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UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

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Re: UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

#61

Post by WastingMyTime89 »

nerdawson wrote: post #8
hetspookjee wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm guessing it has to do with the EU, but it seems far more sensical if it went straight through and allow others to give/receive as well.

That would make it dependent on the countries it hopped through and subject to their political whims. The Gibraltar issue crops up every now and then for instance so having control over an electrical connection gives the Spanish government more leverage. Same with France and the dispute over fishing waters. Only recently France were threatening to cut off power to Jersey.

There is a very easy way for the UK to solve the Gibraltar issue. The same line of reasoning would also allow it to drastically improve its relationship with Argentina.

Re: UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

#62

Post by jodrellblank »

UK is currently generating 30GW from all sources[1], so 10GW is a third of the national power requirement. Germany has just had a hard lesson in having significant energy dependency on Russia. Morocco is UK's 61st largest trading partner[2].

Morocco isn't Russia, but handing your life support to a distant and culturally different country in a less stable world region with limited history of partnership (European colonisation until the 1950s) seems daft. I mean, compared to building nuclear power inside UK territory and wind farms off shore of the UK. For national security reasons if not environmental ones.

[1] https://www.energydashboard.co.uk/live

[2] https://abmec.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/2021-02-Moro...

Re: UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

#63

Post by sofixa »

mike_hearn wrote: post #32
_fizz_buzz_ wrote: post #6

This sounds like brexiteer project. Doubt this will actually happen. 3800 km of undersea HVDC cable just to circumvent the EU. 3800 km is the distance from St.Petersburg to Marocco.

Brexit isn't mentioned anywhere and the physics of it would be the same regardless of the EU existing or not. The reason to go direct to Morocco are that transmission through regular AC grids would lose virtually all the power before it gets anywhere near the UK. 10GW is a hell of a load and you can't just pretend a grid is a bathtub at these scales. But as you brought it up, even if there was a semi-conductor breakt…

> The EU wants the UK to be subservient to the Commission for ideological, political and economic reasons. The UK doesn't want to be back in that situation.

What a load of Brexiteer crap. The UK was never subservient, they were among the top decision makers and powers in the EU. Brexit UK wants to have its cake and eat it too and is simply impossible. You can't be independent from the EU on trade and power simply because of the proximity and history. Blindly cutting off your nose to spite the EU is as dumb as it was when all of this started. As soon as the UK recognises it needs the EU as much as the EU needs it, all will be better.

Few egregious examples of the UK being intentionally obtuse to spite the EU while also harming itself - refusals to accept existing treaties on a bunch of stuff, refusal to accept treaties they signed a few months ago. The whole NI question for which they still haven't accepted a solution. The fish debacle ( the UK refusing to license EU-based ships).

Re: UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

#64

Post by cptcobalt »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #49
cptcobalt wrote: post #44

This is rad. > Alongside the consistent output from its solar panels and wind turbines, an onsite 20GWh/5GW battery facility provide sufficient storage to reliably deliver each and every day Four hour battery storage for renewables. The way of the future. > This “first of a kind” project will generate 10.5GW of zero carbon electricity from the sun and wind to deliver 3.6GW of reliable energy for an average of 20+ hou…

Isn’t 4 hours of battery storage much too low? How is that considered “reliable”? What am I missing?

Indeed, if we're assuming that they'll charge during the day to discharge at full power at night, it won't cover all of overnight use, but with the current composition of grids typically it's what you need to cover after sundown until most go to sleep (and energy use reduces). A project like this doesn't need to reduce base load, but there surely needs to be renewable (or nuclear) energy projects to replace base load. (This is an over simplification, but base load supply is built to be more steady state, less real-time reactive to the needs of grid.)

Also, the "time" of the battery is just a function of storage size and inverter sizing at peak discharge. It's often selected based on how the operator expects it to be used. (For example, Tesla sells megapacks in 2hr/4hr variants [1], and I think a lot of other grid-scale storage works this way. A 2hr megapack replaces some battery bays with more inverters.) While the battery is 4 hour capable, the operator could really intend for this to provide a constant overnight supply, and it could certainly provide that.

[1]: https://www.tesla.com/megapack/design

Re: UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

#65

Post by throwaway894345 »

bdauvergne wrote: post #39
blibble wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

increasing energy dependence on the EU seems unwise given its attempts to use it for political leverage: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/oct/05/france-uk-jers... the government agrees: https://news.sky.com/story/jersey-fishing-dispute-frances-si... (and has denied construction of new interconnectors to France since) Spain would definitely use an interconnector as leverage re: Gibraltar

UK which of course never used unrelated subject like fishing rights or immigration as a political leverage. \s Every country in the EU submit to the majority law, that's the idea of an union, even France or Germany do not have everything to their liking every time.

The point wasn’t “the UK is better than Spain” but rather, “energy dependence on Spain is not in the UK’s best interest”.

Re: UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

#66

Post by logifail »

nbevans wrote: post #33
mike_hearn wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brexit isn't mentioned anywhere and the physics of it would be the same regardless of the EU existing or not. The reason to go direct to Morocco are that transmission through regular AC grids would lose virtually all the power before it gets anywhere near the UK. 10GW is a hell of a load and you can't just pretend a grid is a bathtub at these scales. But as you brought it up, even if there was a semi-conductor breakt…

Exactly. The last couple years has really let the mask slip on what the EU stands for and they've made it expressly clear how they intend to treat the UK going forward - despite the UK's best efforts to forge a genuinely strong relationship, this has been rebuffed at every opportunity. We are "fair game" to them now. So it makes complete sense to design future energy projects with sovereignty in mind.

> The last couple years has really let the mask slip on what the EU stands for and they've made it expressly clear how they intend to treat the UK going forward

I've just paid a €5 handling fee (just the handling fee, there was zero customs fee or any VAT levied) to receive an item sent by post from the UK to the EU, it was sent by post with a declared value of £3, and labelled as a gift.

Yes, I know all about declaring artificially low customs values - been there, done that - but in this case it was a single item of used childrens clothing, the best part of 40 years old(!) and of absolutely zero value other than to the recipient, it was being gifted from one generation to the next.

Somehow cheap electronics orders from China seem have always sailed through EU customs just fine :/

OTOH I can fly to Stansted for less than €10 all-in. Maybe next time it would be cheaper to fly to the UK and collect in person. Given the challenges of climate change, this option in particular appears to demonstrate how not-joined-up international policymaking currently is :(

Re: UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

#67

Post by munch117 »

KarlKemp wrote: post #12
popol12 wrote: post #5

Sounds inefficient How big are the loss on such a high distance connection ?

3.5 % per 1,000 km, according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-voltage_direct_current , which comes out to around 10 %.

14% (1,035^3,8)

Re: UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

#68

Post by jodrellblank »

nbevans wrote: post #33
mike_hearn wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brexit isn't mentioned anywhere and the physics of it would be the same regardless of the EU existing or not. The reason to go direct to Morocco are that transmission through regular AC grids would lose virtually all the power before it gets anywhere near the UK. 10GW is a hell of a load and you can't just pretend a grid is a bathtub at these scales. But as you brought it up, even if there was a semi-conductor breakt…

Exactly. The last couple years has really let the mask slip on what the EU stands for and they've made it expressly clear how they intend to treat the UK going forward - despite the UK's best efforts to forge a genuinely strong relationship, this has been rebuffed at every opportunity. We are "fair game" to them now. So it makes complete sense to design future energy projects with sovereignty in mind.

> "We are "fair game" to them now."

As we should be. "We" spent years going "we've got the EU over a barrel, we'll make them bend to our whim, they need us more than we need them". Brexiteers now finding out that "leaving the EU" means we're no longer on their side and negotiating against 27 united countries sucks, well it would be funny if it wasn't hurting so many people.

Re: UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

#69

Post by argsnd »

WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #61
nerdawson wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would make it dependent on the countries it hopped through and subject to their political whims. The Gibraltar issue crops up every now and then for instance so having control over an electrical connection gives the Spanish government more leverage. Same with France and the dispute over fishing waters. Only recently France were threatening to cut off power to Jersey.

There is a very easy way for the UK to solve the Gibraltar issue. The same line of reasoning would also allow it to drastically improve its relationship with Argentina.

Yeah just hand over any territory anyone ever makes a weak claim to just to avoid conflict despite the wishes of the people who live there.

Has your "Z" bumper sticker arrived in the mail yet?

Re: UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned

#70

Post by cptcobalt »

sofixa wrote: post #56
cptcobalt wrote: post #44

This is rad. > Alongside the consistent output from its solar panels and wind turbines, an onsite 20GWh/5GW battery facility provide sufficient storage to reliably deliver each and every day Four hour battery storage for renewables. The way of the future. > This “first of a kind” project will generate 10.5GW of zero carbon electricity from the sun and wind to deliver 3.6GW of reliable energy for an average of 20+ hou…

> Four hour battery storage for renewables. The way of the future. Only the beginning of the way i hope. 4 hours isn't even close to being enough for "reliable" electricity generation.

See my comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31144464 — The operator is picking a "bigger" battery, smaller inverters. This means they're intending to use the stored energy over a longer period of time. There are similar sized batteries with bigger inverters, when a greater need for peak power discharge (or charge) is expected.
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