Power cuts across Cyprus following malfunction

[Paphos Life]

Power cuts were recorded in areas across Cyprus on Tuesday morning due to a technical problem at the Vasilikos power plant, the electricity authority (EAC) said.EAC spokeswoman Christina Papadopoulou said power had been cut off in some areas at 8:30am and the problem had been resolved by 9:05am with electricity back in all affected locations....

Read the article and chat about it below...

[Kili01]

Does this mean that the EAC are still operating at maximum capacity all the time? Shouldn’t there be enough ‘spare’ in the system to cover at least minor faults in the transmission system without cutting power in some areas?
I live in an area which has neither hotels nor hospitals, and we seem to lose our power for no apparent reason.
Grhh,
Dee

[Kili01]

I was experimenting using emoticons.. didn’t realise how many it had produced.....sorry!
Dee

[trevnhil]

I thought you were just really, really, really angry

[cyprusmax47]

Does this mean that the EAC are still operating at maximum capacity all the time? Shouldn’t there be enough ‘spare’ in the system to cover at least minor faults in the transmission system without cutting power in some areas?
I live in an area which has neither hotels nor hospitals, and we seem to lose our power for no apparent reason.
Grhh,
Dee

Is it not nice to live in a country where a 1/2 hour power cut is such a big thing that it is worth to mention it in the press...?

Here a link from EAC of their daily system generation, where one can see that they are not even near their maximum capacity even in this hot temperatures. By the way: there was no power cut at Marathounda/Armou area today.
http://www.dsm.org.cy/en/daily-system-g ... -system-mw

Max

[Kili01]

In that case can you explain why the graph shows they are operating possibly using the minimum amount of electricity which means having to cancel power supply to particular areas on the island whenever there is a minor reduction in the amount of electricity being generated ?

Also looking at the graph which you added I noticed as well, that the amount of electricity being generated by wind farms was shown, but there was no data shown for the amount of PV power which is also being produced. I wonder why?

Dee

[trevnhil]

I too wondered why there was no PV power shown ?

[Devil]

1. generating more electricity than is being used is very costly. They always try to have a little spare capacity but not enough to cope with an unforeseen accident.
2. to bring on spare capacity in an emergency can take 15-30 minutes, depending on the type of generator.
3. they use very sophisticated software to forecast the demand, taking into account weather, knocking-off time in factories, half-time on football matches on TV (kettle goes on!), but no software can forecast a 4x4 knocking down a power pole, which could have repercussions at the other end of the island.
4. if wind or sun is sustained, this is calculated in but intermittent gusts or cloudy patches cannot be forecast. E.g., yesterday between about 10 am to 13:30, clouds shaded the sun 6 times (once for 15 minutes) where I am. From 13:30 on, the sun was sustained. Similarly, there was sustained wind only for two half-hour periods between 14:00 and 15:30 at about 3 m/s (which is insufficient to generate, anyway). My guess is that very little juice was usefully generated from renewables yesterday, perhaps a little PV in the afternoon, and it is unlikely that the transmission authority would have taken it into account when forecasting demand.
5. the attached chart shows that PV generation last year was only 3.37% of the total. Please note that this figure is the generation and takes no account of the transmission losses, which are higher for PV because of the wide distribution of small generators (e.g. rooftops). In reality, I would guess the losses must be at least 50%, compared with about 10% for other sources.

2018-07-11_111249.jpg (52.76 KiB) Viewed 5500 times

BTW, in a former life, I was a Chartered Electrical Engineer, before working for UNEP.

[cyprusmax47]

You are wrong in section 5, Devil( I won't use your wording "rubbish"!)

5." the attached chart shows that PV generation last year was only 3.37% of the total. Please note that this figure is the generation and takes no account of the transmission losses, which are higher for PV because of the wide distribution of small generators (e.g. rooftops). In reality, I would guess the losses must be at least 50%, compared with about 10% for other sources."

Most of the Cypriot PV systems are the so called net-metering. What one produces on the roof you use up in your own household. Only production above that will be transferred back to the grid. That shows your new meter: 05 = total exported energy. So only a fraction of electricity will be exported and the distance from your house (245 V) to the next transformer (from 11.000 V to 245) is only a couple of hundred meters, sometimes even less.
I don't see 50% losses therefore, what you are guessing....

Max
Renewable Energy Consultant

[Devil]

The 1,100 V (not 11,000 V) transformers are very lossy because your input to the grid is not sinusoidal nor can the phase be exactly guaranteed. The step-down xformers are not designed to double as step-up; they may have an efficiency of c. 95% at full load but that efficiency goes way down at lower loads. The only way your surplus roof-top electricity could be used more efficiently would be if we had a smart grid which is a pipe-dream in Cyprus.

[trevnhil]

At the Paphos end of the island, there are many many fields full of PV panels Presumably owned by EAC

[Devil]

No, they are privately owned. The biggest EAC-owned PV site is on the walls of their HQ as you come into Nicosia.

[trevnhil]

Well that does surprise me that they are privately owned. I wonder who the owner is of all those in the Kili, Tsada, and Polemi areas.. Maybe all those landowners are making a tidy profit..

[cyprusmax47]

No, they are privately owned. The biggest EAC-owned PV site is on the walls of their HQ as you come into Nicosia.

No, you are wrong again Devil. There are several in the pipe. This one is even on the EAC website presented and ready since 2012

https://www.eac.com.cy/EN/EAC/Renewable ... tseri.aspx

Max

[Dominic]

If you are only measuring PV electricity fed back into the grid aren't you missing out a huge chunk that is actually used on site?

[cyprusmax47]

If you are only measuring PV electricity fed back into the grid aren't you missing out a huge chunk that is actually used on site?

That's what I tried to explain in my post above...

Max

[cyprusmax47]

Well that does surprise me that they are privately owned. I wonder who the owner is of all those in the Kili, Tsada, and Polemi areas.. Maybe all those landowners are making a tidy profit..

They are all different projects and owners. For example the one near Ayios Demetrianos is a company from Limassol and the system is 86 kWp fixed.
The nice tracker system on the way to Koili left hand side is a company from Chlorakas. The investment on own land was more than 600.000 Euro
and the contract with EAC is 20 years. The simple payback time is something like 6.7 years as EAC pays 34 cent per kWh. IRR(rate of return):13.3%
( but only if nothing happens in the 20 years..what the insurance is not paying!.)

In the years 2010 und 2011 I did studies and quotations for more than 20 Cypriot investors in the area, but as soon as a foreign investor was involved there was no chance to get the permits from EAC.....

Max

[trevnhil]

Thanks for that information Max.. At least someone is confident enough to 'go for' solar power.

[cyprusmax47]

Thanks for that information Max.. At least someone is confident enough to 'go for' solar power.

You're welcome Trev, I got a lot of experience into PV in the 90's when I built my own PV/Wind plant in the Polis area and the students of the Nicosia University came every month to my place to get introduced in my systems of a stand alone installation powered only by PV and wind. At that time I had the largest stand alone system in Cyprus, even when it was only for my own villa. This knowledge became very handy when I needed to start working again after private circumstances and Cyprus was waking up towards PV. Unfortunately they decided to go into wind power first until they were told from EU that there is not enough wind in Cyprus and they have to push for PV.....

Max

[Devil]

as EAC pays 34 cent per kWh.
Max

Now, from your own words, why I'm diametrically opposed to PV.

I have in front of me a recent EAC bill. I consumed 1,066 kWh in a 2 month period and paid €188.41, including all the extras. This is €0.1767/kWh, half of what the EAC paid in your cited case. Without the extras, I paid €98.07 or 9.2 c/kWh retail. The wholesale price would therefore be about 6 c/kWh.

So your PV farm is receiving 5½ times the true cost of EAC electricity for the honour of supplying the grid. It is a scam that we, consumers, are paying for, through the nose (also for wind farms on a slightly lesser rate).