[HN Gopher] UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector...
___________________________________________________________________
UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned
Author : redcalx
Score : 106 points
Date : 2022-04-24 13:14 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (xlinks.co)
(TXT) w3m dump (xlinks.co)
| jodrellblank wrote:
| 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...
| gnfargbl wrote:
| I don't think we will actually be getting 10GW net from this.
| The article itself claims that the project will
|
| _> deliver 3.6GW of reliable energy_
|
| and
|
| _> be capable of supplying 8 percent of Great Britain's
| electricity needs_
|
| ...from which I assume they 're projecting a total energy
| consumption of about 3.6/0.08 = 45GW in 2030.
| Grimburger wrote:
| > handing your life support to a distant and culturally
| different country
|
| As horrible as it sounds, Morocco isn't a nuclear power and
| would be crushed in an afternoon by UK armed forces while
| western media across the planet creates a hundred different
| justifications and the world's diplomats send their
| congratulations for neutralising the _energy terrorists_
| because they couldn 't care less what happens to them.
|
| This is a completely different situation wrt to Germany <->
| Russia
| sudosysgen wrote:
| That is not true. The UK doesn't have the force projection
| capability to do that to Morocco, which is a US ally. The UK
| would get hammered in an attempt to terrorise Morocco.
|
| The only remotely conceivable way that the UK would have of
| projecting significant power onto the Moroccan mainland is by
| trying to foment a civil war. Otherwise they would not get
| anything out of it.
|
| If the US even allowed the UK to do such a foolish thing, it
| would be disastrous long-term for the whole of Europe.
| Completely alienating and breaking off with North Africa
| means that Europe is now completely surrounded with
| unfriendly countries.
| axg11 wrote:
| This is false. Not that it matters to the wider argument
| but UK has plenty of power projection capabilities to mount
| an offensive in Morocco.
|
| Morocco is even within reasonable distance for the UK to
| run sorties from UK air bases, let alone including aircraft
| carriers, cruise missile attacks from submarines, etc.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| It really isn't. The UK has very little in the way of
| power projection. Sure they could lob a few bombs and
| fire a few cruise missiles, that's not going to make the
| Moroccan government turn on solar power. All it will do
| is make them and the Moroccan people very, very angry.
|
| If you want to take a country's resources by force, there
| is no option short of a ground campaign. Without a civil
| war in Morocco (that the UK couldn't make happen even if
| they tried), there is no way for them to put boots on the
| ground. The only way would be to cut a deal with Algeria
| or Mauritania for a ground invasion (not happening!), or
| to stage some kind of amphibious landing.
|
| I thought that by now people would have understood that
| you can't win a war through air power only.
| [deleted]
| jodrellblank wrote:
| Realistically though is the UK going to invade Morocco if
| Morocco gets into a war with {nearby country} and the solar
| plants are disabled in the fighting? Would the UK be forced
| to send peacekeeper forces into a former French and Spanish
| colony, and how would that play out? Is the UK going to
| invade Morocco over a 10% price hike? A 20% one?
| recuter wrote:
| Morocco is surprisingly well armed due to the ongoing
| conflict with their nemesis Algeria.
|
| > Morocco isn't a nuclear power and would be crushed in an
| afternoon by UK
|
| > This is a completely different situation wrt to Germany <->
| Russia
|
| The irony is _palpable_. Yes, the UK would probably get a
| "win" but not in an afternoon and this energy project would
| be destroyed - rather pointless.
|
| You could just have coal reserves on standby and contingency
| energy deals with France.
| wewxjfq wrote:
| > Germany has just had a hard lesson in having significant
| energy dependency on Russia.
|
| The UK can't quit Russian oil, coal, and gas any faster than
| Germany - that should teach you a lesson.
| gizajob wrote:
| The UK isn't dependent on Russian gas though and isn't
| connected to it. It's reliance on Russian oil is very limited
| outside of a source of Diesel. Can't imagine it takes a great
| deal of Russian coal either, given its large coal fields it
| doesn't bother to use.
| nyokodo wrote:
| > Morocco isn't Russia, but handing your life support to a
| distant and culturally different country... seems daft.
|
| Perhaps, but making yourself a vital part of keeping the lights
| on for a country with a brutal colonial history within living
| memory, a much more capable military, and a military base 36
| miles from Tangier... seems even more daft.
| leke wrote:
| Will countries ever learn to make their own energy! Has this
| Russia situation taught us nothing!?
| nicbou wrote:
| The EU situation has taught us many things about collaboration.
| Y-bar wrote:
| Why does the cables trace the Iberian and French coastlines
| rather than a taking a more direct route?
| _dain_ wrote:
| shallower water
| Y-bar wrote:
| I am not knowledgeable in high voltage transmission, but in
| which ways does the shallower water depth affect the
| transmission line?
| tremon wrote:
| It doesn't; it affects the cost of laying it. The cable
| must be anchored to the sea floor at regular intervals and
| it's cheaper to place an anchor at a few hundred meters
| depth (the coastal shelves) than at 3 km (depth of the
| Biscay abyssal plain).
| lazide wrote:
| It wouldn't surprise me either if it helps in some legal
| situations - if someone runs over your cable in Spanish
| territorial waters vs international waters for instance,
| it's probably easier to get paid back.
| hetspookjee wrote:
| 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.
| nerdawson wrote:
| 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.
| seszett wrote:
| > Only recently France were threatening to cut off power to
| Jersey.
|
| Just want to add that it was a bit different than that.
| More exactly, an English newspaper asked a French official
| if cutting electricity off was a possibility and that
| official answered nothing more than "the treaty that was
| agreed upon does include this as a possibility".
|
| It was never an actual threat or in any plan at the time.
| mike_hearn wrote:
| That's not quite correct:
|
| _[Europe Minister] Clement Beaune, who is a close ally
| of the French president, Emmanuel Macron, said action
| would be decided on within days and discussions were
| already in motion .... [Beaune] added, "We defend our
| interests. We do it nicely, and diplomatically, but when
| that doesn't work we take measures. The Channel Islands,
| the UK, are dependent on us for their energy supply. They
| think they can live on their own and badmouth Europe as
| well. And because it doesn't work, they indulge in one-
| upmanship, and in an aggressive way"_
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/oct/05/france-uk-
| jers...
|
| _" Reducing supplies (of electricity to Jersey) is
| possible, but cutting the power to every Jersey resident
| this winter is something that will not happen and
| something that I do not want," Europe Minister Clement
| Beaune told BFM-TV in an interview._
|
| https://www.dailysabah.com/world/europe/france-could-
| reduce-...
|
| _France could cut electricity supply to UK Channel
| Island Jersey unless a post-Brexit fishing agreement is
| respected, Maritime Minister Annick Girardin told the
| French parliament May 4._
|
| https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-
| insight...
|
| _French fishermen are struggling to obtain fishing
| licenses allowing them to keep working in U.K. waters,
| including in Jersey. They must show they have been
| fishing in these waters from 2012 to 2016 using GPS data,
| which some don 't have. "As you know, the [Brexit]
| agreement contains retaliatory measures ... So as far as
| Jersey is concerned, I would remind you, for example, of
| the transport of electricity via submarine cables. So we
| have the means, and even though I'm sorry it has come to
| this, we will do so if we have to," she told the French
| parliament._
|
| https://www.politico.eu/article/fishing-brexit-eu-uk-
| jersey/
| WastingMyTime89 wrote:
| 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.
| blibble wrote:
| the fact that the people don't want to be Spanish or
| Argentinian is just a small inconvenience to be ignored,
| right?
|
| (referendums in both were >99% remain in the UK)
| argsnd wrote:
| 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?
| WastingMyTime89 wrote:
| Let's conveniently forget that Gibraltar is actually
| territorially part of Spain, most essential facilities
| are provided by Spain, that a significant proportion of
| jobs necessary to it are held by Spaniard and that
| Gibraltar economy is due to it being a tax haven which
| would stop if it was part of Spain. Oversee territories
| are a shame on every countries that still hold them be it
| the UK or France.
| blibble wrote:
| > Let's conveniently forget that Gibraltar is actually
| territorially part of Spain
|
| it is most definitely not
|
| it handed it over in the peace treaty that ended the war
|
| > The Catholic King does hereby, for himself, his heirs
| and successors, yield to the Crown of Great Britain the
| full and entire propriety of the town and castle of
| Gibraltar, together with the port, fortifications, and
| forts thereunto belonging; and he gives up the said
| propriety to be held and enjoyed absolutely with all
| manner of right for ever, without any exception or
| impediment whatsoever.
|
| full text here: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Peace_and_
| Friendship_Treaty_o...
|
| > Oversee territories are a shame on every countries that
| still hold them be it the UK or France.
|
| meanwhile Spain has two enclaves of the exact same type
| of in Morocco, Ceuta and Melilla
| sofixa wrote:
| How is the Spanish claim on Gibraltar weak? They border
| it, it was taken from them at gunpoint, and it's
| extremely dependent on Spain for services and labour.
| anamax wrote:
| Sharing a border isn't a claim. (France and Spain share a
| border - which one has a claim as a result?)
|
| Every border is a result of "taken from them at
| gunpoint." (It's not hard to find folks who had large
| pieces of Spain taken from them at gunpoint.)
|
| Dependency isn't a claim. It is, however, a tool for
| taking.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| "There is a very easy way for Ukraine to solve the Russia
| issue". In the case of Gibraltar, the UK can merely
| bypass Spain for its energy needs.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| > _The Morocco-UK Power Project will be powered by a wind and
| solar farm, approximately 1,500km2 in size_
|
| I'm intrigued by how 1,500km2 of partial shade will transform the
| Sahara ecosystem.
|
| I hope it will make more life possible in the shade.
| 7952 wrote:
| Large wind turbines are spread out so will probably occupy much
| more land but not cast shadow.
| missedthecue wrote:
| The Sahara is 9.2 million km2. So probably not much change for
| the ecosystem.
| fulafel wrote:
| Editorialized title is wrong, the cable is not 10GW according to
| the page.
| giorgioz wrote:
| Given how many from the comments and me have come to understand
| this is a BREXIT move I just want to say:
|
| This is NOT technology is GEOPOLITICS, and it sucks!
| cptcobalt wrote:
| It can be both at the same time. This is bringing more
| renewables and energy storage online. Any way you slice it,
| this is a global need.
| 35mm wrote:
| Why not the south of Spain? Just as much sun and more politically
| stable.
| blibble wrote:
| 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
| bdauvergne wrote:
| 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.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| The point wasn't "the UK is better than Spain" but rather,
| "energy dependence on Spain is not in the UK's best
| interest".
| bdauvergne wrote:
| Without any argument apart "there seem to be rules to
| follow inside the EU" it seems unsubstantiated.
|
| A better argument would be that digging or laying 3000Km
| 12GW terrestrial electric line through Spain and France
| would be expensive and especially difficult to sell to
| them, even if they could benefit from the energy.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| It's already been clearly substantiated: running the
| cable through Spain or France would give leverage to
| those countries regarding (among other things)
| territorial disputes. This has nothing to do with the EU
| except in the tangential sense that Spain and France are
| both member states.
| Veen wrote:
| Which is precisely why the UK is no longer in the EU. It no
| longer has to follow "majority law" and can do what is in
| its own best interests.
| sofixa wrote:
| > and can do what is in its own best interests.
|
| If it did that, it wouldn't have gotten out of the common
| market. The UK is _way_ past sensible choices in its best
| interests, and is firmly in the "cut its nose to spite
| the EU".
| blibble wrote:
| how you leave the legal framework without exiting the
| "common market" (single market)?
|
| the answer is: you can't
| giorgioz wrote:
| I do wonder the same but about Portugal. Portugal would be
| closer than the south part of Spain.
| zikero wrote:
| On what grounds are you claiming Morocco is less politically
| stable?
| rationalfaith wrote:
| KarlKemp wrote:
| The grounds under our feet, i. e. reality: https://en.wikiped
| ia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index#/media/File:De...
| varajelle wrote:
| Democracy [?] politically stable
| KarlKemp wrote:
| True, in the sense that being healthy is also less stable
| than being dead.
|
| Wrong, in any meaningful way, and obviously so: the
| linked index rates democracy on multiple dimensions,
| including protection of civil liberties, electoral
| process and pluralism, functioning of government,
| political participation, and political culture. It's
| impossible to rate high on all those issues and not be
| "stable" in any meaningful sense.
|
| FWIW Morocco is also quite stable, among the best both in
| Africa and the Arab world.
| DuskStar wrote:
| > It's impossible to rate high on all those issues and
| not be "stable" in any meaningful sense.
|
| However, a dictatorship can ALSO be stable - just look at
| North Korea. Democracy is not the only way to achieve
| stability.
| a_humean wrote:
| It has the whiff a brexit about it. The current government is
| allergic to most forms of UK/EU cooperation. They don't want to
| give the EU extra leverage in the future, so its a means of
| diversification esp in the context of a lack of political will
| (strong NIMBY sentiment) to seriously invest in on-shore wind
| power in the UK. We already have 3-4 interconnects with EU
| countries if I recall: France, Ireland, Netherlands, ??? (a
| fourth?).
|
| EDIT: Belgium and Norway is the fourth and fifth respectively,
| and apparently Denmark is planned.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| Genuine question: what's wrong with diversification? Isn't
| that a good thing?
| a_humean wrote:
| There isn't anything wrong with diversification, and this
| might even be a good idea.
|
| I'm just commenting upon the likely motivations are
| primarily domestic politics and geopolitics given its
| pretty obvious that you could achieve similar results by
| doing this with onshore wind and solar installations in
| southern Spain with lower technical and cost requirements.
|
| Its definitely true that outside of the EU we are going to
| be treated differently than if we were EU members. EU
| members will always come first, and geopolitical spats with
| say Spain over Gibraltar or France over fishing that would
| otherwise get mediated via the EU could now be higher risk
| in future.
| 7952 wrote:
| The cable may be cheaper but what about land value?
| mardifoufs wrote:
| Morocco is pretty stable. There are no sectarian tensions,
| tribalism is basically non existent, and even the western
| sahara situation is stabilized with the US recently recognizing
| Morocco's claim to the region. Keep in mind that the moroccan
| state has existed in some form or another for around 1300
| years. so the country is much more cohesive, and the central
| power more powerful than other "newer" post colonial countries.
|
| It's very very far from being a perfect or even good country
| (for most of us moroccans), but it has an almost bulletproof
| record w.r.t foreign investment. The usually very slow
| "makhzen" (state bureaucracy) can suddenly become super super
| efficient to attract foreign capital. Tanger-MED and the huge
| automobile industry around it is a very good example of that.
| tobylane wrote:
| The local residents would complain about the project. In
| perfect English as there are many English retirees in southern
| Spain.
|
| A few percent more sun, cheaper builders, I can understand this
| choice.
| popol12 wrote:
| Sounds inefficient How big are the loss on such a high distance
| connection ?
| FpUser wrote:
| If you do not really know the loss why does it "sound
| inefficient"? I am pretty sure they've done all the due
| diligence and if the project is a go then the losses are
| acceptable.
|
| I am more interested (again if the project is a go) what
| happens if / when some "friendly" people will mess with the
| cable.
| TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
| Worth noting the project isn't even funded yet.
|
| https://doomberg.substack.com/p/20000-volts-under-the-
| sea?s=...
| mabbo wrote:
| High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) is much more efficient at
| transmission over long distances than AC. It can throw off your
| intuition on these things.
|
| In China, there is a 3300 km line like this moving 12GW of
| power. This is a little bit longer, but not by much.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-voltage_direct_current
| semi-extrinsic wrote:
| The line you're talking about is part of China's UHVDC grid,
| which is all on land. The Chinese have invested more than
| $100 billion into this over the past twenty years, because
| they have to, all their power generation is far from their
| cities.
|
| The longest submarine HVDC line today is something like 600
| km. There are no UHVDC submarine lines.
| pxeger1 wrote:
| The reason AC is often believed to be more efficient is
| because higher voltages of either type are more efficient
| (less loss to electrical resistance), and it's much easier to
| step voltage up and down using AC.
| anamax wrote:
| Another advantage of DC over AC is that DC doesn't have to
| be synchronized wrt frequency, phase, or power-factor.
| lazide wrote:
| Transformers are very efficient and easy to make for sure,
| and can 'easily' step up to millions of volts.
|
| Longer distance runs of AC can have a lot of losses though
| due to inductance, especially when they're close to large
| conductive masses (like seawater or earth).
|
| DC requires expensive conversion equipment to get back to
| AC for the grid.
|
| AC is cheap for short runs. Usually AC vs DC high voltage
| starts to be equally cost effective around the several
| hundred miles of buried lines, and a clear winner around
| the 1000 mile range (efficiency and capex wise).
|
| HVDC can also allow grid balancing when disparate grids are
| connected (different frequencies and voltages for
| instance).
| KarlKemp wrote:
| 3.5 % per 1,000 km, according to
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-voltage_direct_current,
| which comes out to around 10 %.
| munch117 wrote:
| 14% (1,035^3,8)
| Diggsey wrote:
| Wikipedia quotes losses of 3.5% per 1,000 km.
| onethought wrote:
| 3.5% per 1000km.
| _fizz_buzz_ wrote:
| 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.
| dankboys wrote:
| Ah yes, famously brexit didn't happen
| mike_hearn wrote:
| 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
| breakthrough tomorrow the political reasons to go direct would
| still be there. 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. The EU would
| absolutely make energy transit dependent on all manner of
| entirely irrelevant topics - fish is the current one but there
| would be others - and thus making electricity supplies
| dependent on the EU would end up being equivalent to being
| sucked back in, not as a member state but as a vassal state.
| sofixa wrote:
| > 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).
| mike_hearn wrote:
| The UK had to implement EU decisions and laws, including
| those the government and voters directly disagreed with.
| That is what subservient means, in this context.
|
| _The fish debacle ( the UK refusing to license EU-based
| ships)._
|
| There are lots of licensed EU fishing vessels. Note that
| Jersey isn't actually a part of the UK, technically it's a
| Crown Dependency. Anyway. The full story of the dispute is
| much more complicated than that:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Jersey_dispute
|
| Summary:
|
| - After Brexit an amnesty period was agreed before the new
| fishing permissions were enforced on UK/Jersey territorial
| waters.
|
| - French fishermen reacted by adopting unsustainable
| fishing techniques like aggressive trawling. Basically
| trying to extract as much marine wealth as possible before
| they were restricted. "Young accused French trawlers of
| "breaking the spirit of the amnesty" and that due to recent
| dredging by French trawlers that Jersey's marine ecology
| "won't take this for much longer and, if it goes on, we
| will have to close the area off for years". This hadn't
| been anticipated in the agreement and appears to have
| poisoned relations from the get-go.
|
| - The agreement involved granting licenses to fishermen who
| had been fishing there previously and could evidence that.
| The French authorities weren't submitting valid evidence to
| the Jersey authorities (blaming bureaucratic screwups like
| lost documents).
|
| - Because the evidence wasn't meeting the requirements,
| licenses weren't always being issued quickly.
|
| So far, ordinary bureaucracy. It should have never really
| reached public attention at all, as it could have been
| sorted out between the local authorities. Unfortunately
| what followed was this:
|
| 1. Blockades of Jersey harbor by the French fishermen, with
| the French government doing nothing.
|
| 2. French boats were repeatedly caught illegally fishing,
| claiming they'd been told by the French government they
| could fish wherever they wanted. See the trawling problems
| above.
|
| 3. Shortly after, the French government banned Jersey
| fishermen from landing fish in France. No justification was
| given. This was in violation of the agreement and Jersey
| thus said it'd appeal to the EU Commission. That was not
| only ignored but the French simply escalated the ban to
| include all freight movements, again, in plain violation of
| the agreements.
|
| 4. The French government then escalated again and
| threatened multiple times to cut off Jersey's electricity
| supply in retaliation.
|
| From the UK's perspective this was all well out of
| proportion to the scale of the problem. Also it involved
| unilateral violations of the agreement by France, no
| workable suggestions for how to do things better and after
| that an MEP argued that it should be escalated to full
| blown trade sanctions. Without passing judgement on which
| side was "right" in this dispute it's obvious why the UK
| would want to diversity energy supplies away from the EU.
| mrlonglong wrote:
| Boring codswallop.
| gghhzzgghhzz wrote:
| If you were one of the big 3 then you pretty much get to
| decide what laws / fines apply and what don't. This was
| often used to the advantage of the British governments to
| claim that they were being forced into doing something
| that they actually wanted to do, but would have an issue
| passing domestically.
|
| Fishing 'debacle' was because the UK governments have no
| interest in fishing nor in the far wider issue of the
| sustainability and viability of costal communities. They
| were happy to give away fishing rights because that's
| what the needs of the markets demand. They only become
| interested in fishermen/women when they think there are
| some votes in it. Same for Macron.
|
| It's all extremely cynical. And I say this as someone who
| voted for Brexit, and would do so again.
| mike_hearn wrote:
| In this case the dispute was with the independent Jersey
| government and part of their justification for the number
| of licenses provided was sustainability. You could argue
| that this justification was a lie I suppose, but it'd be
| good to have some evidence to support that.
|
| OTOH, the UK government recently (2020) passed laws that
| overrode Jersey's independence in this regard and there
| were rumours that the UK was getting ready to basically
| give the EU what they wanted here in return for
| concessions in other areas, much to the outrage of people
| on Jersey itself. However, that hasn't materialized. So I
| guess we'll see to what extent you're proven right.
| Veen wrote:
| sofixa wrote:
| blibble wrote:
| > The world doesn't revolve around you
|
| meanwhile you've posted 5 times in this thread about UK
| energy policy
| tinco wrote:
| Stop being so adverserial. Parent hasn't stated any pro-
| brexit sentiment so just assume they're arguing in good
| faith.
|
| The whole idea of the EU is that all nations in it are
| subservient to the commission. We like it that way because
| that makes the collaboration more rational and it makes the
| rising tide lift all the boats. Wether you agree with it or
| not, the idea of the Brexit is that the UK can be strong
| without the EU, possibly even stronger. Wether that will
| happen remains to be seen.
|
| But how can you say they can't be independent of the EU in
| power while commenting on an article that's literally about
| them establishing power bypassing the EU?
|
| I'd love for the UK to come back to us in the EU. But their
| "intentional obtuse"-ness is exactly what they should be
| doing to make good on their promises to the citizens of the
| UK.
| detritus wrote:
| This is an absolutely valueless comment, so I apologise:
| but I just wanted to thank you for writing one of most
| sincerely level-headed responses I've seen in relation to
| Brexit, and from someone 'over the fence' at that.
|
| I aspire to be as considerate and reasonable in my
| dialogue on the subject, as much as I'd like it to go
| away (much like most Europeans, I guess!) :)
| arlort wrote:
| > The whole idea of the EU is that all nations in it are
| subservient to the commission
|
| It really really isn't though
| tinco wrote:
| It really is though
| dankboys wrote:
| Then it's even more useless than being an auditor at the
| commission
| mrlonglong wrote:
| Bollocks, to put it succinctly.
| _fizz_buzz_ wrote:
| "Securing Britain's energy supply by diversifying from EU
| interconnectors"
|
| Also, it's kind of funny how you say it has absolutely
| nothing to do with Brexit and immediately jump into an anti-
| EU rant, probably not the smoothest transition :D
| mike_hearn wrote:
| I don't see that as an anti-EU rant but more like a neutral
| description of the situation. The EU has been completely
| open that its ideal scenario now is that the UK would agree
| to implement all EU rules and laws as before, but without
| being a member. It has been willing to enforce trade
| sanctions on the financial system in order to try and get
| what it wants in unrelated areas like immigration law. And
| the EU did nothing when one of its two most powerful
| members asserted its intention to use electricity supply
| cutoffs to gain leverage in fishing rights disputes.
|
| These things are all matters of fact. From the EU's
| perspective these things are not "negative" exactly, but
| merely the way they play the game. Everything is connected
| to everything else and any inter-dependency may become
| leverage in any unrelated area of cooperation at any time.
| yakak wrote:
| Not sure about the description of the region, but UK
| legitimizes Morocco's position in land disputes to
| undermine EU seems a possibility to me.
| robonerd wrote:
| Can you expand on the EU's stake in Moroccan border
| disputes? I'm aware of the West Sahara / SADR situation,
| but my impression is that the EU has little legitimate
| stake in that dispute except for their desire to fish in
| those waters. And Europe seems willing to deal with
| Morocco for permission to do that.
| yakak wrote:
| I was hoping someone with more knowledge of the situation
| would chime in..
|
| My understanding is that:
|
| Acting as a group the EU has made some "pragmatic"
| decisions like fishing in western Sahara waters, but
| probably found it relatively easy to turn down less
| economic and/or more illegal activities as a block. If
| the UK were to more fully ignore UN decisions and accept
| natural resource from the disputed lands, the loss of
| respecting the rules is much more a loss for the EU than
| Morocco.
| logifail wrote:
| > "Securing Britain's energy supply by diversifying from EU
| interconnectors"
|
| Honestly, the EU27 have their own home-grown grid problems
| to deal with[0], helping third countries transit power
| through the EU territories must be right at the bottom of
| the list!
|
| Austria and Germany had a single electricity price zone ...
| until October 2018, one of the reasons blamed for the split
| was "slow grid expansion"[1].
|
| [0]
| https://www.euractiv.com/section/electricity/news/german-
| ele...
|
| [1] https://www.apg.at/api/sitecore/projectmedia/download?i
| d=24f...
| alibarber wrote:
| This is basically my reading of the situation. After
| reading the article I was certain the comment section
| here would look like this, but anyway, my take home is
| 'technological advances mean it is now easier just to lay
| a long cable on the sea floor than all of the political
| maneuvering needed to transit power across multiple
| countries'
|
| Obviously- that may be wrong, but let's see, would be
| cool if it's true.
| arinlen wrote:
| > Brexit isn't mentioned anywhere and the physics of it would
| be the same regardless of the EU existing or not.
|
| The point of mentioning Brexit is to stress that the physics
| alone makes this sort of project hard to justify on technical
| grounds, specially when there is a wealth of renewable energy
| projects right around Britain's corner.
|
| You need to be specially motivated to circumvent any of the
| low-hanging fruit projects with European nations to head down
| to Africa to get your electricity.
| mike_hearn wrote:
| I remember doing a bit of spare time research into getting
| power from the Sahara desert when I was a school kid. The
| idea is obvious - solar power requires lots of sunshine and
| land that isn't being used for anything. The UK doesn't
| have that, the Sahara desert does.
|
| If it's an idea obvious enough to occur to a teenager 20
| years ago it hardly requires politics to explain why it
| comes up now, does it? At the time I gave up on the idea
| because either I didn't find out about HVDC or it wasn't as
| effective as it is now. Transmission losses seemed to kill
| the idea. Now apparently that's more or less solved and
| other issues dominate like manufacturing costs and mineral
| availability.
|
| As for renewables being abundant near by - where? UK
| already built tons of windmills. You can't get baseload-
| level renewable power from adding more of those because
| there are days when the wind stops blowing. As for solar in
| Europe, land is at a premium there and they're already
| wanting to use available resources for their own needs,
| rightly so. Also worth considering - for unclear reasons
| global wind speeds have been slowing down over time. Long
| term wind projects need to factor that in to their economic
| calculations. Solar doesn't have that issue.
| nbevans wrote:
| 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.
| KarlKemp wrote:
| The EU does not think of the UK in that way.
|
| In fact it tends not to think of the UK at all, these days.
|
| As to being "fair game": that's true, in the sense that the
| EU will place the interests of member states over those of
| the UK. That dynamic must be among the least surprising
| developments of history, considering it is both obvious and
| formed the core of every serious prediction in the run-up
| to Brexit.
|
| There was plenty of swagger back in those days with
| fantasies of renewed UK superpower domineering the EU and
| extracting every concession it can think of. "Fantasy"
| because that's just not how it works if the other party
| makes up 60 % of your foreign trade, but you make up less
| than 10 % of theirs.
|
| So here we are now, with the UK coming up with these
| harebrained schemes that feel like some party organized
| with the specific purpose of not inviting your ex.
| toper-centage wrote:
| The UK playing victim is the reason Brexit happened in
| the first place. No wonder their residents continue being
| brainwashed in that sense.
| gizajob wrote:
| Maybe many of the residents of the UK see the creepy
| undemocratic bureaucracy of the EU for what it is, and
| it's single-speed forward into the future federal state
| of Europe wasn't something they wanted to be a part of.
| This isn't brainwashing, but people feeling more need for
| control and action on a local level, not their national
| parliaments being subsumed and subverted by Brussels, and
| the diverse peoples of the continent being treated as if
| they were all one thing.
| KarlKemp wrote:
| _yawn_
| dmitriid wrote:
| > creepy undemocratic bureaucracy of the EU
|
| > need for control and action on a local level
|
| Ah you mean that local control and democracy when the
| party with 13% of the votes gets 0.2% seats in the
| parliament", right? [1]
|
| [1] Great CGP Grey video on the 2015 General Election in
| the UK: https://youtu.be/r9rGX91rq5I
| gizajob wrote:
| I haven't got time for a deep-dive into statistics or
| methods of representation right now, which clearly need
| improving. The fact of the matter is that more people in
| the UK voted to leave the EU than even bothered to vote
| in the election of EU representatives in the election
| before. The EU failed to make a case for the importance
| of its democratic process, and rested content in its
| level of power existing despite this failure to reach
| people with its electoral process, and 51% of the
| electorate of the UK saw fit to remove themselves from
| the EU when given the opportunity to. My main suprise was
| caused by the UK doing this probably some 15-20 years
| before it really became a pressing question, but it was a
| case of "now or never" and swathes of people in the UK
| decided they didn't want to be involved (all seemingly
| for an individual set of personal reasons that are hard
| to form any consensus toward).
| dmitriid wrote:
| > which clearly need improving.
|
| Indeed, they do. So you really have no right to point
| fingers at "non-democratic EU bureaucracy" when _at
| worst_ it 's the same system as in the UK.
|
| > The EU failed to make a case for the importance of its
| democratic process
|
| You realise that the UK was in the EU? That it was one of
| its founding members? That the perceived failure to do
| anything about this process is shared by the UK as well?
| mike_hearn wrote:
| It's not the same system. In the EU the executive
| dominates the legislature because only the executive can
| initiate the process of changing the law. The executive
| in turn is controlled by one person who is not selected
| via any democratic process or in fact any documented
| process at all (nobody really knows why vDL was selected
| as current EU Commission head).
|
| That's why when you read about EU law changes you so
| often read about negotiations between the Parliament and
| Commission. In the UK the executive branch implements the
| will of the legislative branch. In the EU the Parliament
| is often found implementing the will of the executive.
| Technically it's not a Parliament at all, due to this
| lack of the "right of initiation".
| gizajob wrote:
| The UK wasn't a founding member of the EU, but I see your
| point. Regardless of the UK's role, I feel that many in
| the UK regard it's parliament as the highest authority in
| law- and decision-making. Any body resting higher than
| that is going to face difficulty when attempting to claim
| greater and greater control over laws, and running them
| from "far away" even if that far away place was Brussels.
| The UK also wasn't part of the Euro, and so one of the
| main benefits of EU membership and coherence was missing.
| There was also a general feeling amongst the working
| classes that the low-wage sector was being undermined by
| labour coming in freely from abroad, mainly eastern
| Europe, and this wasn't reciprocal, i.e. they couldn't go
| to eastern Europe, or basically anywhere else in Europe,
| and get the same benefit from doing so.
|
| P.s. a broken and undemocratic or unrepresentative
| bureaucracy is not going to be solved or fixed by adding
| higher levels of beuraucracy.
| gizajob wrote:
| This doesn't seem like a harebrained scheme, but a
| challenging one of moving renewable energy from where it
| is abundant to where it is required. An example of a
| harebrained scheme would be Germany's reliance on Russian
| oil and gas.
| pydry wrote:
| The tories have been negotiating in bad faith on Brexit
| since day 1 and never really stopped. Stuff like the
| Internal Market Bill etc
| logifail wrote:
| > 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 EUR5 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 PS3, 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 EUR10 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 :(
| jodrellblank wrote:
| > " _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.
| WastingMyTime89 wrote:
| > the UK's best efforts to forge a genuinely strong
| relationship
|
| Last time I checked the UK was still the sole country in
| the world refusing an official ambassador status to the
| representative of the EU and the sole country to have
| threaten to unilaterally withdraw from an international
| treaty with the EU in clear breach of international law. I
| think your definition of genuine and mine differ
| substantially.
| nbevans wrote:
| Check again - the ambassador status was granted last
| year.
|
| The genuine best efforts spanned from 2017-ish
| (negotiations didn't start in 2016 after the vote) to
| 2019. It took a while for the UK to realise the EU no
| longer wanted to be friendly and cordial, and that's when
| the UK's own stance finally changed.
|
| A bilateral treaty between the UK and EU is not
| "international law". A bilateral treaty contains exit
| clauses that can be invoked if necessary. The Geneva
| Convention is an example of an international law. Though
| I don't know specifically what you are referring to in
| your example.
| blibble wrote:
| > Last time I checked the UK was still the sole country
| in the world refusing an official ambassador status to
| the representative of the EU
|
| you're not exactly up to date as this was sorted almost a
| year ago
|
| https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-57002735
| imtringued wrote:
| The EU ignores the UK to the extend that the UK wishes to
| be ignored by the EU.
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| You don't think it had anything to do with the whole of the
| EU being blamed for ever ill to befall the UK for the last
| 7 years? Or the negotiations in bad faith where
| international law was treated as "more like guidelines
| anyway"?
| dmitriid wrote:
| > The EU wants the UK to be subservient to the Commission for
| ideological, political and economic reasons
|
| You mean, the UK was one of the three largest powers in the
| EU with all the power to influence its policy and direction
| which it did.
|
| Instead, the UK adopted the attitude of "we are a superpower,
| you owe us everything, we owe you nothing" to which the
| planet's largest economic union and one of the planet's
| largest markets calmly responded, "u wot mate?"
|
| About a year into the whole Brexit brouhaha the EU said,
| look, here are the various agreements and levels of
| agreements we have with all the countries [1] (taking from
| the amazing short overview here [2]). You don't want Norway
| style because "it's EU with extra steps", you don't want
| Switzerland-style because "same thing", you don't want
| Ukraine or Turkey-style because you don't want to be bound by
| EU trade agreements etc.
|
| At every step of the way UK's reaction was "these Brussels
| democrats are smothering our great independent nation, they
| must give us everything we want". That's not how negotiations
| work. Especially not with an economic block of ~450 million
| people who are your biggest trading partners.
|
| And after all that puffing and chest-beating, almost seven
| years into the whole Brexit ordeal UK also "suddenly"
| discovered the whole Northern Ireland border issue. Which
| tells you a lot about the competence of your government.
|
| So, no. UK went from being the country with the largest
| influence on EU policy to an outside country that has to deal
| with the EU on the same terms as every other country from
| outside the EU.
|
| [1] https://i.imgur.com/m2e5PGa.png
|
| [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agZ0xISi40E
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| But presumably an interconnect from Morocco->Spain would free
| up export resources from France, which could then be exported
| to the UK via a shorter interconnect. Similarly, direct HVDC
| connections can be run overland rather than under the sea.
| I'm not saying these solutions are better. I'm asking how
| much of the current proposal is due to political constraints
| and how much is actually the best engineering solution given
| the resources available.
| mardifoufs wrote:
| I mean it probably would've been very hard to route it through
| Europe too. Morocco already has powerlines with Spain, but I'm
| not sure if it would make sense to transport that much energy
| through the existing grid? Especially since very high voltage
| powerlines are inherently more efficient, so a direct link
| might make sense. I'm not familiar with how the EU grid is laid
| out though, and the little knowledge I have is pretty specific
| the Quebec Grid.
| KarlKemp wrote:
| It'd be stupid to run a cable straight through the EU, as
| well, yes. You want to be part of a large and diverse grid.
| Then, you add or reinforce long-distance connections based on
| observed patterns.
|
| So the UK should get over itself, connect to larger grid
| that's already operating on three sides. The same is probably
| true for Morocco, and at some point these photovoltaic-in-
| the-desert ideas will become economical, although I'm not
| entirely sure if we are there yet (the desert is less ideal
| for solar cells than one thinks, because heat isn't linear
| proportional to irradiation).
| sgt101 wrote:
| It is connected, via France.
|
| There was a fire recently, but it's a strategic connection.
|
| https://ifa1interconnector.com/
|
| Also the UK is connected to Norway
|
| https://northsealink.com/
|
| And Ireland also
|
| https://www.eirgridgroup.com/customer-and-
| industry/interconn...
| [deleted]
| masklinn wrote:
| > It'd be stupid to run a cable straight through the EU, as
| well, yes.
|
| Politically, maybe. Technically and financially, not at
| all.
|
| There's 3GW of interconnection between france and the UK
| with a 4th under construction, and france is a broker / hub
| between germany, italy, spain, and the UK (as well as its
| own production).
| justincormack wrote:
| France won't let solar from Spain into their grid as it
| undermines their nuclear financing. So from Morocco is
| off the table. A Spain UK connection was planned and
| seems sensible.
| masklinn wrote:
| > France won't let solar from Spain into their grid as it
| undermines their nuclear financing.
|
| Complete nonsense. France buys renewable electricity from
| neighbours all the time, both for itself and to sell to
| other neighbours. France also sells its own electricity.
|
| A new interconnect between france and Spain is under
| construction (the biscay bay line), in order to bring the
| exchange capacity between them up to 5GW.
| Symbiote wrote:
| The European grids, and some neighbouring countries, are
| shown here: https://www.entsoe.eu/data/map/
| petr_tik wrote:
| > This sounds like brexiteer project.
|
| Given that the UK has left the EU, couldn't you call every
| trade deal or cultural exchange with a non-EU country a Brexit
| project?
|
| Even if it is, what is wrong with that? The people of Britain
| voted for Brexit and now need their elected officials to
| deliver, which motivates projects like these
|
| Edit: to clarify, i live in London and i didn't vote for
| Brexit. Regardless of the outcome, I consider it a national
| security issue and a productivity boost to have cheap energy
| collected from a diverse set of sources from solar plants
| abroad to domestic nuclear energy plants and off-shore wind
| turbines.
|
| If you live in Britain, would you really prefer Britain stop
| investing in projects like these, just because there was an
| election result you disagreed with?
| matthewdgreen wrote:
| I'm just curious if a direct interconnect from Morocco->UK is
| the best solution from an engineering perspective, or if a
| Morocco->EU->UK interconnect would work better without the
| politics.
| blibble wrote:
| > The people of Britain voted for Brexit and now need their
| elected officials to deliver
|
| the desired position of many is that the UK should crawl off
| into a corner and almost die, then will have to come crawling
| back to the EU to show that is indispensable
|
| projects like this work counter to that narrative
| giorgioz wrote:
| Yes it does, I'm not sure why they can't just put wind turbines
| in the UK. I'm sure there is plenty of wind there too.
|
| Also it would seem the south of France or Portugal would be
| much closer for the solar part.
| varajelle wrote:
| > I'm not sure why they can't just put wind turbines in the
| UK.
|
| From the article:
|
| > When domestic renewable energy generation in the United
| Kingdom drops due to low winds and short periods of sun, the
| project will harvest the benefits of long hours of sun in
| Morocco
| jodrellblank wrote:
| Right now (Sunday afternoon) the UK is getting about 1/3rd of
| the nations power from wind turbines, more than any other
| single source:
|
| https://www.energydashboard.co.uk/live
|
| https://winderful.uk/
| gizajob wrote:
| Great stats, and great username. Hope you're near to the
| great telescope. Spent some joyous school trips there as a
| child.
| Kognito wrote:
| For context the UK is already massively invested in wind
| turbines, with a lot more investment going into off-shore
| farms. On a good windy day, current capacity might satisfy
| ~40% of grid demand and this will only increase. However, the
| wind doesn't always blow and a cache of coal-fired power
| stations are kept on hand to quickly be able to plug the gap.
|
| If this is economical enough - I'd be all for it rather than
| paying energy companies to keep coal-fired power stations
| ready to belch out smog at a moments notice.
| justincormack wrote:
| Gas fired not coal. Its faster to spin up.
| rationalfaith wrote:
| trebligdivad wrote:
| I wonder what it would take to cut say a year off the time line;
| I realize 5 years isn't huge for a big project, but being pretty
| desperate for energy I wonder what it would take.
| kkfx wrote:
| Oh, nice, so in case of wars a cheap submarine can just put a
| small and cheap charge deep in the sea and boom, 10GWp power are
| out of the UK national grid. How nice.
|
| My fellow humans remember a thing: a national grid is not
| national because of politics but because a such critical part of
| a country infra it's better to be self-sufficient under nation
| borders and hopefully self-sufficient inside those borders even
| in case of major attacks (translated, not few big power plants,
| but many small and a distribution network designed to survive
| significant damages).
|
| We, westerners have had the best industry and technology in the
| world, now for some neoliberals economic devastating ideas we
| pull it apart outsourcing anything because that's pay back, in
| thin air, well, and now we see a new world power, China, arise
| and we see our power wane. How much damage we want to take before
| annihilating with lifelong court rulings against those economy-
| driven society? We really want to wait till being completely
| lost?
| jacquesm wrote:
| This goes for all infrastructure. Destroying it is much easier
| than making it. But that 'cheap' submarine won't be as cheap as
| you think it is and it still has to do it undetected and it has
| to achieve some kind of objective. It also immediately gets
| _two_ countries pissed off at you, one of which is in NATO and
| may well see an attack on its infrastructure as an overt act of
| war.
|
| So you better think this over long and hard before sending your
| cheap submarine down there.
|
| Personally I'd be much more concerned about the kind of damage
| marine life, fishing and cargo ships would do to that cable and
| how to armor against that. Probably by the time you've taken
| all that into account you have also defended against that sub.
| And finally, the same thing of course goes for all of those
| other undersea cables, communications ones for instance.
| kkfx wrote:
| Under the sea who know for sure who made what? Even an ally
| can do such sabotage just to generate a military response
| against a common enemy he want to aggress but can't do
| without allies and those allies are not much interested if
| not forced or even a simple self-inflicted damage to justify
| a war the public do not accept but _some_ in the government
| /elites want... Did you remember just Britannia to cite
| something from history or the outcome of the attacks of
| Charlie Hebdo, Bataclan and Nice have generated?
|
| Such attacks can even disable half a country grid just due to
| the big drop in frequency of the whole grid, spark enormous
| outrage and can also be both really damaging and really quick
| to fix. Life it's complicated, where no one can easy see
| anything can happen, design things to _avoid_ potential
| attack surface is a good way to protect themselves.
|
| We do not normally have strokes, but we put defibrillators
| everywhere for a reason, we do not have much car accidents
| but we design cars to make us survive important ones etc. A
| critical infra like an energy grid... Oh, sure we in the west
| are equally dependent on foreign supply chains for oil,
| uranium etc but we stockpile them a bit, months for oil, an
| year or two for uranium, it's not the same of electricity in
| a grid...
|
| Just see how many issues are there due to some supply chain
| issues in south China or the "Ever given" crisis in Suez. We
| are already hyper-vulnerable planning even bigger
| vulnerabilities for the future it does not sound that smart
| to me.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Conspiracy thinking isn't going to stop infrastructure
| projects from happening. For now. Fortunately.
| 7952 wrote:
| I think it is just plowed into a trench and covered back up.
| cptcobalt wrote:
| 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+ hours a day.
|
| The classic error, mixing up units: "3.6GW of reliable energy".
| The writer certainly means power here. [1] I work in energy, and
| have had teams like legal (and tools like Grammarly) think we're
| just mixing up words for fun. Regardless, definitely seems like a
| very sufficient install to supply real power and charge the
| battery for load shifting at utility scale.
|
| [1]: https://energyeducation.ca/encyclopedia/Energy_vs_power
| baybal2 wrote:
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| Isn't 4 hours of battery storage much too low? How is that
| considered "reliable"? What am I missing?
| cptcobalt wrote:
| 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
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| Interesting, but does this assume Morocco won't have a
| cloudy week or something (I understand that Morocco's
| climate is almost always sunny, but even still)? I always
| assumed the threshold for "reliable renewable energy" began
| at a week's worth of storage.
| fauigerzigerk wrote:
| Not that I know anything about this, but isn't it the job
| of "the grid" to make sure all sources of energy combined
| can provide the necessary power at all times? No
| individual power source is ever completely reliable.
|
| Please forgive my naive question. I have exactly zero
| relevant expertise.
| cptcobalt wrote:
| Yes!
|
| The grid is one of the world's largest real-time reactive
| machines. Power is generated on the fly as you need it.
| You could draw a direct path from your home A/C switching
| on all the way back up the chain to some source needing
| to push power to meet your demand.
|
| The supply of the grid is a big mix of diverse sources:
| renewables, natural gas, hydro, nuclear, coal--whatever.
| Each power source has different pros and cons, and you
| cannot really over-index on one to have a reliable grid.
| For example, nuclear is a fantastic and relatively clean
| source for base load (obviously, when handled
| responsibly), but not great to provide power that reacts
| to the shifts of demand through the day. Solar,
| obviously, doesn't work at night. The grid operator has
| to build a supply mix that fits the needs of their
| region. (And that's typically by facilitating energy
| market with different energy products where generators
| bid and participate.)
| cptcobalt wrote:
| This project also includes wind, which doesn't require
| sun.
|
| "A week's worth of storage" feels somewhat like an
| armchair simplification. It roughly sounds on target if
| we're moving toward the march of nines for real-time
| zero-carbon power supply, but...that honestly doesn't
| need to be the target expectation for today. Long term
| goal, yes. Today's targets really should be to get to
| 90-95% renewable, since chasing the last 5% will be the
| hardest and most expensive--and that's probably where we
| can acceptably use some dirtier backup sources. With the
| state of the grid today, there's lots and lots of power
| sources that can be replaced for cheaper and cleaner
| before we need to chase the long tail of 100% renewable
| at all hours during every season.
|
| The reality though, is that all of these requirements are
| modeled, and the operator surely has their install
| min/maxed for typical use.
|
| At the risk of being off topic, I personally have what
| energy-wonks could consider a "three hour" system (10kW
| solar, 15kW/43.5kWh battery, my typical daily energy use
| is between 25-50kWh, higher if I need to charge the car)
| and have done two weeks fully off-grid last summer, which
| included some cloudy weather. (True off-grid: the utility
| breaker was open to hard disconnect from the grid). While
| I could probably live full-time off grid in the summer, I
| definitely feel its better to have my system help clean
| up the grid where possible. So there's really a _lot_ of
| flexibility to be had depending on the system 's
| requirements.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| > "A week's worth of storage" feels somewhat like an
| armchair simplification.
|
| It is. The way I've heard it explained by energy experts
| (or people who were introduced by the media as such) was
| that storage needs to be on the order of days/weeks, not
| hours. I'm sure that's something of a crude
| oversimplification for a lay audience and certainly not a
| rugged analysis for this particular project.
|
| > With the state of the grid today, there's lots and lots
| of power sources that can be replaced for cheaper and
| cleaner before we need to chase the long tail of 100%
| renewable at all hours during every season.
|
| I'm of the impression that "clean carbon" peaker-plants
| are fairly inefficient because there's a fair amount of
| overhead in starting them and consequently they don't
| actually end up being that much cleaner. :/
| Unfortunately, I wish I had more to offer than "this is
| what I've heard an alleged energy expert say". :(
| Retric wrote:
| Capacity factor, across 24 hours a 30% capacity factor works
| out to 7.2 hours at max output. Being able to 4 hours of max
| output is therefore 55% of the total energy produced in the
| average day.
|
| Grid demand is also significantly higher in the daytime so
| that 4h of battery allows you to very closely match users
| demands over 24 hours or ramp up during peak demand and fall
| back on other sources at night.
| ncmncm wrote:
| Anyway, just now money is _overwhelmingly_ better spent on
| top-line renewable generating capacity. There is no value
| in storage you are not generating enough power to keep
| charged up.
|
| Furthermore, cost of storage is falling even faster than
| wind or solar ever did. Wait until next year, and you get
| lots more storage for your money.
|
| Finally, batteries are good for very short-term storage --
| their round-trip efficiency and fast response are
| unbeatable -- but they cost more than alternatives. For
| storage you don't need to draw down every night, something
| you can fill cheap tanks with is better even if round-trip
| efficiency is low. Something you can _also_ sell when your
| local tanks are full, and buy if they seem likely to go
| dry, is better yet.
|
| So, expect to see a lot of anhydrous ammonia long-term
| storage. Also, hydrogen, and liquid nitrogen. And, lots of
| tropical sites synthesizing for export to higher latitudes
| in winter, and lots of higher-latitude cities importing it
| in place of LNG and oil.
|
| It is kind of surprising to see the batteries set up in
| Morocco, not in UK. That might be politics. Typically,
| storage is best suited near point-of-use.
| imtringued wrote:
| Those 4 hours don't mean wall clock time, they mean it takes
| 4 hours to discharge the battery at its maximum discharge
| rate.
|
| In other words, the battery would bridge exactly 4 hours of
| 0% power generation. The moment you have more than 0% power
| generation but still less than 100%, the battery will last
| more than 4 hours of wall clock time.
| MrPatan wrote:
| It's very reliable compared to 0 hours of battery storage
| sofixa wrote:
| > 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.
| cptcobalt wrote:
| 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.
| [deleted]
| danans wrote:
| 4 hours is solidly in the middle of what is needed for the
| daily peak load management tier of the energy storage problem
| [1], which is how we experience electricity "reliability" on
| a day to day basis, and it is the upper end of what is
| economical for lithium ion batteries.
|
| Beyond that, other technologies (pumped hydro, perhaps
| hydrogen electrolysis) are more economical.
|
| 1. https://storagewiki.epri.com/index.php/Energy_Storage_101/
| Te...
| BurningFrog wrote:
| Adding battery power for v2 should be one of the easier
| upgrades.
|
| I assume batteries in 10 years will be vastly better/cheaper.
| Havoc wrote:
| Why not pump the energy into the EU grid at bottom and pull it
| out in the north?
| BurningFrog wrote:
| I don't think there is such a grid with this spare capacity.
| samwillis wrote:
| I assume control, with the investment coming from the UK they
| want to have control of it. If it has to go via the EU they
| would loose that control and could potentially lose access.
| fulafel wrote:
| If you sell in place a and buy back in place b, you might
| sometimes get less of it back for the same money.
| qwedf wrote:
| The latest Doomberg does a great job in pointing out the
| practical flaws.
|
| https://doomberg.substack.com/p/20000-volts-under-the-sea
|
| "The Xlinks project is a pretty good concept, and yet...it needs
| access to materials already claimed by many others at prices
| increasing by the day, it needs to build an entire HVDC industry
| in Britain from the ground up, and it needs money, lots of it."
| redcalx wrote:
| For the battery storage, perhaps they will ultimately choose
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_iron_phosphate_battery.
| The cable manufacture seems like more a 'when' rather than an
| 'if' problem. The scheduled first phase of construction is
| 2025-2027, which we can reasonably expect to be delayed by 2-3
| years if they are trying to build new manufacturing capability.
| Overall this still looks to be in the realms of possible/viable
| IMO.
| rcMgD2BwE72F wrote:
| How much?
| aaron695 wrote:
| Yuioup wrote:
| Yeah no, this is Brexit twaddle.
| gnfargbl wrote:
| This is a proposal for a 3.6GW interconnector (as 2 x 1.8GW HVDC
| cables). The headline here is incorrectly editorialized.
| credit_guy wrote:
| I find liquefied Hydrogen to make more sense. In case of conflict
| (like now), undersea cables can be sabotaged with plausible
| deniability. The Royal Navy can protect a tanker en route from
| Morocco to UK, or a convoy of such tankers, there were two times
| in the not so distant history when it had to do just that. But
| how do you protect a continuous line of a few thousand km?
|
| Separately, if at some random point in the future the relations
| between the UK and Morocco go south, it's much easier to change
| suppliers if you use tankers. The EU is investing massively in
| Hydrogen, so the Worldwide Hydrogen market will be quite mature
| in 10 to 20 years.
|
| Even from Morocco's point of view, the same calculus applies. If
| the UK sanctions Morocco, and refuses to take delivery of
| electricity, how do you find an alternate buyer if the
| transmission line is in place? With Hydrogen tankers, you simply
| start selling to China or someone else, or you put the Hydrogen
| in some medium-long term storage. This gives you more leeway to
| negotiate whatever diplomatic situation you found yourself in.
| kibwen wrote:
| Rather, the thing that makes the most sense is for countries to
| rely exclusively on local power generation, and completely
| eliminate their reliance on other countries for energy. There
| is no infrastructure more fundamental than energy, because
| energy underlies all other infrastructure. Swapping out oil or
| coal or gas for liquefied hydrogen (or enormous
| intercontinental power lines) just trades one poor situation
| for another. Don't rely on any energy that you couldn't
| immediately switch over to providing yourself, even if it means
| paying an eye-watering premium.
| kaibee wrote:
| > But how do you protect a continuous line of a few thousand
| km?
|
| Cameras/sensors, and fast response time. You could put a sensor
| package every couple km. Given the amount of power this
| installation delivers, it wouldn't exactly break the bank.
| samwillis wrote:
| This is really interesting in the context of what is happening
| locally to my home, we are about two miles from what is planned
| to be the UK largest domestic solar farm [0,1]. It will output
| 350MW, so the one proposed in Morocco will be about 28 times the
| size.
|
| There has been a significant push back against the project
| locally and so I suspect it won't be built to the scale proposed.
| The main criticism is that the land is particularly fertile.
|
| 0: https://www.mallardpasssolar.co.uk/
|
| 1: https://www.stamfordmercury.co.uk/news/amp/clock-is-
| ticking-...
| redcalx wrote:
| Yes, I don't see the logic of using fertile agricultural land
| for solar PV. It seems like short term thinking and a planning
| failure. I've heard at lest one similar story regarding
| reforesting, i.e., a scheme that was planning to use fertile
| land in Wales that was ultimately canned due to local
| objections/resistance.
| redeyedtreefrog wrote:
| So if it goes ahead it will generate 10.5GW, but deliver 3.6GW
| for "20+ hours a day". I guess the 10.5GW figure is peak
| generation during the day with lots of wind + sun, then by using
| batteries it will be able to consistently deliver approx 1/3 of
| that, or 8% of current UK demand (from the article). Makes sense,
| but the headline used by the submission is a bit misleading.
|
| At the same time, the electrification of heating + transport is
| predicted to approximately double UK electricity demand by 2050.
| So even if this goes ahead and works as intended, it will end up
| providing something like 4% of the UK's needs.
|
| A whole bunch of comments here comparing this idea negatively to
| wind, nuclear or tankers filled with hydrogen (?!). Even if it
| goes ahead, there need to be like a dozen other new projects of
| similar scale just to meet demand on these small islands. If you
| also want to provide carbon free electricity to the other 10
| billion people likely to be living on this planet by that 2050,
| then you need to multiply that dozen projects by a factor of at
| least 100.
| danw1979 wrote:
| Wowsers, 200km2 of _tracking_ solar. This is an ambitious
| project.
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