UK To Exit Coal Power By 2024
By Paul Homewood
h/t Philip Bratby
Last year, coal generation accounted for just 1.6% of UK electricity.
Meanwhile Tallbloke’s Talkshop reveal that:
Five Asian countries are responsible for 80 percent of new coal power stations planned worldwide, says Phys.org, with the projects threatening goals to fight the climate crisis, a report warned Wednesday.
China, India, Indonesia, Japan and Vietnam are planning to build more than 600 coal plants, think-tank Carbon Tracker said.
The stations will be able to generate a total of 300 gigawatts of energy—equivalent to around the entire electricity generating capacity of Japan.
And in 2019, UK consumption of coal was just 0.2% of the world’s.
Pissing in the wind springs to mind!
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Its got bugger all to do with CO2.
Besides lining pockets , the age old concern of politicians, I guess the cold and dark will kill a load more people off. Can’t really think of any other reason.
Nice posting,, Paul. I am not impressed by these childlike UK govt. conceits about being being the first , best or leading on the dismissal of coal. No doubt Drax will be able to pursue its strange polluting alternatives.
Because burning trees instead is so much greener!
You mean trees + old car tyres + household refuse/rejected recycling. It seems wood pellets don’t burn hot enough for recommissioned coal fired power stations (but car tyres and plastic waste do). I suppose the rubbish is just as “renewable” as the trees!
The old Oak trees in the way of HS2 are being felled for an alleged 15 minute faster journey time.
The timber is not saved for beams and other worthy uses.
Instead it it diced up to make pellets.
That’s what they call progress.
The UK’s greenhouse gas output being negligible, as a proportion.of global, there is no need to decarbonise.
Will someone tell those in charge?
Using the IPCC’s own figures, it is possible to calculate the UK’s share of man made CO2 at 0.0000065% How much closer to zero can you get!!!!
How dare you? 🤣
Why bother? They won’t listen. The only way that things will change is if those governing us start to suffer.
Virtue signaling….All for COP 26, I had high hopes that Alok Sharma, with his degree in Physics, might just bring some scientific discipline to the climate debate, I was wrong.
Even now, in middle of summer, National Grid has been running coal most days, up to a GW at times, it is good for frequency stability particularly when we rely on wind, solar and interconnector and batteries, all of which are asynchronous (synthetic ac from dc inverters, not huge spinning turbines with kinetic energy reserve). As nuclear is being run down, the only spinning mass will be Drax (as if burning US wood is green) and the pumped storage.
Just wait till the day comes when the grid trips out automatically and cannot be restarted for a week or so.
“I had high hopes that Alok Sharma, with his degree in Physics, might just bring some scientific discipline to the climate debate, I was wrong.” I had similar hopes but…his degree was not actually in Physics. It was one of those “sort of” courses in “Applied” Physics with Electronics. Whilst that sounds “sciencey” those sorts of courses tend to be very watered down with a heavy emphasis on “policy”. My brother did Physics at the UEA when the CRU was being established. He always said all those who couldn’t do real science went to the CRU as it was a “soft” course. I suspect Sharma’s course at the University of Salford was a similarly “soft” one.
GeoffB:
If I may insert a small plug for South Australia, where we led the (supposedly developed) world with a total grid collapse and a black start after 3 days (extending up to 6 days in some suburbs). This wasn’t that long after the 2 coal-fired stations had been forced out of business (and hastily demolished).
Both sides of politics are greener than the other, while their ranks are filled with incompetent numbskulls (I am sure you know what I mean) but fortunately the Federal authority (AEMO) has insisted ever since that sufficient gas (and diesel) generation is running at all times. Indeed the State has been running mainly on gas (and brown coal-fired from Victoria) for months, something that hasn’t appeared in the media.
You might have seen some Green gloating late last year about the State running entirely on solar for ONE WHOLE HOUR. In practice the gas fired plants were running but the excess electricity was exported to Victoria.
I should point out that some part of Victoria (the Dandenong ranges just outside Melbourne) is going to be without electricity for 3 weeks following a wind storm bringing down trees.
Curiously the Victorian State government (which is even worse that SA’s) hasn’t rushed solar panels to the area, but diesel generators.
An utterly stupid policy. Just wait until the lights go out because there is not enough capacity. This last week of cloudiness and low winds will have had gas fired power stations working full blast. Drax using wood pellets from American hardwoods shipped across the Atlantic while sitting on millions of tons of coal is one of the stupidest decisions ever made by the UK. CO2 emitted from wood that will take a 100 years to regrow is not part of the solution to lowering CO2 now.
None of these “green” targets will be met and the elephant in the room is China and the rest of Asia burning coal and wood, plus imported oil and gas. Every reduction made in the UK is countered on a monthly or even weekly basis by increases in CO2 emissions elsewhere in the world. We are impoverishing ourselves so we can appear virtuous while hypocritically buying all the stuff made in polluting countries – out of sight out of mind!
Not only that but over 10% of demand has been met by imports for some considerable time this year.
Martin it is getting worse than that. Last 28 days has run at 13.5%. At the rate new interconnectors are being commissioned and planned we may well be importing more than we generate at times within 5 years.
https://www.mygridgb.co.uk/last-28-days/
“… while sitting on millions of tons of coal ”
Trillions of tons of coal under the North Sea https://www.worldcoal.com/coal/31032014/coal_discovered_in_north_sea_674/
Interesting how our Government quite easily bring forward bad ideas such as this but seem unable to bring forward good ideas such as small-scale nuclear power generation.
Peter: Good point. I could understand it if they qualified the decision by saying they would ban coal once sufficient SMRs (whatever) were on line to take up the slack. But that requires joined up thinking (bearing in mind some of them can hardly do joined up writing).
Harry, joined up thinking implies joined up brain cells. These idiots don’t have any brain cells to join up so any kind of thinking is impossible……
This really infuriates me to say the least. Small and micro nuclear reactors are not only vital to or future energy mix they could be massive money spinning ventures for the UK.
Units small enough to fit on a truck and used as plug and play are perfectly possible.
https://www.westinghousenuclear.com/new-plants/evinci-micro-reactor
Rolls Royce have been manufacturing small reactors for the last 50 years
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolls-Royce_PWR
A totally juvenile – no, childlike – gesture. It’s as if they got together a group of prepubescent wannabe Gretas and asked them for some slogans. And the winners (for slogans) is: ‘Build back greener’ and ‘UK’s leadership’ (as opposed to UK’s LEADERSHIP)!
While the losers will be the poor bloody voter with no say in the matter. Power cuts are us.
(Big sigh)
‘move means that within just 10 years Great Britain will have reduced its reliance on coal for electricity from around a third to zero, helping the country build back greener’
That’s not how the world works. They are pushing in a balloon – which just pops out somewhere else. The country will not build back greener; the build back will be elsewhere.
You have high level government officials bragging about getting rid of cheap, reliable energy. Economic suicide never ends well.
This announcement puzzles me …..
I thought there were only 3 coal plants left at the start of this year.
Drax has since closed its remaining units earlier than planned. West Burton is scheduled to close in September of this year and Ratcliffe is due to follow 12 months later.
So, as of late next year, will there be any plants left to be affected by advancing the deadline?
The “puzzle” comes from the terms “UK” and “GB”. Northern Ireland is part of the UK but NOT part of the GB grid. When you read stuff like “went x days without coal generation” they actually mean the GB grid not the UK as a whole. This runs most of the time https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilroot_power_station
As a secondary point, the imports to the UK (a significant and growing amount) are also often surplus coal generation from Germany routed over the “BritNed” interconnector from the Netherlands. At present that import has significant coal content. At other times the import from the Republic of Ireland is also rather “dirty”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moneypoint_power_station
This interactive map is very instructive. In the top right you can toggle between “production/consumption”
https://www.electricitymap.org/map
It is very noticeable how some of our so called enviro friendly neighbours (notably Denmark) are often incredibly environmentally unfriendly
Even closer there is a new coal powered station going up in Rotterdam
https://www.gem.wiki/Maasvlakte_Power_Station_(Uniper)
‘ It was reported that it is proposed that carbon dioxide from the project will be transported by an existing pipeline to the P18-A platform 20 kilometres offshore and then injected under the sea’
So thats all right then
Thursday, there is a parliamentary debate about community energy
R4 seems to be pushing them with a 30 minute positive prog now
no negatives allowed.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000xdq9
“oh yes the community is saving £7,000 a year ”
except of course they aren’t whilst they have bought into a solar power shareholder scheme the taxpayer is putting much more in subsidies
which of course the community ultimately pays for.
We can’t say we weren’t warned.
I have watched over the years the governments policy towards coal. In 1992 I wrote to my MP to point out that the that they were throwing away the opportunities in the energy industry culminating in the loss of a world class centre, CERL at Leatherhead, the downgrading of facilities to exploit new technologies for coal combustion and gasification, to name but two. Here we are some 30 years later about to rule out coal as a source of energy. If only we had put the money we have expended on green subsidies into continuing with the research, we would have a secure supply of fuel and the guarantee of a constant supply of electricity.
California leads the way with rolling blackouts (or brownouts) in the ‘West’ with prices ‘absolutely exploding’.
The result ?
Low- and middle-income consumers leaving the State.
Is the UK Government delibrately pricing the poor out of the country ?
Since many countries are building coal power stations and lots of them, the present situation has nothing to do with rising C02 levels.
As in California, it’s seems more to do with a lead up to (UK) gentrification.
Check out Alex Epstein’s You Tube videos – The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels on his site Improve the Planet and send your local MP a link.
Seems to be a race – who can commit economic suicide first based on some shrill, uninformed squawking from a few
Some points to consider Firstly our German cousins (as I type…it’s dark and not particularly windy) are generating one third of their electricity from a mixture of coal and really shitty coal (lignite). A mere 19GW.
https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/DE
Secondly our wonderful Uk (ish) wind turbines – for each and every single month from December 2020 to the end of June 2021 (even with a day to go) – have produced 15% LESS than the equivalent months of December 2019 to June 2020. YES every single month was lower despite increased capacity. BUT also every single month Solar has similarly produced 16% LESS. and even Hydro electricity has produced nearly 20% LESS.
So we have spent a goddamn fortune subsidising this stuff and increasing capacity only for it to produce less. You really could not make that up.
Here is the data (from a renewables enthusiast site) https://www.mygridgb.co.uk/last-12-months/
Just to really rub it in the “Carbon intensity” is increasing and with the impending closure of more aging nuclear plants (replaced by gas generation) will continue to INCREASE! Money down the drain.
Over the course of the last calendar year UK coal generation may well have only provided 1.6% of total electricity demand. However, during the last winter/early spring, our few remaining coal fired power stations were churning out up to 6%+. With wind and solar bottoming out, and gas, nuclear, hydro, biomass and interconnectors maxed out, that measly 6% was the crucial difference between us living in our usual luxury or shivering in blackout hell. With more nuclear going the same way shortly as our coal fired generators, and no immediate replacements on stream anytime soon, one wonders how our government is going to sell a return to the Dark Ages as a giant stride forward. Answers on a post card to 10 Downing Street please!
‘cripes what? ah no electricity?’
Never mind dear, that’s is just a minor detail to boris and his green poppet queen.
Buy a portable generator as a matter of urgency, you can get a 2.5kW for £250 at the moment, it will keep your lights on, run your boiler (assuming the gas keeps going) keep fridge and freezer going and you can watch TV. Wiring up is a bit of a pain though, you have to plug in to your ring main, which means when the power fails you have to switch off from the grid. You can get auto systems to do this but it will add cost, But it is going to be costly to run, a gallon of petrol is now over £7 and would last about 10 hours. so run hour on hour off, or you can buy a Tesla battery for £4500 which will only give you a few hours. When the grid goes down, it will be days to get it all back on…
GeoffB; I’m no electrician so please excuse my ignorance but, from comments elsewhere, I thought a special isolator has to be installed before any form of onsite generation can be connected to the house circuitry?
Yes. A guy I knew well had a bungalow with a gennie set. He had a big switch in his garage to which I wired his gennie. This isolated the house from mains when he wanted to fire up the gennie. Worked well until he switched his quick-boil (3kW) kettle! (2kW gennie. )
I used to spend a lot of weeks per year in African countries where rolling power cuts were the norm. The wealthy people and bigger businesses had stand-by generators, switched on by the servants. We are heading the same way: no doubt Gummer and the clown-prince already have these and will have suitable servants quarters.
I would say that a tank of propane and a gas hob are the most important backup items, the gas grid will surely fail in the event of a system-black.
Petrol? Surely a multifuel generator is a much more sensible investment that could be run on red diesel or gas. Who knows, before long it might be cheaper to run it all the time and leave the grid.
Just another virtue signaling proposition that won’t materialize. All King Canute thinking. As the deadlines come closer they realize the folly in their thinking and quietly let it pass only to beget a new unachievable proclamation. It makes them feel good.
Hmm, bloody hell, I hope that you’re right but bloody hell I think that such optimism is pie in the sky, these are green fanatics we’re having to suffer.
Boris Johnson’s cabal are reportedly throwing many (unknown number) £millions at a Nissan Leaf car factory in Sunderland for greater battery manufacture.
The media are loyally repeating this bit of news. Although not in any crucial detail.
Like where is the electricity for this mad venture being generated ?
Not within Britain by the sound of the above comments.
Many are already being kept in the dark!
Apart from the carbon emissions issue and foolish economics, the country has to evaluate national security. Coal fired power stations offer high security against supply problems as they store several weeks of coal (miners’ strike was beaten by that). The USA recognised this as have Germany and Japan. The UK will have only nuclear as inherent storage capacity very soon: hope that we do not fall-out with anyone after that!
” Coal fired power stations offer high security against supply problems as they store several weeks of coal ”
At least one UK coal-fired power station had 18 months of coal stacked on site during the miner’s strike (reported in Hansard as I recall).
Meanwhile over at the home of the cosmic intellects(!) https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/jul/01/full-steam-ahead-for-cornwalls-geothermal-energy-project
So we can shut down GW scale coal plants to open up 10MW (yes that is all of ten megawatts) geothermal plants. To demonstrate the level of expertise involved in the reporting of these issues go to the Wikipedia page
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Downs_Deep_Geothermal_Power
I quote…”In January 2021 the company agreed to sell 3 Megawatt-hours a year for 10 years to Ecotricity.[15][16]”
Yep allegedly 3MWh a year which is about the consumption of 1 household. Obviously that is wrong (I believe they mean 3MW) but such ignorant errors are just typical of these unicorn projects.
And to end my rant can anyone explain why fraccing for hot water is somehow safer than fraccing for oil or gas?.
Ray S: further to your comments, I have read that geothermal projects have a much worse record than fracking wrt causing earth tremors. Iirc there was one near Bern in Switzerland which was halted because of the seismic activity it provoked.
Also the Cornish project will be circulating water through granite in an area known for radioactivity so they could flush out some contamination.
It will be interesting to see how they get on…….
Coal may only account for 1.6% of UK electricity generation but at times of cold, dark windless midwinter its contribution can be absolutely vital. How do these mindless wreakers propose to manage without it? More woodchip burners which have even higher net emissions than coal?
To Mike Hig above.
Just plug fridge tv etc.into extention blocks which go to your genny.Perhaps one ext. block plugged into the house main ring,with the live and neutral removd,to give your new circuit a decent earth connection.A bit of tidying up with the connecting of your new self built ring main to the (maybe) circular plugs on the genny and away you go.
If you are not up to it leccy wise perhaps you know someone who can do it for you.
Any comments from any leccies reading this would be appreciated,as I intend to do the above myself.Cheers.
All the technology is probably well established and readily available, as boats can use their generators at sea, then plug into the mains when in harbor.
Avro607: Thanks for this. It does seem sensible to keep the genny “circuit” separate from the house wiring.
I’ve been e.mailing my (Tory) MP recently about the Government’s mad Net Zero policy. Here is the latest reply. ” The overwhelming consensus of international climate scientists is that CC is happening and is exacerbated by human activity. The fact that uncertainty exists in climate science, as it does in other fields, does not negate the value of current evidence, and the strong correlation between GW and and rising greenhouse gasses from human activity since 1900. It was also highlighted by the sobering conclusions of the IPCC’s special report on GW of 1.5 %C. The report included over 6,000 scientific references, and was prepared by 91 authors from 40 countries.”
So no reference to the fact that the Earth has been cooling for 20 years, that AGW makes up only 3% of GGs, or that the IPCC was pre- determined from its creation in 1988 to exaggerate the importance of AGW, in every way possible.
One of the founders is known to have quoted, “The only way we can save the planet is to destroy industrialized civilization. Isn’t it our task to do it?
Our Government, like many others, is basing its policies on fake data, lies and misleading information from corrupt organizations such as the IPCC.
“he overwhelming consensus of international climate scientists is that CC is happening ” Climate change has always happened, and will continue to happen. Does your MP believe that climate change is something new? My view is that many people believe that climate change is something new
My MP seems oblivious to the obvious scientific facts. The more I find out about the IPCC, the more it appears to be corrupt and rotten to the core.
The American physicist, William Masters, completely destroys its value and integrity.
The AGW fiasco-scam stimulates the worst of all world’s..
So Mr Xi et al are showing what makes sense even if they fail other tests of suitability to lead.
Why do our politicos in charge, who think they are the “great and the good”, behave as the dolts and the bad?
?Group think, ignorance, senselessness, stupidity, corruption, an anti-Midas touch-in varying degree, all of these, I suspect, and there is, I bet, lots more evidence to eject them from office.
But who would be the right replacements? .
Perhaps without exception, international bodies tend to corruption.