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COP 26 Announcement that 'New Gas Boilers' will be banned from 2035


Alan de Enfield

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Are Liveaboards "homes" ?

Are instaneous heaters included ?

Presumably the manufacture of gas water heaters will cease and they will become unavailable, irrespective of whether the law covers boats or not.

As the time draws near, maybe buy a couple of "Morco's" so you can keep up & running

 

From the Times and the Express :

 

 

For 50 years the gas boiler has been the mainstay of central heating. Its days, however, are numbered.

According to Boris Johnson’s flagship climate policy, to be unveiled tomorrow in the run-up to the Cop26 climate summit, new boilers will be banned in British homes from 2035.

 

Other measures being considered by the Government to reach its net-zero target include a ban on all new gas boilers by 2035. Kate Blagojevic, Greenpeace UK's head of climate, said: "While £5,000 grants and a 2035 boiler phase-out date are a decent start, they aren't ambitious enough to adequately tackle emissions from homes or support low-income households to switch.

 

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I think this particular announcement is premature.

 

There is currently a government programme to investigate the feasibility of substituting hydrogen for natural gas in the existing distribution network. The first round of tender responses for the underpinning investigation (materials suitability, logistics, safety etc) were only submitted about a month ago (I know because I wrote one).

 

The government will be investigating options for heating between now and 2025 when it will make the decision between hydrogen and electricity. If anyone actually wants to know more on this (I doubt it!) it can be found on the BEIS website.

 

Alec

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Just now, Tracy D'arth said:

Are all aircraft ( which they are still making ) going to be scrapped?

 

Apparently not, there are already electric aircraft operation on short-haul flights (up to 3 hours) operating in Canada and Scandinavia.

Battery technology will contine to improve and the range will increase.

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4 minutes ago, Tracy D'arth said:

I won't be around, so that's one less thing for me to worry about.

 

How are folks with oil heating going to cope when there is none?  Are all aircraft ( which they are still making ) going to be scrapped?

ATI was, until it ran out of money, funding the development of both electric and hydrogen-powered flight.

 

Electric works in principle for short haul, if you disregard current costs. Hydrogen is further out and is currently seen as the future for long haul. Whether the technology gets there on the desired timeframe is debatable. My guess is that oil-fired heating will become a major issue for the small number of people affected but they will be seen as politically disposable, much like users of coal are today.

 

Alec

Edited by agg221
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5 minutes ago, agg221 said:

There is currently a government programme to investigate the feasibility of substituting hydrogen for natural gas in the existing distribution network.

 

It was discussed in 2019 In the Maritime Zero-Emmission plan with Liverpool / Manchester being the feed in point - has that changed ?

 

 

 

 

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Edited by Alan de Enfield
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2 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

Apparently not, there are already electric aircraft operation on short-haul flights (up to 3 hours) operating in Canada and Scandinavia.

Battery technology will contine to improve and the range will increase.

 

Such touching faith. 

 

There is nothing much on the horizon AFAIK in terms of new battery technologies. All we are doing currently is making incremental improvements at the margins. We need batteries with energy densities several orders of magnitude higher than we have now for long haul aviation, and there is no sign of those that I can see. 

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2035 is almost 15 years away, most of us will be dead or at least no longer boating. Most organisations don't plan more than  5 years ahead.  Climate change assisted by CRT poor management might have removed much of the canal system by 2035, dry summers, wet winters threatening the reservoirs, will be a big problem.

There are much bigger challenges that gas water heaters.

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1 minute ago, MtB said:

We need batteries with energy densities several orders of magnitude higher than we have now for long haul aviation, and there is no sign of those that I can see. 

 

Agreed, but there are also step-change technologies that look as if they may offer what the aircraft industry needs - long haul will likely require 'jet engines' and .............

 

 

Is an electric jet engine possible?
 
 
 
Image result
 
While still a prototype, the engine could one day help alleviate climate change rates. A team of researchers has created a prototype jet engine that's able to propel itself forward using only electricity. ... Their study was published in AIP Advances in May 2020
 
 
DHL have ordered several 'electric planes'
 
 
The purchase, announced this week, will see DHL acquire 12 Alice eCargo planes from Eviation, to form what is says will be “the world’s first electric Express network.” The acquisition is in line with Deutsche Post DHL Group’s sustainability roadmap, released earlier this year. Delivery of the planes is slated for 2024.
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1 minute ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

It was muted in 2019 In the Maritime Zero-Emmission plan with Liverpool / Manchester being the feed in point - has that changed ?

I would say evolved rather than fundamentally changed.

 

The swing to the Conservatives in North East since then has seen a shift in emphasis from Liverpool and Manchester towards Teesside which is now both a Freeport and a Hydrogen Hub. A new site has also been added in South Wales.

 

There are several different aspects to hydrogen. Hydrogen goes by various colour names depending on source. Brown hydrogen is made by heating water and coke together, forming a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen (the old towns gas) and is still industrially significant, particularly on Teesside. Green hydrogen is made by electrolysis of water and is seen as clean and sustainable, so long as you are using surplus renewable electricity to make it. Blue hydrogen is the same but specifically made using offshore wind turbines.

 

Leaving aside the challenges for the moment, and they are considerable, the planned applications are where you need a higher energy density than can be delivered with battery storage. Current areas of interest include rail, flight and shipping, and possibly heavy road haulage. The question is how you use it, which is in part a matter of semantics but it is actually at the heart of one of the current areas of debate. If you burn hydrogen, either for domestic heat or to run an internal combustion engine, it is very simple and cost-effective at point of use, but whilst it creates no carbon emissions it does emit nitrous oxides as the oxygen and nitrogen react at temperature. This NOx is nowhere near as significant a greenhouse gas as carbon based gases but it is still there. The alternative is to use a fuel cell for motive power and rely on electrical heating but this has major technical and commercial barriers - the fuel cell uses enough platinum for this to be infeasible to scale to the current requirements (my first job was developing fuel cell catalysts for Johnson Matthey). Therefore, what it comes down to is whether targets are defined as 'net zero carbon emissions' or 'net zero emissions' and if the latter whether offsetting the NOx emissions is deemed acceptable. It's a political debate and I personally have little interest in what the decision is, but I will probably be part of working out how to implement it so I do take a significant interest in knowing where the thinking ends up.

 

Alec

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9 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

Such touching faith. 

 

There is nothing much on the horizon AFAIK in terms of new battery technologies. All we are doing currently is making incremental improvements at the margins. We need batteries with energy densities several orders of magnitude higher than we have now for long haul aviation, and there is no sign of those that I can see. 

There are some fairly radical battery technology changes under development. Whether they succeed commercially is more debatable.

 

If you look at battery chemistry as Wh/kg which is the usual comparative measure, and particularly important for transport where the lighter the better as it corrresponds to range or payload, current generation Tesla batteries which are about the state of the art are around 280Wh/kg. Experimental versions of Li-based batteries have got up to around 350Wh/kg and 400Wh/kg is feasible. This is the incremental change which would help but would not result in a paradigm shift.

 

In parallel, there are other battery chemistries which are known that can achieve 1500Wh/kg. Conveniently they are also based on sodium which is a whole lot more common than lithium and globally available so long as you have access to the sea. The challenge isn't making the battery, it's making it last and operate safely. The more energy you store, the more of a problem you have if it is released in an uncontrolled manner. Lead acid batteries are pretty low energy density and are internally pretty safe - they do not combust, so do not need a management system. A lithium based battery is much less inherently stable and without a battery management system it is quite capable of spontaneous ignition. A sodium air battery is extremely challenging to manage as if it does ignite there is no stopping it. This is where a lot of the focus currently lies. I could bore you endlessly with the technicalities of cell plate design, but I won't!


Alec

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3 minutes ago, agg221 said:

In parallel, there are other battery chemistries which are known that can achieve 1500Wh/kg. Conveniently they are also based on sodium which is a whole lot more common than lithium and globally available so long as you have access to the sea. The challenge isn't making the battery, it's making it last and operate safely. The more energy you store, the more of a problem you have if it is released in an uncontrolled manner. Lead acid batteries are pretty low energy density and are internally pretty safe - they do not combust, so do not need a management system. A lithium based battery is much less inherently stable and without a battery management system it is quite capable of spontaneous ignition. A sodium air battery is extremely challenging to manage as if it does ignite there is no stopping it. This is where a lot of the focus currently lies. I could bore you endlessly with the technicalities of cell plate design, but I won't!

 

This is very encouraging, thanks for the info. That's half an order of magnitude advance which might make aviation at least partly viable. Jet power to take off then electric to stay up, etc. 

 

Regarding hydrogen replacing methane in the gas network, no-one ever in the media addresses the concern mentioned by chemists, the ability of hydrogen molecules to migrate straight through some of the materials our network pipes are made from. Is this something you know about too perhaps? 

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1 hour ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Are Liveaboards "homes" ?

Are instaneous heaters included ?

Presumably the manufacture of gas water heaters will cease and they will become unavailable, irrespective of whether the law covers boats or not.

As the time draws near, maybe buy a couple of "Morco's" so you can keep up & running

 

From the Times and the Express :

 

 

For 50 years the gas boiler has been the mainstay of central heating. Its days, however, are numbered.

According to Boris Johnson’s flagship climate policy, to be unveiled tomorrow in the run-up to the Cop26 climate summit, new boilers will be banned in British homes from 2035.

 

Other measures being considered by the Government to reach its net-zero target include a ban on all new gas boilers by 2035. Kate Blagojevic, Greenpeace UK's head of climate, said: "While £5,000 grants and a 2035 boiler phase-out date are a decent start, they aren't ambitious enough to adequately tackle emissions from homes or support low-income households to switch.

 

All the energy efficiency mandates for homes so far have been applied via  the building regulations, and building regulations don't apply to boats, so the precedent says that this won't directly affect boats.

 

 

MP.

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6 minutes ago, MoominPapa said:

All the energy efficiency mandates for homes so far have been applied via  the building regulations, and building regulations don't apply to boats, so the precedent says that this won't directly affect boats.

 

 

MP.

 

Mind you the gas regs apply to "dwellings" rather than buildings, so legislation drafted to ban gas boilers might well apply to dwellings rather than just buildings.  

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39 minutes ago, Tracy D'arth said:

I won't be around, so that's one less thing for me to worry about.

 

How are folks with oil heating going to cope when there is none?  Are all aircraft ( which they are still making ) going to be scrapped?

Change to HVO.

 

Lots of trials been taking place on domestic oil CH boilers over last winter with no problems encountered on the operation front. HOWEVER, the current subsidy scheme does not support HVO when used outwith the the Non-Road Mobile Machinery (NRMM) sector which means that home heating currently has to pay the full price for HVO. The same product used within NRMM attracts two RTFC credits, each valued at approx £0.35p, so in effect a £0.70p subsidy on HVO. 

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19 minutes ago, MtB said:

Regarding hydrogen replacing methane in the gas network, no-one ever in the media addresses the concern mentioned by chemists, the ability of hydrogen molecules to migrate straight through some of the materials our network pipes are made from. Is this something you know about too perhaps? 

Yes, as it happens I do, both on the strategic and technical levels as a lot of our work is for the oil and gas extraction sector and the issue of permeability is heavily tested there, as are the effects of hydrogen due to the problems of hydrogen embrittlement within welds. The government has identified the issue (note, by government I mean the ministries rather than the politicians) and is explicitly assessing the issue. The link below is a very dry document but if you scan the subject areas it shows the initial investigative work is about to be undertaken to assess which materials present a problem and how to manage that:

 

https://www.delta-esourcing.com/delta/respondToList.html?accessCode=9W8Z2VUX4N

 

The reason I know about this is that I wrote a tender response, so if we are selected it could even be me doing some of the work!

 

The comments that this will go through building regs and therefore not specifically apply to boats are correct. The issue will be one of supply I suspect - this is what the historic steam users (railways, boats, pumping engines etc) are beginning to experience with the closure of the last steam coal pit in Wales and the challenges of importing.

 

Alec

Edited by agg221
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8 minutes ago, Up-Side-Down said:

Change to HVO.

 

Lots of trials been taking place on domestic oil CH boilers over last winter with no problems encountered on the operation front. HOWEVER, the current subsidy scheme does not support HVO when used outwith the the Non-Road Mobile Machinery (NRMM) sector which means that home heating currently has to pay the full price for HVO. The same product used within NRMM attracts two RTFC credits, each valued at approx £0.35p, so in effect a £0.70p subsidy on HVO. 

 

HVO sounds too good to be true.  I suspect its real problem is that it will never be available in the quantities required. It would be great for niche markets (like us boaters 😀) but I doubt if it can power the global fleet of HGV's. Also the internal combustion engine is a very inefficient way of turning the fuels stored energy into mechanical effort.

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2 minutes ago, dmr said:

 

HVO sounds too good to be true.  I suspect its real problem is that it will never be available in the quantities required. It would be great for niche markets (like us boaters 😀) but I doubt if it can power the global fleet of HGV's. Also the internal combustion engine is a very inefficient way of turning the fuels stored energy into mechanical effort.

 

The root problem is it originates from crops IIRC, so production in any worthwhile volume will compete for agricultural land with food production. I think I can imagine which will win.

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Transport and the need for it is going to be one of the casualties of climate change. Business travel is becoming less necessary with zoom meetings etc, holiday travel is just a luxury that has only been around a short time and won't be missed much. Car journeys multiplied with the death of corner shops and growth of supermarkets, and that's easily remedied.

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6 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

The root problem is it originates from crops IIRC, so production in any worthwhile volume will compete for agricultural land with food production. I think I can imagine which will win.

 

Especially as we are still hell bent on increasing our population. A big memory of this years travels is seeing more and more trees getting cut down to build 'ouses 'ouses 'ouses (and HS2).

5 minutes ago, Arthur Marshall said:

Transport and the need for it is going to be one of the casualties of climate change. Business travel is becoming less necessary with zoom meetings etc, holiday travel is just a luxury that has only been around a short time and won't be missed much. Car journeys multiplied with the death of corner shops and growth of supermarkets, and that's easily remedied.

 

but we are inceasingly building out of town housing estates with no shops, schools or jobs (or train stations) so that travel is essential

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37 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

Mind you the gas regs apply to "dwellings" rather than buildings, so legislation drafted to ban gas boilers might well apply to dwellings rather than just buildings.  

 

 

The wording in the annoucement did say "homes" so it may be that liveaboards are included, but not leisure boaters.

 

45 minutes ago, MoominPapa said:

All the energy efficiency mandates for homes so far have been applied via  the building regulations, and building regulations don't apply to boats, so the precedent says that this won't directly affect boats.

 

 

 

I did consider that point when I posted ..............

 

 

2 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Presumably the manufacture of gas water heaters will cease and they will become unavailable, irrespective of whether the law covers boats or not.

As the time draws near, maybe buy a couple of "Morco's" so you can keep up & running

 

Edited by Alan de Enfield
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As the number of homes heated by gas declines, so will the number of gas fitters. Kids from school are not going to want to train up starting from now, knowing that in middle age they are going to be out of a job, so gas safe registered people will become increasingly old. From that pool of people you need some to also get the extra LPG and Boat qualifications on their ticket. You may, or may not be able to buy a gas heater for a boat in a decade, or two, but will you find someone to fit it if you live aboard?

Jen

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14 minutes ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:

From that pool of people you need some to also get the extra LPG and Boat qualifications on their ticket.

 

My own boat LPG ticket has expired and I have not renewed it, due to the near impossibility of finding a convenient training skool offering 'LPG boats'. So there's a straw in the wind already, illustrating your point.

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