Labour Day News

A little off the usual track for my blogs, but ... it is Labour Day Monday, and in the U.S. there's a group of workers inspired by the idea that a person with a full-time job should be able to escape poverty.

Just in time for Labour Day,  the New York Times' Economix pages included In New Wave of Walkouts, Fast-Food Strikers Gain Momentum;

As a wave of one-day walkouts by fast-food workers gains momentum in a push for a $15 hourly wage, the movement has been notable both for the prominence of young faces and for the audacity of their demand.

The next day on the same site Jared Bernstein's "The Audacity of the Fight for Higher Wages" replied;

...corporate profits were again up near record highs as a share of national income while compensation fell again and is now at the lowest share it has been since the year I was born (1955 — ancient history, I know).
And yet, what I mostly heard about this was about the audacity and the economic illiteracy of the strikers.

The Canadian Encyclopedia communicates the relevant of Toronto, and it's newspapers in the formation of Labour Day.

Knew Study on Wind Energy Impacts on Property Value

Pretend you are a government distributing funding for studies out of genuine curiousity.
then
Pretend you are a government looking to purchase a predetermined outcome from a study.

Which situation explains the newest study:

Entergy to Close, Decommission Vermont Yankee

So much for Vermont being a low-emissions electricity system.

The stated reasons for Entergy's decision seem to mirror Dominion's stated reasons for closure of Kewaunee earlier this year.

Entergy to Close, Decommission Vermont Yankee - Financial (FINANCIL) News - InvestorPoint.com:

The decision to close Vermont Yankee in 2014 was based on a number of financial factors, including:

• A natural gas market that has undergone a transformational shift in supply due to the impacts of shale gas, resulting in sustained low natural gas prices and wholesale energy prices.

• A high cost structure for this single unit plant. Since 2002, the company has invested more than $400 million in the safe and reliable operation of the facility. In addition, the financial impact of cumulative regulation is especially challenging to a small plant in these market conditions.

• Wholesale market design flaws that continue to result in artificially low energy and capacity prices in the region, and do not provide adequate compensation to merchant nuclear plants for the fuel diversity benefits they provide.

Making the decision now and operating through the fourth quarter of 2014 allows time to duly and properly plan for a safe and orderly shutdown and prepare filings with the NRC regarding shutdown and decommissioning.

The entire article can be read at InvestorPoint.com

The feasibility of small modular reactors is questionable when smaller,  lower-cost, legacy reactors are not.

Heatwave dampens green energy hopes in Scotland, and ...

Electricity units: The marketers equivalent of stepping down to gigawatt hours from terawatt hours is stepping down to kettles from houses.

Heatwave dampens green energy hopes | UK | News | Daily Express:

SCOTTISH Government plans to generate all of the country’s electricity from renewables have been blown off course by the summer heatwave.
Wind farm electricity output drastically fell away as a high pressure system throughout June, July and August gave the country a welcome break from months of rain.

Ontario's wind generation is much weaker in warmer months

The massive drop in energy production during the weeks of hot, windless weather has seen wind farm critics claim the strategy will see the “lights go out” in Scotland.
In total turbines produced 1,044GWh (gigawatt hours) of electricity in June, 4.7 per cent of the total 22,335MWh input from all sources into the National Grid.
In July that total dropped to just 726GWh – or 3.1 per cent, of the total.
The statistics for this month lie at 667MWh, which is 5.1 per cent of the total output.
During one week-long period at the height of the heatwave, one wind farm – Bilbster, near Wick – was generating enough to boil little more than 180 kettles, instead of the intended equivalent of 1,300.

Continue reading at the Daily Express

Coming soon to YOUR electricity bill ... in Ontario

A couple of perspectives on the large increases occurring in what the system operator refers to as the "commodity charge" - consisting of HOEP (Hourly Ontario Energy Price) and the Global Adjustment Class B rate.

The article below is the result of a collaboration between myself and Parker Gallant; I think it features Parker's knack for focusing on how all these figures, and the actions of government, are, and will increasingly be, impacting residential and small business consumers' electricity bills

As I worked with Parker I was snared by the realization that aspects of Ontario's electricity contracting meant prices would fall only if emissions rise - and vice-versa.  I attempt to communicate the absurdity of the situation on my original content site in The Capacity Trap: Ontario's Electricity Costs Soar as Emissions Drop.

Coming soon to YOUR electricity bill:OEB spin (originally posted at Wind Concerns Ontario)

The Ontario Energy Board (OEB) is responsible for setting Ontario's time-of use (TOU) and regulated price plan (RPP) electricity rates, and it does this twice annually, in April and October. The announcements are made slightly in advance of the effective dates of May 1st and November 1st and reflect what the OEB anticipates will occur in the upcoming six months. The reset rates are based on what the OEB feels will be required to pay the generators over that period of time. 

The OEB preface their announcement by saying that “the increase will add [insert amount] to the average ratepayer’s bill per month or [insert percentage] of the total monthly bill.” They never specify that it is only the cost of electricity and that other items on your bill will/or may have already gone up! Their last announcement on TOU and RPP rates indicated an increase of 2.9% for the May 1, 2013 bills but it was actually an annual increase of 11% for many residential consumers. 

The upcoming announcement in late October will accordingly reflect an adjustment to what has actually occurred (during the six months from May 1st to October 31st) and what is anticipated in the next six months.

Based on the first three months (May through July 2013) of the current period, Ontario's ratepayers should expect another significant increase. Data from the Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO) indicates this period has seen a drop in Ontario's demand of 4.7% or 1.7 terawatts (TWh) which is equal to 1.7 billion kilowatts (kWh). In any sane industry, a drop in demand normally signals the providers that the product/service needs a price reduction, or suppliers to exit the market, but the electricity sector is not ruled by “sane” individuals. It is a instead a centrally mismanaged industry run by the McGuinty/Wynne Liberal government with support from the NDP.

Do wind turbine costs need to come down?

An article in the New York Times today ends with the obligatory cost concerns from a wind industry figure

Wind Farms Take Root Out at Sea | New York Times

“If you want to do wind on a big scale with power plants based on wind, you need to go offshore,” said Michael Hannibal, chief of Siemens’s offshore wind business.
“Power plants” are the important words here. Wind farms are no longer engineering experiments or small pilot schemes. They have grown very large, to the point where they are of the same scale as gas- or coal-fired power stations.
...The key to cutting costs, Mr. Hannibal said, is to ...
Mr. Hannibal said that costs are coming down at the rate of 40 percent per decade, but he concedes that the industry still has much to do to become competitive. The high costs mean that there is little incentive to build these plants without hefty subsidies.
“We are fooling ourselves if we depend on subsidies,” he said. “We know we need to bring costs down.”

"Ourselves" are not the target of Hannibal's fooling.

MISO board frets over generation losses expected by 2016

"Whether the wolf is on the porch or in the room, it's damn close to where we're sitting"

Another jurisdiction sees a capacity crunch approaching

MISO board frets over generation losses expected by 2016 - Electric Power | Platts News Article & Story: 

In addition to 6.5 GW of known retirements -- many of which were initiated by new federal environmental rules -- another 4.5 GW of generation is mothballed and expected to be retired for environmental or economic reasons.
As generators representing another 200 MW have not responded to the survey, those are also assumed to be retired, Moeller said.
"I'm not prepared to cry wolf, but the conditions are such that there may be a wolf at the door," Moeller said. "There's a full moon, there's howling, and indications are that there may in fact be a wolf."
A male speaker who was not identified to conference call listeners added: "Whether the wolf is on the porch or in the room, it's damn close to where we're sitting, regardless of where the wall is."
MISO expects about 2,400 MW of new build generation to be brought online across its footprint by the summer of 2016.
Assuming no load growth, MISO could be short 3,000 MW of generation needed to meet its minimum 14.2% planning reserve margin by 2016, Moeller said. Assuming 0.8% load growth, the potential shortage could be as much as 5,000 MW, and assuming 1.4% growth, the shortage could be 7,000 MW, he said.
"We have not operated at those [levels of] minimum requirements since the late 1960s," Moeller said.

Update on Electricity Market Reform: The Capacity Market

Interesting article finishing up a series on U.K. electricty reforms.  Jurisdictions implementing programs to spur generation from variable renewable energy sources lack of clear path to ensuring sufficient firm capacity for meeting demand at all times

Update on Electricity Market Reform: The Capacity Market | Reed Smith - JDSupra: 

There are therefore two aspects to the proposed Capacity Market:

• Increasing potential supply, by ensuring that there is sufficient “spare” capacity that is able to generate during periods of high demand when additional electricity is required. In terms of the Capacity Market, we are talking not of traditional plant margin but instead about generating capacity which is only called upon in times of potential generating shortfall.

• Reducing demand, whether this means electricity users agreeing to limit their electricity use in periods of high demand (Demand Side Response (DSR)), or through incentivising permanent electricity demand reduction.

I've Been Misled on wind forecast accuracy, and the cost of renewables

A couple of stories that caught my attention this week.

The global wind industry was repeating claims from IBM (International Business Machines Corp.).
Home News TechnologyIT IBM taps Big Data to boost renewable power output | Business Green

IBM has officially launched a new weather modelling system specifically designed to help renewable energy generators and utilities accurately predict output from wind and solar farms, allowing them to reduce back-up power requirements and increase output from renewable energy plants.
The so-called 'Hybrid Renewable Energy Forecasting' (HyRef) system combines advanced weather modelling with detailed information on windturbine and solar panel output to allow utilities to model output in near real time.

Sounds great, but ...
I've Been Misled on the claims of accuracy in forecasts before.  In May, Ontario's Independent Electricity System Operator presented on "Centralized Forecasting Accuracy":

10-years Before the Blackout 10 years ago: Re-Energizing Ontario

The mainstream media has lots of stories about the great blackout of a decade ago - here's a speech from Bob Rae's second appointed head of Ontario Hydro from 1993.

As Ontario dabbles in long-term system planning once again, it's worthwhile to consider the scarcity of supply during peak demand periods in 2003 wasn't necessarily due to decisions in only a couple of years preceding 2003.

Re-Energizing Ontario: The Empire Club Addresses:

In light of our current surplus capacity, which we project will continue for the next 10 years, Ontario Hydro cannot commit to developing new capacity, to extending existing capacity by retubing the Bruce A reactors, or purchasing new supplies from non-utility generators at a time when we don't need the power. To do so would result in unnecessary rate increases at a time when our customers can least afford them.

Read Maurice Stong's entire 1993 speech