UK gas/electricity supply shortages this winter
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mx wcfc
Well-Known Member
My facebook feed is getting a lot of adverts for seriously big rechargeable battery systems like this.
EcoFlow
EcoFlow. 292,225 likes · 4,578 talking about this. We’re here to Power A New World. How are we doing it? By providing you with the best power stations in the game. Opt for the EcoFlow DELTA series...
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I'm wondering whether I could rig a power supply from the solar charged leisure battery in my camper van to the house and whether it would last more than 5 minutes powering an electric blow heater.
mx wcfc
Well-Known Member
I'm assuming the tiny amount of heat I might generate in the house would be lost through the letter box as a result of the cable running through it.
I do have a three pin socket in the van that I could run an extension lead from. I don't think I'm going to try though.
Maybe I could run the engine, so that the split charge keeps the battery topped up at night. Would that be a good plan?
My camping stove is ready to be deployed though, and I have decent enough camping lights.
WouldBe
Dislicksick
If you've got gas c/h you could rig it to power the central heating which would only take a few Watts.My facebook feed is getting a lot of adverts for seriously big rechargeable battery systems like this.
EcoFlow
EcoFlow. 292,225 likes · 4,578 talking about this. We’re here to Power A New World. How are we doing it? By providing you with the best power stations in the game. Opt for the EcoFlow DELTA series...
I'm wondering whether I could rig a power supply from the solar charged leisure battery in my camper van to the house and whether it would last more than 5 minutes powering an electric blow heater.
mx wcfc
Well-Known Member
Thanks for the tip. Genuinely.
On the other hand I am so inept at that sort of thing, that I'd probably blow my house up, and now I've finally actually paid for it, that is something I'd rather avoid,
WouldBe
Dislicksick
You could get an electrician to put the central heating on a 3 pin plug instead of wired into a fused spur then you can just unplug it from its normal socket and plug it into the inverter incase of a power cut.
mx wcfc
Well-Known Member
Ok. I have no idea tbh.
Down here, though, since brexit, no one can get any sort of work done. We were told two years to get a builder to stick a porch on our house, Getting an electrician in,or a plumber or anyone else is impossible cos they are all signed up to do the vast quantities of new builds that are going on, and, frankly, the Polish guys we used to use have all gone home.
Can't think why.
cupid_stunt
Chief seagull hater & farmerbarleymow's nemesis.
If there's little wind*, and a seriously cold spell resulting in increased gas use for heating, and therefore not enough gas for electric generation, there's no choice but to cut the electric on a regional basis, it's the last option left.
What do you mean by 'I don't think people will people will tolerate that'? We'll have no choice, it is what it is.
It was also 'completely out of our experience' back in the 70s, but it still happened, and people coped.
* Wind often produces over 50% of our electric, but some days that drops to under 5%.
MrCurry
right after this urgent rest
If they’re going to do rolling power cuts it might lead to people using more energy to heat their homes to a higher temp, because whereas I might be able to tolerate keeping my lounge at 18C, I’m not going to risk running at that level if I think the power might go off and the heating will be out of action for hours the temp drops even lower. Then I’m going to need some spare heat in the house so as the temp drops during a power cut, it’s still above that tolerable 18C threshold.
It’s a shame if this is one of the unintended side effects, as with the price of electric I could do with trying to get through the whole winter with the thermostats set lower.
It’s a shame if this is one of the unintended side effects, as with the price of electric I could do with trying to get through the whole winter with the thermostats set lower.
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
I think some people especially under-40s have been lucky enough to live in areas that haven't experienced any notable power cuts in their lifetime, so they view the prospect as some sort of descent into a third-world nightmare.
Three hours is pretty typical for the sort of routine cable fault that causes numerous such localized power cuts every day around the country. I guess it depends what area you live in.
Three hours is pretty typical for the sort of routine cable fault that causes numerous such localized power cuts every day around the country. I guess it depends what area you live in.
gentlegreen
I hummus, therefore I am ...
Just to wind me up, my electrics went on the blink this morning and after an hour of isolating circuits, unplugging stuff and running up and down stairs, all I am left with is that my main breaker was having a funny five minutes.
I'd gone to the kitchenette at 6am to bake bread and switched on the work lights - a branded 5 volt transformer off the dedicated spur... but subsequently all sorts of things on different circuits would trip the thing whereas quite a few other loads were not a problem.
Now I'm back to being able to plug a fan heater in everywhere.
I'd gone to the kitchenette at 6am to bake bread and switched on the work lights - a branded 5 volt transformer off the dedicated spur... but subsequently all sorts of things on different circuits would trip the thing whereas quite a few other loads were not a problem.
Now I'm back to being able to plug a fan heater in everywhere.
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MrCurry
right after this urgent rest
That’s a new one on me. I don’t know why the inverter would know or care how long the mains extension you’ve plugged into it is. I have two of those Banggood inverters run from my 5kWh house bank battery and have run cabling from one end of the house to the other, at least 15m, powering the various constant and short term loads I can run from solar when there’s been enough sunshine.
I guess it‘s volt drop down the extension cable which would be the consideration, but ohms law says this will be affected by the size of the load and the core size of the extension cable. If I can run my 2.1kW peak dishwasher down a 15m 1.0mm2 cable, I don’t think you should let that 3m limit you’ve mentioned hold you back from running cabling further, if it will let you make better use of your inverter.
two sheds
Least noticed poster 2007
Interesting - yes I wondered why they said that, particularly since as yo say you could use a thicker cable.
I do also have a lead from my solar panel inverter from the attic down to the consumer unit in the kitchen so it doesn't seem to matter there. I've also wondered whether it was the reason that lithium ion batteries were used for solar power backup instead of lead acid despite adding a couple of thousand (?) to the price - it would mean having a heavy battery bank up in the loft. If you could have lead acid batteries downstairs somewhere it would be hugely cheaper - but again you've have a long lead from the charger down to the batteries. *
One question though - what is the total Ah value of your battery bank and do you charger/inverter work ok with them? I've got two 100 Ah batteries but they're only supplying me with 50 Ah of power in the evening before the inverter cuts out despite the charger having told me that they're fully charged. I'm wondering whether the inverter decides that the batteries are discharged by assuming they have a fixed charge which is much lower in my case than the actual charge in there.
*disclaimer: this might be bollocks
I do also have a lead from my solar panel inverter from the attic down to the consumer unit in the kitchen so it doesn't seem to matter there. I've also wondered whether it was the reason that lithium ion batteries were used for solar power backup instead of lead acid despite adding a couple of thousand (?) to the price - it would mean having a heavy battery bank up in the loft. If you could have lead acid batteries downstairs somewhere it would be hugely cheaper - but again you've have a long lead from the charger down to the batteries. *
One question though - what is the total Ah value of your battery bank and do you charger/inverter work ok with them? I've got two 100 Ah batteries but they're only supplying me with 50 Ah of power in the evening before the inverter cuts out despite the charger having told me that they're fully charged. I'm wondering whether the inverter decides that the batteries are discharged by assuming they have a fixed charge which is much lower in my case than the actual charge in there.
*disclaimer: this might be bollocks
a_chap
When the world came apart, where were you?
So the Tories' constant rhetoric works after all. Put all the blame Putin.
Remember who closed down the Rough gas storage facility. It was Centrica. In 2017. Under the Tories.
It's not like no-one warned them: Closure of UK’s largest gas storage site ‘could mean volatile prices’
2hats
Dust.
The longer the cable, the greater the capacitance, and so the greater the earth leakage current. Consequently there is a higher risk of RCD trip or electrical shock. Particularly so where IT&A/V equipment is involved due to their additional filtering (adds even more capacitance).
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cupid_stunt
Chief seagull hater & farmerbarleymow's nemesis.
Indeed, and think of those poor people that end-up with no electric for several days after a major storm, I was working in Ireland with a mate when the great storm of '87 hit the south-east, we both tried to call our mothers to check on them, but the phone lines were also down. My mother in Tonbridge was without power & phone for a week, his mother in Sevenoaks had 10 days without electric, 3-hours is nothing.
Meanwhile, some of our other mates had been literally rocking & rolling on the Radio Caroline ship in the north sea, one of the few radio stations still on air after that storm!
An amusing side story, when I lived out in the sticks, in rural Somerset, we were suffering regular short power cuts, so I complained to SW Electricity Board & got it escalated right up to to director level, he totally agreed it was unacceptable, this was late on a Friday afternoon, and he promised to look into it & call me back on Monday, and indeed he did, plus he timed his call perfectly!
So, mid-morning on Monday he calls, and explains they thought it was overgrown trees interfering with the overhead wires & causing their systems to trip-out, and that he had organised a helicopter to fly over & check where the problem was, and at the very moment a bright orange SWEB branded helicopter flew pass the cottage!
Needless to say, I was well fucking impressed! He called back about an hour or so later, confirmed they had found the problem and would get the trees cut back within a few days, and we never had another power-cut.
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two sheds
Least noticed poster 2007
That's really interesting, ta. Why higher risk of electrical shock though if there's also a higher risk of RCD trip - wouldn't that make the RCD more sensitive and so reduce risk of electrical shock?
pinkmonkey
2.4 hour party person
I'm sure this is all fine
BBC prepares secret scripts for possible use in winter blackouts
Exclusive: Scripts set out how corporation will reassure public in event of major power losswww.theguardian.com
MrCurry
right after this urgent rest
I have 375Ah of LiFePO4 prismatic (lithium) batteries which are charged directly from solar via charge controllers, ie mine is an “off grid“ solar setup as opposed to the grid connected type you have. I can’t sell any excess to the grid, but I only have a small 1.8kWp DIY installed solar array so this isn’t a drawback as I manage to use all that my panels will produce.
Lead acid has a couple of drawbacks in that (1) the self discharge means you’ll always get less out of the battery than you put in*, and (2) the internal resistance of the battery means the voltage at the terminals rises and drops significantly (compared to lithium) when you charge or discharge the battery. Of course lithium batteries have their own disadvantages, such as much higher price and higher level of user knowledge normally being needed as they can be dangerous or get damaged if overcharged or overdischarged.
If you’re only able to discharge 50Ah from 200Ah of lead acid, it sounds like something is wrong. The inverter wouldn’t be making assumptions about the amount of charge the batteries can deliver and is most likely tripping out due to a low voltage threshold being reached. If you have a multimeter you can test this by observing the voltage at the battery terminals at the point the inverter is switching off. It sounds to me most likely the charger is maybe not fully charging your batteries - again check the terminal voltage at the point the charger is disconnecting with the batteries supposedly fully charged. Is there anything you can do to shorten or thicken the cables connecting the charger to the batteries, as any volt drop there will prevent full charging? Presumably you’re using good, thick cables between batteries and inverter, with well secured connections at the battery terminals? The inverter will draw high currents and any resistance in the circuit to the battery will cause volt drop and premature low voltage disconnect.
Alternatively it’s possible the charger has a safety limit on how much energy it will load into the battery when charging. Does the manual say it has any limit on the number of Ah of battery it will charge? What happens if you restart the charger after it has decided the battery is full - maybe it will go back into charging mode?
* this is true of any battery of course, but relatively speaking lead acid is worse for this as it will normally need a constant trickle charge to keep a lead acid battery full.
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Karl Masks
Birds Angel Delight
Society will cope, people, individually, will struggle. Yes they will have to tolerate it, but that might lead to a rise in antisocial behaviour. It all depends how bad things get, if at all.
I don't think comparisons to the 70s are helpful or even all that relevant, ours is a much different world witha greater dependence on tech and thus energy.
I'm curious how rolling blackouts in a community would be able to differentiate between a GP surgery and the surrounding ordinary homes, or a care home, etc. I'm sure they will figure that out, as they will have to.
2hats
Dust.
Hopefully your breaker kicks in first. Assuming you have them fitted in your homebrew emergency power system.
Though I do recall in the [not entirely] distant past (~20 years) getting mild shocks off a PC frame on a supposedly (ultimately) RCD protected circuit where someone had been playing a game of extension lead daisy chaining spaghetti.
gentlegreen
I hummus, therefore I am ...
Perhaps I should help out my elderly main breaker by eliminating a few extension cables ...
I briefly owned a Tesco "Value" plastic toaster that tripped the breaker even with the earth wire disconnected....
These day I might have offered it to one of the various online electrical mystery solvers ...
muscovyduck
Good IT skills and food hygiene competent
Yes I've found this really confusing. I remember a lot of localised powercuts over the years that went on for hours and I'm in my mid 20s. And I'm not talking rural areas either
cupid_stunt
Chief seagull hater & farmerbarleymow's nemesis.
So, you've gone from 'I don't think people will people will tolerate that' to 'yes they will have to tolerate it', thanks for clearing that up.
The comparison with the 70s is perfectly logical, because that was the last time we had planned rolling blackouts.
People will cope without tech for a few hours, especially if they have charged their phones/tablets/laptops/etc., people cope without electric for days on end after storms, and did when the national grid fell over back in 2019, which was somewhat chaotic, at least if these happen, they will be planned and should come with reasonable advanced warnings.
pinkmonkey
2.4 hour party person
I just installed 300ah of LiFePO4 on my canal boat and it’s incredible - like being on mains. They take charge so much better than wet lead acids, plus they don’t lose anything overnight, meaning we’re still running soley off solar - we’d normally be running the engine 1 hour a day by this time of year.
Karl Masks
Birds Angel Delight
I haven't gone from anything to anything. It's obvious that, if the government initiates this then people will have no choice. How they react to that is the point. Not really sure why that needs to be contentious. It's an experience most people aren't used to, regardless of how things were half a century prior
It may be logical, but it is not entirely relevant because todays is a different world.
Storms are also different because, while inconvenient likewise, we all know they happen and are simplay force majeure. People can accept that more, I suspect.
gentlegreen
I hummus, therefore I am ...
Lithium batteries and LEDs are definitely a game changer.
This crisis is making me look forward to being somewhere I can invest in solar and storage - though I've scaled my consumption down so much, it might almost be worth seeing what I can do with a very small DIY installation on my wasted south-facing roof.
I hope this winter boosts the renewables industry massively.
This crisis is making me look forward to being somewhere I can invest in solar and storage - though I've scaled my consumption down so much, it might almost be worth seeing what I can do with a very small DIY installation on my wasted south-facing roof.
I hope this winter boosts the renewables industry massively.
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WouldBe
Dislicksick
Isn't that pushing the cable close to it's limit? Iirc 1.0mm cable has a max current capacity of 10A.
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