Drax power station

[old man]

Not to worry, maybe true that it's credentials in tatters but hey ho haven't all associated with it enjoyed the massive subsidies? Just more cash dished out to mates?

[TIGHTCHOKE]

?

[old man]

Reportedly emissions really bad, worse than coal burning and loads of money given under the green representation?

[TIGHTCHOKE]

From the Guardian;

 

"The Drax power station was responsible for four times more carbon emissions than the UK’s last remaining coal-fired plant last year, despite taking more than £0.5bn in clean-energy subsidies in 2023, according to a report.

The North Yorkshire power plant, which burns wood pellets imported from North America to generate electricity, was revealed as Britain’s single largest carbon emitter in 2023 by a report from the climate thinktank Ember.

The figures show that Drax, which has received billions in subsidies since it began switching from coal to biomass in 2012, was responsible for 11.5m tonnes of CO2 last year, or nearly 3% of the UK’s total carbon emissions."

[chrisv]

There was also a TV programme that discovered that significant amounts of the wood used in the pellets was ancient Canadian woodland rather than waste wood.

The biomass power generation sector seems to be a huge con with fossil fuels being used in production and transport and then conveniently ignored 

[Penelope]

1 hour ago, chrisv said:

There was also a TV programme that discovered that significant amounts of the wood used in the pellets was ancient Canadian woodland rather than waste wood.

The biomass power generation sector seems to be a huge con with fossil fuels being used in production and transport and then conveniently ignored 

The whole thing is a con.

[100milesaway]

2 hours ago, chrisv said:

There was also a TV programme that discovered that significant amounts of the wood used in the pellets was ancient Canadian woodland rather than waste wood.

The biomass power generation sector seems to be a huge con with fossil fuels being used in production and transport and then conveniently ignored 

A massive government con.

From Auntie 

[Westward]

Just now, 100milesaway said:

A massive government con.

From Auntie 

The whole carbon dioxide hysteria is a con, and it's one that will bankrupt the western economies without doing anything to affect the climate.

[udderlyoffroad]

Nice to see 'mainstream media' finally waking up to the all-out fraud that is biomass.

 

[Zoli 12 guage]

and it's nice to see that the Hermans are still mining coal/lignite to use in their power stations so their lights don't go out.👍

good on 'em😎

this country is self destructing in more numerous ways than is necessary to the job👍

[Stonepark]

3 hours ago, udderlyoffroad said:

Nice to see 'mainstream media' finally waking up to the all-out fraud that is biomass.

 

Where the money has gone......

 

 

 

[matone]

4 hours ago, udderlyoffroad said:

Nice to see 'mainstream media' finally waking up to the all-out fraud that is biomass.

 

This.

[daveboy]

We can now update you on the arrests that we made in connection with a planned climate camp at Drax Power Station near Selby.

On Wednesday night, 22 individuals were arrested for public order offences relating to interference with key national infrastructure. Today (Friday 09 August 2024) all 22 have been released on bail with conditions which prevent them from entering a 25km radius around Drax Power Station.

[Stonepark]

8 hours ago, daveboy said:

We can now update you on the arrests that we made in connection with a planned climate camp at Drax Power Station near Selby.

On Wednesday night, 22 individuals were arrested for public order offences relating to interference with key national infrastructure. Today (Friday 09 August 2024) all 22 have been released on bail with conditions which prevent them from entering a 25km radius around Drax Power Station.

Two Tier Policing by Two Tier Keir in Two Tier Britain

Edited August 10 by Stonepark

[old man]

Maybe good payouts to shareholders too?

[Agriv8]

I belive drax is on standby 24/7 to generate power onto the grid when needed . The necessity to get it switched on asap when the grid needs it is part of the issue. Bit like your car it’s more efficient cruising than getting there . It’s a dinosaur but it’s filling and need because we don’t have anything else afaik.

Agriv8

[amateur]

Just now, Agriv8 said:

........It’s a dinosaur but it’s filling and need because we don’t have anything else afaik.

Agriv8

Yet we have the mini Rolls Royce sub-based generators which are responsive and quickly available, blocked by the blob.

[Agriv8]

51 minutes ago, amateur said:

Yet we have the mini Rolls Royce sub-based generators which are responsive and quickly available, blocked by the blob.

Agreed and the not in my back yard police - the fact these have been in subs that can stay submerged for a year  I think proves they are reasonable reliable?

[Westward]

The underlying reality is that the Grid has to be balanced in terms of it's capacity to deliver the right amounts of power. This was tricky enough back in the days of predictable generation using fossil fuels and nuclear only, because demand varied according to the time of day, day of the week, Xmas day etc. It's much harder to balance the Grid these days thanks to the bonkers idea that unpredictable wind power helps reduce climate change and the even more bonkers idea that wind power reduces energy costs. The Grid now has to pay huge sums for the likes of Drax to be on standby or tickover and then, when the power stations have been brought in, they have to pay the wind farms to switch off their generators. It is of course us who end up paying for all this stupidity.

To get an idea of how mad it is, we're on the agile tariff with Octopus. On Friday we got an alert to advise that from 12.30 - 15.30 we would get paid for any electricity we used. Then yesterday the same thing for an hour at midday. IOW we were paid to help balance the Grid.

[JohnfromUK]

19 hours ago, Agriv8 said:

the fact these have been in subs that can stay submerged for a year  I think proves they are reasonable reliable?

I think one of the concerns is "security" rather than reliability.  Clearly in a sub, they are easily protected from attack by terrorists.  However, on land, maybe located close to major power using demand, they would need good protection.  A terrorist attack resulting in damage that allowed radiation leakage is the risk.  I'm not sure (for example) how vulnerable the cooling systems are?  In a sub they presumably have plenty of water(!).  On dry land - do they need access to river/coastal water?

I assume the reactor pressure casing is tough - and could also have additional protection (e.g. concrete bunker containment?), but can they be shut down quickly to the extent that they are safe if there is major damage/loss of the cooling mechanism?

Multiple small sites looks attractive in some ways (easier to connect in, flexibility, no single point of failure etc.) but also has multiple vulnerable sites and needs security cover at many locations.

[udderlyoffroad]

2 hours ago, JohnfromUK said:

I assume the reactor pressure casing is tough - and could also have additional protection (e.g. concrete bunker containment?), but can they be shut down quickly to the extent that they are safe if there is major damage/loss of the cooling mechanism?

Reactor Scram (emergency shut down) should be easily achieved regardless of design.  It's avoiding the need for it that's the issue.

What do I mean by that?  There's little doubt that the RR plant on boats works, they've been around in one form or another for 50+ years.  But they need 'packaging' and adapting for civilian use on land.  Obviously you need cooling, plenty of it.  But you also need to be able to economically construct containment without getting into ever-increasing complexity, at the same time satisfying the regulator of safety whilst guaranteeing uptime.  It's not so much nuclear physics, it's the Newtonian applied physics of Civil and process engineering whilst keeping costs down.

Obviously, we could lead the world in this, but apparently there's little will or money from Whitehall.  Plenty of money for on-shore windfarm subsidies though.  I'd really like my old thermodynamics lecturer to give Ed Milliband a good sl...talking to about the realities of energy generation.

2 hours ago, JohnfromUK said:

I think one of the concerns is "security" rather than reliability.

There's a dedicated police force for nuclear sites that would need to be expanded for these smaller sites.

[Stonepark]

35 minutes ago, udderlyoffroad said:

There's little doubt that the RR plant on boats works, they've been around in one form or another for 50+ years.  But they need 'packaging' and adapting for civilian use on land. 

 

Obviously you need cooling, plenty of it. obviously we could lead the world in this

 

The "Civilian" contracts ER are trying to capture are them looking to develop their next generation of Sub reactor and get funded for doing so under Civilian pretenses.

 

Their designs are simply scaled down PWR's and so great there is circa 19 boats sitting in docks at Rosyth and South of England that they have no ideas how to dismantle safely.

 

If we were leading the way, we would have built Modular Molten Salt Reactors just like China, Canada and USA is doing but we are still focused on "traditional", inefficient (only uses 5 to 10% of fuel) semi- military reactors (produces nuclear weapons materials), rather than an MMSR which uses 90% to 95% of fuel, unable to blow up or go critical and does not produce nuclear weapons materials.

 

[udderlyoffroad]

1 hour ago, Stonepark said:

If we were leading the way, we would have built Modular Molten Salt Reactors just like China, Canada and USA is doing but we are still focused on "traditional", inefficient (only uses 5 to 10% of fuel) semi- military reactors (produces nuclear weapons materials), rather than an MMSR which uses 90% to 95% of fuel, unable to blow up or go critical and does not produce nuclear weapons materials.

I think we ought to be doing both, MMSR aren't proven yet, but then MRDA (Mandy Rice-Davis Applies, I would say that wouldn't I?)

Won't comment on the decomissioning of old boats, other than to say by necessity reactors on boats are sealed into a fully welded hull.  No such requirement exists on land.