Is the double peak evidence of effective UK demand management?

Today for the first time I noticed that electricity demand peaked twice - at 1730 and again at 1845 ( 2nd Feb 2015).
Both peaks were 52.4 GW, with a "trough" of 51.7 GW at 1830.
Furthermore, demand was almost flat for a full twenty minutes from 1730 to 1750
Why am I telling you this geeky fact?
It looks as though the reason for this is demand response kicking in.
Industrial users anticipate high "Triad" charges which can occur without warning on days of very high peak demand in February .

Here is a screenshot from Stephen Morley's excellent realtime National Grid  site for 2nd and 3rd Feb

The double peak is clearly visible.

It shows that demand response works!

I wonder what the peak would have been without it?

Let's all do what we can with our own domestic consumption to pull the peak right down to the 1500 and 2000 figure of around 47GW by this time next year!

Happy demand side responding!

There is no correlation between the size of the carrot and demand reduction at peak times!

Here is a very useful summary from a DECC report of the effects of price motivators on the extent to which domestic electricity users alter their consumption patterns.

There is one clear message:

They hardly do at all!

As predicted by Alex Laskey of Opower, consumers do not react to this sort of price message! (Interestingly, though, the average reduction is about 14%, which is what is needed to eliminate the early evening peak).

People react to peer pressure - so the useful communication is:

I shift my electricity time-of-use out of peak times, do you?

Tell your friends!

Disaggregated Homes: Household energy consumption without major consume...

Disaggregated Homes: Household energy consumption without major consume...: I've already noted that the tumble dryer, washing machine and dishwasher account for a quarter of Alex's energy consumption. However...

Time for a new approach to electricity - how we can solve the energy trilemma together. Introduction

It’s time!

Time to make electricity affordable.

Time to save the planet.

Time to keep the lights on.

If I told you that you could make a significant contribution to doing this without even reducing how much you use, and without any expensive equipment, would you believe me?

Most people probably wouldn’t.

They might say there’s no such thing as a free lunch, there must be a catch.

But there isn’t!

In the UK, every winter weekday, from 3 to 8pm, peaking at around 5.30, we use seven large power stations ( 7 Gigawatts) worth of electricity more than we do at any other time. Why? Because some people are coming home from school and from work, and it’s getting dark. Most offices, factories and shops are still working.

But here’s the good news – that peak, which is about 14% above the normal daytime level, can be easily avoided.

If we all shifted our consumption out of the peak by an average of just 350W (3½ bright old fashioned light bulbs) the problem would be solved.

If you ask people in the electricity industry, most of them will tell you that the problem will be solved by smart meters – unfortunately it won’t!

Smart meters in themselves will not switch anything off, much less work out when to delay consumption for specific appliances. They will allow for more complicated time-of-use tariffs in future, which will penalize us for using electricity at peak times, but even these will rely on us to respond by switching things off or delaying them coming on.

How many hospital beds does it cost to provide extra electricity at peak times - or to timeshift it?

Depending on whether you take the EDF or the EU figure, Hinkley C will cost us the consumer/taxpayer between £5000 and £8000 per kilowatt of capacity. To underwrite this, the Government is committing us as taxpayers to a wholesale price guarantee to EDF of £93/MWh, which is 9.3p/unit. To get the corresponding domestic retail price, you can  at least double this figure to 18p.

What are we paying for and are there cheaper ways of getting it?

The 3.2GW capacity of Hinkley C equates to 120 Watts for each UK household.

Timeshifting 120W per household is not onerous. If each of us used delay timers, as fitted to modern appliances, it would very easily eliminate the need for such a power station.

All we need to do is set our dishwasher, tumble drier or washing machine to
come on at around 2-4 am when national demand is at a minimum.

Each of us would then save £600 to £1000 in new capacity costs, at no extra cost to anyone. We just need to remember to buy appliances with delay timers when we come to replace them.

Or do we have a spare £24 billion for the next new power station?  It's over ten times what George Osborne has just promised the NHS as a top-up.

At £255/night, it's 94 million hospital bed nights.

Tell your friends!

Hinkley C - what we can do personally to control the cost of new power stations.

Some searching questions came up when the National Grid disclosed in late October that national power generation capacity would be at a seven year low this winter. The safety margin – spare capacity - fell from 17 per cent three years back to around four per cent for the coming cold season. Generator shutdowns and closures were blamed for the steep drop. The National Grid made predictably soothing noises. Yet the point had been lit up, in flames, on national media a week earlier as a huge fire spread across four cooling towers at Didcot power station in Oxfordshire. True, Didcot was back on stream the next day. But electricity output at the plant will be less than four-fifths of normal levels for some time. And the power station serves around a million people. Do we need to worry? The short answer is probably not – or not that much. Yet the UK’s shrinking power reserves throw into sharp relief a longer-term issue that everyone among the UK’s 64 million people will need to consider, even if their prime concern is keeping household bills down. You could call it ‘The Energy Trilemma’ – keeping the lights on, keeping the bills down, and preventing climate change. It’s often presented as a huge conundrum. Yet there is a surprisingly simple answer. How can anyone make such a bold statement? And, if true, why isn’t it being done already? Each winter day in the UK, between 3pm and 8pm, we use about 14% more electricity than at other times . People are coming home from work and school. Yet many offices and factories are still hard at work, and burning power. It’s cold and dark, so we use a lot of electricity. Britain wants to cut greenhouse gases by 80% by 2050. And with power costs spiraling year on year, businesses have a strong financial incentive to cut their electricity consumption during those peak hours. At home, it’s another story. We can try shifting our use of power-hungry appliances to different times. But unless you’re on an Economy Seven tariff or have solar panels, you are unlikely to benefit financially. Or are you? Hinkley C, a new nuclear power station, got the construction go-ahead from the EU in late 2014. It will yield 3.2 Gigawatts of power, or 3.2 million Kilowatts of power. The estimated cost was also hiked from £16 billion to £24.5 billion. That works out at nearly £8,000 per kilowatt. On current usage, we need about one kilowatt each for every person in the country. But the key point is that this applies only at peak times. The decision to build new power stations is based on estimates of future peak demand. It’s also assumed that domestic consumers – you and I, assuming we’re on the mains – will do nothing to reduce our individual peak demand because we have no direct financial incentive to do so. But we do have a very significant collective incentive to do something about it. That’s because every kilowatt we stop using at peak times contributes to a large cost saving on building new power stations. The saving is around £8,000 per per person if we carry on building nuclear power stations like Hinkley C, and the cost will rise. In the long run we’ll have to stump up these sums through bills or taxes, for the government subsidizes the construction costs of new power stations and needs to get the money back. So how can we avoid paying? By switching our peak consumption times. That goes for immersion heaters, dishwashers, washing machines and tumble driers. And there’s no need to reduce our overall consumption, either, though it’s useful in terms of bills and the environment alike. Shifting our use of power-hungry appliances that aren’t especially time-sensitive away from 3pm-8pm peak period would largely eliminate the peak. And with modern appliances, it takes no effort at all, simply because they’re usually fitted with delay timers. For instance, if you normally start up your dishwasher at 7pm, you could delay it for anything up to 20 hours - without having to get up in the middle of the night. (I set mine to start at 2am.) Immersion heaters are another clear example. They don’t need to be on all the time. So if you have one, you can fit a time switch and the water will stay hot. (I set mine to switch off at 7am, back on again at 8pm. And if I happen to want a piping hot bath during the day, I can easily override it.) There’s a strong precedent for taking collective action of this kind, and that is recycling. We are mostly willing to sift our rubbish into categories, with no direct reward. We just know it’s the right thing to do. It helps. Isn’t it time to do the right thing with electricity as well? If enough people did, there would be an indirect payoff, both financial and environmental: fewer new power stations, no matter what fuel they burn.

If Hinkley C costs £16 billion, how much is it worth to get rid of the 7GW peak?

At £16 billion, Hinkley C is costing a staggering £5 billion per GW.
If we carry on like this, our electricty capacity will cost us about £5,000 each!
That's each person, so nearer £15,000 per household.
Are we willing to do anything about it?
I hope so.
Eliminating the 7GW peak would save us £35 billion for a start.
It would be worth the Government giving away smart appliances that delay switching on to after peak times.
Think about it.
A new dishwasher  would save £500 in generating capacity cost even on the conservative assumption that shifting its use out of the peak period only saves 100W.
Please Mr Davey, can I have a new washing machine? I promise not to use it between 3 and 8pm in winter....
Thoughts on a postcard to Ed Davey at DECC - or tweet me @tomgld1