By ERIC YEP
MUMBAI -- India plans to quadruple its power generation capacity from renewable sources to 72,400 megawatts by 2022, its renewable energy ministry said late Tuesday.
The South Asian nation's push to increase the amount of energy produced from renewable sources is linked to concerns over coal supplies, global climate change commitments and domestic moves towards clean energy.
Developed countries are demanding stronger environmental commitments from major growing economies such as India and China, where energy demand is set to rise sharply to feed rapid industrialization and bring electricity to millions of rural households.
India is projected to be the second-largest contributor to the increase in global energy demand by 2035, accounting for 18% of the rise, with its energy consumption more than doubling by 2035, according to recent data from the International Energy Agency.
India, which has put in place a "National Action Plan on Climate Change", has said it will reduce its emissions intensity--the amount of carbon dioxide emitted per unit of gross domestic product--by 20%-25% of 2005 levels by 2020.
It may also consider emissions cuts under an international mandate, softening an earlier stand, its environment minister said earlier in December.
In order to meet these targets, India needs to curb emissions from the power sector, which accounts for about 60% of its total carbon dioxide emissions, according to government data. The power sector's dominant fuel source, and the most polluting, is coal.
India's power generation capacity at the end of October was about 167 gigawatts, of which its renewables-based capacity was about 11% at 18,321 MW, the ministry of new and renewable energy said in a statement.
It aims to raise renewables-based capacity to 72,400 MW--or 15.9% of total capacity--by 2022, when the country will have 455 GW of total capacity.
Generation capacity under the renewables ministry covers renewable energy such as solar, wind and small hydroelectric plants, but not large hydroelectric projects.
At the end of October about 65% of India's capacity was from fossil fuels, mostly coal. The government estimates domestic coal supplies will fall short of demand by 82.89 million metric tons in the financial year through March 2011, and widen in the following years, making it vital for it to look towards renewable energy.
The ministry said it is pushing state distribution utilities to procure a specified minimum percentage of renewable power to boost generation from clean energy sources.
The country has also launched a solar program targeting 20 GW of solar-based capacity by 2022 and introduced market instruments called renewable energy certificates. The planning commission has also put together a group of experts to prepare a strategy for a low-carbon economy.
Analysts say India will have to work through numerous bureaucratic and procedural hurdles to meet its renewable energy targets and to match the sector's growth in other emerging markets.
"In 2009 renewable investment in India was $2.3 billion, compared with $34.6 billion for China and $7.4 billion for Brazil," Fitch Ratings said in September in a note.
Write to Eric Yep at eric.yep@dowjones.com
Friday, 31 December 2010
Construction schedule on Chinese third-generation nuclear plants races ahead of European models
Local experience and long working hours speed progress
Guardian Weekly, Tuesday 28 December 2010 14.00 GMT
The workers in their blue overalls and yellow helmets waste little time, ignoring the view of the South China Sea. "They don't hang around," says Rémi Sénac, the Areva representative at Taishan, Guangdong province, where work on the first two European pressurised reactors (EPRs) is going well. France's nuclear conglomerate takes pride in the progress being made on the third-generation reactors sold to China in November 2007. Things have worked out much better here than at Flamanville, in western France, and at Olkiluoto in Finland.
The first reactor, currently no more than a metal cylinder 39 metres high, stands in the middle of a lunar landscape extending over 450 hectares, served by some 20 cranes. Nearby, the dome – which will cap the structure containing the 1,660-MW reactor – is waiting for its last two rings to be added.
The symbolic act of lifting the dome on to the building is scheduled for May 2011, a month ahead of its French counterpart, on which work started earlier. The difference reflects the steep learning curve for new technology. Engineering work on the two Chinese reactors draws on the experience Areva has gained on the other two jobs. The number of subcontractors has also been limited to simplify the division of labour, and changes have been made to several welding procedures.
Areva's partner, the China Guangdong Nuclear Power Company (CGNPC), one of the two companies that dominate the Chinese market for civilian nuclear power, also benefits from the experience of its own subcontractors, who have been working at full capacity since the 1980s when China started trying to reduce its dependence on coal.
"Their civil engineering firms haven't stopped building power stations since," says Roger Seban, the deputy chief executive of TSNPC, the joint venture that has enabled the French utility company EDF to take part in the project.
Another essential ingredient is Chinese labour; there are 9,000 workers currently on site. Instead of working three eight-hour shifts, as is common in Europe, the people working for Hua Xing, the concrete contractor on the first Taishan reactor, work 10-hour stints, seven days a week.
Financial incentives help keep the workers and contractors on track. "One of the most important factors for the economics of a project like this is sticking to the original schedule," says Eric Neisse, a deputy manager at Areva-China. Especially since CGNPC is competing with another state-owned company, which has opted to install a third-generation reactor built by Toshiba-Westinghouse.
Every summer typhoons sweep through Guangdong. A dyke had to built along the coast, with channels cut into the surrounding hills to divert the rain. The seawater is warmer here than in northern Europe, so a 4km tunnel had to be bored for the cooling system on each reactor to draw in cold water from the sea.
The two reactors should be commissioned at the end of 2013 and in autumn 2014 respectively. In the meantime, Areva hopes to have started work on more reactors thanks to Wecan, another joint venture in which CGNPC has taken a majority share, an essential point in this strategically vital sector for China. As everyone is quick to point out, the Taishan site could accommodate six reactors. Work on two of them is just waiting for government approval. In fact, to save time, the earthworks are already complete.
This article originally appeared in Le Monde
Guardian Weekly, Tuesday 28 December 2010 14.00 GMT
The workers in their blue overalls and yellow helmets waste little time, ignoring the view of the South China Sea. "They don't hang around," says Rémi Sénac, the Areva representative at Taishan, Guangdong province, where work on the first two European pressurised reactors (EPRs) is going well. France's nuclear conglomerate takes pride in the progress being made on the third-generation reactors sold to China in November 2007. Things have worked out much better here than at Flamanville, in western France, and at Olkiluoto in Finland.
The first reactor, currently no more than a metal cylinder 39 metres high, stands in the middle of a lunar landscape extending over 450 hectares, served by some 20 cranes. Nearby, the dome – which will cap the structure containing the 1,660-MW reactor – is waiting for its last two rings to be added.
The symbolic act of lifting the dome on to the building is scheduled for May 2011, a month ahead of its French counterpart, on which work started earlier. The difference reflects the steep learning curve for new technology. Engineering work on the two Chinese reactors draws on the experience Areva has gained on the other two jobs. The number of subcontractors has also been limited to simplify the division of labour, and changes have been made to several welding procedures.
Areva's partner, the China Guangdong Nuclear Power Company (CGNPC), one of the two companies that dominate the Chinese market for civilian nuclear power, also benefits from the experience of its own subcontractors, who have been working at full capacity since the 1980s when China started trying to reduce its dependence on coal.
"Their civil engineering firms haven't stopped building power stations since," says Roger Seban, the deputy chief executive of TSNPC, the joint venture that has enabled the French utility company EDF to take part in the project.
Another essential ingredient is Chinese labour; there are 9,000 workers currently on site. Instead of working three eight-hour shifts, as is common in Europe, the people working for Hua Xing, the concrete contractor on the first Taishan reactor, work 10-hour stints, seven days a week.
Financial incentives help keep the workers and contractors on track. "One of the most important factors for the economics of a project like this is sticking to the original schedule," says Eric Neisse, a deputy manager at Areva-China. Especially since CGNPC is competing with another state-owned company, which has opted to install a third-generation reactor built by Toshiba-Westinghouse.
Every summer typhoons sweep through Guangdong. A dyke had to built along the coast, with channels cut into the surrounding hills to divert the rain. The seawater is warmer here than in northern Europe, so a 4km tunnel had to be bored for the cooling system on each reactor to draw in cold water from the sea.
The two reactors should be commissioned at the end of 2013 and in autumn 2014 respectively. In the meantime, Areva hopes to have started work on more reactors thanks to Wecan, another joint venture in which CGNPC has taken a majority share, an essential point in this strategically vital sector for China. As everyone is quick to point out, the Taishan site could accommodate six reactors. Work on two of them is just waiting for government approval. In fact, to save time, the earthworks are already complete.
This article originally appeared in Le Monde
Liquid gas expands to fill Britain's energy gap
Virtual pipeline that ships LNG around the world is growing in importance – and reducing the UK's reliance on Russia. But it can't insulate the gas supply from disruption
Tim Webb guardian.co.uk, Monday 27 December 2010 17.27 GMT
On a freezing morning, Simon Fairman, manager of National Grid's Isle of Grain liquified natural gas terminal, greets a blue-faced engineer in a control room. The engineer had just come inside after a morning checking nuts and bolts on the windswept new jetty which opened for business at the start of this month. Protruding some 300 metres into the murky River Medway, the jetty can accommodate tankers the size of aircraft carriers to offload their precious cargo of supercooled liquid gas.
The timely expansion – which coincided with the coldest weather for decades – means the £1bn liquified natural gas (LNG) terminal, the world's largest outside Japan and Korea, can now supply up to a fifth of the UK's average annual gas demand.
However, a tanker which had been expected to dock that day was not now due until the following week, giving engineers the opportunity to carry out maintenance. It is impossible to know precisely when LNG tankers – sailing mostly from Algeria, Qatar and Norway – will arrive. A maximum of five can dock there each week. Gas producers such as BP, Algeria's Sonatrach and Gaz de France pay National Grid to book berthing slots at the terminal but do not have to use them.
"They will pick and choose – they can change their mind up to the last moment," Fairman says. "If there is a demand for gas in Spain, they will take the cargo there because there is a better price rather than bring it to the UK, for example."
Last year one tanker from Algeria on its seven-day voyage to the Isle of Grain had got as far as the Straits of Dover when the ship's master was called by Sonatrach, owner of the cargo.
"There were some problems in Turkey and a need for LNG there," Fairman recalls. "They were saying: 'We may need you to divert, we may need you to turn round and go full speed to Turkey.'"
LNG is gas compressed into a liquid for shipping and then reconverted into gas after it reaches its destination. Fairman calls the growing number of LNG tankers and terminals such as the Isle of Grain around the world a virtual global pipeline.
The UK has three major terminals which between them are able to supply almost half of the country's average annual gas demand. Each of the largest tankers carries enough gas to supply about a third of the UK's average daily winter demand.
Gas glut
The International Energy Agency this year pointed to an unexpected global "gas glut" which it forecasts will last for a decade, the result of new ways of producing "unconventional gas" from shale or coal seams. This glut means that oil companies such as Shell will soon be producing more gas than oil for the first time.
Not relying on physical pipelines, LNG allows producers to reach new markets such as the UK. On one of the coldest days of the month – December 19 – a record quarter of all the gas consumed in the UK came from LNG. Ships flocked to UK terminals to meet demand – and to benefit from the high prices energy companies such as British Gas were prepared to pay to keep their customers supplied.
National Grid estimates that as supplies from the North Sea run out, the UK will be forced to import 70% of its gas by 2020, with two thirds of this coming from LNG. The gas glut and expansion of terminals such as the Isle of Grain have also eased concerns over security of supply as the country is less heavily reliant on imports shipped by pipeline from Europe and Russia.
However, the growth in LNG does not mean the UK will be entirely insulated from winter gas supply rows involving Russia and its European neighbours. In fact, the Guardian's visit to the Isle of Grain coincided with one by Russian energy group Gazprom, with the company talking to National Grid about booking new berthing slots.
"If you are a producer of LNG you will always be looking for new markets," Fairman says. "In the situation with Gazprom – they clearly would like to develop their capacity for LNG. From our point of view, there is an opportunity of having a conversation which prospectively could or could not lead to something."
Diverting demand
Nick Campbell, from energy consultancy Inenco, argues that relying more on LNG opens up the UK to the vagaries – and volatility – of global gas demand. He cites the example of an LNG tanker from Nigeria bound for the Dragon LNG terminal at Milford Haven in Wales in August, which was diverted at the last minute to Brazil. Lower-than-expected rainfall meant that Brazil's hydro plants were generating less electricity, requiring its gas plants to increase production.
The UK can import up to about 75% of its average winter demand via pipelines from Norway and the Continent, but this gas will flow elsewhere in Europe if the price is higher there.
"With pipelines we are competing against Europe for gas. With LNG, we are competing in a global market," Campbell says.
Whether LNG cargoes arrive in the UK depends on how much suppliers are willing to pay. "When people say we are running out of gas we are not, but the price may have to increase to incentivise shippers," Campbell says. "Gas producers are not the Salvation Army. They are not going to do anything for free."
But equally, he estimates that gas bought on the spot market would cost a quarter more had the UK's LNG capacity not nearly tripled in the last two years.
Fairman insists the destination of most LNG tankers is scheduled months in advance: "This not 'Where am I going to put it today?'" He says they should not be viewed any differently to oil tankers. "We don't worry about where oil tankers are going with our petrol."
Tim Webb guardian.co.uk, Monday 27 December 2010 17.27 GMT
On a freezing morning, Simon Fairman, manager of National Grid's Isle of Grain liquified natural gas terminal, greets a blue-faced engineer in a control room. The engineer had just come inside after a morning checking nuts and bolts on the windswept new jetty which opened for business at the start of this month. Protruding some 300 metres into the murky River Medway, the jetty can accommodate tankers the size of aircraft carriers to offload their precious cargo of supercooled liquid gas.
The timely expansion – which coincided with the coldest weather for decades – means the £1bn liquified natural gas (LNG) terminal, the world's largest outside Japan and Korea, can now supply up to a fifth of the UK's average annual gas demand.
However, a tanker which had been expected to dock that day was not now due until the following week, giving engineers the opportunity to carry out maintenance. It is impossible to know precisely when LNG tankers – sailing mostly from Algeria, Qatar and Norway – will arrive. A maximum of five can dock there each week. Gas producers such as BP, Algeria's Sonatrach and Gaz de France pay National Grid to book berthing slots at the terminal but do not have to use them.
"They will pick and choose – they can change their mind up to the last moment," Fairman says. "If there is a demand for gas in Spain, they will take the cargo there because there is a better price rather than bring it to the UK, for example."
Last year one tanker from Algeria on its seven-day voyage to the Isle of Grain had got as far as the Straits of Dover when the ship's master was called by Sonatrach, owner of the cargo.
"There were some problems in Turkey and a need for LNG there," Fairman recalls. "They were saying: 'We may need you to divert, we may need you to turn round and go full speed to Turkey.'"
LNG is gas compressed into a liquid for shipping and then reconverted into gas after it reaches its destination. Fairman calls the growing number of LNG tankers and terminals such as the Isle of Grain around the world a virtual global pipeline.
The UK has three major terminals which between them are able to supply almost half of the country's average annual gas demand. Each of the largest tankers carries enough gas to supply about a third of the UK's average daily winter demand.
Gas glut
The International Energy Agency this year pointed to an unexpected global "gas glut" which it forecasts will last for a decade, the result of new ways of producing "unconventional gas" from shale or coal seams. This glut means that oil companies such as Shell will soon be producing more gas than oil for the first time.
Not relying on physical pipelines, LNG allows producers to reach new markets such as the UK. On one of the coldest days of the month – December 19 – a record quarter of all the gas consumed in the UK came from LNG. Ships flocked to UK terminals to meet demand – and to benefit from the high prices energy companies such as British Gas were prepared to pay to keep their customers supplied.
National Grid estimates that as supplies from the North Sea run out, the UK will be forced to import 70% of its gas by 2020, with two thirds of this coming from LNG. The gas glut and expansion of terminals such as the Isle of Grain have also eased concerns over security of supply as the country is less heavily reliant on imports shipped by pipeline from Europe and Russia.
However, the growth in LNG does not mean the UK will be entirely insulated from winter gas supply rows involving Russia and its European neighbours. In fact, the Guardian's visit to the Isle of Grain coincided with one by Russian energy group Gazprom, with the company talking to National Grid about booking new berthing slots.
"If you are a producer of LNG you will always be looking for new markets," Fairman says. "In the situation with Gazprom – they clearly would like to develop their capacity for LNG. From our point of view, there is an opportunity of having a conversation which prospectively could or could not lead to something."
Diverting demand
Nick Campbell, from energy consultancy Inenco, argues that relying more on LNG opens up the UK to the vagaries – and volatility – of global gas demand. He cites the example of an LNG tanker from Nigeria bound for the Dragon LNG terminal at Milford Haven in Wales in August, which was diverted at the last minute to Brazil. Lower-than-expected rainfall meant that Brazil's hydro plants were generating less electricity, requiring its gas plants to increase production.
The UK can import up to about 75% of its average winter demand via pipelines from Norway and the Continent, but this gas will flow elsewhere in Europe if the price is higher there.
"With pipelines we are competing against Europe for gas. With LNG, we are competing in a global market," Campbell says.
Whether LNG cargoes arrive in the UK depends on how much suppliers are willing to pay. "When people say we are running out of gas we are not, but the price may have to increase to incentivise shippers," Campbell says. "Gas producers are not the Salvation Army. They are not going to do anything for free."
But equally, he estimates that gas bought on the spot market would cost a quarter more had the UK's LNG capacity not nearly tripled in the last two years.
Fairman insists the destination of most LNG tankers is scheduled months in advance: "This not 'Where am I going to put it today?'" He says they should not be viewed any differently to oil tankers. "We don't worry about where oil tankers are going with our petrol."