While the debate surrounding the pros and cons of wind power rumbles on, the increasing numbers of turbines that are appearing across the country are beginning to make a real contribution to the UK’s energy supplies.

The National Grid reports that Monday 6^th September saw a record output for the wind farms of Britain – generating nearly 5% of all power going into the Grid at that time. The company confirmed that with output peaking at 1,860MW, the power generated by the wind energy sector was greater than that produced by three nuclear power stations.

The National Grid believes that over that 24-hour period (and taking into account embedded wind generation), nearly 10% of the UK’s power came from the wind alone. A great achievement, even if the UK is still a long way behind other parts of Europe in this field. Spain and Portugal, for example, consistently meet 50% of their energy demands through wind farmed along the Iberian Peninsula. But as mentioned in an earlier post, the political, social and economic infrastructure of these nations seems to offer greater support to the renewable cause than here in the UK.

When considering the 2020 target of generating 15% of the UK’s energy from renewable sources, this latest data should be encouraging news for the industry – and could go a long way to helping raise the common image of wind farms from ‘noisy blots on the landscape’ to valuable part of the renewable energy mix.

The developers of an innovative ‘wave power’ device claim that within 5 years, their invention will be generating energy for 50,000 UK homes. The ‘Anaconda’ energy converter is currently in the test stage, but recently announced results have shown that each 200 metre rubber tube could generate enough energy to power 1,000 homes.

The Anaconda (named for its resemblance) is anchored to the ocean floor, moving with the tides. The waves in the water create bulges along the tubing that travel along its length gathering energy. At the end of the tube, the surge of energy drives a turbine and generates electricity. It’s rubber construction makes it cheap, resilient and low-maintenance, and the designers, Checkmate Seaenergy Ltd are confident that not only will it be cheaper than it’s wind-farm equivalent , but it will face less opposition from the public as the ‘shoals’ will be under the surface of the water – effectively out of sight. The company are now looking for further investment to sea-test the devices, with the aim of deploying a shoal along the west coast of the UK by 2014.

With the EU targeting the UK to source 15 per cent of all the country’s energy needs from renewables by 2020 (the majority of which is expected to come from wind power ) the Carbon Trust suggests that the Anaconda ‘has the potential to deliver breakthrough reductions in the cost of wave energy’ and that it could ‘represent the next generation of marine renewable energy’.

This is not a political blog but why do we not follow the vision sometimes? President-elect Obama has just announced his plans to stimulate the US economy through large infrastructure projects and alternative energy initiatives. The UK government goes for tax breaks on the one hand and rises on the other. Same old recipe in the UK – something exciting in the US. No wonder the Conservative Party just have to sit back and let Labour win the next general election for them. ‘Yes we can’ versus ‘No we can’t…’

The Energy Event came up on my radar the other day. The show focuses on energy procurement, management and efficiency. What caught my eye were a number of companies who act as energy consultants and work with clients to reduce their energy consumption. This opened up a new view on building management and gave more of an insight into the workings of a facilities manager. Uninterruptible power supplies are a component within such energy systems and innovations in this particular area are driven by a need to conserve energy and not add to existing cooling systems. We are also working with the Carbon Trust to help the industry take a lead in this area – one whose importance will continue to grow in an ever more energy conscious world.

There are many things the Danish are famous for but who would have thought that they lead the world in energy independence? In 2006 Danish imports of energy actually fell -8% (minus eight percent!) whilst the rest of Europe rose by more than 2.4%.  So how has this been achieved? The answer lies in decentralised power distribution rather than the more traditional centralised approach. In Denmark, consumers can not only draw power from the grid but feed power into it as well – from solar panels and wind turbines. The key is a term called ‘smart-metering’ and may set the model for the future. You see in a generating station only a third of the energy used is converted to electricity which can then be fed into a grid. This change in generation has taken Denmark over 20 years to implement and I wonder just how far behind the UK is? Now in terms of power quality management I have no idea how good or not the system is but I suspect they are pretty hot on this to.

I was disappointed to learn that the UK’s first Energy Saving day ended with no noticeable reduction in the country’s electricity use. Disappointed but not wholly surprised.

E-day, which started at 1800hrs on Wednesday 27th February 2008 and finished at the same time on 28th was supposed to encourage people to switch off electrical devices they did not need but instead National Grid recorded a 0.01% increase in electricity consumption despite the event being backed by campaign groups such as Greenpeace, Christian Aid and the RSPB, plus major energy companies EDF, e.on and Scottish Power.

I’m not surprised it was a flop for several reasons; firstly, it received little publicity. Secondly, why schedule it in the middle of winter and in the middle of the working week!? Other than not leaving the TV, or other electrical equipment on standby, what devices, machinery or equipment can people do without during their normal working life? It is a symptom of modern society that everything is powered by electricity and most professionals and businesses are unable (and unwilling) to go back to manual operation.

Thirdly (and this is contentious one), I believe that saving the planet from global warming is too big an issue for people to swallow and is therefore not the right one to ‘incentivise’ them to save energy. Of course, I care about the environment (many of my blog entries lay testament to that) but I believe people’s apathy towards this event is very telling. Do they really believe it’s possible to save the planet? Or, do most people feel it is too late anyway, the damage has already been done? The pleasures of living in an ‘always on/always connected’ world are too strong to worry about tomorrow. Some people think saving the planet is not up to us but in the hands of ’the Gods’, a religious icon or ethereal power?

I believe the best and only way to ‘incentivise’ people, particularly business people, into saving energy is through the wallet. Make the core issue saving money and the secondary issue about the planet and you will more likely motivate the masses. Environmental issues are far more of a pr story than money saving ones but the people behind such initiatives as this need to ask themselves why they are doing it – is it really to save the planet or to get publicity? and there lies the rub I fear.

At Riello UPS we take energy saving seriously from an environmental perspective and economic one. Many of our customers, particularly large data centres, are demanding that energy saving innovation be incorporated into UPS technology and we’ve responded by designing units with low input current distortion, maximum input power factor, progressive rectifier start-up and battery care systems to optimize performance that will all combine towards savings in running costs and total cost of ownership over the lifetime of the product. We feel this is a practical step towards saving the planet.

For more information about energy saving UPS visit: Riello UPS