Beelbeebub

There was an analysis by "uplift" (which is pro renewables for full disclosure) that indicated all the licencing by the last government from 2010 to 2024 had yielded about 40 days more oil and gas than would otherwise have been extracted. Again the point being that it really doesn't help with energy prices or security.

Agree, though I think the logic was that A) almost everyone has electricity but not everyone has gas. B) at the time the grid was very co2 heavy and gas was cleaner. I looked into heatpumps back in the late 00's and iirc the grid was. Over 600g/co2 per kwh, so a 3:1 heatpump would be about 200g (assuming you could achive that with heatpumps then) which is about the same as a gas boiler. So there was almost no co2 saving and a very considerable extra install and running cost. Now the grid averages well below 200g, so you are actually greener (but poorer!) using a 3 bar fire than a gas boiler.

Why do you suppose that governments are not experts, or don't have access to experts? Governments should absolutely be able to say "no you can't do this even if it would make you money" Advertising cigarettes Selling personal data Crash safety and emissions for vehicles Minimum building standards Sugar in drinks All of these are profitable things companies have decided are practical and profitable and the government has stopped. The argument that allowing more drilling would lower bills and increace energy security is BS. The argument it may reduce CO2 vs burning imported gas is a red herring. We are left with "it will allow investors to make a cracking return" - which isn't super strong. They could invest the same money into renewables.

I'm not actually arguing against drilling new wells. The title of the thread was about why we needed net zero policies - because we were running out of gas and oil regardless of how much we drilled. I would say that, given how vital gas and oil are to the petrochemical industry eg plastics, maybe we shouldn't extract it just to be burned in a vain attempt to keep the old model going. Maybe we should either wait or extract it, but use it for industries that aren't burning it. This would require a different model from the current "here's your licence, do what you want with the oil" approach. It would require a much more integrated approach, which I doubt will be viable at the moment, but might be in decades to come. Overall, our best bet is to go even quicker on the switch away from burning oil and gas to move and heat things. That will reduce CO2 (again, not actually he original point of the thread) even faster than burning locally sourced oil.

Again, the whole point of the thread is that drilling for more O&G in UK territory doesn't actually add meaningfully to our supply. There simply isn't much left. The argument that it would replace the imported gas is partly true. There is a graph showing that Aby 2040 (or something) we could be importing over half our consumption via LNG(*) but of we drilled for more we could replace that with UK gas (the rest being Norwegian) What that leaves out though is A) that scenario is the most wildly optimistic oil and gas industry projection. It is likely we still would need imported LNG, just a tiny bit less. B) that demand in 2040 {or whenever) assumes we have massively reduced demand by implementing the current net zero policies (energy efficency plus electrification of transport and heating). So we could replace that imported LNG by drilling or by pushing net zero a bit harder to reduce demand for gas even more. The last bit (pushing net zero harder) also generates even more jobs in those industries. *the LNG import picture is a little nuanced. Yes we import a lot but if you look at our national consumption, the LNG is basically extra. That is to say the UK imports about as much LNG as it exports gas via pipeline. Effectively the UK is acting as Europe's LNG terminal (at the start of the Ukraine war, thr UK had the lions share of European LNG terminal capacity so lots of the extra LNG Europe imported to replwce Russian gas via pipeline cam via UK LNG imports that were gasified and exported via pipeline)

The idea of shifting the carbon tax up and down as the O&G moves effectively gives a fixed price for O&G So the uptake of renewables is driven at a constant rate as the fixed o&g price would always be higher than the "floating" price, assuming that the tax rate will never go negative. Which is great but that is just as much tinkering with the supply side as just not granting any licences.

The key bit being economically extracted. The current high prices mean there is more gas/oil that can be extracted profitably at this higher price. What that oil and gas doesn't do is reduce our prices or increace the security of supply (both arguments that have recently been advanced)

You can see the difference between the red/white lines which are the demand on the transmission system vs the pink/red lines which are the actual consumption of homes and businesses (plus import /export etc) The difference is the amount of LV solar &. Wind which are the renewables that operate on the low voltage distribution network At this time of year almost all my instantaneous electrical demand is met by my solar system.

I'm not sure. It is a company but is it one of those weird ones where the Gov is 50.1% share holder?

@LnP I don't disagree with the idea that the high elec price is an issue or that we could do with some sort of reform to bring it down. And pricing intermittently into the renewables price would effectively take the place of the marginal auctions now, though it might help by better ammortising the intermittent gas stations costs with the renewables cost. But I do quibble with a few things.... Yes, better storage would be good but the "long term gas... North Sea" bit is (potentially) a bit more of an issue. The core point of this thread is that UK North Sea gas is running out - even the Norwegians are seeing production falling, albeit at a slower rate than us. So if by "long term gas... North Sea" you mean drilling more to get more gas - nope. I can see (ha!) a potential for drilling new gas fields specifically for providing gas to power stations when they are needed as backup for renewables (sort of storage except we never put the gas in), but that only works of the fields are vertically integrated with the power stations. The UK peak is now down closer to 35GW and we have nowhere near 120GW of renewables capacity (though your point about having to have a greater "nameplate" capacity to peak demand ratio for renewables vs thermal is very true) I would point out that solar can be extremely close to the consumer ie on their roof. This is visible in current data when the national consumption diverge from the transmission load as more LV solar supplies the demand without having to travel long distances.

The EU has rules around government involvement but I don't think they are absolute - the NHS wouldn't have been able to exist otherwise. I agree there could be some market distortions but I'm not sure it would stop people joining unless the government had so much capacity that nobody else was ever needed to generate - but at that point, by definition, we wouldn't need the extra capacity so the problem is moot!😁 Maybe if the government built and owned the storage facilities? Eg pumped hydro and battery. That way they would be creating an additional market for the excess power. Big long term infa like pumped hydro is more suited to government ownership rather than quarter to quarter shareholders. And building big battery farms (or providing lots of domestic batteries) would provide a "prime the pump" investment for UK based battery manufacturing...

Possibly. No. I mean the government build and operate the facilities themselves. They may (prob will) use private companies to do that but the asset will remain the property of the government and be operated by the government. We used to do it. We used to build and operate national railways, hospitals, schools, even power stations. Whilst there are pitfalls in this approach, it would be hard to argue that the privatisation model eg railways, water, hospitals has been a success on all fronts. Edit: I don't mean PFI or similar - I've been involved in hospital and school PFI schemes and they are often really shit for the tax payer. Not only is the build quality really low, the contractual conditions of the "landlord" are terrible. The power facilities are going to be big enough and around long enough for a corps of efficient government employees to form to operate them.

I do get the logic behind the marginal price auction system and it should be pointed out that the CFD system of strike prices basically negates some of that by effectively fixing the price for renewables over a long period. I don't quite know how it feeds into the price we pay as consumers or if the over/under just goes the treasury. However, it would be nice if the cost savings from renewables could be passed on more. The flip side is the profits to be made from putting in renewables does encourage more to be put in. Of course it would be nice if the gov, who can borrow money nice and cheaply (relative to companies) borrowed, built and operated some windfarms and solar parks to sell the power to the grid at a low cost.

A fair point except the climate example misses the fundamental difference between climate and weather. In this case I'm showing that renewables are cheap. The rise in electricity prices track the rise and fall of gas prices not the rise and rise of renewables. Renewables have steadily risen in last decade But electricity has tracked gas prices. The fact electricity is more expensive now is despite our increace in renewables not because of.

"bUt rENeWabLes arE maKiNg elEcTrIcitY mOrE ExPeNsIvE!!...."

But what does the fee contribute to? AFAIK, you apply, the system operator looks up what your connection can take and that's it. The form is electronic and has drop down menus for all the applicable fields. The whole thing could be almost automated - especially for the "default" 3.6kw connection. I can understand maybe some engineer time if you want to ask for more than 3.6kw as someone might need to dig into some records and do some calculations. If the system meeds upgrading to cope with the extra input that is the dno's responsibility anyway and £200 isn't going to go far when it comes to replacing cables or transformers. I can see it may be neccesary/prudent to just have 3.6kw (or maybe a lower figure) as the default that everyone can export and then charge for higher levels. The current "first come first serve" allocation is a little unfair as some early adopters have huge limits and then late comers get very little.

I'm sure I saw at one point the gas contribution was less than the amount we were exporting ie the only reason we were burning gas was for export.

How. Much headroom do you have below the 4x2 joists?

The crux for me is that these systems have been working away in Europe for several years now. Unless there is some fundamental difference between our systems and European ones - maybe the fact we use ring mains or something - I can't seen there being a problem, beyond regulations and paperwork.

I'm frequently wrong Show me some evidence and I'll happily change my mind (I still think we need to stop burning fossil fuels from a climate PoV, but i'll accept that the energy security facet will move from "a reason to stop burning fossil fuels" to "a reason we might need to keep churning fossil fuels"). I'll point out that the ones in this debate who are clinging to the idea we can "drill" our way to energy security despite the evidence to the contrary are the ones displaying the "can't be wrong ever" attitude...

Brilliant - we should look to mining that. Probably not with steam pumps and kids though... 😁

When have I misrepresented your position? I merely mentioned there seems to be a nostalgia streak and desire to find any alternative to renewables even coal.

You bring some good arguments to the table and I'll happily change my mind. The orginal premise of the thread was to highlight that there was no realistic possibility of improving UK energy security by increacing oil and gas production (and that the best route was a package of policies broadly in line with "Net zero") To support my position I referenced several studies and reports, including from the oil industry itself, showing the impracticallity of "drill baby drill" To my knowledge nobody has rebutted that other than insisting I'm wrong and there is tons of oil just waiting to be found.

None of the old coal plants are any use right now because none of them are working nor could any be brought back in to service in any real aitch timescale or budget. I looked up estimates for repowering a typical ccgt plant, not exactly the same but likely to be ball park, about £900m. Life extention was less but very dependent on the depth of the overhaul needed. Ivve agreed that if we had any plants running today and scheduled for imminent closure, we would be wise to look at keep them running for a bit longer. But that isn't the case

I have an old tractor, really tiny - uses a 2hp sidevalve B&S motor that is knackered. I was thinking of replacing it with a 2kw scooter motor from ebay and a 5kWh Lfp battery. Would be useful for little jobs our (slightly) bigger diesel one is currently overkill for. I'd replace diesel one except it is so bloody reliable and sips fuel it s not worth it.