General > General Technical Chat
"Gas Armageddon": Energy/electricity prices in EU/UK (and how to deal with them)
nctnico:
--- Quote from: richard.cs on August 25, 2022, 05:38:27 pm ---
--- Quote from: nctnico on August 25, 2022, 03:20:42 pm ---
--- Quote from: richard.cs on August 25, 2022, 02:15:37 pm ---The low efficiency of creating it by electrolysis is unfortunate, but not necessarily a show stopper depending on the source of the energy input. What I can't see is why we would ever use hydrogen as H2 (an inconvenient gas that's hard to liquify, low energy density, explosive in pretty much all concentrations, leaks through almost everything, embrittles metals, etc.) rather than stick it to some carbon atoms and make synthetic methane or synthetic LPG.
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If you dig a bit deeper into hydrogen you'll find that it is widely used in many industrial processes. People that make such claims seem to reason from a POV where the large scale use of hydrogen is something completely new. It simply isn't. The technology and infrastructure are there, it just needs to be scaled up from large to extra-extra-large.
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Sure, there's plenty of hydrogen used industrially, though I would be enormously surprised if industrial hydrogen use is within two orders of magnitude of methane use. Almost none of that is made electrolytically, instead by reacting natural gas with steam. Nor does the fact that it's widely used industrially have any bearing on whether it is a good idea to distribute it to the general public in a network of pipes not designed for it, through private pipes not designed for it, to large amounts of equipment also not designed for it.
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That is the kicker: the public gas distribution network in the NL (and appearantly in the UK as well) is already being modified to support hydrogen. In the NL there are several small suburbs which are using hydrogen instead of natural gas already.
And for sure most of the hydrogen is produced from natural gas nowadays but hydrogen electrolysis plants that use electricity from wind & solar are going to be built in the next couple of years. It is not something that happens overnight or has all the pieces in place at the same time.
Miyuki:
btw I know when I was small they switched from Coal/Town gas to Natural gas where I lived. It was not so long ago. In 1996.
I'm not sure if they used coal or reformed it from natural gas. But it might be coal fed as there were plenty of coal mines and some coal-fired power plants operating to this day.
But they just purged the lines and do something with gas appliances, but they stayed in place, grandma uses that same stove for 50 years.
I just wonder if it can be in the worst case swapped back coal gas. I know the generator equipment will be long gone. But Europe has coal and even if not, it can be transported way easier than Natural gas.
james_s:
--- Quote from: vad on August 25, 2022, 05:17:36 pm ---
--- Quote from: james_s on August 25, 2022, 04:34:13 pm ---It's pretty hard to tell Russia what to do, and there isn't much the rest of the world is going to be able to do to persuade them short of starting WWIII. I suspect the sanctions will have a negligible effect on Russia, all they are really doing is causing suffering in the countries imposing them.
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What makes you believe that nuclear deterrence no longer works?
Sanctions do have negligible effect, because there are no real sanctions. Russian energy exports are stronger than ever. EU’s oil embargo will only start in January 2023, and EU has no plans to cut natural gas imports any time soon.
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I think that's covered by "short of starting WWIII". Nuclear deterrence may work to a point, but does anyone really think we are going to use them? If we did the result would be catastrophic.
MT:
Lefti US citizen Jimmy Dore on UK energy companies outrageous profits by looting compliant brain washed UK citizens.
NiHaoMike:
--- Quote from: nctnico on August 25, 2022, 03:15:17 pm ---If you Google around a bit, you can find reports that say exactly the same. Batteries are good for storage for single digit hours. Beyond that, hydrogen is more cost effective.
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There's thermal storage that's very cost effective for a few days. Some larger installations might be able to push it to a few weeks before insulation costs render it impractical.
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