Utility Bills

[Frickin_idiot]

17 minutes ago, andydclements said:

The government (or their agents) intervene in many markets, sometimes for good and achieving good, sometimes for good and achieving the absolute opposite.

In this case though, it's not really the price cap alone, and @C8RKH has pointed out well that this is about suppliers that haven't hedged for future severe increases. These suppliers that have failed, and others will have many customers on fixed price contracts, and those older prices will have been set at what was expected at the time to be a realistic level, but those fixed price contracts are probably even lower then the cap, those fixed prices weren't set or mandated by anybody outside of the energy firm themselves. So, the biggest (by cost per unit, not overall customer base as we don't have the data) loss to the energy firms is caused by those fixed price contracts marketed by the energy firms.

I have no doubt that other factors are also at play but artificially introducing a maximum price for a commodity is always asking for trouble.

 

The Government have failed to adequately plan for Pensions, elderly care and health services despite access to all data relating to life expectancy and demographics. Some of this may be down to self preservation or cowardice to grasp the situation grantee.

 

What chance do this same group of people have when it comes to controlling a volatile market?

[C8RKH]

28 minutes ago, Bibs said:

37 minutes ago, C8RKH said:

OK, so the Price Cap is controlled by the Regulator, OFGEM, not the Government

They're a non-ministerial department of government though run by civil servants under a framework agreed in the Commons.

Correct. They operate within the framework that successive Governmentys have laid down, but the Operational and Executive Decisions are made by them, not Politicians. An important distinction to remember.

10 minutes ago, Frickin_idiot said:

The Government have failed to adequately plan for Pensions, elderly care and health services despite access to all data relating to life expectancy and demographics. Some of this may be down to self preservation or cowardice to grasp the situation grantee.

FFS, I am assuming by The GOVERNMENT you are meaning this one. If so, you're deluded man, you could point that smoking gun at any Government since 1945!

[Frickin_idiot]

35 minutes ago, C8RKH said:

Correct. They operate within the framework that successive Governmentys have laid down, but the Operational and Executive Decisions are made by them, not Politicians. An important distinction to remember.

FFS, I am assuming by The GOVERNMENT you are meaning this one. If so, you're deluded man, you could point that smoking gun at any Government since 1945!

No need for the FFS, calm down. We were up until that point having a reasonable discussion. And at no time have I said any particular party of Government. I believe that we have been badly let down by all Governments for decades.

[Barrykearley]

6 minutes ago, Frickin_idiot said:

I believe that we have been badly let down by all Governments for decades.

And that will continue for ever - since they are only interested in blaming each other and the fixed term they enjoy - what we need is a 100 year plan

[Frickin_idiot]

3 minutes ago, Barrykearley said:

And that will continue for ever - since they are only interested in blaming each other and the fixed term they enjoy - what we need is a 100 year plan

Absolutely nailed it.

[andydclements]

In the case of Bulb it does appear that most of their customers were not on fixed tariffs, so the price cap on "standard" tariffs came into play for their losses. If you look at many of the other supplier you'll see them having a large proportion of their customers on fixed tariffs. Avro and Shell for example look to have 80-90% of their customers being on fixed prices, so if they've not then hedged it such that they can obtain the energy at below that fixed price, then their possible exposure to losses caused by supply price increase is almost completely unrelated to any regulator-imposed cap.

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/energy-data-and-research/data-portal/retail-market-indicators  See    Number of domestic gas account customers by supplier (...) Standrad variable, fixed and other tariffs.   A similar picture for for electricity as well

[Barrykearley]

2 minutes ago, andydclements said:

so if they've not then hedged

Anyone else think that just maybe the wholesale AND retail markets are failing - this behaviour or hedging simply doesn’t help frankly. What we need is secure energy supply at a given cost.

[andydclements]

And how do we get a supply that doesn't work on the approach of supply Vs demand?

[C8RKH]

51 minutes ago, Barrykearley said:

Anyone else think that just maybe the wholesale AND retail markets are failing - this behaviour or hedging simply doesn’t help frankly. What we need is secure energy supply at a given cost.

And just how do you think that will work with Renewable power Energy which by its very nature is unpredictable?  

We (the UK) lost the plot 20 years ago when we decided to stop the investments in nuclear. nuclear is absolutely "bang on" for providing the strong, reliable and resilient "base load" that you need to power the Grid and provide say a steady 60% of predicted demand. you can deliver that for an almost fixed price of £x per KWH for 100 years.  But no, the fooking environmentalists and the trendy middle class nimbies had to stick their fooking oars in and hey presto, we sell our Nuclear fleet to the fooking  French and stop all new nuclear builds for a few decades, forgetting, that it takes 2 decades to get a nuclear plant built in the bloody UK (traditional nuclear plant, not one of the new "mini" plants a la RR or Urenco).

Yup, as @Barrykearley says, an energy policy built on a 4 year cycle to last till the next election and the short term Government strategy, of any Government in the UK in the last 70 years, gives you a shit energy strategy and outcome. Then we have that monumental muppet and and ex Energy Minister who royally fooked things up for New Labour, Eddie Milliband preaching to us all on what we should have done / should do after COP26. You couldn't make this shithousery up. only real life can you give you such monumental fookups.

It hurts a lot to see what politicians, or muppets, have done to the UK's energy policies, strategies over the last 30 years. This is what happens when you truly let the lunatics run the asylum.

[Barrykearley]

21 minutes ago, C8RKH said:

And just how do you think that will work with Renewable power Energy which by its very nature is unpredictable?  

It’s about mix. Renewable wind and tidal is pretty much consistent in delivery, solar PV is good all year round but better feb - sept. Add in the nuclear option and balance up with some battery stored energy.

instead of building huge centralised power plants - the government could have invested in the roof space we have on our homes - in summer months off grid for most homes is a very real possibility - in the winter they would still need some import energy. Sensible use of battery storage in homes and huge giga storage is what’s required to assist  in smoothing out the lumps of demand.

instead - nah - bollocks to all of it and just shut all the coal stations we have - then import it from the French. That’s not a plan.

[C8RKH]

35 minutes ago, Barrykearley said:

Renewable wind and tidal is pretty much consistent in delivery

I'm sorry Barry but you are dead wrong re renewable wind, as it stands right now.  Tidal yes, the tides can relied on - but the technology to truly harvest that energy at scale is still very, very immature. 

Renewable Wind, from a generation at scale point of view it is not a reliable base load, it is intermittent.  Yes, some bright spark will jump in with saving it to batteries, but they are still some way off at the scale we are talking about.

I've just completed an exercise for work, mapping ALL the UK's renewable fleet - every windfarm, every turbine by manufacturer, by date of installation and date of commissioning.  From that I've been able to map the expected output at various capacities and the next stage is loading that data into a Digital Twin (an electronic simulation) to allow us to then add meteorological forecasts to vary windspeed and directions to map output. The variances in total power generated by time of day, day of month, will astound you! Take this time of year. Historically we can get very cold temperatures, but with a standing low weather pressure above the UK, so, no wind!  Whoopsie. We're fooked

The reason why we had huge centralised power plants was that it delivered a huge volume of energy, at a predictable load, at an almost fixed price point. The strategy served us well for over 100 years and it has only been since we started to dismantle it that we have seen the cost of energy truly explode.  The cost you pay for your energy now includes a huge premium for renewable subsidies. You'll see that cost printed on your last bill.

Yes, renewables are the right thing for the future. Their time is coming, some will say has come. But currently that is at a cost - both in pounds, shillings and pence, and resilience and security of supply.

 

[pete]

In your exercise above why was solar and tide not mentioned or did I miss something

[C8RKH]

8 minutes ago, pete said:

In your exercise above why was solar and tide not mentioned or did I miss something

Purely because the Digital Twin I was working on is a Wind Farm one.  I was not looking at the whole "renewable" spectrum for this exercise, the focus was looking at what happens as the original turbine motors and blades age. What does this do to resilience, reliability and output. And then modelling what improvements the latest generation of turbines and blades, sensors and control systems could deliver in terms of power output, resilience, reliability etc.

Was also looking to see what we could do to extend the live of the earlier blades. We've all seen how large they are, but as the early ones were almost exclusively made of fibreglass they either end up in landfill or shredded and added to bind to concrete. Not exactly eco friendly to be honest. But then the warriors never care about that, think about that, or talk about that

 

[pete]

Are they no longer fibreglass, not thought about that before and if asked would probably have said aluminium

[Mysterae]

I was surprised they buried them too.

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

How do you think they grow? 😀

[Barrykearley]

9 hours ago, C8RKH said:

Yes, renewables are the right thing for the future. Their time is coming, some will say has come. But currently that is at a cost - both in pounds, shillings and pence, and resilience and security of supply.

They are looking for macro solutions whereby overlooking obvious micro solutions. You can’t eat an elephant in one go chap 😬

8 hours ago, C8RKH said:

fibreglass they either end up in landfill or shredded and added to bind to concrete. Not exactly eco friendly to be honest

A brilliant reuse though. 

8 hours ago, pete said:

In your exercise above why was solar and tide not mentioned or did I miss something

It’s important to highlight the costs of these projects results in fairly consistent energy supply , year to year - not day to day - but it really needs to be storable to make the most of it.

the costs per Kw are without question cost effective. Even solar Pv at home now without grants etc is worth doing - especially with the rocketing cost of electric. So bloody glad I stuck up 2 lots of 4kw when the tariffs were good. 

[C8RKH]

8 hours ago, pete said:

Are they no longer fibreglass, not thought about that before and if asked would probably have said aluminium

Recent shift has been to carbon fibre based composites and these can be recycled more easily.

[C8RKH]

43 minutes ago, Barrykearley said:

They are looking for macro solutions whereby overlooking obvious micro solutions. You can’t eat an elephant in one go chap 😬

When you need to generate sufficient energy, reliably, and at a low cost point, for 25m homes and countless numbers of heavy energy use businesses then you need to do the heavy lifting up front.  Micro generation has only been "attractive" due to the heavy subsidies that have been provided to date.  So what do you want? Subsidised unreliable/intermittent supply, or lower cost resilient supply?  The technology is changing rapidly, and costs are coming down, but then like with the first generation wind turbines, that are now 15-20 years old, the early Solar PV installations are aging rapidly and their efficiency is poor, and increasingly key components are wearing out/coming end of life.

It's the age old debate Barry, local micro v national macro. There's a place for both but the key thing is getting the balance right to assure affordability and resilience. No silver bullets here.

[windymiller]

i worked at sizewell b on the qc side and should of simply carried on to sizewell c !!!

[PaulCP]

I am sure that Sizewell C will get the go ahead next year but the way that EDF have ridden roughshot over the local communities by not listening to genuine concerns about their access plans, constantly providing mis-information and generally showing nothing but contempt for anyone who asks questions about their extremely flawed plans it is a complete joke.

Traffic access along an already congested A12 has still not been properly addressed and the minor roads from the A14 through to the A12 are grossly unsuitable for the rabbit run that will take place by haulage companies and employees to save 10 miles of distance but nothing in time.

One of the rabbit runs through a small village on the B1078 which is narrow for around 600 metres due to residents in 1890’s built terraced houses which face the roadside with limited pavement having no where to park their cars other than on the road. EDF want to ensure that traffic can flow freely through that village so their solution is to insist that parking is prohibited along the route and to build a car park for the residents some 400 metres from their homes.

I have personally called them out at two meetings with their bogus claims. On one occasion they stood up in a meeting saying that they will build park & ride facilities at a site, which happens to be at the end of a congested 8 mile section of road rather than where it should be at the start, and that they would utilise a lorry booking system in a haulage park along the congested section of road where haulage vehicles would be required to park up before being called forward to the site. They actually used what they called the successful system deployed for the stadium build for the London Olympics which they claimed to have studied closely. When I asked questions about the lorry booking system and in particular the system used for the London Olympics it was clear that they didn’t have a clue. They came out with waffle worse than Boris’. In the end I pointed out that I worked at Tilbury during this time and had first hand knowledge of all of the failures of the London Olympic system which was far from successful. I also suggested that they should at least talk to haulage companies before talking about vehicle booking systems where traffic delays and drivers attitudes tends to kill those systems.

Sizewell C is going to be a complete mess during a construction period that will completely over run in timescale by many years due to the incompetence of the people who are currently planning it. I have nothing against it in principal but EDF have proven themselves to be a complete joke over the past 7 years of planning.

[Bibs]

11 hours ago, C8RKH said:

Yes, some bright spark will jump in with saving it to batteries

I believe the next gen of EV's, some of which are coming out next year, will be a 2 way system so can be used to power your house and indeed feed back to the grid at high demand times. 

https://www.edfenergy.com/electric-cars/microgeneration

[C8RKH]

1 hour ago, windymiller said:

i worked at sizewell b on the qc side and should of simply carried on to sizewell c !!!

We're working with EDF at Sizewell. Fascinating projects across the piece with some 10,000 engineers involved in some form or another.

We're also just about to deploy the secure communications network (voice and data) across one of the largest offshore wind farms in Europe.  I do find the energy and utilities sector fascinating and having been involved with it since 1996 you can really see how things have changed, and how the pace of change is really starting to ramp up.

1 minute ago, Bibs said:

I believe the next gen of EV's, some of which are coming out next year, will be a 2 way system so can be used to power your house and indeed feed back to the grid at high demand times. 

https://www.edfenergy.com/electric-cars/microgeneration

Yup. Been promised for a few years but let's see just how efficient they are. The issue with all of this is that you are still attaching these things to a gird that was designed to work "one way" (energy from source to point of use) and needs a lot of work done to it to "cope" with these types of changes. it's part of the infrastructure challenge that people tend to over look as (1) they don't understsnd it and (2) the marketing brochure/salesman says it will just work

 

[exeterjeep]

30 minutes ago, Bibs said:

I believe the next gen of EV's, some of which are coming out next year, will be a 2 way system so can be used to power your house and indeed feed back to the grid at high demand times. 

https://www.edfenergy.com/electric-cars/microgeneration

Have said this before it also why the chargers have to be connected to the internet to control what charge is going in to the ev and what times they can be charged and if any charge can be drawn back from the car if required.  Timings can be overridden some how to cope with emergencies and people like shift workers.

[C8RKH]

1 minute ago, exeterjeep said:

Have said this before it also why the chargers have to be connected to the internet to control what charge is going in to the ev and what times they can be charged and if any charge can be drawn back from the car if required.  Timings can be overridden some how to cope with emergencies and people like shift workers.

You could do that using some simple powerline comms technology. Not a huge issue. however, I sense that people still "think" it is about what is convenient for the "owner" here of the EV. The primary concern will be around safeguarding the grid and it's security and resilience first, consumer convenience second.

The technology to do this is there, as is the Time of Use tariff mechanisms etc. For instance for some time in parts of the US, west coast areas, utility companies have been able to isolate air conditioning units in people's homes and "control" when the condensers are working or not - these are the primary load bearing units so you can switch them off when demand is high, but keep the fans circulating the air for a period, so it "feels" like the air con is on, but the air is being moved not cooled.  By aggregating this across say a million air con units you can have a real impact on "demand" at peak load periods.  The consumers/businesses who allow the suppliers to remote control in this way usually get a nice discount on their tariff for their flexibility. This is how they can easily expand this capability to EV's.