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Financial Times: Energy from industry could halve gas imports
Industries across the UK could generate as much electricity as 10 nuclear power stations and halve gas imports by installing or extending plants that generate energy while using the waste heat to warm local buildings, according to a report by Pöyry Energy Consulting, commissioned by Greenpeace.
A surprising solution to our energy needs
Posted by tracy on 19 June 2008.
No one will be surprised that Greenpeace is against the construction of new nuclear power stations, but what some may find unusual is one of the solutions we are proposing to meet our energy needs and reduce our CO2 emissions - industrial CHP, or combined heat and power.
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Securing Power
Securing Power - Summary
Green energy firm moves up the field with bid to power London Olympics
Power cuts blamed on "antiquated energy system"
Tuesday's power cuts were due to an "antiquated energy system", according to environmentalists.
Robin Oakley, head of Greenpeace's climate and energy campaign, said: "Britain's antiquated centralised energy system relies on a few large power stations, such as our aging and increasingly unreliable nuclear power plants. When they fail the impact can be enormous. Sizewell B for example, the plant that failed on Tuesday, has the single greatest need for back-up on the national grid.
"Creaking, outdated nuclear plants, such as Sizewell, cannot deliver energy efficiently, reliably or cheaply.
"But there's a very simple answer. Using a decentralised energy system, and producing power closer to where it is needed, would meet our energy needs, tackle energy security and slash carbon emissions. More local power stations means that the system overall is much more robust if problems arise."
The huge loss of energy associated with the UK's centralised system occurs because large power stations discard heat, while more power is lost transporting the energy long distances through power lines. Decentralised power plants - also known as Combined Heat and Power (CHP) plants - supply heat to homes and businesses as well as electricity thereby doubling the efficiency with which they burn fuel.
ENDS
Greenpeace press office: 020 7865 8255
The Weekly Geek: combined heat and power (CHP)
Posted by bex on 7 March 2008.
The ROCA 3 CHP plant in Rotterdam provides electricty and heat to 400,000 homes
Due to popular demand (well, demand anyway), The Weekly Geek now has its very own RSS feed.
Back in 1882, Thomas Edison built the United States' first electric power plant. Pearl Street Station, which supplied the good folks of Lower Manhattan with electricity for lighting and steam for manufacturing, was around 50 per cent efficient.
125 years on, the typical UK power plant is just 38 per cent efficient. But those modern power plants that have been built on the same principles as Edison's are reaching efficiency levels of up to 95 per cent.
So how did Edison do it? And where are we going so wrong?
In this week's slightly tardy Weekly Geek, we're looking at combined heat and power (CHP): the system Edison was using, and the heart of any truly clean and efficient decentralised energy system. (Those who read the first Weekly Geek on decentralised energy may notice a fair bit of crossover.)
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Government nuclear announcement only bold in its deception
Posted by tracy on 10 January 2008.
I was sitting in my local last night with the Arsenal game on and looking around me at the rapt faces in the Hackney pub and I started to wonder what makes people so passionate about football yet so apathetic about politics and the future of our planet.
It's rip-off Britain, even when it comes to climate change
Posted by John Sauven on 23 October 2007.
John Sauven, our executive director,writing in The Guardian on why Gordon Brown's reluctance to embrace the economic and environmental potential of renewable energy technology is costing us time, money and could eventually cost us the climate.
At the centre of Britain's efforts to tackle climate change are targets for renewable energy, energy efficiency and ultra-efficient combined heat and power (CHP) plants.
Yet as warnings about the impact of global warming grow more severe, every single one of those targets is projected to be missed or has already been abandoned.
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The real solution to climate change
Posted by bex on 3 August 2007.
We recently launched a new film about the real solution to climate change (clue: it's not nuclear power - and the film explains exactly why not). The film's been sent to every MP in the country and is making its way around the interweb nicely. But we think its message - that the UK needs a new, and sane, energy system now - is crucial and we want to push it out further. So we've produced this new trailer.
There are plenty of ways you can help us get the word out: write to your MP asking them to watch the film; embed the film or the trailer on your website, blog or MySpace page; send it to a friend; Hugg it, Digg it or add it to your StumbleUpon favourites.
Climate change is happening. We know exactly what needs to be done to stop it. The technologies already exist. Let's do it.