now.

Re: Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages

#256

Post by mijoharas » Sun, Sep 25, 2022, 6:56 PM UTC

chiph wrote: post #251

mijoharas wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's fair. If almost 40% of french nuclear is offline right now[0][1] then I think it's reasonable to ask questions about reliability. Could you explain how the position is lazy? (Note: I'm in favour of nuclear power) [0] https://twitter.com/BurggrabenH/status/1567971418255532035 [1] Our forecast is for 59% utilisation or 315TWh based on EDF's guidance.

The French reactors were taken offline for scheduled maintenance and repairs. Those hours don't count against reliability metrics because the plants weren't expected to be operating. The argument is lazy because it's false equivalence. A power plant failing suddenly is not the same thing as a power plant being taken offline to fix a known issue. edit: EDF has announced that they will be restarting their nuclear plant…

Thank you.

Re: Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages

#257

Post by thrown_22 » Sun, Sep 25, 2022, 6:56 PM UTC

lostlogin wrote: post #80

pjmlp wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone forgot the laws of physics regarding electricy production for the amount of cars in transit.

Petrol prices rising are part of this crisis too. Most EVs are charged over night, when grid usage is low. Doesn’t that maximise the use of a strained system?

Right, so we just need to burn natural gas to meet that new demand. We can get that from ... oh.

Re: Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages

#258

Post by kennend3 » Sun, Sep 25, 2022, 6:57 PM UTC

teraflop wrote: post #248

kennend3 wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This doesnt make sense, at least not for Ontario. Prior to "Time of use" billing (and having to upgrade all our meters in like 2016) i dont see how this was possible. The old meters simply measured how much power was used, they had no idea of WHEN it was used. The electric company would go house to house and "read the meter" once a month and report this back to billing. Based on your usage a bill would be produced an…

It's called a multiple-tariff meter. Of course it's easier to implement with modern electronics, but there's no reason you can't design an electromechanical meter device that has two different mechanisms to tally up "peak" and "off-peak" usage. I just did a quick Google search and found patents dating back to the 1970s.

I think you intentionally overlooked my point.

I wasn't debating if these meters exist or not, it was that they were never used in Ontario.

Continuing your logic, did Canada ever use these "multiple-tariff" meters? If they did, what was the point of the light the OP mentioned?

Re: Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages

#259

Post by tom_ » Sun, Sep 25, 2022, 6:57 PM UTC

teraflop wrote: post #248

kennend3 wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This doesnt make sense, at least not for Ontario. Prior to "Time of use" billing (and having to upgrade all our meters in like 2016) i dont see how this was possible. The old meters simply measured how much power was used, they had no idea of WHEN it was used. The electric company would go house to house and "read the meter" once a month and report this back to billing. Based on your usage a bill would be produced an…

It's called a multiple-tariff meter. Of course it's easier to implement with modern electronics, but there's no reason you can't design an electromechanical meter device that has two different mechanisms to tally up "peak" and "off-peak" usage. I just did a quick Google search and found patents dating back to the 1970s.

Economy 7 in the UK switches meters based on time of day: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_7

Re: Europe is in danger of rolling electricity shortages

#260

Post by jopsen » Sun, Sep 25, 2022, 6:57 PM UTC

maCDzP wrote: post #174

As a Swede that just went though an election with electricity prices being discussed this is very interesting. Prices in Sweden are at an all time high. I don’t remember this analysis being talked about. The problem was cast mostly as a domestic issue - that’s my take at least. In hindsight I think it was only the left that had a solution that maybe would address this for Sweden at least. They wanted to have domestic…

> They wanted to have domestic and EU-pricing.

But would it be legal? That kind of protectionism would definitely run counter to the ideals if the EU common market.

It's hard to know what EU countries might do, but during covid the EU avoided protectionism when it came to vaccines.

Of course, it could be different this time.