Wednesday, March 02, 2005
Big business secures LNG supply from Qatar
The Economist has published an article on the recent business developments relating to Shell and liquified natural gas in Qatar. Big firms (Shell, ExxonMobil, Total) and big money are involved; Qatar rulers are praised:
So, *exactly* what do they mean with 'greater energy security'?
"... as demand for LNG grows and the big oil firms go looking for new sources, they may find it easier to avoid those countries that are unstable and unwelcoming to foreign investment, and seek instead places like Qatar, which has reduced bureaucratic barriers and given the multinationals a warm welcome."(?) ***Amazingly*** (?), Iran, Venezuela and Russia are bashed for 'failing to encourage investments in LNG'. Also, according to the Economist:
"Since the world’s gas reserves are more widely spread than is its oil, the growth in facilities for handling LNG should also mean greater energy security"But... isn't Qatar one of the Middle East Arab emirates on the Persian Gulf? Isn't it the very same place where around a quarter of the acknowledged crude oil reserves are? And isn't it one of the 'highly unstable regions' of the planet?
So, *exactly* what do they mean with 'greater energy security'?
Thursday, February 24, 2005
Conference: Copenhagen offshore wind (26-28 October 2005)
The conference programme at Copenhagen Offshore Wind 2005 will include presentations from key players within technology, science, business and policy. The accepted papers will be presented in an innovative setup of plenary and parallel sessions, workshops and poster exhibitions. Here is the call for abstracts (deadline: 1st March 2005).
Conference: EWEA 2006 (Athens, 27 February - 2 March 2006)
Europe's Premier Wind Energy Event is due on 27 February - 2 March 2006 in Athens, Greece.
"The European Wind Energy Conferences are widely recognised as Europe's premier wind energy events, attracting a high number of professionals, leading experts and exhibiting companies from across the globe. It is the ideal forum for up to date and relevant information on business, policy, science and technology."Here is the call for abstracts (deadline: 30 June 2005).
Conference: Joint BIEE-UKERC event (Oxford, 22-23 September 2005)
The BIEE and the UK Energy Research Centre have released details of the forthcoming British Institute of Energy Economics (BIEE) academic conference at St John's College, Oxford. Here is the call for papers (deadline: 6 May 2005).
Anyone interested should apply to Mrs. Mary Scanlan, British Institute of Energy Economics (BIEE) Admin Office by E-mail: admin@biee.org
There is a very much reduced student rate of £50 which includes accommodation and meals in the college (as conference will last for two days).
Anyone interested should apply to Mrs. Mary Scanlan, British Institute of Energy Economics (BIEE) Admin Office by E-mail: admin@biee.org
There is a very much reduced student rate of £50 which includes accommodation and meals in the college (as conference will last for two days).
Conference: Power-Gen Europe (Milan, 28-30 June 2005)
Power-Gen Europe is the conference and trade exhibition for the European power generation industry. It will be held in Milan (Italy) on 28-30 June.
The entry fee for attending the conference is stiffly priced (USD 590 for students); however note that attending the trade event is free.
I attended a similar event around a year ago, and wandering around the trade stands turned out to be a good chance to develop a professional network. Besides, there are plenty of cheap flights to choose from; and Milan is not so bad in late June.
The entry fee for attending the conference is stiffly priced (USD 590 for students); however note that attending the trade event is free.
I attended a similar event around a year ago, and wandering around the trade stands turned out to be a good chance to develop a professional network. Besides, there are plenty of cheap flights to choose from; and Milan is not so bad in late June.
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
Conference: Distribution Europe 2005
Distribution Europe 2005 (New solutions for European energy grids) is an event organised by Synergy. It will be held in Berlin (Germany) on 25-28 April 2005.
The programme at a glance is organised around three broad themes:
The programme at a glance is organised around three broad themes:
- Management and organization
- Operation and innovation
- New energy world
Friday, February 18, 2005
Another bid for power?
Matteo has passed me a link to an article published on the NERA website (and originally published on Energy Risk), arguing the benefits of clock auctions as opposed to the standard request-for-proposal (RFP) process.
Any feedback gratefully appreciated.
"Clock auctions offer benefits over the standard request-for-proposal (RFP) process for procuring electricity, says PSEG's Robinson. Under the RFP method, power suppliers submit sealed bids setting out the amount they wish to supply at a certain price. And even if a supplier's bid is successful, it might end up supplying power at a significantly lower price than another winning bidder.However, just like any other game, an auction mechanism is prone to manipulation by players seeking to maximize their utility. In the case of clock auctions electricity producers are happy because of the price transparency. So, is there anybody who stands to lose? What could be possible equilibria of the game? Has anybody got pointers?
By contrast, says Robinson, in an auction, bidders are informed of the going price; how much the price has ticked down from the previous round; and an approximate idea of how many tranches each utility needs to obtain (they are told a range of, say, 125 to 135 tranches). Hence suppliers can adjust their bids according to the level of excess supply. "
Any feedback gratefully appreciated.
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
Meeting notes - what to publish
Our 2nd meeting was held yesterday at the South Kensington campus. During the meeting I took the chance to introduce some of the practical aspects of the discussion board website to all of us... (read more)
The contents of my presentation included:
* A practical demonstration of: using CiteULike; how to publish, edit and delete a post and comments.
* Achievable objectives Barriers: within the PhD research environment; within the development process
* Target audience
* What to post
* Measures of success
I cannot go over all the details here, and unfortunately the presentation format is ill-suited for it to be released as a file. However, most of the material is already available in the documentation available at the ESG ICL Support website. Over time, I intend to include most of the remaining relevant information in the documentation section.
In the meantime, below is an abstract from the presentation. It's an attempt at defining what would be 'appropriate' to publish on this discussion board. When consolidated, this will be a part of the 'editorial policy' of the discussion board.
Harmless
* Links to press articles
* Industry news, announcements
* Congress news, meetings, round-tables, events, etc.
* Research related open-ended questions
* Outlines of personal research work
* Outlines of research reviews
* Outlines of personal research results
Potentially risky
* Sources of confidential and/or restricted information (what about the piece of information?)
* Outlines of research work within own group?
* Outlines of half-way research progress (public domain – loss of originality)?
Definitely risky
* Breach of copyright
* Breach of posting guidelines
* Rubbish
Any comments and feedback on the above will be greatly appreciated.
The contents of my presentation included:
* A practical demonstration of: using CiteULike; how to publish, edit and delete a post and comments.
* Achievable objectives Barriers: within the PhD research environment; within the development process
* Target audience
* What to post
* Measures of success
I cannot go over all the details here, and unfortunately the presentation format is ill-suited for it to be released as a file. However, most of the material is already available in the documentation available at the ESG ICL Support website. Over time, I intend to include most of the remaining relevant information in the documentation section.
In the meantime, below is an abstract from the presentation. It's an attempt at defining what would be 'appropriate' to publish on this discussion board. When consolidated, this will be a part of the 'editorial policy' of the discussion board.
Harmless
* Links to press articles
* Industry news, announcements
* Congress news, meetings, round-tables, events, etc.
* Research related open-ended questions
* Outlines of personal research work
* Outlines of research reviews
* Outlines of personal research results
Potentially risky
* Sources of confidential and/or restricted information (what about the piece of information?)
* Outlines of research work within own group?
* Outlines of half-way research progress (public domain – loss of originality)?
Definitely risky
* Breach of copyright
* Breach of posting guidelines
* Rubbish
Any comments and feedback on the above will be greatly appreciated.
Monday, February 14, 2005
UK - gas and electricity price rises in 2004
Here's a table showing all the energy price hikes in 2004, plus those announced so far this year. Data provided by uSwitch.
Energy price rises during 2004/05
Supplier Average increase(%) Fuel type Month
Atlantic Electric & Gas 15.5* Gas March
British Gas 5.9 Both January
British Gas 10.9 Both September
EDF Energy
(LE, Sweb and Seeboard) 8.2 Both January 2005
London Energy & Sweb 7.8 Both March
London Energy & Sweb 3.7 Both† September
Npower 5.7 Gas February
Npower 5.9 Elec April
Npower 9.4 Both October
Powergen 5.6 Both January
Powergen 3.1 Gas September
Powergen 9.3 Both November
Powergen Online -3.3 Elec*** April
Powergen Online 10.2 Both**** November
Scottish Hydro 4.9* Gas February
Scottish Hydro 6.1 Both July
ScottishPower 5.3 Both** March
ScottishPower 10.1 Both October
ScottishPower Online 7.2 Both August
ScottishPower Online 10.2 Both January 2005
Seeboard 7.6 Both March
Seeboard 3.7 Both† September
Southern Electric 4.9* Gas February
Southern Electric 6.1 Both July
Swalec 4.9* Gas February
Swalec 6.1 Both July
Virgin HomeEnergy 6.8 Both March
Virgin HomeEnergy 7.8 Both September
Notes:
* For new customers
** Staggered increases throughout UK regions.
*** Online customers in the Scottish Power and Manweb regions.
**** Customers that switched after November 2nd 2004 affected immediately. All other customers affected as of 31 January 2005.
† In Eastern, London, Seeboard, Southern, Swalec and Sweb regions.
Saturday, February 12, 2005
Millionaires' green mansions
Forbes (US magazine) has an article on millionaires' green mansions (USA-centered).
"To the very rich, an energy-efficient home is not about ecology--it's about independence."
"Some of our high-end clients literally never see their energy bills," says Steven J. Strong, founder and president of Solar Design Associates in Harvard, Mass. "They are basically putting a higher value on having more control over their energy destiny. This is a hedge against uncertainty."Worth reading for the several interesting leads on commercial organizations in the USA providing green energy services aimed at the residential sector.
Thursday, February 10, 2005
UK wind power in recent press
Wind power in the UK has attracted fresh attention on recent press.
The NaREC (New and Renewable Energy Centre) website offers a link to a recent article on the FT, "Taking the wind out of fossil dependence", emphasizing that:
Both articles are worth a look, as they provide lots of interesting background on the issue.
The NaREC (New and Renewable Energy Centre) website offers a link to a recent article on the FT, "Taking the wind out of fossil dependence", emphasizing that:
"Wind energy is probably the most immediately promising of all the renewable energy technologies proposed as alternatives to the burning of traditional fuels such as coal."In its latest issue, The Economist offers a somehow different perspective in the article "breezy" (published on 3rd Feb. 2005 - Access requires subscription - article accessible using EBSCO or FACTIVA databases). On one hand it helps understanding why the FT article is upbeat about prospects for wind farms:
"BRITAIN is top of a previously unknown league: countries in which to invest profitably in wind farms, according to Ernst & Young, an accountancy firm. As a result, wind farms are spreading across the country like warm butter."On the other hand, the author states that "plans for wind farms multiply faster than evidence that they work".
Both articles are worth a look, as they provide lots of interesting background on the issue.
Marine renewable energy conference at the Science Museum
From the BWEA website:
The conference programme is structured around five themes:
There is an attendance fee (£255+VAT), I'm not sure about the scope for student concessions. Is anybody interested in attending?
Following on from the success of BWEA's first marine renewable energy event in
February 2004, BWEA is holding its second dedicated annual wave and tidal energy conference on Thursday 3 March 2005 in the IMAX Theatre at the Science Museum, London, sponsored by ScottishPower Renewables.
A range of industry and Government figures will be speaking on the political outlook, supporting marine renewables, finance, investment and consenting issues. Journalist and author Will Hutton will also be chairing a stakeholders panel session and the closing debate.
The conference programme is structured around five themes:
- Finance and investment
- Delivery: where, when and why?
- Supporting marine
- Stakeholders
- Closing debate: a 2020 vision for the sector
There is an attendance fee (£255+VAT), I'm not sure about the scope for student concessions. Is anybody interested in attending?
Monday, February 07, 2005
Electricity Market Liberalisation and Energy Efficiency
Author: Lazaros Exarchakos
Hello!
What follows is a try to gather and mix information from paper reading about energy efficiency in liberalised electricity markets in the EU. I tryed to chop it for making it easy to read it, so if something is not clear to you or even seems to be incorrect, please let me know. Is enybody interested in these issues? What could he suggest? (long post - click on "read more")
Introduction
The dependence of the Member States in total on the imported primary sources of energy (50% now and estimated 70% in the next 20-30 years), carries high risks for the security of energy supply. The security of supply as a term does not reflect the less possible proportion of imported primary energy sources in the overall consumption, but the creation of a highly diversified portfolio of these resources in favour of the ‘clean’ ones and the ‘demand policy’, addressed to the energy efficiency and load management. Further technological progress and financial measures will help to the promotion of these clean resources.
Liberalisation of electricity sector
The traditional structure of the electricity sectoris gradually changing in the electricity markets of Member States in different extent. Under the directions of the EU through the Directive 2003/54/EC (Article 10, ‘Unbundling of Transmission System Operators’) the Transmission System Operator has to be legally and organizationally independent from the other functions of the electricity firm, not related to the transmission. This doesn’t have any implication on the ownership of the transmission company.
Liberalisation of electricity sector
The traditional structure of the electricity sectoris gradually changing in the electricity markets of Member States in different extent. Under the directions of the EU through the Directive 2003/54/EC (Article 10, ‘Unbundling of Transmission System Operators’) the Transmission System Operator has to be legally and organizationally independent from the other functions of the electricity firm, not related to the transmission. This doesn’t have any implication on the ownership of the transmission company.
Bearing in mind that this regulation is a driving force of reforming, four main shapes of electricity structure reforming are very briefly presented in the following sections, which are the Commercialization, Privatisation, Unbundling and Competition (Vine et al, 2003).
Commercialization exposes a former public electricity firm to the taxes, regulations and rules of the market, valid for every private company.
In commersialisation of the electricity market, energy efficiency plans are mostly addressed to the upstream level, and not to the end-users side, because ‘a kWh saved is viewed as lost revenue’ (Vine et al, 2003). This level of energy efficiency implementation is most possible to happen in vertically integrated utilities, where the profit from energy efficiency efforts and investments are going to return to the same utility. However the end-users themselves will move towards energy efficiency measures and this move is possible to create free space in the market for specialized companies dealing with energy saving services.
Privatisation is the transfer of shares or functions of the public owned utilities to the private sector. Therefore, production, transmission, distribution and retail can pass to the exploitation of private companies. Regulations to retain the public service obligations by the new utilities need to be put on by the Member States according to the Directive 2003/54/EC.
The profit of a privatized company is its ultimate goal. Every measure driven from the company and increases its revenues is pretty much possible to increase the bills of its customers who will then try to use electricity efficiently. New companies will emerge for facilitating the customers to save electricity, but as the end-user electricity consumption is crucial for the utility, regulators and governments should establish programs for efficiency and load management (Vine et al., 2003).
Unbundling refers to the separation of the vertical structure of a traditional utility into distinct entities owned or run by different firms. Unbundling can be seen in the frames either of commercialization or privatization of a utility.
At the unbundled status of an ex-vertical utility, the distinct entities may be different firms with their own management or may be firms under the central management of the same business. There are no incentives for energy efficiency measures from companies when these measures are going to make profit not to them, but to other firms.
The proportion of the price of the bill that reflects the tariff is very important for the future of the of energy efficiency plans. If the tariff is the vast majority of the final price the power of efficiency measures seem feeble and so does the potential of emergence for companies dealing with energy efficiency.
Competition which can be divided in wholesale and retail can be applied in every sector of the utility and it is not necessary that the utility is reformed in any way for being in the market competition. Though, regulation from State authorities is more needed in conditions of open markets than before.
In wholesale competition the electricity firms avoid to pass the whole cost of electricity production to the final prices. In this way, the end-users find no strong incentives for moving towards energy efficiency.
In retail competition things do not seem to be different as due to intensive competition the retailers would intend to increase the KWh sales and therefore would decrease the prices. The end-users with such low prices will find no reason to use electricity efficiently.
Commercialization exposes a former public electricity firm to the taxes, regulations and rules of the market, valid for every private company.
In commersialisation of the electricity market, energy efficiency plans are mostly addressed to the upstream level, and not to the end-users side, because ‘a kWh saved is viewed as lost revenue’ (Vine et al, 2003). This level of energy efficiency implementation is most possible to happen in vertically integrated utilities, where the profit from energy efficiency efforts and investments are going to return to the same utility. However the end-users themselves will move towards energy efficiency measures and this move is possible to create free space in the market for specialized companies dealing with energy saving services.
Privatisation is the transfer of shares or functions of the public owned utilities to the private sector. Therefore, production, transmission, distribution and retail can pass to the exploitation of private companies. Regulations to retain the public service obligations by the new utilities need to be put on by the Member States according to the Directive 2003/54/EC.
The profit of a privatized company is its ultimate goal. Every measure driven from the company and increases its revenues is pretty much possible to increase the bills of its customers who will then try to use electricity efficiently. New companies will emerge for facilitating the customers to save electricity, but as the end-user electricity consumption is crucial for the utility, regulators and governments should establish programs for efficiency and load management (Vine et al., 2003).
Unbundling refers to the separation of the vertical structure of a traditional utility into distinct entities owned or run by different firms. Unbundling can be seen in the frames either of commercialization or privatization of a utility.
At the unbundled status of an ex-vertical utility, the distinct entities may be different firms with their own management or may be firms under the central management of the same business. There are no incentives for energy efficiency measures from companies when these measures are going to make profit not to them, but to other firms.
The proportion of the price of the bill that reflects the tariff is very important for the future of the of energy efficiency plans. If the tariff is the vast majority of the final price the power of efficiency measures seem feeble and so does the potential of emergence for companies dealing with energy efficiency.
Competition which can be divided in wholesale and retail can be applied in every sector of the utility and it is not necessary that the utility is reformed in any way for being in the market competition. Though, regulation from State authorities is more needed in conditions of open markets than before.
In wholesale competition the electricity firms avoid to pass the whole cost of electricity production to the final prices. In this way, the end-users find no strong incentives for moving towards energy efficiency.
In retail competition things do not seem to be different as due to intensive competition the retailers would intend to increase the KWh sales and therefore would decrease the prices. The end-users with such low prices will find no reason to use electricity efficiently.
Wednesday, February 02, 2005
Home Power Magazine
Buried under a pile of academic articles? Lighten up your day browsing the Home Power magazine.
Articles are searchable and downloadable as pdf files.
a simple and elegant introduction to solar electricity for homes the guerrilla guide to solar the homemade PEM fuel cell project the solar production of hydrogen at home the handy utility interactive inverter safety, a look at the market for utility-interactive inverter systems.
"Since 1987, we've dedicated more than 100 issues to home-scale renewable energy and sustainable living solutions. That means comprehensive coverage of solar, wind, & microhydro electricity, home energy efficiency, solar hot water systems, space heating & cooling, green building materials & home design, efficient transportation, and much, much more. Whether you're a do-it-yourselfer or not, off-grid or on-grid, Home Power is here to help you make informed decisions about your home energy use. We provide extensive product information, homeowner testimonials, buyer advice, and "how-to" instructions."
Articles are searchable and downloadable as pdf files.
Some highlights:
Worth bookmarking?
CiteULike
Pay a visit to CiteULike. The following is a quote from their website.
Have a look at the list of academic material of interest to the group here. There is a static link to CiteULike in the links section of this blog.
"CiteULike is a free service to help academics to share, store, and organise the academic papers they are reading. When you see a paper on the web that interests you, you can click one button and have it added to your personal library. CiteULike automatically extracts the citation details, so there's no need to type them in yourself. It all works from within your web browser. There's no need to install any special software.
Because your library is stored on the server, you can access it from any computer. You can share you library with others, and find out who is reading the same papers as you. In turn, this can help you discover literature which is relevant to your field but you may not have known about."
Have a look at the list of academic material of interest to the group here. There is a static link to CiteULike in the links section of this blog.
First register as CiteULike users (it takes 15 seconds), then start saving any reference relevant to your research and that you would like to share with the members of the group.
Once registered and logged in, click on view groups. Click on "ask to join this group", besides IC_ElectricitySystemsGroup and the administrator will have a look at your request and hopefully approve it very quickly.
Any list of references is public, everybody can see it. Everybody can export references to EndNote (or Reference Manager, since the export format should be compatible with it anyway). In the (hopefully near) future, it should be possible also to upload a list of references from a stand-alone reference manager to citeULike.
Is there a more convenient way to share references of academic papers between us? Try uploading the essential references needed to gather understanding about your research.
Tuesday, February 01, 2005
The Electricity Systems Group
Welcome to the discussion board of the Electricity Systems Group at Imperial College.
The Electricity System Group is an informal research group composed mainly of Ph.D. Researchers and Research Associates working across the Imperial College in London.
Our backgrounds and expertise are varied, and typically include engineering and economics. The study of electricity systems is our common research interest.
We hold regular meetings within the South Kensington campus. Between meetings, and for those of us who could not make it, this is our web-based platform to share information and knowledge. Feel free to look around and comment on it.
More details about the Electricity System Group and this discussion board can be found here. Please note the disclaimer to this website.
