Hinkley Point C – Will It? – Won’t It?

Will Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant ever despatch electricity to the National Grid?

Andrew Newby’s willing to bet it won’t!

Colin Megson’s willing to bet it will!

2 old men of dubious sense who are likely to be dead before the bet ‘matures’

Still, we’ll be leaving it up to our facebook friends to make sure the bet is honoured in all eventualities through these facebook pages:

THE ABOMINATION THAT IS WHITELEE WINDFARM !

Scottish Power still publicise that Whitelee Windfarm has an “…average capacity factor of 27%...” – But this is the reality of metered generation:

WHITELEE WINDFARM OUTPUT

 The trendline, as of Nov 17, is down at about 15% and STILL trending downwards. That’s not capable of generating enough electricity to power “…*298,837 homes per year…”, it’s only generating enough to power 166,021 homes per year.
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Wind farms were paid more than £100 million in 2017 to switch off their turbines. Astonishingly, windfarms receive on average 40 per cent more when switched off than when they are generating electricity.The National Grid pay the windfarms, but it is added to electricity bills of consumers.

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Scottish Power are, today, quoting a generating ‘capability’ for Whitelee Windfarm which is 80% in excess of metered reality !!!

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“…The topography of the area is of a relatively flat plateau with occasional hills rising above the flatter plateau landmass, all of which is overlain with deep peat, in some places reaching down past 8 meters………. No-one knows exactly when blanket bogs began to form but its accepted that it was somewhere between 6000 and 9000 years ago…” 

WHITELEE LANDSCAPE - BLANKET BOG 

IT'S FAIR TO SAY THE SITE OF WHITELEE WINDFARM WAS UNDEGRADED PEATLANDS ! 

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“…Here we show that, whereas in 2010, most [undegraded peatlands] sites had potential to provide net carbon savings, by 2040 most sites will not reduce carbon emissions even with careful management. This is due to projected changes in the proportion of fossil fuels used to generate electricity.

 THE RESULTS SUGGEST FUTURE POLICY SHOULD AVOID CONSTRUCTING WIND FARMS ON UNDEGRADED PEATLANDS unless drainage of peat is minimal and:

THE VOLUME EXCAVATED IN FOUNDATIONS CAN BE SIGNIFICANTLY REDUCED COMPARED TO ENERGY OUTPUT…” 

Wind farms on undegraded peatlands are unlikely to reduce future carbon emissions 

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This paper was published just 3 years after Whitelee commenced operation, following the excavation and muck-spreading of 850,000 m³ of undegraded peatland (ancient - 6,000 to 9,000 years old - blanket peat bog).

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In addition, 2,500,000 tonne of stone was quarried for roads and turbine bases; 120,000 tonne of concrete was used; 2,250,000 non-native conifer trees [900 hectares] were removed; 300 hectares of spruce trees were removed.

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The raison d'être for windfarms is to save greenhouse gas emissions. Was Whitelee worth it when its Capacity Factor was 27%? 
DOUBTFUL !!!

Now its Capacity Factor is 15% - WHAT’S THE POINT ?

WHAT IS THE POINT !!!! 

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Whitelee would not pay back its Carbon Debt if it operated for 100 years!!!

But its lifespan may only be 20 years - 

25 years at the most.

How many more onshore windfarms are worsening our greenhouse gas emission, when we are paying through the nose for them to supposedly improve matters???

3,200 MW OF NUCLEAR POWER = 22,116 MW OF OFFSHORE WIND POWER.

3,200 MW Hinkley Point C [HPC] NPP [nuclear power plant] will operate at a capacity factor of 90% for its 60 year design life. It will generate 1513.7 million MWh of 24/7 electricity.

950 MW Moray East Offshore Windfarm [MEOW] will power up to 950,000 homes at 3,300 kWh p.a.. This gives a 1st year capacity factor of 37.67%. But the latest research paper shows an annual decline in turbine performance of 1.6% p.a., which reduces the 25 year average capacity factor to 31.25%

Over its 25 year lifespan of its 100 x 9.5 MW turbines, 1 MEOW will deliver 65.0 million MWh of intermittent electricity.

 It would take windfarms using a total of 970 x 9.5 MW turbines to deliver the same amount of electricity every year as HPC. That would occupy an area of 2,862 sq km, compared to the 0.08 sq km HPC site.

 But that's not the end of the story. To generate for 60 years, those 970 wind turbines would have to be decommissioned and replaced a 2nd time and be 10 years into their 3rd build before reaching the HPC total. That's a factor of X2.4.

 2.4 x 970 turbines = 2,328 x 9.5 MW wind turbines = 22,116 MW

@ £1,800 million/950 MW, the capital cost is £41,904 million.

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HPC has been awarded a CfD rate of £92.50/MWh for 35 years and the commercial £42.00/MWh rate for 25 years. However, a fairer comparison requires the use of a £57.50/MWh CfD rate for 35 years. Note: the 35:60 ratio for NPPs is lower [more disadvantageous] than the 15:25 ratio for windfarms.

MEOW has been awarded a CfD rate of £57.50/MWh for 15 years and the commercial £42.00/MWh rate for 10 years.

Spending £41,904 million in Overnight Costs on Offshore Windfarms, for a ‘Profit’ of £3,247.47 million equates to:

A Compound Interest Rate just over 0.3% p.a. - [Three Tenths of 1%]

Spending £18,000 million in Overnight Costs on a NPP, for a ‘Profit’ of £43,223.85 seems a far better investment bet.

Applying the £92.50/MWh for 35 years takes the ‘Profit’ up to £74,129.13 million - an even better investment bet for the children and grandchildren of investors too.