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How the U.K. broke its own economy

theatlantic.com

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Re: How the U.K. broke its own economy

#501

Post by [deleted] »

Ekaros wrote: post #325
alvah wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's misleading, and those who use it generally know it's misleading. It's used to persuade the layperson that electricity generated by wind turbines is cheaper to the consumer or industry than electricity generated by thermal sources or hydro turbines, when in fact that is only true if you disregard the requirement for said electricity to be available on demand - a fairly important omission.

I often wonder how many people would accept automatic black outs when buying green energy. A process that "happens" here. You can buy for example purely wind powered electricity. But somehow that does not stop being delivered when there is no wind. Instead there would be electric relay connected to mains in your home and when there is less supply than demand you would get blackout. That would be similar comparison to…

[deleted]

Re: How the U.K. broke its own economy

#502

Post by cjrp »

pjc50 wrote: post #486
DrScientist wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see a lot of irrational online hate for wind power - even going as far as wanting to dismantle offshore farms. I do wonder who is fermenting this - the obvious place to look here is the fossil fuel industry - they have the means, the motive and a track record of flexible morals. A lot of currently very rich and powerful people lose in a world where most countries and even people can generate most of the power they…

The conservative media (Daily Mail, Telegraph etc - e.g. James Delingpole, climate change denier) are quite capable of formenting this kind of thing all on their own, simply for clicks. The average reader is old and afraid of change. Anything new is scary to them and can easily be magnified into a massive, largely fictitious, horror. People might object to the view of wind farms, but they'll also object to any other…

I think the complaints have also been that people close to the wind farms don't see much economic benefit from them, and only get the negative (noise, loss of countryside, etc.). I believe that's changing though https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-business-672...

Re: How the U.K. broke its own economy

#503

Post by junto »

DrScientist wrote: post #436
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #80

The last government intentionally banned the cheapest source of energy, onshore wind, from being built in England, by making it so that a single complaint could stop a project. I cannot believe this article talks about planning constraints and energy prices and doesn't mention that.

I see a lot of irrational online hate for wind power - even going as far as wanting to dismantle offshore farms. I do wonder who is fermenting this - the obvious place to look here is the fossil fuel industry - they have the means, the motive and a track record of flexible morals. A lot of currently very rich and powerful people lose in a world where most countries and even people can generate most of the power they…

The same narrative is being pushed on Germany for instance. I think it’s quite simple.

Renewable energy is a route to energy independence for various nations that were previously highly dependent on foreign nations and corporations and there are very powerful fossil fuel interconnected groups / nations that are terrified of that.

Russia wants Germany to buy Russian gas. The U.S. wants Europe to buy their gas’s too. The Saudis want Europe to buy their oil. Wind turbines, solar power and electric vehicles are a direct threat to that hegemony.

The other aligned narrative is nuclear and I consider it to be Trojan horse to continued reliance on fossil fuels at least for the next 25-30 years whilst countries like Germany would argue with NIMBY’s and politics to try and even build just one new power station.

I believe that to be the primary root cause of the geopolitical instability we see today globally.

Re: How the U.K. broke its own economy

#504

Post by lnsru »

h4kor wrote: post #478
alt227 wrote: post #468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I come from Cornwall in the UK, and whenever I go back there I am struck by how many on shore windfarms and turbines there are there. As you drive through the countryside they are everywhere. I have asked hundreds of local people what they think of them over the years, and not one of them have ever said anything about them spoiling the view. The farmers love them as they get subsidies for putting them on their land,…

Same in Germany. Farmers (most conservative population group) love renewable energy. Every farmer I know tries to get wind turbines build on their land and have their roofs packed with PV. Yet the conservative parties are the biggest blockers for the energy transition.

Farmers love subsidies. Guaranteed price paid for every kWh they produce. Yet there is remote shutdown implemented in new large PV installations and the love is slowly disappearing.

Re: How the U.K. broke its own economy

#505

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

rickdeckard wrote: post #480

"These problems are obvious to many British politicians. Leaders in the Conservative and Labour Parties often comment on expensive energy and scarce housing. But their goals haven’t been translated into priorities and policies that lead to growth." I can't find this mentioned anywhere in the article, but the current imbalance of supply and demand and the resulting high prices is quite beneficial for parts of the real…

Here in Australia, there are 227 sitting Members of Parliament, of those: one in three federal politicians (71) own two properties; one in three (77) own three or more properties, and about one in three (67) own one property. Eleven federal politicians don't own a home, at least not in their name, and of those only one is known to be a renter.

I don't know why we call it Parliament House, it should be call the House of Lords.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-10-16/how-many-properties-d...

Re: How the U.K. broke its own economy

#506

Post by notTooFarGone »

mavhc wrote: post #437
notTooFarGone wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

12 hours of night time is not 30TWh The world is currently at 26TWh A DAY https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_energy_consumption Let's say it is 30Twh a day in 2030 - you can calculate 50% less energy usage during night making it 20 TWh during daytime and 10Twh during night time. This excludes large wind farms that add to base load if you average over the world. There is always wind somewhere around you. Realistic…

Are you including energy usage that's currently not electricity but should be in the future? https://www.tesla.com/ns_videos/Tesla-Master-Plan-Part-3.pdf suggests 240 TWh of storage is required, but also that that's a realistic target

why should I? I have no idea how fast adaption rate are, we can calculate what it would cost for the current grid to be feasible and work based off of that.

Ah yeah the magical 107 Twh hydrogen capacity. How far off is that? That's a pipe dream.

This is a plan for anything past 2050. I'm talking right now.

Re: How the U.K. broke its own economy

#507

Post by Symbiote »

mantas wrote: post #404
willvarfar wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It always amused me that people were voting for the clowns in Westminister to have more say. Even before Brexit they were showing how inept they all were so it was crazy to have confidence in them

As if EU parliament is not full of clowns too. At least local parliament has some windows to break close by. - citizen of EU member, not happy with either national or eu parliaments :D

The EU parliament is elected with a much fairer system than the British one, half of which isn't even elected but nominated in return for bribes or being a bishop.

Re: How the U.K. broke its own economy

#508

Post by cjrp »

devnullbrain wrote: post #373
alvah wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's misleading, and those who use it generally know it's misleading. It's used to persuade the layperson that electricity generated by wind turbines is cheaper to the consumer or industry than electricity generated by thermal sources or hydro turbines, when in fact that is only true if you disregard the requirement for said electricity to be available on demand - a fairly important omission.

Most electricity use is not required to be available on demand, there is a high, constant level of demand and the occassions where there is enough wind to exceed demand are rare enough to generate headlines. World Cup final kettles are the exception, not the rule.

There are also interconnections between the UK and Belgium, Denmark, France, Ireland, Netherlands and Norway. Excess supply can be exported, assuming there's demand.

Re: How the U.K. broke its own economy

#509

Post by graemep »

nikkwong wrote: post #116
kmeisthax wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brexit is a symptom, not the cause. The people who were most screwed by Britain's prior mistakes voted for it in a vain attempt at fixing the problem by throwing misguided nostalgia at it.

The British economy was doing quite well before Brexit. Now it's absolutely crippled.

It has preformed broadly in line with other western European economics. If you look at GDP numbers over time the big problem was COVID. The UK is richer relative to France or Italy than it was 25 years ago, but no European country has done as well as the US:

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gdp-per-capita-worldbank?...

Re: How the U.K. broke its own economy

#510

Post by graemep »

rickdeckard wrote: post #480

"These problems are obvious to many British politicians. Leaders in the Conservative and Labour Parties often comment on expensive energy and scarce housing. But their goals haven’t been translated into priorities and policies that lead to growth." I can't find this mentioned anywhere in the article, but the current imbalance of supply and demand and the resulting high prices is quite beneficial for parts of the real…

This is absolutely key. The lobbies are very rich (because they own lots of land) and therefore very influential.
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