‘GREEN’ STRATEGIES AND NET ZERO CARBON
Need for low carbon energy supplies Looking at her next slide, Dame Sue said: “We need low carbon energy supplies, but if we look at the UK’s current carbon burden– transport accounts for just over a quarter, and heating our homes, and running our businesses, another 30 per cent; nor is our current energy supply low carbon.” Focusing on one of the key areas – decarbonising transport, and heating our homes, and what the UK was effectively doing was considering steps that would increase the demand on our electricity grid ‘by double, if not more’. Thus, unless our electricity supply was ‘clean’ and low carbon, we risked ‘simply shifting the problem somewhere else’. Dame Sue said the ‘basic elements’ open to us remained unchanged – we can tap into sources from the earth, air, fire, water, and sun, to help source the energy we need. She asked, however: “‘How, though, does that translate in engineering space?’ The answer, she said, was that, in terms of low carbon solutions, it translated to nuclear, biomass, hydro, marine, solar, and wind.
A surprising statistic? “Look at what this means in carbon contribution terms,” she said, “and some of you may be surprised to learn that nuclear and wind are the two lowest carbon solutions for our power supplies; about the same grams of CO2
per kW/hour – at 12
and 11 respectively, while hydro is 24, solar, 45, and biomass not as low carbon as you might think. The fossil fuels, gas and coal, are much higher contributors, at 490 and 820 g/CO2
/kWh, respectively.”
Focusing on biomass as a form of energy, Dame Sue explained that the biggest current deliverer was Drax; it currently took 62,000 tonnes of container pallets, and 37 freight trains, to provide enough power for 2.5 days, with over half the UK’s current biomass requirement sourced from overseas. Some of the carbon footprint was thus attributable to the transportation to get the pallets to the UK. The Climate Change Committee had acknowledged this in its 2019 report.
working with industry to generate low carbon hydrogen. Currently, however, hydrogen is actually generated by steam re-forming of methane, which is not carbon-free. Equally, has anybody really properly considered the problems of integrating hydrogen into the main high pressure gas grid? There are quite a number.”
The Government publication, The Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution, launched last November, featured a forward written by Prime Minister, Boris Johnson.
Dame Sue put up a slide showing the expectations for biomass. She said: “The CCC reported that unless biomass is accompanied by carbon capture and sequestration, the expectation was that it would be phased out towards 2050.” Here she told attendees: “So, here we come to the Government publication, launched last November, The Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution, which had a forward written by the Prime Minister. Her view was that the Plan had been ‘built around the UK’s strengths, and realistic’, but she wondered whether anybody had ever asked if the various goals were ‘deliverable in an engineering sense’.
The ‘PM’s plan’
She said: “Looking at the PM’s plan, and it explains that to produce sufficient offshore wind to power every home would mean quadrupling current levels by 2030. As regards hydrogen, it foresees
Dame Sue pointed out that the Government was keen to advance nuclear as a ‘clean’ energy source, but wondered how, ‘on a timescale’, the UK could meet the challenge in hand. Although electric vehicles offered carbon-reducing potential, there were issues both around sourcing the necessary materials, and charging; the PM’s plan also proposed more walking and cycling. She said: “We then come to ‘jet zero’ and green and maritime, and supporting those difficult- to-decarbonise industries to become greener, while with homes and public buildings, it is a case of making our homes, schools, and hospitals, greener, warmer, and more energy-efficient, with an emphasis on heat pumps. However, have we actually looked at the engineering challenge involved?” The speaker recommended that attendees look at the ‘Ten Point Plan’, but warned that on doing so, they would then recognise how difficult some of the measures proposed would be to actually implement. She added: “It has clear aspirations for what might be delivered, but doesn’t say very much about how.”
Electricity demand by sector Focusing next on current UK electricity demand by sector, Dame Sue said the demand ‘draw-down’ was ‘pretty equal’ between ‘domestic’, ‘commercial’, and ‘industry’ – with chemicals, paper, engineering, and food production, the ‘biggest players’. As to electricity generation by fuel over the last two years, ‘renewables’ were ‘slowly but surely increasing’, at the expense of coal. Gas had also increased, with renewables currently accounting for just under 40 per cent of the overall share, gas just over 40
June 2021 Health Estate Journal 21
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