[HN Gopher] $22B project to provide 8% of UK energy via undersea...
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$22B project to provide 8% of UK energy via undersea cable from
North Africa
Author : consumer451
Score : 61 points
Date : 2023-03-09 22:10 UTC (50 minutes ago)
(HTM) web link (e360.yale.edu)
(TXT) w3m dump (e360.yale.edu)
| nl wrote:
| For those who aren't aware, there is already a 3200km
| transmission line operating in China:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-voltage_direct_current
| diordiderot wrote:
| An excellent video on this project from YouTube's "Just have a
| think"
|
| https://youtu.be/iJunxkln578
| moralestapia wrote:
| ~$300 for each person living there. That's a bit steep, honestly.
| peoplearepeople wrote:
| It always seems odd to me that countries are willing to go across
| international boundaries for such a vital part of the economy. If
| they could just be self-sufficient with a load of nuclear power
| plants then they would have less political leverage problems
| epistasis wrote:
| The UK has been valiantly trying to build new nuclear, but it's
| hard to find anybody that can do it, and it's unbelievably
| expensive if it even does get built.
|
| I think that there was a narrow window in time where labor
| costs were low enough for nuclear to make sense, but in more
| advanced economies, highly labor intensive energy sources, as
| required by nuclear construction, are no longer viable.
| Advanced manufacturing capabilities have eclipsed construction
| technology.
| nicoburns wrote:
| > If they could just be self-sufficient with a load of nuclear
| power plants
|
| Given that most countries don't have a source of uranium, I
| don't see how this is any better from a geopolitical security
| perspective.
| kneebonian wrote:
| From my understanding you don't need a lot of uranium to run
| reactors for quite a while. That's one of the reason it is
| such a promising lead.
| rtkwe wrote:
| An unfortunate part of human cognition is we're pretty bad
| at assessing small but widespread and constant
| risks/damages so the impact of pollution pales in
| comparison to the mental impact of singular events like the
| various nuclear disasters or near misses we've had between
| TMI, Chernobyl, Fukushima, et al. So they receive outsized
| push back compared to their actual reduced risk. (Also to
| be fair when a nuclear disaster does happen it renders an
| area unusable for a lot longer so the events tend to stick
| in people's memories)
|
| Building them is also unfortunately a many decades long
| endeavor so we need shorter timeline solutions to bend the
| curve of climate change. I think a lot of environmentalists
| have also been burned by long term projects that sit in
| planning and approval hell for years to decades then get
| cancelled or funding redirected when a new administration
| decides to try to make their mark on a project. A similar
| thing has hampered NASAs Moon and Mars programs where
| options are pursued and cancelled constantly. SLS is not
| the first plan for a Moon return NASA has worked on for
| years it's just the first one that managed to spread the
| pork around enough to avoid cancellation.
| doodlesdev wrote:
| You can stock it though, in case foreign countries cut supply
| short you're not suddendly out of power but instead have time
| to plan a negotiation or attempt to source it from elsewhere.
| CTDOCodebases wrote:
| Not so great when the foreign powers decide to bomb the
| nuclear reactors though.
| demindiro wrote:
| Or cut the cable.
| cobaltoxide wrote:
| At least uranium can be stockpiled.
| AngusH wrote:
| Uranium is a mineral and can be purchased from many places
| and stored then used as needed.
|
| 15 countries mining it currently: https://en.wikipedia.org/wi
| ki/List_of_countries_by_uranium_p...
|
| There are also more countries with estimated reserves: https:
| //en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_uranium_r...
|
| While an undersea cable requires continuous operation and the
| agreement from a single country where it starts. If they
| suddenly decide for whatever reason to turn it off (say
| they're short of electricity) then the supply is immediately
| stopped.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| The UK presumably does, as it maintains nuclear weapons.
| WJW wrote:
| The UK does not mine its own uranium though. There used to
| be a uranium mine in Cornwall but it stopped mining in
| 1930.
|
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium_mining_by_country)
| NKosmatos wrote:
| I fully agree with nuclear fusion power plants, but there is so
| much free solar power that is currently being "wasted". Nuclear
| fusion reactors are many decades away and hopefully that's when
| our global power problems will be (hopefully) solved :-)
| [deleted]
| consumer451 wrote:
| I very much dislike how these posts often result in a very
| predicable "but nuclear..." binary argument.
|
| Here is a crazy idea: don't put all your eggs in one basket.
| Try to do both.
|
| This project only addresses 8% of UK needs, plenty of room for
| other sources in the portfolio.
|
| How is this a bad thing?
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| It depends. Hopefully they source say 150% of requirements
| and not max them out so that losing 8% takes you yo 142% and
| not a single led gets dimmed. Redundancy. But I also read how
| it is hard to stop / start generating power on demand so it
| might be costly to have so much redundancy.
| vkou wrote:
| This is exactly why France went all-in on nuclear in the 20th
| century.
|
| (That, and nuclear weapon ambitions.)
| Gwypaas wrote:
| And learned a very expensive lesson in negative learning by
| doing.
|
| https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03014.
| ..
| frognumber wrote:
| If I were a planner, I'd go for both.
|
| Impossible in capitalism or with modern politics, but I
| planning for failure makes a lot of sense to me, and I don't
| mind having a power grid support 2x capacity.
|
| Same for food, medicine, and general-purpose manufacturing
| (e.g. machine shops), for that matter.
| kinnth wrote:
| The UK in particular has a vast abundance of wind power off
| it's coasts. It makes more sense to double down with 22bn
| investment in wind!
|
| These solar projects are good to start as they could empower
| more african nations with cheaper electricty. We just need more
| electricity everywhere if were going to drop the reliance on
| oil.
| makomk wrote:
| The UK has built a huge amount of offshore wind generation -
| in fact it had the most in the world until quite recently,
| and is currently second only to China. This just isn't a
| complete solution because wind is intermittent, and in
| particular it tends to drop off to nearly nothing during the
| coldest parts of winter when energy demand is at its highest.
| All of the solutions to this are about as speculative and
| questionable as this proposal.
| nicoburns wrote:
| From what I understand, the UK actually has private companies
| ready and more than willing to build wind farms with their
| own money. The government is just inexplicably being slow at
| handing out the permits.
| adaml_623 wrote:
| They've (the right wing government) underfunded the
| government so much there aren't sufficient staff to run the
| beaucracy. The recent (failed) rocket launch from the UK
| was massively delayed because of slow government processes
| londons_explore wrote:
| The market for wind in the UK is unusually profitable due
| to a quirk of the UK electricity market.
|
| Specifically, the power price across the UK is the same
| everywhere. However, there isn't infinite transmission
| capacity. So, if you generate power in one place, but the
| power network cannot transport it, you get told not to
| bother producing it, but you still get paid, and you get
| paid compensation on top.
|
| You know what's better than producing power... being paid
| to produce power, paid extra compensation, and then not
| need to actually have those wind turbines spinning (so much
| reduced maintenance too!).
|
| The government is delaying lots of permits till they can
| figure out how to change these perverse incentives...
| Needless to say, the wind industry isn't happy about the
| fact they might no longer get paid such large amounts, so
| they're demanding the old scheme be kept in place for
| existing producers for 25+ years, and having the new
| pricing rules only apply to new builds...
| Gwypaas wrote:
| They simply need to divide the country into cost regions
| based on the bottlenecks and it will work like
| international power connections. The political problem is
| making Scotland its own separate region.
|
| Have a look at the regions in for example Sweden which
| face similar bottlenecks in transmission capacity from
| north to south.
|
| https://app.electricitymaps.com/map
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| > It always seems odd to me that countries are willing to go
| across international boundaries for such a vital part of the
| economy.
|
| Versus going across international borders for most other
| aspects of their economy? if the UK stopped international trade
| it would completely collapse anyway.
| incone123 wrote:
| This planned link is very long distance, but UK is still part
| of a European power grid: it's normal for power lines to cross
| national (or State) borders.
| nottathrowaway3 wrote:
| Some people don't like nuclear power plants and somehow that's
| more important to them than national/energy security.
|
| UK (and France) already have the bomb; going renewable here
| rather than nuclear has nothing to do with proliferation. I
| don't see how (for the UK) it's anything except people's
| feelings are hurt by nuclear power plants.
|
| For the rest of Europe maybe it's about proliferation. And
| maybe economies of scale make tagging along cheaper than local
| nuclear for Britain.
| Gwypaas wrote:
| Pure cost. Paying Hinkley Point C $150/MWh for 35 years is
| just bonkers waste of money. Flamanville 3 is a similarly
| amazing project.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flamanville_Nuclear_Power_Plan.
| ..
| nottathrowaway3 wrote:
| Average electricity prices in the U.S. are ~$250/mwh
|
| https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.p
| h...
| Gwypaas wrote:
| Which includes the transmission grid. Nuclear costs that,
| and then you have to build a grid.
| epistasis wrote:
| Your chart shows residential prices for the total us
| average ~$140/MWh, not $250/MWh.
|
| Plus, this is the total cost including transmission and
| distribution, which is roughly half the retail cost.
| Generation costs average less than $70/MWh, including
| expensive peaking power in the average.
|
| You want to compare the PS150/MWh to generation costs of
| the alternatives in the UK, which are a fraction of
| PS150.
| londons_explore wrote:
| Yet the spot price of power has been over PS150/MWh for
| most of the last year...
|
| That deal is starting to look pretty good for the
| government...
| Gwypaas wrote:
| A haphazard continent-wide transition from Russian gas,
| and all we get is nuclear prices for power? So to get it
| straight, you are proposing that we _always_ should have
| an energy crisis in Europe?
| londons_explore wrote:
| The futures market, even 5 years out, doesn't show a
| return to old prices.
|
| It looks like the market doesn't expect russian gas to
| ever return.
| Gwypaas wrote:
| Like an addon of $10-20/MWh. That does not pay for a
| nuclear plant.
| thrashh wrote:
| Most countries are small and have to choose between being
| neighborly but dependent or self-sufficient but much more
| modest.
|
| The UK, for example, imports nearly half of its food.
| consumer451 wrote:
| Project's official site: https://xlinks.co/morocco-uk-power-
| project
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| I wonder when are we starting to lay cables across longitude so
| you get solar power when it's night time. Thinking this out loud
| now - lower night time loads get covered by wind and other
| renewables.
| andrewstuart wrote:
| Sounds like an major national security vulnerability.
| yuliyp wrote:
| I'm amazed by the NIMBYism for the middle of the desert. Yes it's
| not completely devoid of life and impact, but as far as places
| for generating solar power go, it's about as good as you're gonna
| get.
| samwillis wrote:
| Extensive discussion from last year:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31143636
|
| "UK-Morocco 10GW Renewable Electricity Interconnector Planned"
|
| 110 points, 243 comments
| whywhywhydude wrote:
| It's insane how these articles somehow conjure up some kind of
| nonsensical bad for environment arguments. Putting solar panels
| in the desert is good for the environment. It reduces the ground
| temperatures and lets more plants and animals survive. It might
| also slow down further desertification.
| mohamedattahri wrote:
| I see where you're coming from, and I agree that the arguments
| highlighted in the article are rather unconvincing, but messing
| up with ecosystems ALWAYS triggers unintended consequences.
| Some might be good, others terrible.
|
| I wouldn't be as definitive about the "good" in it as you make
| it sound.
| threeseed wrote:
| Their arguments really are ridiculous.
|
| It ignores the fact that climate change is disproportionally
| going to affect Africa and that doing nothing does not mean the
| status quo remains for nomadic tribes.
|
| It means more desertification, less grazing area and greater
| poverty.
| kinnth wrote:
| This!
| Retric wrote:
| It's different, but hard to say if it's better or worse
| globally. Dust from the Sahara plays a major role in cloud
| formation and transporting nutrients to the Amazon basin.
|
| I doubt it would be significant for the Amazon in the short
| term, but it could mean less frequent but larger tropical
| storms in the mid Atlantic which then pound the east coast.
| blippage wrote:
| I have to say that this is one of the dumbest ideas I've heard in
| a long time. Like "you have to be dropped on your head as a baby"
| dumb.
|
| Let's say the cable is 5000 miles long. How much power
| dissipation is there going to be over this distance?
| _Microft wrote:
| According to the article, it is 2300 miles, that is
| approximately 3700km. Losses for HVDC power lines are in the
| low single digit percent per 1000km.
|
| China already built a 12GW connection over 3000km for example.
| That was not a submarine cable, though.
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-voltage_direct_current
| nl wrote:
| > How much power dissipation is there going to be over this
| distance?
|
| Not much, and it should be efficient enough to make economic
| sense.
|
| Note that the article says it is 3700km, not 5000 miles.
|
| Ultra high voltage lines lose about 3.5% per 1000km[1]
| (although this is improving). In China they have multiple
| 3000km+ lines, eg[2].
|
| Some estimates indicate the US could reduce generation
| emissions by at least 80% with better long distance
| transmission capacity[3].
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-voltage_direct_current
|
| [2] https://spectrum.ieee.org/chinas-state-grid-corp-crushes-
| pow...
|
| [3] https://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate2921
| WatchDog wrote:
| Singapore is building a similar project, a large solar array in
| Australia connected by undersea cable[0].
|
| I think it makes a lot more sense for a city state like
| Singapore, with very limited space to build their own power
| infrastructure.
|
| But for a country like the UK, just the energy security risk
| alone seems dangerous, especially after what we have seen with
| the Russian gas pipelines.
|
| These cables can easily be attacked, any country with a semi-
| competent navy could probably pull it off covertly, which would
| make attribution difficult.
|
| Although I guess the US could have been a little more covert
| about their efforts[1].
|
| [0]: https://suncable.energy/
|
| [1]: https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/02/09/ftaz-f09.html
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Can anyone comment on how sane this is for energy security?
| Probably OK if this is not required energy but is used with local
| redundancy.
| seanalltogether wrote:
| > The cost of the proposed 10,500-megawatt Xlinks project is
| expected to be $22 billion, half for the solar and wind energy
| farms and half for the cables.
|
| I thought the UK had too much wind energy as is, why would they
| be importing more?
| diordiderot wrote:
| The wind blows consistently at night and infrequently during
| the day in that region.
|
| Solar during the day and wind at night for, relatively to
| solar, steady energy generation
| Gwypaas wrote:
| It is all about correlation between sources. The wind power
| where it connects to is more weakly correlated to UK's existing
| wind compared to for example Danish.
| [deleted]
| 8jy89hui wrote:
| This sounds like the output of a LLM. No actual reasoning or
| thought.
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