Decentralised Energy – The Economically and Environmentally Logical Solution
Key Points:
- 80% of electricity bills
is not for electricity - 75% of energy is wasted
before leaving power plants - Centralised power plants
waste large amounts of water - Energy can by supplied
25% of current cost - Decentralised energy is
more economically efficient
Do you ever consider what components of your power bill add up to the rate that you’re paying? According to innovative British engineer Allan Jones, about 20% of the rate accounts for actual electricity. The majority of the rate is to pay for distribution, power loss and government grid fees. Jones recognised these financial and fuel inefficiencies and proposed a solution, local decentralised power, that managed to save a council 80% in energy costs and is now being implemented in London.
Jones planted the seed of decentralised power in 1990, when was a senior officer in council for the borough of Woking and submitted a report on global warming - long before it became an epidemic. The council moved very quickly and set up a revolving fund for the environment. The phenomenon started from there.
The primary cause of climate change is centralised energy. Centralised energy is energy generated by big power stations and delivered over long distances to many locations. Most centralised power plants use Coal as the fuel, which is about five times more polluting than gas. Most centralised power plants also waste two thirds of their energy as unused heat, in fact they waste large amounts of water to dissipate this heat. Considering a significant portion of consumer energy is spent on heating, the wasted heat seems rather unfortunate.
With such serious inefficiencies Allan Jones and the council of Woking recognised the opportunity to revolutionalise energy supply, the revolution of decentralised energy. Decentralised energy is a much more efficient of distribution electrical and heat energy through municipalities.
Decentralised energy is generated locally, that is, a small power plant is located close to or within the town or city it supplies. Both the electricity and heat are distributed – this is called ‘combined energy’. This way most of the energy is used, rather than most of it being wasted through heat dissipation. Much less electrical energy is lost through transmission because the distances are so short. Additionally, the heat that is usually wasted can be used to power heating inside buildings, hot water systems, and even refrigeration and cooling through a technology called ‘heat fired cooling’ - operations that usually require energy.
New infrastructure was required in order to generate and then deliver the electricity and heat, requiring a hefty amount of capital. However, the economic advantage of decentralised power made this easily feasible for Jones. £250 thousand was provided by the council Woking, a town with a population of 100,000. Jones had one condition, “Providing you allow me to recycle the financial savings from the energy bills, I won’t need any more money from you…”. Jones didn’t need any more money for the implementation.
The council of Woking saved about 1.2 billion a year on energy costs after the implementation of decentralised power while profiting from the joint venture energy services company established by Jones. Economically and environmentally Woking has done very well out of decentralised energy.
Jones believes that big energy companies can either interpret the current energy climate as a threat or as an opportunity. They can be large dinosaurs, refuse to change and become extinct or they can adapt by tackling climate change head-on. Centralised energy must be changed, Jones believes, since it is responsible for around 75% of emissions for some large cities.
Source: Allan Jones: getting off the grid - ABC Radio National’s “Saturday Extra”, 26 July 2008
Tags: carbon, decentralised, efficiency, electricity, energy, Environment, innovation, podcast, power
September 6th, 2008 at 9:21 am
It’d be interesting to see some actual figures on this one. Australia is always going to suck eggs in the rollout of decentralised equipment because we’re such a large land mass and the population is relatively sparse.
However we probably use more energy than the average UK households because we have bigger houses - harder to heat/cool. Also bigger houses means more rooms, meaning more TVs, computers, etc.
September 8th, 2008 at 11:59 pm
I don’t agree that Australia would “suck eggs” (whatever that’s supposed to mean) in implementing decentralised energy. From my perspective, our concentration of Australia’s population would make decentralised energy attractive in most populated areas, seeing that most (> 50%) of the population live in relatively densely populated areas regional, suburban and urban - even though those areas themselves are sparse. Of course, counties with consistently dense populations such as Japan and UK have even more to gain.
We do appear to use more power with our larger households. It is also very energy expensive to cool, which we love doing in summer.
September 9th, 2008 at 4:27 am
I agree 100% this would be ideal for australian towns and cities.However present vested interests may have a different barrow to push, but does it not open the door for brand new industries and all the jobs that would be created.
September 11th, 2008 at 6:12 am
While it doesn’t directly encourage the emergence of innovative, new industries, the ‘decentralised’ model could be a more feasible and rapid way to roll out renewable energy sources.
For example, one common argument against wind power is the fact that it requires more area per watt to generate electricity - so powering an entire state from wind would require 100s of square kilometers. However, decentralised wind power would be idea for regional communities - each with a relatively small demand for power and availability of land.
This still does not address the problem of consistent availability for renewable energy sources, unfortunately. One step at a time.