Electronics > Power/Renewable Energy/EV's

Not as Green as it should be... SF6 leakage

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Gyro:
I've just been watching an interesting news story. Apparently leakage of SF6 is increasing rapidly from our electrical infrastructure (up by 8.1% in 2017). One reason is that, with wind farms etc. our generating capacity is becoming much wider spread that when it was restricted to a few large power stations.

Given that SF6 is such a powerful greenhouse gas - 23500 times that of CO2 ( :o ) and so persistent, it doesn't take much of it being released to start eroding the benefit  being gained over fossil fuelled generation.

It looks as if the industry really needs to get an urgent grip on this, both in preventing release and finding alternatives for switchgear and general HV insulation. They seem to be scoring a bit of an own-goal at the moment.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-49567197

ejeffrey:

--- Quote ---It looks as if the industry really needs to get an urgent grip on this, both in preventing release and finding alternatives for switchgear and general HV insulation. They seem to be scoring a bit of an own-goal at the moment.

--- End quote ---

Only if you don't do math.

According to the article the UK and EU emit an equivalent amount of SF6 as 6.73 million tonnes of CO2.  Some fraction of that is presumably due to increased wind generation.

The EU produced 336 TWhr of wind power in 2017.  Compared to natural gas, that saves 191 million tonnes of CO2.

If wind power were responsible for 100% of the total SF6 emissions (which again, they are not), that would be equivalent to about 3.5% of the avoided emissions.  That puts it on the same scale as the energy consumption used in their production and installation.

It does sounds like something that should be addressed, but "wind power's dirty secret" and "a bit of an own goal" is not really reasonable.

fourtytwo42:
Unfortunately this is typical BBC reportage, certainly no longer the respected organization it once was.

FreddieChopin:
What about all those tankers using 2-stroke diesels running on bunker fuel? That's more harmful than some minor leaks from trafos.

babysitter:
SF6 is heavy as reproductive human interaction, good luck getting any up there. :)

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