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Yet the UK, not exactly blessed with excess sun, has already reached a point of generating more by renewables than fossil. With little noticeable impact on anyo

Yet the UK, not exactly blessed with excess sun, has already reached a point of generating more by renewables than fossil. With little noticeable impact on anyone anywhere aside from a few windmills in hilly spots, or visible a mile or so off some areas of coastline, and a fair bit of roof mount solar. If that is all the space required to power the planet I find cause for much hope. I doubt there would be much impact on anyone once you distribute across all the countries. How much area is available globally that is currently empty roof? Car parks as others have noted. What of offshore, covering reservoirs, road and rail side verges and medians, wind, wave and nuclear. How much scrub and desert that provides little for us or the local flora and fauna? Unless Minnesota plans on actually powering the world it doesn't seem a reasonable comparison or objection.

BurningFrog 8y ago
> Yet the UK, not exactly blessed with excess sun, has already reached a point of generating more by renewables than fossil Sorry, but more of what precisely? Not all kinds of energy, surely?
- NeedMoreTea 8y ago
  Nuclear + wind, solar and hydro has now achieved parity (and just surpassed) coal, oil and gas for electricity generation. Both in capacity and actual generation achieved. We have a way to go to match Orkney, but electric is progressing nicely down the route to fully renewable, even with the Tory changes of subsidies. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-06/britain-now-has-more-green-capacity-than-any-other-power-source https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-06/britain-n...
  - acidburnNSA 8y ago
    Are you counting nuclear as renewable then? Not totally off-base since uranium in seawater replenishes at a rate higher than we could ever extract it at world scale for a few billion years.
    - NeedMoreTea 8y ago
      Nuclear comes out pretty well on CO2. I figure it has to be part of the mix as we move away from fossil, even if we eventually just use it to buy 40 years and ultimately move entirely to non-nuclear renewables.
  - BurningFrog 8y ago
    Aha. That explains it. I assume wind and solar are < 1% of that "renewable" total.
    - tobylane 8y ago
      No need to assume (especially with such a low number). http://gridwatch.co.uk/ http://gridwatch.co.uk/ has nuclear, solar and wind at 18%, 6% and 15%. Wind reached 37% this year, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wind-power-record-electricity-gigawatt-output-national-grid-a8260836.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wind-power-r...
glogla 8y ago
According to http://electricitymap.org http://electricitymap.org UK has most installed and used capacity in gas power plants.
- NeedMoreTea 8y ago
  Well a much publicised yearly report commissioned by Drax (UK's largest coal and biomass station) this week from Imperial College and sourced from Nat Grid thought otherwise. https://www.drax.com/press_release/capacity-renewables-overtaken-fossil-fuels/ https://www.drax.com/press_release/capacity-renewables-overt... Who's most up to date or accurate? Given the steady drop of fossil capacity, perhaps electricitymap that seems to be volunteer run simply hasn't caught up yet? There's over a 5GW difference in amount of installed wind power between that site and the "over 20GW" claimed in the Imperial report. Solar varies by a similar percentage. There have been other reports on the same lines throughout this year of the dropping off of fossil and rise of renewables, for both generation and capacity. Even with the distraction of fracking and changes to feed in tariffs.
  - rndmio 8y ago
    That's the maximum net generating capacity, but you can't just turn it on, it generates what it generates based on the wind/sun. If you want to see a live breakdown of power generation to the UK grid it's here http://gridwatch.co.uk/ http://gridwatch.co.uk/
Reason077 8y ago
"Yet the UK, not exactly blessed with excess sun, has already reached a point of generating more by renewables than fossil." Natural Gas is still the biggest source of electricity generation in the UK, by some margin. But it is declining, slowly. By the early 2020s, it's likely that wind turbines will have overtaken nuclear as the #2 source. UK electricity generation mix: https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/data-portal/electricity-generation-mix-quarter-and-fuel-source-gb https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/data-portal/electricity-generation-...
- Sean1708 8y ago
  I think they must be including nuclear in renewables (32.97% non-renewables w/o nuclear, 21.69% renwables w/o nuclear, 36.79% renewables w/ nuclear).
  - NeedMoreTea 8y ago
    Correct. Nuclear + renewables as against fossil.
polotics 8y ago
May I recommend euanmearns.com as a reliable claim-debunking source? Also manicore.com some of the contents is in English.

BurningFrog 8y ago

> Yet the UK, not exactly blessed with excess sun, has already reached a point of generating more by renewables than fossil Sorry, but more of what precisely? Not all kinds of energy, surely?

NeedMoreTea 8y ago
Nuclear + wind, solar and hydro has now achieved parity (and just surpassed) coal, oil and gas for electricity generation. Both in capacity and actual generation achieved. We have a way to go to match Orkney, but electric is progressing nicely down the route to fully renewable, even with the Tory changes of subsidies. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-06/britain-now-has-more-green-capacity-than-any-other-power-source https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-06/britain-n...
- acidburnNSA 8y ago
  Are you counting nuclear as renewable then? Not totally off-base since uranium in seawater replenishes at a rate higher than we could ever extract it at world scale for a few billion years.
  - NeedMoreTea 8y ago
    Nuclear comes out pretty well on CO2. I figure it has to be part of the mix as we move away from fossil, even if we eventually just use it to buy 40 years and ultimately move entirely to non-nuclear renewables.
- BurningFrog 8y ago
  Aha. That explains it. I assume wind and solar are < 1% of that "renewable" total.
  - tobylane 8y ago
    No need to assume (especially with such a low number). http://gridwatch.co.uk/ http://gridwatch.co.uk/ has nuclear, solar and wind at 18%, 6% and 15%. Wind reached 37% this year, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wind-power-record-electricity-gigawatt-output-national-grid-a8260836.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wind-power-r...

glogla 8y ago

According to http://electricitymap.org http://electricitymap.org UK has most installed and used capacity in gas power plants.

NeedMoreTea 8y ago
Well a much publicised yearly report commissioned by Drax (UK's largest coal and biomass station) this week from Imperial College and sourced from Nat Grid thought otherwise. https://www.drax.com/press_release/capacity-renewables-overtaken-fossil-fuels/ https://www.drax.com/press_release/capacity-renewables-overt... Who's most up to date or accurate? Given the steady drop of fossil capacity, perhaps electricitymap that seems to be volunteer run simply hasn't caught up yet? There's over a 5GW difference in amount of installed wind power between that site and the "over 20GW" claimed in the Imperial report. Solar varies by a similar percentage. There have been other reports on the same lines throughout this year of the dropping off of fossil and rise of renewables, for both generation and capacity. Even with the distraction of fracking and changes to feed in tariffs.
- rndmio 8y ago
  That's the maximum net generating capacity, but you can't just turn it on, it generates what it generates based on the wind/sun. If you want to see a live breakdown of power generation to the UK grid it's here http://gridwatch.co.uk/ http://gridwatch.co.uk/

Reason077 8y ago

"Yet the UK, not exactly blessed with excess sun, has already reached a point of generating more by renewables than fossil." Natural Gas is still the biggest source of electricity generation in the UK, by some margin. But it is declining, slowly. By the early 2020s, it's likely that wind turbines will have overtaken nuclear as the #2 source. UK electricity generation mix: https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/data-portal/electricity-generation-mix-quarter-and-fuel-source-gb https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/data-portal/electricity-generation-...

Sean1708 8y ago
I think they must be including nuclear in renewables (32.97% non-renewables w/o nuclear, 21.69% renwables w/o nuclear, 36.79% renewables w/ nuclear).
- NeedMoreTea 8y ago
  Correct. Nuclear + renewables as against fossil.

polotics 8y ago

May I recommend euanmearns.com as a reliable claim-debunking source? Also manicore.com some of the contents is in English.