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https://www.britannica.com/eve... [britannica.com]
So you are saying no one drives anymore because there is to much traffic?
https://www.timeout.com/london... [timeout.com]
The traffic is bad, but what is it mostly? Delivery vans and trucks, taxis, busses, and motorbikes. It's pretty well-utilized before private cars / SUVs even get to the party.
He's just channeling Yogi Berra.
There's a ã15 per day congestion fee to drive in.
It needs to be 5x that, probably more, and extend all the way out to the M25. At the moment, you can enter the congestion charge zone (eventually), pay your £15 and sit stuck in traffic for ages. There's an optimum capacity for roads, beyond which adding more cars reduces the capacity, and London is way, way over that point.
And yet, the moronic driver lobby will fight tooth and nail any attempt to do anything about it, because at
And you think that will contain information about coal-smog pollution in London 1000 years ago (your claim)
Well, I sit surprised : Britannica claims "But polluted fog was an issue in London as early as the 13th century, due to the burning of coal, " ; I'm not disputing the "polluted fog" bit (you can get that from burning wood, charcoal,
Maybe they need everyone to buy EVs.
Maybe they need everyone to buy EVs.
Might balance out demand, from what I hear.
> Heck the cost of AC for my home adds more to my electric bill then my EV. Which is the actual problem Homes use a lot of energy, actually a lot more than an EV
You must have a giant home in a hot climate? The average 2-car US home would use more than 4x their AC usage to power cars.
This was recently discussed in Congress by an MIT engineer who does policy and is off-grid solar/EV himself.
For a Typical American Driver. A UK Driver drives a lot less. Thus needing less pull from the grid.
I work from home, and I only typically just drive small distances (40-50 miles a few times a week (which is more than I previously drove, because EV cars are just more fun to drive for some reason)) For a US Driver a trip of about 200 miles we would have it as a day drip, while in the UK, you would normally spend the night or the weekend.
The world doesn't revolve around the US, the rest of the world has different problems, and different advantages. Saying that the US use case for Solar Cars and its effect on the grid is the same as the UK is just idiotic. However my driving distance from my experience aligns closer to the average UK driver than the Average US driver. Thus my assertion that EV for the UK isn't the major issue to its Electrical Infrastructure problems, but homes are.
40-50 miles a few times a week
40-50 miles a few times a week
For reference, the UK average is 142 miles per week.
> You must have a giant home in a hot climate? The average 2-car US home would use more than 4x their AC usage to power cars.
[citation needed] - Interesting you don't mention the person's name... (I bet it's Thomas Massie; a climate change denier who got upset that a math course used greek symbols, to give you an idea of the caliber of engineer he is)
US average driving is 40 miles/day. If we assume both vehicles are used as such that's 80 miles/day. If we further assume a nominal 3.0 mi/kwh efficiency, that's ~27 kwh per day. If we go by rule of thumb the average US home is ~2200 sq.ft. which is just on the lower end justifying a 4-ton unit, but let's stick with 3-ton. A 3-ton AC system will use about 3500 watts continuous. If it runs 8 hours a day that's 28 kwh. =Smidge=
A lot of people live in the suburbs and work in an urban area, which if you don't take a train is a commute of 30-60 minutes @ 65mph. Average that all out and it's pretty reasonable that the average would be 40 miles with some people not driving much and others doing 120 miles round trip each day.
I can't imagine averaging LESS than 40 miles a day, personally.
I think for most of my working career, I've always wound up with jobs where the office was about a 45-70 minute commute, each direction. Sometimes I could work from home, mind-you. But then there are weekends where I drive to visit friends or run errands, etc.
So yeah... probably typical for me to drive more like 100 miles/day average.
I can't imagine averaging LESS than 40 miles a day, personally. ... So yeah... probably typical for me to drive more like 100 miles/day average.
I can't imagine averaging LESS than 40 miles a day, personally. ... So yeah... probably typical for me to drive more like 100 miles/day average.
The Federal Highway Administration says that the average annual miles per driver is 13476 miles / year [dot.gov], which is 37 miles / day. And that's precisely why one should not rely on personal experience or anecdotes in these matters.
Oddly enough, I don't mind it so much. I like listening to music on the drive, because I really can't do it while working. (I mean, I've worked in several offices where it was allowed using earbuds or headphones -- but it's just never been practical or enjoyable for me to do it because I always have co-workers needing to ask me something or my boss calling my name from across the hall, or like in the current job? I need to listen for the front door's doorbell chime, because I'm often the one who has to let
You must have a giant home in a hot climate? The average 2-car US home would use more than 4x their AC usage to power cars. This was recently discussed in Congress by an MIT engineer who does policy and is off-grid solar/EV himself.
You must have a giant home in a hot climate? The average 2-car US home would use more than 4x their AC usage to power cars.
This was recently discussed in Congress by an MIT engineer who does policy and is off-grid solar/EV himself.
Absolutely, it's a silly comparison to just say "2 car home" without specifying where the home is and especially when it was built.
A home built in the last 5 years is wildly different in energy usage than homes in a lot of states that are 50, 60 sometimes over 100 years old. The insulation R values are much higher, the windows, doors, and construction methods are much more refined and will have newer more efficient HVAC systems.
It's also pointless to compare EV power to HVAC power usage, they are what the
My EV adds between $25 and $40 to my electric bill on any given month, which is nothing compared to the winter/summer price swing of $250 per month. and $25-$40 on electricity is way less than what I was paying in gas, and my car got 30mpg highway.
The average 2-car US home would use more than 4x their AC usage to power cars.
The average 2-car US home would use more than 4x their AC usage to power cars.
What has US got to do with London? I drove so little last year that the power of my car would be less than the power of my server running 24x7, or me running an AC for about 3 days.
They could build new houses too passivhaus standard, fit big solar installations and batteries. Overall contribution to the grid, especially at peak times, would be positive.
They won't though because all new houses in the UK are crap.
I wish more people here in the UK knew about options other than buying new builds from the handful of big housebuilding firms, whose products do mostly seem to be mid-quality and light on features at best.
In the current market, I bet quite a few homebuyers would consider waiting for a custom build using a smaller firm in exchange for getting a much better home and usually spending much less than it would cost as a turnkey sale. Including things like solar power and heat pumps instead of gas heating and appl
The majors own the land.
The majors own the land.
There's truth in that, but a lot of it is because the current planning regime makes it unattractive for smaller builders to take the risks involved in buying such large plots. If the rules incentivised breaking up those plots and selling them in parts to smaller builders or self-builders then the buying patterns would surely change to match.
Most houses in London don't have AC. Most of the year it's simply not needed, and people are more likely to need heating - and most heating in the UK is gas powered i believe.
I thought the thoughtless hand of the "market" was to sort all this out for us so we did not have to ourselves. Has that been repealed now?
We are here right now in 2022, timestamped, saying this will stress out the grid and destroy poor peoples ability to afford electricity
One could make a similar argument, but timestamped going back decades, saying that climate change will destroy huge numbers of peoples ability to...live.
Yeah, I really struggle to see EVs scaling up much past the tech-bro market.
Why? They're like older cars except you can charge them on the roadside rather than driving to a petrol station.
This is what you get with the Tories, under investment in infrastructure combined with magical thinking.
Fisted by the invisible hand once again.
But hey, I'm not the one to kinkshame.
What? Utilities are naturally monopolies & aren't competitive unless you set up some kind of artificial, govt regulated competition system?! Tell me it's not true!!!
What? Utilities are naturally monopolies & aren't competitive unless you set up some kind of artificial, govt regulated competition system?! Tell me it's not true!!!
I think he was saying the opposite. Goverments create the monoplies by restricting who can joing the market. We see the same in the States with ISPs.
With Internet you build to the curb and let any provider use the public right away. If we were not so corrupt we would have a government fiber network to the curb and on that network ATT, Verizon, local assholes, would offer Internet service. We would get cheaper, faster Internet then we do now, but because ATT, Verizon have already bought the local politicians we now have to suffer with typically one or two options that cost about the same with okay service.
Electric (go solar+batteries) and water (water ca
Electric (go solar+batteries) and water (water catchment and filtration system). Sewage can even be handled with septic tanks or use composting toilets. Grey water can be filtered and used for outdoor watering.
Electric (go solar+batteries) and water (water catchment and filtration system). Sewage can even be handled with septic tanks or use composting toilets. Grey water can be filtered and used for outdoor watering.
You must live in the countryside. Solar and batteries are on shaky ground in terms of reliability, it's why even homes with big roofs and small number of people still need to be connected to the grid in case of failures. And as for both those and septic tanks, good luck getting those to work in a densely populated area. Hell, even luck won't matter. You just can't do it. You need sewers. With septic tanks the ground around high-rises would become saturated with shit. Composting toilets, nope. Don't work in
I don't really have much issue with central water, sewage, etc but we fail so hard at fair and reasonable as a society that the people controlling all this infrastructure are private interests that are doing it for money (got to pay the mortgage, or the yacht) as opposed for the overall benefit of society.
As a southern Californian, I'm quite sure they are screwing people on the price of electric and water. Speaking of water, if we are in a drought maybe we should act like. Beyond our state government whinin
That's not the invisible hand you're feeling, in a lot of cases these utilities and grid operators are little more than privatized monopolies. The market is not at play here, a few cronies have been given the opportunity to fleece the public. Same in my own country, BTW.
That's not the invisible hand you're feeling, in a lot of cases these utilities and grid operators are little more than privatized monopolies. The market is not at play here, a few cronies have been given the opportunity to fleece the public. Same in my own country, BTW.
While it's trendy to blame "monopoly utilities" , the reality is utilities that actually manage wires operate almost entirely off of what the government allows for funding in terms of rate increases. They also operate within the confines of what the government allows in terms of project planning. There isn't any real discretion on the part of the utility. And private utilities profit typically by building infrastructure or by hitting government set metrics for things like outages, speed of new connections
Every government and local council ever underfunds when it comes to infrastructure vs. building houses. It's essentially a license to print money, rely on creaky old infrastructure while issuing building permits to pack ten dogbox apartments on a property sized for one house.
So this isn't going to stop the money rolling in to the council/government, they'll just keep charging to allow houses to be built and charging again every year once they're built, and whether there's power, water, parking, or ameniti
Every government and local council ever underfunds when it comes to infrastructure vs. building houses. It's essentially a license to print money, rely on creaky old infrastructure while issuing building permits to pack ten dogbox apartments on a property sized for one house. So this isn't going to stop the money rolling in to the council/government, they'll just keep charging to allow houses to be built and charging again every year once they're built, and whether there's power, water, parking, or amenities available for them is someone else's problem. The previous government, or that other department way over there, or the local council if it's the government, the government if it's the local council.
Every government and local council ever underfunds when it comes to infrastructure vs. building houses. It's essentially a license to print money, rely on creaky old infrastructure while issuing building permits to pack ten dogbox apartments on a property sized for one house.
So this isn't going to stop the money rolling in to the council/government, they'll just keep charging to allow houses to be built and charging again every year once they're built, and whether there's power, water, parking, or amenities available for them is someone else's problem. The previous government, or that other department way over there, or the local council if it's the government, the government if it's the local council.
You betray a complete lack of knowledge about how UK councils and housing work.
I have no knowledge of who is responsible for what permitting in the UK or what the tax local/regional/national tax authority structure looks like. So I'll just talk about the related issue the poster was speaking about in American terms.
he has a point - the issue though unless you are the Fed and Maybe the national treasury - as long as you can hawking those bonds - money does have to come from somewhere. It not like city council folks are sitting around going - Hey lets hawk building permits and grow the
This is what you get with the Tories, under investment in infrastructure combined with magical thinking.
This is what you get with the Tories, under investment in infrastructure combined with magical thinking.
London's mayor, who has a lot of power in many areas of running the city and it's infrastructure is Labour.
Yes? The tories whine about few houses being built, but it's overwhelmingly Tory voting NIMBYs who block them. Sewage is regulated nationally, not locally. A labour council might be on the receiving end of raw sewage, but the amount of raw sewage discharge has been increasing, and Labour aren't in power.
Yes? The tories whine about few houses being built, but it's overwhelmingly Tory voting NIMBYs who block them. Sewage is regulated nationally, not locally. A labour council might be on the receiving end of raw sewage, but the amount of raw sewage discharge has been increasing, and Labour aren't in power.
Yes? The tories whine about few houses being built, but it's overwhelmingly Tory voting NIMBYs who block them. Sewage is regulated nationally, not locally. A labour council might be on the receiving end of raw sewage, but the amount of raw sewage discharge has been increasing, and Labour aren't in power.
The current Tory government brought in changes in planning laws where they have to approve projects without a decent reason not to.
Now, install a generator to Her Majesty's wheeled throne.
Of course, it is known how to do this right. Probably one or several of the famously incompetent current crop of UK political "leaders" had a hand in this.
I imagine city planning is more difficult in places like London which has a lot of infrustrue and housing in place before electrical grids where even a thought.
I'm sure hypothetically, knocking down everything existing and starting from scratch would produce a much more well thought, and efficent city, but that's not reaaly feasable.
They know that they will have this fixed in 10 years. That means they screwed up the planning.
They should have been aware of capacity limitations years ago and started working on it _before_ it became a problem. What sort of knuckleheads run London?
What sort of knuckleheads run London?
If you're talking about the Mayor of London, his first name has been Sadiq for over 6 years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
I'm pretty sure his first name has been Sadiq for his entire life.
Great motivation for developers to start building their own micro-grids.
There is absolutely zero reason that a new neighborhood can not come with solar, wind, and storage, and leave the old grid behind.
Distributed micro-grids are where we really need to be moving. They are more fault-tolerant and less expensive, and unlike with carbon-based plants there is little efficiency gain for solar and wind at scale... the efficiency scales much more linear... so why try to centralize it all? It is old-school thinking.
One side of a street is houses, the other side is solar panels, vertical wind turbine generators and micro nuclear fusion reactors*.
** Which is why we need the solar panels and vertical wind turbine generators in the meantime.
** Which is why we need the solar panels and vertical wind turbine generators in the meantime.
** Which is why we need the solar panels and vertical wind turbine generators in the meantime.
And you will have dead birds (the real flying kind) everywhere. So how it that stench going to be an improvement?
Great motivation for developers to start building their own micro-grids. There is absolutely zero reason that a new neighborhood can not come with solar, wind, and storage, and leave the old grid behind. Distributed micro-grids are where we really need to be moving. They are more fault-tolerant and less expensive, and unlike with carbon-based plants there is little efficiency gain for solar and wind at scale... the efficiency scales much more linear... so why try to centralize it all? It is old-school thinking.
Great motivation for developers to start building their own micro-grids.
There is absolutely zero reason that a new neighborhood can not come with solar, wind, and storage, and leave the old grid behind.
Distributed micro-grids are where we really need to be moving. They are more fault-tolerant and less expensive, and unlike with carbon-based plants there is little efficiency gain for solar and wind at scale... the efficiency scales much more linear... so why try to centralize it all? It is old-school thinking.
That sounds fantastic. There aren't many cloudy/rainy days in london (Ya right) and the wind is always blowing at around 15 KPH (nope), and exactly what Solar and Wind "Storage" are you talking about? Micro Suns and Blow Dryers? I love the"magical thinkers" that make it sound so easy to have "reliable energy" with solar and wind ... and issolated at a neighborhood level is laughable.
If you were talking about micro neuclar plants, or even coal/gas as the reliable energy source (aka. "storage" as you might call it), then you could have something to talk about. But issolated grids depending completely on wind and solar and this mythical storage that doesn't exist yet is setting themselves up for issues like Sri Lanka.
If you don't believe the reports about how terrible it is for Sri Lanka, and others that have gone "green", you're not paying attention. Sri Lanka has national "power cuts" where people have to shut their power off after specific hours. It's insanity, but you ironically won't find this talked about in the US news. I only know about it because I talk to people in Sri Lanka and they have been having to work around the "power-cut" schedules for the past months.
https://ceb.lk/ [ceb.lk]
https://newsin.asia/power-cut-... [newsin.asia]
The panels are magic now? You're still going to get less than half of peak output on a cloudy day and even less in the winter.
It's sort of possible on a national scale, but the thread was talking about local "micro-grids".
Shame there's only a limited number of solar panels in the world, and we can't just add more of them to cover cloudy days.
You get ~2.85 equivalent daily hours of sun on an annualized basis-- dropping to 0.85 in the winter (highest demand period), and 4.5 in the summer. Not a meaningful offset in winter for a residential house that might be able to generate 6 kWh per day in the winter.
Realistically the only way to do a microgrid in London area for a housing estate would be with gas microturbines and district heating, along with a good sized battery and thermal storage. It is unclear if the root issue is transmission, distribution, or generation, but that addresses all three.
What the UK really needs though is a major efficiency and insulation upgrade program for the existing housing stock... preferably with fire-rated insulation. District heating might help in places, but most would be be
This is true. Where I live every second house has a heat pump so I forget they are not as common elsewhere.
In its note [archive.ph], the GLA said pressure on the grid in west London has been particularly acute because a number of data centres have been built nearby in recent years, taking advantage of fibre optic cables that run along the M4 corridor, before crossing the Atlantic.
According to the GLA, "data centres use large quantities of electricity, the equivalent of towns or small cities, to power servers and ensure resilience in service".
So charge them more in order to give them an incentive to use less power or move someplace more appropriate for their power needs.
Would the city approve that kind of building in the middle of the city? Are there no regaultory roadblocks that would prevent data centers from leaving the grid and creating their own?
West London can be quite far out of "the city" especially if it is close to the M4. Sounds to me like the boroughs might be desperate enough to consider granting them permission to run another cable alongside the M4 or perhaps even drop it into the river.
There are other nearby cites to the west of London, It may not need to run the cable very far to join the adjacent "area" (or however the grid is compartmentalized)
Maybe instead of taking grid power they could pay adjacent property owners to rent them r
"So sorry, we can't build your posh new condo because I want to watch Netflix."
So charge them more in order to give them an incentive to use less power or move someplace more appropriate for their power needs.
So charge them more in order to give them an incentive to use less power or move someplace more appropriate for their power needs.
The GLA doesn't get to set the tariff for the electricity, the electricity companies do.
The only contracts which work like that are those between you and tech giants which get to say "accept our new terms or fuck off". The rest of the world has consequences of change, and consequences mean lawyers.
There's a reason energy companies all over Europe are going bankrupt, and that reason has something to do with them not being able to simply charge more money.
Sure they should invest in grid but this is the right thing to do with limited supply.
Compare with New England ISO where Boston banned natural gas heat for all the new buildings and is mandating electric resistive.
With no new generating capacity. No new pipelines are allowed. No new nukes can be rated. No off-shore wind. No LNG terminals. Zoning against solar. No new hydro.
Because, fuck it, ESG and "power comes from the wall, that's where". Rolling blackouts are forecast in NH and VT because of these fuckheads. We're looking at separating from MA so they can die in peace.
Highly recommend leaving MA. Born and raised there but I just couldn't take the stupidity, corruption, criminality, malevolent AG, horrendous roads, high taxes, excessive and nonsensical level of bike lanes, etc.
I've got bad news for you about the rest of the country
While more capacity is a good idea, this isn't really about electricity generation, but about electrical distribution.
It doesn't matte if you can make 1 billion kV if your transformers and wires can only transport 1 million kV. Standard high voltage lines carry 800 kV, sublines carry upto 69 kV. Each one of those can supply about 250 homes.
You add a subdivision with 300 homes and you need a new subline going to it. If you build 10 or so large condominium buildings and you need a new High Voltage overhead
Sure they should invest in grid but this is the right thing to do with limited supply. Compare with New England ISO where Boston banned natural gas heat for all the new buildings and is mandating electric resistive. With no new generating capacity. No new pipelines are allowed. No new nukes can be rated. No off-shore wind. No LNG terminals. Zoning against solar. No new hydro. Because, fuck it, ESG and "power comes from the wall, that's where". Rolling blackouts are forecast in NH and VT because of these fuckheads. We're looking at separating from MA so they can die in peace.
Sure they should invest in grid but this is the right thing to do with limited supply.
Compare with New England ISO where Boston banned natural gas heat for all the new buildings and is mandating electric resistive.
With no new generating capacity. No new pipelines are allowed. No new nukes can be rated. No off-shore wind. No LNG terminals. Zoning against solar. No new hydro.
Because, fuck it, ESG and "power comes from the wall, that's where". Rolling blackouts are forecast in NH and VT because of these fuckheads. We're looking at separating from MA so they can die in peace.
It is insane that first-world countries are dealing with "limited supply" issues of electricity generation. This is how first-world countries become third-world countries in a hurry. When governments no longer have the will/ability to satisfy the most basic requirements of the populace in less than a 13 year timespan.
I doubt there is a mandate for resistive, more a consequence of developers cheaping out and most consumers being idiots.
I don't really see the problem with forcing new developments into ground source heatpumps though. Drilling costs for large developments are negligible, the utilization of drill rig and operator time is an order of magnitude better than for single homes. Ground source heatpumps just make sense for large housing developments. The earn back time relative to resistive would be a couple years,
Are you sure? From a little googling it appears two big offshore wind projects are in the works, Commonwealth Wind and Mayflower Wind
https://www.offshorewind.biz/2... [offshorewind.biz]
https://www.commonwealthwind.c... [commonwealthwind.com]
Compare with New England ISO where Boston banned natural gas heat for all the new buildings
Partially false [wsj.com]. Boston is not Brookline, and Brookline is not Boston.
and is mandating electric resistive.
No new pipelines are allowed. No new nukes can be rated. No off-shore wind. No LNG terminals. Zoning against solar. No new hydro.
A whole bunch of citations needed, because I'm not going to chase down each of your lies [boston.gov].
Rolling blackouts are forecast in NH and VT because of these fuckheads. We're lo
Remember modems? When it felt slow, you simply enabled Van Jacobson in PPP and voila: faster internet!
Apply that same principle on the electricity grid: compress the electricity to fit more through the existing lines.
This isn't much different from water shortages in the American west. The developers don't give a sh*t. That's somebody else's headache down the road. The city governments don't give a sh*t for two reasons: A) they're looking at all the additional property tax revenue they'll have to play with and 2) they've often been bought by the developers themselves.
What you need is somebody with an engineering background who is willing to force the developers to make sacrifices. Case in point, a friend was on a cou
One of their main power providers, Electricité de France was nationalized by Macron a few weeks ago.
But he might concentrate on France first.
The amount of money developers would be willing to pay to get those projects off the ground has to be an order of magnitude more than what is needed to get distribution put in within a couple years.
Everything can be solved with enough money, except government. No fucking way a 13 year delay can be down to market limitations, government has to be the cause.
I think TFA screwed up its housing count, or counted skyscrapers with 200 units and single-family homes as "1" (of ~45,000... 5000 / 0.11). Greater London has ~16,000 people per square mile, and a population of at least 10-12 million. I think the slums of Mumbai & Lagos have more housing units per resident than TFA's math claims London has.
Cities tend to be dense. Meaning less square meters that you could use for a home solar array. Cities while could benefit from having roof top solar, will probably need a grid to get it going along, now that grid energy could possibly be powered by green or greener energy.
This. Remember that solar is not magical, and a 10x10 solar panel with a 100% perfect conversion to energy ratio cannot generate more energy than a 10x10 window lets into your house.
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