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Why are UK electricity bills so expensive?

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Re: Why are UK electricity bills so expensive?

#251

Post by pfdietz »

Xelbair wrote: post #244
threeseed wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a) China is third to US and EU in terms of GDP. And their economy is on a downwards trajectory. b) Majority of the early R&D in solar, EVs etc came from the US. China has been vital in driving unit economics.

a) China is third to US and EU in terms of GDP. And their economy is on a downwards trajectory. what about population? as that's the main driving factor for pollution - especially if you couple that with energy needs.

Chinese population is falling now, I believe. There's some talk the ~1.4 B official figure is seriously overstated as well.

Re: Why are UK electricity bills so expensive?

#252

Post by pfdietz »

switch007 wrote: post #112
graybeardhacker wrote: post #64

The graph shows the price for 3100 kWh. I'm not sure if that is a very low annual amount or a very very high monthly amount. The average US household uses 10,000 kWh annually ~833 kWh per month. So I'm guessing most Americans reading the article and looking at the interactive graph are thinking either: this is very cheap or very expensive, depending on whether they are assuming it's monthly or annual. In the US the a…

We mostly don't have AC, we have tiny houses, our heating is gas powered. Lots of showers aren't electric either. We don't use huge amounts compared to the US

When you switch to heat pumps you'll get AC for no extra capital cost.

Re: Why are UK electricity bills so expensive?

#254

Post by a2tech »

Spooky23 wrote: post #109
a2tech wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a historic home in the Midwest a single month in the depths of of the winter could easily be 700-800 usd.

That’s crazy. I live in New York in an old drafty house. My highest bill is about $400-450 and it’s much colder here. Those rates are brutal.

2400 sq feet, brick, limited/no insulation, original wood windows. I wouldn't trade it for the world though, even if its crazy to heat/cool.

Re: Why are UK electricity bills so expensive?

#255

Post by ericd »

akira2501 wrote: post #237
cogman10 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not saying PG&E shouldn't pay out, they were directly responsible. But I will say that Paradise was in a bad state prior to the fire, simply nobody knew how bad. While a wildfire like that wasn't guaranteed, they were just one bad lightning strike away from the same disaster. Funding FEMA, forest management services, and wildfire fighters something that isn't always prioritized and it should be.

> simply nobody knew how bad It was a 100 year old C hook that caused the fire. Which failed in high winds. Which drove the fire. It was PG&E's responsibility to know "how bad" this was. They literally lost track of their own transmission lines.

If it wasn’t that, wouldn’t it have been a lightning strike, or something else? Fundamentally, the problem is that the houses were in an area that has become incredibly flammable. It’s not all PG&E’s fault.

Re: Why are UK electricity bills so expensive?

#256

Post by Nextgrid »

desas wrote: post #178
Nextgrid wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a competent implementation, real-time metering can enable near-real-time pricing where consumers are incentivized to vary their consumption to help grid stability. Your EV can modulate its charging very quickly, and "background" loads like electric heating, water heater or even A/C can also be modulated somewhat quickly (though not as quick as an EV's inverter). The meter needs however to make sure you indeed comp…

Octopus are already doing this in the UK,so it does actually happen.

Octopus is doing hourly blocks, and is limited to a single provider. It's an interesting idea and broadly heads in the right direction, but is far away from what I'm describing.

What I describe would be real-time with seconds-level granularity and operated by the grid operator as part of the distribution network and thus provider-agnostic. The idea is to (financially) incentivize people to shift their demand and production around grid fluctuations in real-time - this should allow everyone to get "more" out of the grid by better coordinating supply and production and respond to unexpected events.

Re: Why are UK electricity bills so expensive?

#257

Post by hansvm »

yumraj wrote: post #184

The rate shown is 29p which comes to 36 cents. It is substantially less than PG&E California prices, which average around 50-55 cents.

I've had cheaper, more reliable, higher quality power every place I've lived with a population over a few dozen people. Why is PG&E like this?

Re: Why are UK electricity bills so expensive?

#258

Post by danw1979 »

Already__Taken wrote: post #228
gambiting wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I must be the only person in the UK that has had an abysmal experience with Octopus, where they gave me a quote in writing, I attempted to sign up for it, couldn't due to "technical difficulties" on their end but got another email promising that the quote will be honoured once the difficulties are resolved....and of course once they finally fixed their system a month later they refused to honour it. I kept forwarding…

Are you in the north of the N/S smart meter divide? I wonder if that has a lot do with experiences.

Please do elaborate …

Re: Why are UK electricity bills so expensive?

#260

Post by hwillis »

jayceedenton wrote: post #243
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/carbon-intensity-electric... They mean the rate of reduction in the metric graphed above.

Why was Poland so high?

> The share gross electricity generation from coal in 2022 was 70.7%, (1.7 p.p. less than in 2021).

https://www.trade.gov/country-commercial-guides/poland-energ...

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