<story><title>Wind turbines in Denmark reached record level in 2014</title><url>http://energinet.dk/EN/El/Nyheder/Sider/Vindmoeller-slog-rekord-i-2014.aspx</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jacquesm</author><text>Scotland (and other countries besides) has a lot of &amp;#x27;pumped storage&amp;#x27;, lakes at a relatively high point that are fed from lakes at a lower point by running pumps that push the water from the lower lake to the higher one when energy is cheap and then back into the grid when it is more expensive (when there is a scarcity).&lt;p&gt;The net effect of this is that electricity originally generated by nuclear plants and other fossil fuel plants gets &amp;#x27;converted&amp;#x27; into (more expensive!) &amp;#x27;green&amp;#x27; energy.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s a kind of white-washing for electrons. The price difference can be substantial more than making up for the cost of the pumping and subsequent re-generation.&lt;p&gt;And of course it&amp;#x27;s the energy sold to the public that matters, not how it was originally generated so by double counting this energy it changes the balance considerably without there actually being more renewable energy to begin with.</text></item><item><author>teh_klev</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t understand what you mean by that. Could you explain?</text></item><item><author>jacquesm</author><text>Beware of double-counting pumped storage.</text></item><item><author>teh_klev</author><text>Scotland does pretty well with regards to renewables with ~49.8% of energy consumption sourced from renewable sources (17.1k GWh wind&amp;#x2F;hydro out of 19k GWh total renewables).&lt;p&gt;This puts wind and hydro at around 42%.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.scottishrenewables.com&amp;#x2F;sectors&amp;#x2F;renewables-in-numbers&amp;#x2F;#chart5&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.scottishrenewables.com&amp;#x2F;sectors&amp;#x2F;renewables-in-num...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.gov.scot&amp;#x2F;Resource&amp;#x2F;0048&amp;#x2F;00480365.pdf&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.gov.scot&amp;#x2F;Resource&amp;#x2F;0048&amp;#x2F;00480365.pdf&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jsingleton</author><text>Pumped storage is typically reported separately from Hydro. So much so that Hydro is officially referred to as &amp;quot;Non-pumped storage Hydro&amp;quot;. Pumped isn&amp;#x27;t included as a renewable because the energy mix will depend on when it&amp;#x27;s recharging as a consumer of the grid. Typically this is overnight so usually nuclear power and wind is used as coal and gas spin down then.&lt;p&gt;Currently both pumped and hydro are making up about 1% of the UK grid each: &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s only useful to think about it in the short term as long term it adds nothing. It just functions as a buffer.&lt;p&gt;You can go round one in Wales: &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.electricmountain.co.uk&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.electricmountain.co.uk&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>Wind turbines in Denmark reached record level in 2014</title><url>http://energinet.dk/EN/El/Nyheder/Sider/Vindmoeller-slog-rekord-i-2014.aspx</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jacquesm</author><text>Scotland (and other countries besides) has a lot of &amp;#x27;pumped storage&amp;#x27;, lakes at a relatively high point that are fed from lakes at a lower point by running pumps that push the water from the lower lake to the higher one when energy is cheap and then back into the grid when it is more expensive (when there is a scarcity).&lt;p&gt;The net effect of this is that electricity originally generated by nuclear plants and other fossil fuel plants gets &amp;#x27;converted&amp;#x27; into (more expensive!) &amp;#x27;green&amp;#x27; energy.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s a kind of white-washing for electrons. The price difference can be substantial more than making up for the cost of the pumping and subsequent re-generation.&lt;p&gt;And of course it&amp;#x27;s the energy sold to the public that matters, not how it was originally generated so by double counting this energy it changes the balance considerably without there actually being more renewable energy to begin with.</text></item><item><author>teh_klev</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t understand what you mean by that. Could you explain?</text></item><item><author>jacquesm</author><text>Beware of double-counting pumped storage.</text></item><item><author>teh_klev</author><text>Scotland does pretty well with regards to renewables with ~49.8% of energy consumption sourced from renewable sources (17.1k GWh wind&amp;#x2F;hydro out of 19k GWh total renewables).&lt;p&gt;This puts wind and hydro at around 42%.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.scottishrenewables.com&amp;#x2F;sectors&amp;#x2F;renewables-in-numbers&amp;#x2F;#chart5&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.scottishrenewables.com&amp;#x2F;sectors&amp;#x2F;renewables-in-num...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.gov.scot&amp;#x2F;Resource&amp;#x2F;0048&amp;#x2F;00480365.pdf&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.gov.scot&amp;#x2F;Resource&amp;#x2F;0048&amp;#x2F;00480365.pdf&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>teh_klev</author><text>Scotland only has one pumped storage scheme (Cruachan). It&amp;#x27;s annual generation was only 705 Gwh (as at 2009), which is only 13% of total hydro generation. Sure there might be &amp;quot;green electron&amp;quot; washing going on, but it&amp;#x27;s probably not significant.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Cruachan_Power_Station&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Cruachan_Power_Station&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>