UK power production graphics

[pc1966]

I happened on this web site today that shows the UK power production & demand:

National Grid: Live

Shows the live status of Great Britain’s electric power transmission network

grid.iamkate.com

The obvious elephant in the room is today just over half of the power is from gas. What is missing to me is an indication of percentage capacity, i.e. how much of each source is being used at one time.

 

[littlespark]

So we’re not as reliant on solar and renewables as we should be.

I wonder if this information can come direct from the grid itself, rather than someone else’s website?
I might be suspicious, but the vegan with a rescue hamster might be adjusting the data somehow to paint a different picture.

 

[Electro-tech]

So we’re not as reliant on solar and renewables as we should be.

I wonder if this information can come direct from the grid itself, rather than someone else’s website?
I might be suspicious, but the vegan with a rescue hamster might be adjusting the data somehow to paint a different picture.

It was me, I am a meat eater & I used to have a rescue pet hamster.

 

[Julie.]

So we’re not as reliant on solar and renewables as we should be.

I wonder if this information can come direct from the grid itself, rather than someone else’s website?
I might be suspicious, but the vegan with a rescue hamster might be adjusting the data somehow to paint a different picture.

It comes directly from the BMRS, so should be up to date within 5 mins or so (assuming that website updates as the data changes, and not just snap-shots ever so often)

Yeah, that's been one of my arguments/gripes for some time, "EV is good because we only buy our electricity from renewables" - absolute tosh.

How suppliers can sell 100% renewable energy only - and get away with this outright lie is beyond me!

It's pretty obvious as well, every so often usually in the summer, we have a news flash "today the uk was 100% renewable" - if indeed everyone was buying 100% renewable energy, then this wouldn't be such a rare event that its newsworthy - it would be the norm every other day.

Why do we have so many different generation stations at all if we are anything like close to meeting our needs via renewables?

It's so obviously wrong.

 

[plugsandsparks]

Thick cloud today and not too windy, its a bummer for renewables today. Suggest we all stop all activity until the sun shines or the wind picks up otherwise we will never be truly net zero...... Total joke isnt it

 

[Moley]

I prefer the way that Gridwatch lay out the info
HERE

 

[Moley]

I'm with @Julie. with what she says. I've lost count of the number of people who have told me they only use green electricity. Every time I have to go through with them how the grid works. Some still won't accept it.

 

[pc1966]

I knew the UK had gone in for a lot of gas (not just politician's talk) but did not realise it was now over half the total. I guess it has been years though since I last looked and a good few coal plants have gone since.

 

[Moley]

I think that there's only 2 coal left. Ratcliffe and West Burton still has two units on the bars.

 

[SparkySy]

I like gridwatch often have a quick look to see what we are using and producing.
I agree with above comments too,
Even green energy isn't green, it still needs raw materials, shipping, acres of concrete and is only really good for 25-30 years or so at best before it needs replacement. And most of the materials used in their production are not very recyclable.
It saddens me greatly!

 

[GBDamo]

So we’re not as reliant on solar and renewables as we should be.

The only green generation that is dependable is Nuclear and as such it should be our baseline.

Wind and solar are too unreliable without massive storage, which the technology is just not there for, hopefully one day, but not now or the foreseeable future.

You almost have to cover wind and solar with an equal capacity of fast online fossil fuel generation to plug the gaps, gas at the moment.