iDRY Vacuum Kilns

Sponsors:

Coal And Natural Gas-Fired Generation In US Equal For First Time In April 2012

Started by submarinesailor, July 09, 2012, 07:14:25 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

submarinesailor

I knew this was coming.  But it surprized me that it happened this early.  I wonder what it means for the long term price of natural gas?  Will we go for plenty of natural gas to shortages again?  Last time I checked the numbers, electrical production was around 7.1%, up from 6.8%, of all natural gas consumption.

Wonder if it will continue?  The price of natural gas has come up about $0.50+ since April.  Wonder if the gas/Coal switching will or has it gone back to coal?

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2012/07/eia-20120706.html

Bruce

jimparamedic

Gas fired plants in this area are not being used to their full power, just small amounts to keep them running. There are 3 close buy. Also a coal fired plant here is running just enough to keep it on line. And 2 small plants have been shut down. One of these plants was shut down to lower AEP's emmisions out put to keep the EPA happy. As far as natural gas goes I worked in the patch and when gas prices went down companys would shut in wells to increase demand. I know of at least 100 wells that are setting idle now. Oh how the BIG MAN plays the game.

Al_Smith

Quote from: jimparamedic on July 10, 2012, 06:52:56 AM
   Oh how the BIG MAN plays the game.
As they have in the past and will continue to in the future .

Some people might see this recent magical natural gas find with the fracking is the great energy hope .Being a sceptic on this stuff I personally do not .

I've seen them do stuff like this in the past only to lay it to the public once they get a major controll of the market .Look for example how they pushed diesel powered vehicals when diesel fuel prices were extremely cheap as compaired to gasoline .How did that work out ?

Remember 40 years ago how they pushed all electric homes with special low rates ?

The old adage of the golden rule has never changed .He who has the gold makes the rules .

JSNH

The EPA and Washington DC don't like coal.

The Natural gas has advantages the plants are smaller and can be built faster. The plants can respond to loads well. Gas is cheep now.

I think we will see  many gas plants comming on line and electric prices stable for a few years. Once we start exporting out natural gas the price will rise to the world price and we will see large increases in prices.Gas will no longer be cheep and elec. prices will rise. Many places will go to time of day billing.

SwampDonkey

As Al said. They also pushed stove oil for furnaces because of convenience. Now, if I would heat with oil it would cost me 3 times as much as with wood. My wood bill is under $2000 a year. Katrina, if you recall, really drove up the price of petrol big time and it felt good to "the powers that be", so the prices remained high since. I'm not sure of wages in other areas, but don't try and tell me that the working man isn't going behind compared to what he could buy with his cheque 30 years ago. My grandfather on Canada pension throughout the 70's and 80's could buy a new truck every other year on that pension. You can't now.  This is pension everyone is entitled to, not a pension from an employer.
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

Al_Smith

Quote from: SwampDonkey on July 11, 2012, 04:29:05 AM
  My wood bill is under $2000 a year.   
Ah ha ha ,mine is free so there  :D On the other hand if you factor in time spent to get it ,parts for the saws ,tractors ,gasoline etc. it's probabley 4 grand . :o

Al_Smith

Profane--er propane is probabley the greatest rip off scam going on now .They have you over a barrel and they know it .

Sure you can supposedly sign up for level pricing through the year and they still manage to raise the prices on you as they see fit .I personally will never again in my life time deal with them if I can help it at all .

Now I know for a fact there are folks on this forum who will defend the bottled gas industry  to the bitter end but there is no defense for down right piracy .That's 98 cents worth instead of the usual 2 cents .

SwampDonkey

Like I have said around the wood pile before, wood is never free.  :)

The risk to those folks doing the "level pricing" agreements will always be low for the seller every time over the long haul because stuff always goes up over time. It might make you feel good when there is a little dip, but the price will recover and keep climbing to offset the temporary loss. They, like a bank, aren't going to do anything that won't make them money. ;)
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

pineywoods

I think we are comparing apples to oranges here. Are we talking total generating capacity or actual on-line production? Most of the newer gas powered plants are actually large gas turbines, which can be easily shut down when the load drops off, and then quickly restarted when the demand goes up. Coal fired and older gas fired plants have huge boilers which can take hours or even days to bring back on line. Consequently, they are usually run at close to full capacity and the gas turbine systems cycled on or off to level out the supply. It just ain't as simple as you would think
1995 Wood Mizer LT 40, Liquid cooled kawasaki,homebuilt hydraulics. Homebuilt solar dry kiln.  Woodmaster 718 planner, Kubota M4700 with homemade forks and winch, stihl  028, 029, Ms390
100k bd ft club.Charter member of The Grumpy old Men

submarinesailor

Quote from: pineywoods on July 11, 2012, 08:29:18 PM
the gas turbine systems cycled on or off to level out the supply. It just ain't as simple as you would think

Piney,

You are right when you say, "It just ain't as simple as you would think".  I was reading and article the other day about one of GE's new gas turbine engines.  It was about one of their new ones with a "fast" ramping time, from start up to full load.  They were talking about 30 minutes for start to full load.  A little slow until you look at the base load coal, gas or nuc plants that takes days to ramp up. 

Back when I worked for Halliburton, we when in one plant in Florida that had a 200 MW steam turbine spinning at full speed but unloaded, in neutral they called it, just to pick up any unexpected  or major load changes.  BTW - while we were around these BIG boys we were REAL CAREFUL.  Because it was a lot of money if you screwed up and tripped one of them off line - not a good thing. :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o

Bruce

Al_Smith

They use a lot of gas turbines for "peaker " units which can be stepped in or stepped out to meet load demands .

Ianab

QuoteBTW - while we were around these BIG boys we were REAL CAREFUL.  Because it was a lot of money if you screwed up and tripped one of them off line - not a good thing.         

My buddy did that a few years back. Managed to trip the big local gas fired plant when it was under load. Luckily it wasn't his fault as he had the correct work permit and was working on the right gas leak detector at the time etc.

Someone else had messed up and it was still live and connected to the control system, so when he unplugged it the system thought there was a main gas leak, shut off the main supply valve, burners shut down, emergency vents on the steam system open. 1,000 ft tall steam cloud, noise the whole city can hear and the station is left on emergency lighting only to cut down on the explosion risk (from the supposed gas leak)

All this happens and my buddy is there with a spanner in one hand and a unplugged gas sensor in the other... Ooopppss..

This was an old station that's since been shut down, was gas fired, but had boilers and steam turbines, same sort of base load set up as a coal station. So yeah, rest of the day getting it back online again, $$$$ of lost generation etc.

The new station being built are gas tuirbine like the guys are talking about. Smaller setups, 15 minute startup etc. But smaller and cheaper.  Can be built pretty much any place. No significant noise, low water use, only the size of a small factory. Means you get away from that "not in my backyard" syndrome.

We have 2 gas turbine stations just down the road from us, you would hardly know they are there. Another is almost complete near New Plymouth, with a 4th just getting planning go-ahead this week.

In NZ most of the power (70% ?) is hydro, wind or geothermal. They just need the peak stations to cover shortfalls during peak times, or to be able to run base load if you get a calm dry spell and the wind / hydro outputs are low.

Ian
Weekend warrior, Peterson JP test pilot, Dolmar 7900 and Stihl MS310 saws and  the usual collection of power tools :)

Thank You Sponsors!