North South Interconnector - Worth the Money ?

Aside from the renewables aspect, the main justification for the North South interconnector is a deficit of reliable electricity generation in Northern Ireland.

Today, following the closure of old plant in the North, it is the South which is exporting its surplus electricity northwards - John Fitzgerald, economist.

Despite the signing of a local reserve services contract in 2015, the construction of the second North South Interconnector is the optimum solution available to alleviate this security of supply risk and allow the surplus of generation capacity which exists in Ireland to be counted towards security of supply in Northern Ireland - Eirgrid 2015.

Eirgrid now acknowledge that the commissioning of a new plant in Northern Ireland would help solve this problem :

In Northern Ireland, emissions legislation is causing a significant amount of plant to be restricted in its running hours, or to be decommissioned. This will lead to a deficit of supply. This situation would be alleviated by the second North-South Interconnector in 2021, or by the commissioning of new plant.

The assumption that South Ireland will have surplus generation to export to the North is now questionable due to new capacity market rules:

While we have reported a large surplus of plant in previous GCS reports, we now envisage that this surplus will be reduced if it is not required by the new Capacity Market. This is because the Capacity Market will only pay for enough generating units to meet the capacity requirement - Eirgrid 2017.

Interconnectors are fraught with all sorts of engineering and system problems. The interconnector from Northern Ireland to Scotland has suffered numerous faults and England no longer has enough surplus electricity to export to South Ireland through the undersea cable between the two countries (EWIC).  

The East-West interconnector (EWIC) connects the transmission systems of Ireland and Wales with a capacity of 500 MW in either direction. However, it is difficult to predict whether or not imports for the full 500 MW will be available at all times. Informed by the proposed I-SEM Capacity Market decision, we assume a 50% derating factor, i.e. 250 MW.

For the purposes of adequacy studies, we treat the Moyle interconnector similarly to EWIC, i.e. with a suitable capacity reliance (50% of 450 MW which gives 225 MW) to account for the uncertain availability of generation in Great Britain.

So assuming that the interconnector actually works for most of the time (granted this is less of a problem with overground land cables than it is with those placed under the sea), what happens if the exporting market does not have sufficient generation to export electricity through it ? Given the new capacity market rules and the planned data centres which will drive demand for electricity upwards in South Ireland, a new power station in Belfast would probably be the least costly and most secure solution to Northern Ireland's problems. 

Furthermore, if the new All Island capacity market will pay for surplus generation in the South to export to the North, then why not just allow the capacity market to pay for that generating plant in the North and save money on a completely new grid ?

Cash For Ash - How Green Feel Good Polices Damage the Environment

        The remedy is sometimes worse than the disease - Francis Bacon

Josh cartoons

Green polices are mostly ideological and rarely based on any kind of robust analysis. This was never more evident in the Cash for Ash scheme that was setup in Northern Ireland where amazingly, farmers got paid a profit to burn wood pellets. There are reports that farmers with empty sheds could qualify for the handsome subsidies. There are also reports that people are burning the wood pellets right around the clock with windows and doors open to allow the heat out.   The impact on the environment of course is entirely negative. 

A full report on this crazy scheme can be found here in The Irish Times.

ESRI Report on Brexit

The ESRI report on Brexit warns about the implications for the All Island Electricity Market. ESRI economic forecasts have being proven wrong before, most famously when they predicted a "soft landing" in 2008. This recent report seems to have flaws as well.

•  The first point that needs to be noted is the fact that an all-island electricity market has existed since 2007. Interconnection between Ireland and Northern Ireland is particularly important for Northern Ireland which relies on electricity imports from Ireland to make up for insufficient local electricity generation capacity.

Northern Ireland has a capacity shortage. Now that they are outside the EU, they can ignore EU Directives on power stations, reverse the closure of their coal plants, and open a new power station if required. This is an easy solution to their problems, it's also cheaper than building the North South Interconnector, but somehow ESRI failed to spot it.

• Hence the UK government considered trading in renewable electricity with Ireland, which could have reduced the cost of UK compliance. However, negotiations on this strategy stalled because of a reluctance to pay the necessary subsidy to Irish producers, in spite of the fact that it would have reduced the overall cost of compliance for the UK. 

Cost was only one issue. The UK officials realized that there was a high correlation of wind between the two islands i.e when wind is blowing in the UK, it is blowing in Ireland and vice versa. This reduces the benefits of importing wind from Ireland.

•  If the UK left the EU it would no longer be subject to EU regulatory measures to deal with a possible crisis situation in the case of a gas or oil shortage. Ireland would then have to consider how best to provide protection from very unlikely, but potentially catastrophic outcomes. Gas supplies are of crucial importance to Ireland because gas plays a central role in electricity generation. Because of this, any interruption to supply could have very serious consequences. 

I thought that Ireland's goal was to be energy independent by building wind farms ? So why will there be a problem if UK can't supply gas to us anymore ? An inherent, but unwritten, assumption in the ESRI report is that investment in wind energy will not make us materially any less dependent on gas imports.  So why are they pushing the wind policy ?

In reality, should a wide gap open up between UK and Ireland in terms of one country pursuing EU energy policy for the next 10-20 years and the other not, then Ireland will become more and more dependent on UK for electricity. EU energy policy may well result in the closure of uneconomical Irish power stations whilst UK will be free to build more.

Who pays for the North South Interconnector and why?

Guest post by Pat Swords. 

Is the North South Interconnector worth the investment, who pays and who benefits ?  

The amount of money we are paying in our electricity bills for grid expansions and the lack of reasons why, is starting to reach epidemic proportions. The recent Energy Green Paper in its Figure 5 shows the breakdown of the domestic electricity rate, in which transmission and distribution, i.e. the grid, amount to some 34% of the domestic electricity price (an additional VAT at 13.5% is then applied).

So we can deduce that nearly a third of what we pay on our final bill is going to fund the grid. As such then, one should be highly concerned, when in 2011 Newspaper articles entitled "Ireland's big hope or just hot air" are published. These summarise the position of the Irish Academy of Engineering with respect to the proposed roll out of the renewable energy programme and supporting grid infrastructure.

As the article highlights:

• Between now and 2015, billpayers will also pay at least €1.4 billion in grid development and improvement costs that are necessary for the development of more wind farms, according to grid operator Eirgrid.
• In addition, there is the €500 million cost to billpayers of the East-West interconnector, also needed to facilitate more wind energy, it says.
• Another aspect of all this, perhaps indicating the true total cost of all of this wind energy, is that the ESB in 2008 announced plans to invest €11 billion in the grid and a further €11 billion in renewables and smart meters by 2020, although ESB sources say this strategy may be revised. 

Therefore, we are looking at potentially some €13 billion to be spent on the grid, both for high voltage (Eirgrid) and medium voltage (ESB), in order to facilitate all of this renewable programme. This is a staggering amount of money. Indeed to put it in its context, if we go back to Figure 5 in the Green paper, some 46% of the domestic rate is the wholesale price and 80% of that is fuel for the power stations. In other words, a third of what you pay in your final bill is fuel for the power stations. Yet it can quite easily be calculated, that if there was no wind energy, Irish thermal power stations could be kept running for a fuel cost amounting to some €1 billion per year. 

If one was to use simple maths and ignore such issues as that some electricity is sold at a lower rate to industry, one gets the simple answer, in that if we didn't progress all this grid expansion to facilitate renewables, we could have free electricity instead for four years. Note: This is not an unreasonable conclusion, there is no such thing as a 'free lunch' and all these billions for investment in renewable infrastructure has to come out of unnecessarily soaring electricity bills.

So let's examine the roll out of the North South Interconnector and particularly what's in it for us the consumer in the Republic of Ireland. Why should we be paying for this 400 kV line running 103 km through the Republic and a further 34 km through N. Ireland? In essence, it doesn't take a genius to figure out, that as more three quarters of the infrastructure lies in the Republic, we are the ones with the biggest cost exposure. As to what this cost exposure actually is can be seen in the European Platform Against Wind Farms (EPAW) submission on the North South Interconnector:

 http://westcorkwind.com/images/Adobe/EPAW_N-S.pdf

As Section 6.6 of this clarifies; Jenny Pyper, who is the Chief Executive of the Utility Regulator in Northern Ireland, stated to the Oireachtas Committee on the 16th June 2015:

• I should apologise for the absence of a crucial bullet point which provides the total project cost of the North-South interconnector, including overhead line, land acquisition, substation and other costs. The total project cost is €286 million

• It is important to understand that, while the security of supply concerns do not directly apply to us - we probably have more comfort in the Republic in terms of the capacity available for generation - there is an argument that we have an excess that cannot flow to Northern Ireland because the second interconnector is not available at the moment, which is imposing costs on consumers. This extra cost, which we think at minimum is about €10 million per annum, is the primary concern from the Republic's point of view.

So let's think this through; the Republic of Ireland doesn't need to import any power from Northern Ireland, as it has a surplus of generation capacity. Jenny Pyper is claiming that the presence of the interconnector would lead to greater efficiencies in thermal power plant generation, which would amount to some €10 million per annum. This is complete peanuts in an all island electricity market, which pays each year some €2.75 billion to generators, to which grid costs, etc.have to be added before the final consumer price is arrived at. Furthermore, it is generally recognised that the economic lifespan of high voltage transmission systems is 45 to 50 years, so the simple payback on this proposed North South Interconnector project would be in the order of half its expected lifespan. In engineering terms this is simply absurd.

So why are we doing this, when clearly the bulk of the economic and environmental costs are to be picked up by the consumers in the Republic of Ireland, who have absolutely no need for this investment? 

It doesn't take long to figure out that all of this investment is for the 'Glory' of even more renewables. As Section 4.1 of the EPAW document shows:

• The governments of Ireland and Northern Ireland have both set targets of meeting 40% of electricity consumption from renewable sources by 2020. This is expected to be achieved mainly by significant amount of new wind generation capacity in both jurisdictions. The RIDP project is required to facilitate the connection of wind generation in Donegal in Ireland and in the west and north of Northern Ireland, where the renewable resources are largely located. The additional grid transfer capacity provided by this North South 400 kV interconnection project is essential to allow access to a larger market for the new renewable generation, particularly for Northern Ireland wind generation in times of high wind conditions and low local demand. This project therefore indirectly allows the connection of 600 MW in Northern Ireland, i.e. the equivalent of the additional grid transfer capacity initially provided by the link.

So what does this mean in real terms? Well first of all the power generation situation in N. Ireland is in a complete crises, as nobody will invest in the conventional generation necessary to keep the lights on. This is described in detail in Sections 5.2 and 5.3 of the EPAW document, but in simple terms why would one put hard earned cash into a conventional generation plant there, when the market place is to be turned over to the new renewable generators and the power stations in the Republic of Ireland. The latter to have improved access through the capacity of this new interconnector. The whole thing is actually quite nasty, Government funded renewables and interconnectors are putting conventional plants out of business in N. Ireland and the fact that there are no longer sufficient conventional generators left in N. Ireland is then being used as the justification for those same projects. Yet if those State sponsored schemes weren't there, there would be plenty of companies interested in the N. Ireland power generation market. 

In fact you couldn't make it up, consumers in the Republic of Ireland are now to finance ill-conceived interconnector projects, which would never happen without massive subsidies, while the alternative makes absolute 100% sense. Finance nothing and let N. Ireland have a proper vibrant electricity market, in which its own electricity consumers finance the necessary convention power generation it requires. Not only is this proper economics and provides the security of supply that N. Ireland requires, but it prevents the completely unnecessary scarring of the Irish countryside with over 137 km of massive pylons, associated medium voltage transmission lines and more than 300 additional wind turbines in N. Ireland alone. 

The future of power generation in Northern Ireland - Part 3

Will the North South interconnector resolve the security of supply problem in Northern Ireland?

In 2009 the international engineering company Poyry completed an extensive engineering study that included over 20,000 hours of technical effort entitled: “Impact of intermittency: How wind variability could change the shape of the British and Irish electricity markets”. As the press release concluded:

• As far as investment is concerned, the drivers for new thermal plant are not encouraging. According to Pöyry, such plants will have to operate at low and highly uncertain loads and, under current market arrangements, the likely returns do not appear good.

• The report says: “If significant wind energy is achieved, along the lines required by the 2020 renewable targets, we predict power stations which are built now will face much more uncertain revenues in the future. For example, any generation built before 2016 to cover closure, under emission regulations, of existing coal-fired power stations, would face a volatile future, uncertain to the point that plant may only operate for a few hours one year and then hundreds of hours the next year.”

• And with the level of wind energy envisaged on the system by 2030, the variation in prices will be extreme. There will be periods of negative prices and very short periods with prices at almost £8000/MWh.

Note: The latter price is some two hundred times what is currently typically achieved in the market place for power supply to the grid. Both Eirgrid and National Grid, as steering committee members, participated in the above study by Poyry.

There is no doubt that Johnathan Swift of Gulliver’s Travels fame would have recognised this for what it is, outright stupidity. However, he was equally adept at putting it: “It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into”. The lack of thought and analysis to justify this renewable programme, not least that analysis, which was legally required but never completed, is simply astounding. Taking away some 40% of the electricity market from reliable dispatchable power plants and handing it over to unreliable intermittent wind turbines, means that those dispatchable power plants no longer get the run times they used to and when they are running, it is often in a highly inefficient stop / start mode to balance the intermittent wind energy input to the grid. So a good solid business venture becomes a lousy business and it makes absolutely no sense, to invest in new infrastructure in a jurisdiction, which is pursuing such an energy policy.

Hence the reason why AES is simply not interested in completing the DeNOx upgrade to Kilroot or investing in new generation capacity to replace Ballylumford B. The fact that decisions have been taken by both administrations, as documented in the Eirgrid Planning Report Volume 2A Section 4.2.4 ‘The Position of the Governments and Regulatory Authorities’, to build the North South Interconnector and associated wind energy developments, simply means that Northern Ireland is now off limits for investment in replacement conventional generation.

This can actually be seen in Volume 3B Chapter 4 Transmission andTechnology Alternatives Section 4.4.3.1 ‘Potential Alternative: New Conventional Generation in Northern Ireland’:

• 30 One measure to reduce the impact of the transmission capacity restrictions described could be to build further generation in Northern Ireland.

• 31 It is conceivable that a new conventional generation plant constructed in Northern Ireland would improve security of supply issues in the medium term; however, it must be recognised that investment in new generation is at the discretion of independent commercial ventures, and market forces have not produced any proposal for new conventional generation to date.

• 32 Enforcing the construction of a new power station to improve security of supply in Northern Ireland could not be achieved without creating fundamental distortions in the SEM. Such distortions would, in their turn, have a consequential adverse impact on other existing generators, further jeopardising future investment in generation.

 The above statement is disingenuous to say the least. The fact is that building a replacement power station for existing dispatchable capacity, which will no longer be available, is a perfectible viable alternative to the North South Interconnector, which in practice is not being realised, because of decisions already taken at Government level to economically ‘kill it’ as a viable option. If we go back to Section 3.2 and the Maastricht Recommendations, then to re-quote:

• 80. “When all options are open” may be read as a time when any option could still be chosen as the preferred option. Some examples of situations when all options might no longer be considered open could include:
  • When a public announcement of a preferred option has been made even though the plan or programme has not yet been adopted;
  • When a formal decision on the issue has been taken by a public body (including representative bodies like local, regional or national parliaments);
  • When a decision maker has promised to constituents that they will pursue or avoid particular options;
  • When a public authority has concluded contracts or agreements with private parties related to a decision subject to the Convention which would have the effect of foreclosing options prior to meaningful input from the public - (See the findings of the Compliance Committee on communication ACCC/C/2008/24 concerning compliance by Spain (ECE/MP.PP/C.1/2009/8/Add.1), para. 119 (a) (iii).

An examination of the Eirgrid Planning Report Volume 2A Section 4.2.4 ‘The Position of the Governments and Regulatory Authorities’ is thus revealing within the context above.

• In March 2006, the Director of Energy Networks at the Commission for Energy Regulation confirmed in writing to the then Head of Grid Development and Commercial at ESB National Grid (now EirGrid) that:

• The Commission [for Energy Regulation] and the NIAER have considered the option of constructing either a 275 kV or a higher capacity 400 kV line. Both regulators have decided that the additional cost associated with the 400 kV line is justified on the basis of both its higher energy transfer capability and its ability to be upgraded in the long run more practically and economically. Accordingly, the Commission hereby approves a standard of 400 kV for the additional Interconnector line.

• This letter of confirmation from the CER thus set the context for developing a higher capacity additional interconnector between Ireland and Northern Ireland.

What is clear is that public authorities are entering into agreements with associated public funding arrangements, which have the deliberate intent of closing off alternatives and doing so in a manner, which bypasses the whole procedures of public participation related to such large and obtrusive infrastructural projects.

However, to return to the issue of ‘security of supply’, it is clear that the future direction proposed by this Eirgrid project will lead to the situation in the near future, such that Northern Ireland will only have two remaining dispatchable power stations of note, namely those at Coolkeeragh and Ballylumford C. Is this significant? As a grid engineer will explain, power stations were traditionally built close to where the actual power demand was required, not just to reduce the extent of the transmission network and associated losses, but also to assist in maintaining grid stability. In other words you can transmit power (electrons) on long transmission lines, but you can’t maintain the stability at the end of them where the point of use is. Therefore to maintain grid stability, imbalances and disturbances in smaller grids have to be compensated for, both locally and immediately. This is completed by relying on power generation units, which must store enough kinetic energy and reactive power to compensate the power imbalance; in simply terms they have rotating inertia. In more complex terms it can be explained by the below:

• Voltage is a measured physical quantity, which fluctuates as a function of the network state, i.e. grid topology, generation, load, transmission lines and transformers. For network security reasons, i.e. compatibility with the rating of equipment, the supply of customers within the contractual ranges of voltage, plus the power system’s voltage stability regarding disturbances, a voltage control is needed to maintain voltage deviations within predetermined ranges.
• • Voltage levels are maintained by reactive power, assured by different facilities: depending on their operational state, all generators, loads, lines and transformers are either reactive power consumers or producers. Reactive power cannot be transmitted over long distances efficiently, and voltage control is thus a regional problem.
  
  
  • Primary voltage control is implemented by the voltage regulators of generating units. These regulators initiate a variation in the excitation of generators, and reactive power is adjusted using automatic devices with a time response of less than a few seconds. Secondary or tertiary voltage controls are implemented within a time period that can range up to several minutes, using either automatic control devices within a given zone of voltage control, or by the TSO’s manual action to activate reactive compensation equipment.
  • 
    
  A good example is Dublin, for which it is eminently possible to transmit all the power it requires (in terms of electrons) from power stations located in the South and South West of the country, plus supplemented by power transmission from the UK over the new East West Interconnector linking the North of Dublin to Wales. However, this is never done, at least two power stations in the Dublin area must be kept running at all times to maintain grid security – the rotating inertia of their large generator sets is essential to maintain grid stability in the surrounding area.
  
  
  So where does this leave the future position of Northern Ireland; only two remaining power stations of note, of which one could trip or be off-line for maintenance, while the grid is full of highly intermittent wind energy rapidly varying their output, as the wind rises and falls. Doesn’t take a genius to figure that one out, but this is what Eirgrid are actually selling in their planning documentation as ‘Security of Supply’.
  
  
  Note: The term brownout comes from the dimming experienced by lighting when the voltage sags. A voltage reduction may be an effect of disruption of an electrical grid, or may occasionally be imposed in an effort to reduce load and prevent a power outage, known as a blackout. As the Institute of Directors in Northern Ireland put it in their May 2014 press release:
  
  
  • Security of supply
  
  
  • It has been many decades since ‘security of supply’ has been the primary concern in relation to our electricity grid.
  
  
  • The recent focus has been on the cost of electricity and on fuel poverty, masking the serious issues around the current stability of the Grid and the availability of adequate quantities of electricity at peak times of the day.
  
  
  • Even if the priority issues are appropriately addressed now, the lead-in time for the required infrastructure investment means that stability and supply issues will become even more acute in the short term.
  
  
  • Regrettably, timely decisions on improvements to our infrastructure have not been taken to date; as a result the impact will be untimely ‘brown-outs’ (short interruptions in supply) and potentially ‘black-outs’.
  
  
  • By the time the necessary decisions on infrastructure investment are eventually approved, significant costs will have accrued to these projects.
  
  
  • How NI plc tackles this problem is of hugely significant strategic importance yet it is not apparent that any co-ordinated approach is being taken.
  
  
  • The failure in decision making and prioritisation at the Northern Ireland governance level has not only led inevitably to more widespread security of supply issues, but ultimately to higher electricity prices than otherwise would have been necessary.
  
  
  • How is this manifesting itself?
  
  
  • These issues are already impacting on business expansion plans and jobs.
  
  
  • Brown-outs are happening now across the province - from the Ards Peninsula to North Antrim, from Castlewellan to Omagh.
  
  
  • Businesses are having to use generators to provide electricity where Grid supply is not available. (On-site generator supply is at least twice as expensive as Grid electricity, thereby affecting competitiveness).
  
  
  The only conclusion which one can draw from the above, that bad enough as it is now, the North South Interconnector and its associated wind farms are only going to make it worse.
  
  

1 http://www.poyry.co.uk/news/impact-intermittency-how-wind-variability-could-change-shape-british-and-irish-electricity-markets

The future of power generation in Northern Ireland - Part 2

The North South Interconnector - what is the payback of the project ?

The North South Interconnector is hailed as the panacea to Northern Ireland's electricity woes.

If we consider Eirgrid’s figures for the interconnector for 2020, they claim a central estimate of €20 million for 2020 and a sensitivity estimate of €13 million. The latter one is actually the justifiable figure. So how much does the North South Interconnector cost? In the presentation to the Oireachtas Committee of 16^th June 2015, it was clarified by Jenny Pyper, who is the Chief Executive of the Utility Regulator in Northern Ireland:

• I should apologise for the absence of a crucial bullet point which provides the total project cost of the North-South interconnector, including overhead line, land acquisition, substation and other costs. The total project cost is €286 million

• It is important to understand that, while the security of supply concerns do not directly apply to us - we probably have more comfort in the Republic in terms of the capacity available for generation - there is an argument that we have an excess that cannot flow to Northern Ireland because the second interconnector is not available at the moment, which is imposing costs on consumers. This extra cost, which we think at minimum is about €10 million per annum, is the primary concern from the Republic's point of view.

Note: None of this includes the cost of the 600 MW of wind energy in Northern Ireland to be facilitated by the North South Interconnector, which as previous is in the order of €2 million per MW installed capacity.

From an engineering perspective what is provided above is simply astounding, a project cost of €286 million and a realist return of €13 million results in a simple payback of some 22 years. In the private sector a project would need a simple payback of some 5 years before it would be considered as viable. As regards the actual payback, then one has to include other costs, such as maintenance, operational costs, depreciation, interest rates on borrowings, etc. So this would push the 22 years out by many more. It is generally recognised that the economic lifespan of high voltage transmission systems is 45 to 50 years, so the payback on this proposed North South Interconnector project would be in the order of half its expected lifespan. In engineering terms this is simply absurd.

For instance, if we consider the UK’s Department of Energy & Climate Change report on “Research to Assess the Barriers and Drivers to Energy Efficiency in Small and Medium Sized Enterprises”, then this clarified with respect to payback period:

• The majority of Interviewed Businesses reported that energy efficiency improvements with a payback period of less than two years made business sense and would be likely to go ahead if finance was available; some extended this to five years.

Why is this so, because it reaches a point where there are simply far better opportunities available to achieve an actual return on the investment, i.e. there is a better bang for the buck elsewhere. After all nobody begrudges that public money is spent on essential infrastructure for health and education, but what is proposed is a project, which wouldn’t see the light of day in the private sector, due to its chronic lack of viable payback. Have Eirgrid looked at alternatives properly ?

As was highlighted in Part 1, Northern Ireland requires new dispatchable generation capacity to replace that which no longer meets EU emissions standards. Could such capacity be installed for the reported €286 million, which is to be spent on the North South Interconnector plus the €2 million per MW to be spent on the associated 600 MW of wind energy? Given that the installed cost of Combined Cycle Gas Turbine technology is less than €0.9 million per MW, then the overwhelming answer is yes it could. So why was this option not investigated in the consideration of alternatives by Eirgrid?

The future of power generation in Northern Ireland - Part 1

Kilroot Coal Power Station's output will be restricted from 2016

Northern Ireland is facing a generating capacity shortage in the all too near future. How did this happen and what are the implications ?

 

 There are essentially four thermal plants in Northern Ireland.

• Coolkeeragh power station a modern Combined Cycle Gas Turbine plant in Derry owned by ESB entered into service in June 2005 and is 400 MW.

• Ballylumford B which dates to 1974 and is 540 MW. This was very similar to Ringsend with it's two large chimneys in that it was designed originally for heavy fuel oil and later converted to natural gas, it does not meet the nitrogen oxide emission limits set in the EU's Large Combustion Plant Directive and was 'opted out'. There is also an open cycle gas turbine of 112 MW dating from 1976 and used for peaking operations. fired by fuel oil at this site. There is a derogation in the EU legislation for such turbines used for 'emergency use', i.e. less than 500 hours per year. These are owned by AES.

• Ballylumford C, which is 600 MW and commenced operations in 2003. It includes two Combined Cycle Gas Turbines (CCGT) with combined efficiency of 48 percent running on natural gas and the ability to burn distillate as back-up fuel. Also owned by AES.

• Kilroot is coal fired with 520 MW and dates to 1981. It has sea water desulphurisation but in the absence of DeNOx technology, won't meet the nitrogen oxide (NOx) limits originally set in the Large Combustion Plant Directive of 2001/80/EC and applicable from 1st January 2015. There are also two small peaker distillate fired open cycle gas turbines of 84 MW in total installed in 2009. Also owned by AES.

It was originally envisaged that when Ballylumford C was built that the Ballylumford B plant would be shut down, but it was kept in use as a back-up, as in that time the electricity demand had increased. If one of the other three power stations failed, it had to step in. N.Ireland's own electricity statistics show:

http://www.soni.ltd.uk/media/documents/Operations/Statistics/NI%20Monthly%20Electricity%20Statistics%20November%202014.pdf

• All Time Maximum Peak Demand: 1,777 MW on 22nd December 2010

• Installed Dispatchable Capacity: 2,342 MW. As at 30th November 2014 - This figure excludes import capacity of Moyle. (Import = 450 MW Nov-Mar & 410 MW Apr-Oct. Export = 295 MW Sep-Apr & 287 MW May-Aug).

The EU's Large Combustion Plant Directive has been superseded by the 2010/75/EC Directive in Industrial Emissions (IED). From January 2016 older plants can enter into what is called a Transitional National Plan (TNP), which is based around an allowable level of emissions, which progressively gets reduced over a period of five or so years. Ireland now has a TNP in place and agreed with the EU, see below, but the UK's TNP hasn't been agreed, it seems to have been rejected at least once if not twice.

The power company AES's presentation of September 2013 to the N.I Committee is extremely interesting  :

AES's assets must comply with the EU's large combustion plant directive (LCPD) until the end of 2015 and its successor, the industrial emissions directive (IED), from 1st January 2016.  Several options are available to AES in order to comply with the more stringent emission limits under IED, including limited hours of operation up to 2023; operating under a transitional national plan (TNP), which would allow restricted operation until 2020; or investing to make the plants fully compliant with IED emission limits from 1st January 2016. Our current view is that Kilroot will opt into the TNP.  Assuming no further significant capital investments under the TNP option, the capacity factor of the Kilroot main units will be limited to approximately 45% from 2016 to 2020, with a further reduction in operations to 1,500 hours per annum from June 2020.  Ballylumford C station is currently compliant with IED emissions requirements while firing on gas, but investment will be required in one of the units, unit 10, to enable running on backup fuel, which is distillate.  Ballylumford B station was opted out of the LCPD in 2007 by the previous owner, Premier Power Ltd, and is scheduled to cease operations on 31st December 2015.

What we do know is that Ballylumford B will be shut down on the 21st January 2016. Even if they enter into a derogation on Kilroot with the Transitional National Plan (TNP), they can only operate it at best 45% of the time, which is quite generous, based on the fact that on the past decade it was run 80 to 85% of the time. By 2020 they can only run it for 1,500 hours per year out of the 8,760 hours in a year, namely 17% of the time. However, that 45% is somewhat optimistic, as it is based on a form of emissions trading. It requires for additional emission credits to become available when other companies in the TNP elsewhere in the UK make improvements to their power stations (no longer likely). Also each year there are less and less emission credits available as free issue. On this basis in theory there might be credits that Kilroot could buy, but on the other hand each year there are less and less credits in the TNP. As AES explained to the N. Ireland Committee :

Essentially, we can run the plant up to the point at which we run out of those emissions.  When we run out, we have to shut down the plant until the next year, when we get a new allocation.  The intent of the TNP is to allow the sustained performance of the units and meet the energy needs of the market but still allow some investment.
If you are dispatched strongly throughout the year and hit your capacity factor limit in September, you are not available for the rest of that year.  You have gone through your bubble, so you cannot emit. 

The new Industrial Emissions Directive is very specific in that if you 'opted out' in 2007 under the then Large Combustion Plant Directive, you must close your plant by 31st December 2015. So it is inexplicable why the N. Ireland authorities are writing new emission limit values for Ballylumford B post that date and the Committee discussing possible upgrades to it, as by EU law the operators are forbidden to operate beyond 31st December 2015. It smacks of complete desperation going on.

So in summary there are clearly times of the year post 1st January 2016 when the dispatchable generation capacity in N. Ireland could be down to:

Dispatchable Plant      2,342 MW

Less

Ballylumford B           ( 540 MW )

Kilroot                        ( 520 MW )

Total                        = 1,282 MW

This compares really bad with their peak load of 1,777 MW. It is also well known that they are having operational trouble with the Moyle interconnector, 

• http://www.uregni.gov.uk/uploads/publications/DETI_-_Utility_Regulator_-_Updated_Security_of_Supply_Paper_-_22_Dec_14_draft_2.pdf 

• These issues are compounded by a fault on the Moyle interconnector which has reduced its transfer capacity to 250 MW. Efforts by Mutual Energy to complete interim repairs to the cable proved to be unsuccessful in restoring the Moyle to full capacity. A  project to install new undersea low voltage cables is being progressed and expected to be operational by 2017. 

While there is a surplus of dispatchable capacity in the Republic, there is currently only 400 MW of transfer capacity between the Republic and N.Ireland and this will not alter until the North South Interconnector is built. 

So N. Ireland at best can import 650 MW and legally generate 1,282 MW, which only just exceeds their peak load by 150MW, leaving very little spare for reserve. So what happens if a Combined Cycle Gas Turbine either at Derry or Ballylumford trips??

However, Eirgrid in their 2013 -2022 Capacity Statement report state :

Northern Ireland

• In the base case scenario the Northern Ireland Generation Security Standard is met until 2020.

• Thereafter, Northern Ireland will be in deficit. With the additional North-South tie line in place, these deficits are avoided.

• Northern Ireland is at risk of deficits from 2016 onwards in the event of a prolonged outage of a large generation plant or of the Moyle Interconnector.

• No new generation is expected to connect out to 2022 other than renewables.

• 510 MW of conventional plant in Ballylumford will close by 2016. From 2021, the output from 476 MW of plant at Kilroot is projected to be severely restricted because of limited running hours due to the Industrial Emissions Directive (IED). The effect of this is that the Northern Ireland Generation Security Standard is not met in 2021 and 2022.

• The Moyle Interconnector has been modelled at an import capacity of 250 MW due to uncertainty as to when the current ongoing fault on one cable will be repaired.

But the restrictions on Kilroot kick in from 1st January 2016, as the company stated and they are major ones, which is now acknowledged in the December 2014 draft SONI report above. You can see also how up front the owners are in their presentation to the N. Ireland committee as to what the situation is :

Mr Miller: There are two routes of remuneration.  Let us just say that, if we get comfortable with our expectations of what the market would deliver post-2016, we would bear the risk of that investment, as it currently stands.  If we struggle based on the investment required to make that into a measurable investment metric — in other words, that we will recover our investment over a certain period — we could be forced down the route of asking for some sort of surety through a capacity contract, as we outlined in our opening statement, to ensure that we will get our investment back.

This is the core of the issue, it has absolutely nothing to do with opposition to the North South Interconnector, but everything to do with a dysfunctional renewable policy and an ideologically driven elite, who are out of control. N. Ireland operated perfectly as an essentially independent electricity network for many decades, with a reliable and affordable electricity supply. It is no longer worth the while of electricity generation companies to participate in investing further with conventional reliable generation in that market, as that market place has been destroyed by a set of decision makers ignorant of power generation. This is clear. So too is it clear what the purpose of the North South Interconnector is:

• http://www.unece.org/fileadmin/DAM/env/pp/compliance/C2013-96/Communication/Attachment_6_Questionnaires.pdf 

• The additional grid Transfer capacity provided by this North South 400 kV interconnection project is essential to allow access to a larger market for the new renewable generation, particularly for Northern Ireland wind generation in times of high wind conditions and low local demand. This project therefore indirectly allows the connection of 600 MW in Northern Ireland, i.e. the equivalent of the additional grid transfer capacity initially provided by the link.

So this is the "real" reason behind the North South interconnector - facilitation of wind. But this wind programme has not been legally assessed and therefore it is invalid to approve the interconnector without first assessing all that interconnected wind energy as part of the combined project. An issue which hasn't been completed to date. See the below for more on this:

• http://the-law-is-my-oyster.com/2015/01/24/the-great-eis-swindle/

And will all this wind energy contribute to the adequacy of electricity supply ? Well, not much is the answer. Because of its intermittency, its value in conventional generation terms, i.e. it's capacity credit, is only 20% at present and will decrease as more wind is added. As Eirgrid explain :

Installed Wind Capacity In Northern Ireland is expected to increase to over 637MW during the Winter months, with a corresponding capacity credit of 130MW.

So is N. Ireland going to experience power outages post 2016 ? -  the answer is most likely yes and the reason for it is an obsession with renewables to the detriment of conventional reliable plant and cheap electricity. As the public realise this, there is going to be a hell of a backlash.