Henry Fingleton

Entrepreneurial type. Masters in management. Like the big picture and how strategy versus culture. Avid skier, S&C certified & aspiring calisthenics guru !.

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@JakeFitzsimons Sounds like a very wordy way of doing SFA.

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

Hannah is divorced from energy reality. A classic case of a climate activist/academic. @irishtimes Fossil fuel phase-out is missing link in climate policy https://t.co/924nstHICF

[Ireland's Energy Mix @XEnergyIreland]

Graph Lesson 101:

Dark Grey is "synchronous" power and "grid forming" and comes from our gas turbines spinning at 50Hz.

Green and yellow in the graph are all "asynchronous" power: Inverter based and "grid following"

The ratio of those two is about 1:3
I.e the current limits are 25% : 75%

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@EmmetByrne3

[Darragh O'Brien @DarraghOBrienTD]

From 1 July, a new targeted EV Scrappage Scheme will support drivers with cars aged 13 years or older.

Eligible applicants can now get up to €8,500 towards a new electric vehicle, with a strong focus on supporting rural Ireland transition to cleaner transport.

[Ireland's Energy Mix @XEnergyIreland]

Credit the author Peadar. Ffs.

Your interpretation is also incorrect: CRU is there to ensure ~4% max profit margins on network assets, so Eirgrid and ESB are not "taking 43% of the price of electricity" its simply the cost of our extraordinarily huge grid assets themselves that mostly runs by ESB.

Get some advice before you post (I'm happy to give it)

[Niall ₿urke ☘ 🪉 @nialljburke]

If there's one takeaway from all this: the CRU could be far more transparent about the structure of these network costs.

Three examples that came up:
• The carbon charge (Irish Carbon Tax + EU ETS) is embedded in the wholesale price and shows up nowhere, despite being four times the size of the PSO levy that does appear.
• The System Services charge is the biggest part of transmission but isn't really explained to consumers.
• There's no published split of how much network cost is driven by integrating remote, variable renewables vs the baseline grid.

None of this is hidden maliciously, it's just how pool markets and revenue-cap regulation report. But a clearer consumer-facing breakdown would do a lot for public understanding of why bills are what they are.

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@nialljburke @XEnergyIreland @Toibin1 Maybe not hidden maliciously, but certainly obscured and downplayed?

[Niall ₿urke ☘ 🪉 @nialljburke]

Start with the part that surprised me most.

The network, the physical wires, poles and transformers that move electricity around the country, costs 11.31c/kWh. The actual electricity itself costs 11.18c/kWh.

The delivery costs as much as the thing being delivered.

That is TUoS + DUoS, set by the regulator each year, and it has been climbing as the grid is rebuilt to handle wind and solar. More on that below.

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@nialljburke Great breakdown Niall

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@XEnergyIreland Thanks

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@XEnergyIreland Can I have both ?

[Ireland's Energy Mix @XEnergyIreland]

🇮🇪𝙒𝙤𝙧𝙡𝙙'𝙨 𝙢𝙤𝙨𝙩 𝙚𝙭𝙥𝙚𝙣𝙨𝙞𝙫𝙚 𝙚𝙡𝙚𝙘𝙩𝙧𝙞𝙘𝙞𝙩𝙮 𝙗𝙞𝙡𝙡 (𝟒𝟎 𝙘𝙚𝙣𝙩/𝙠𝙒𝙝)...
𝙗��𝙘𝙖𝙪𝙨𝙚 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙥𝙖𝙮 𝙛𝙤𝙧 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙬𝙤𝙧𝙡𝙙'𝙨 𝙢𝙤𝙨𝙩 𝙚𝙭𝙥𝙚𝙣𝙨𝙞𝙫𝙚 𝙜𝙧𝙞𝙙:

Wholesale elec. = 12 c/kWh (30%)
Taxes and levies = 5 c/kWh (12%)
Supplier's Profit = 2 c/kWh (5%)
Data Centres = 0 c/kWh (!!)
The Grid* = 21 c/kWh (>50%)

*These bloated grid costs arise from operating a highly non-synchronous power system, requiring backup from older firm gas generation, new transmission assets expansion, intermittent oversupply, interconnectors, non-sync services, curtailment.

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@DavQuinn

[Ireland's Energy Mix @XEnergyIreland]

On datacenters:

1. (i) if we want growth in firm demand we need to match with growth in firm supply. Nuclear is one such option. The existing plan of wind only is beginning to crack (NB)

(ii) if its ecosocialist's degrowth we are looking for then yes let's ban datacenters, let the tech industry depart to Asia, collapse Ireland's economy, and keep the ban on nuclear.

2. There should be nothing stopping DCs from self-powering.. relying less on our national grid. Nuclear SMR included.

3. It might be time to look at rebalancing the price/kWh that heavy industry pays, with the price a low-usage consumer pays per kWh. for fairness.

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@DavQuinn - for very insightful and knowledgeable info on energy

[Ireland's Energy Mix @XEnergyIreland]

We all want to "blame something" for having the highest electricity prices in the world. The report by Dr. Fearon blaming datacenters is extremely weak and has wild assumptions.

If demand growth is matched by adequate/abundant supply, there would be NO price increase
(& in a market with no price gouging, which is the case)

Either we blame the demand growth itself, or we blame the supply unable to keep up with demand.

If you want degrowth, you blame "too much demand" and try to curb it, ban it, smash it all down.

If you are pro-industrial growth you advocate for higher supply to match that new demand, and blame goes to the supply (generation) side for not keeping up.

[Ireland's Energy Mix @XEnergyIreland]

Reposting this today. A day where media articles (written by Friends Of the Earth) are in circulation blaming everything on data centre demand, while our network/system costs are the actual culprit.

There is NOT ENOUGH demand, and TOO MUCH intermittent supply. There is time mismatch between supply (generation)and demand for power.

The only thing these articles got right is that intermittent renewable energy and baseload demand from datacenters, are totally incompatible.

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@ProgressIreland Without realistic storage, much of it may be wasted.

[Climate Intelligence @ClimateIntel001]

"Ireland’s high electricity prices are a choice—the result of a small, isolated system attempting a complex energy transition without an honest conversation about the costs of backup and grid stability." https://t.co/fLSCduioTy

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@XEnergyIreland The general public have been misled for a long time on our energy system, I believe, by politicians and media. Wind and solar are constantly hyped with little awareness that it has no impact on the approx. 80% of our energy that is not electricity.

[Henry Fingleton @HenryFingleton]

@IrishTimes - it’s time to stop misleading the public on the cost of renewables. Caroline o Doherty’s article this morning is incredibly misleading.

[Ireland's Energy Mix @XEnergyIreland]

@thejournal_ie @d1052541 It was never the suppliers. Its time to be honest about the wider system costs of intermittent renewables. With that honesty comes real solutions.