Nissan and Renault sell 200k electric vehicles worldwide

Not sure if this is refering to my post. The UK hasn't built a coal powerplant for years. Most new plants in the 90's onwards are NG and coal stations are slowly coming offline or getting converted to a small percentage biomass.

Energy in the United Kingdom - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This shows how our gCO2/kwh has fallen from 537gCO2/kwh in 2004 to 428g last year 2013.

 

Most of the dirt and smog is generated in the North, up around Yorkshire ....... awful up there ... much cleaner in London with the clear streets 'cause of the congestion charge!

 

Bit of a tangent again, sorry.

 

lol you're half right. It's been a lovely clear day today and whilst on my way to Leeds I could see the 3 massive power stations on the horizon. I think they generate a significant percentage of UK electricity. They're no longer as smoggy as they were in the 80's and are getting cleaned up all the time.

When I was a young child I used to think they were where clouds came from. In my defense, on a clear day the only 'clouds' are what comes out of the mass of cooling towers.

Ferrybridge power stations - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Drax power station - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Eggborough power station - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

I was giving calgaries energy mix not canada. In 2011 canada was 13% coal and 7% natural gas with most coming from large hydro projects. Most of Canada is very green for plug-ins, but calgary, where greg may be as well off with a prius as a leaf.

It is easy and cheap to retrofit a coal plant with natural gas, but its a bad economic decission. New ccgt are about $1/watt or $500M for a 500 Megawatt facility, which is much more efficient (around 60%) compared to a retrofit (maximum 40% but often much lower. A new ccgt plant also has lower maintenance, so when considered payback is fairly short compared to a retrofit just in terms of fuel and maintenance. The big benefit though is a fast cycling ccgt plant can continuously and quickly adjust to load, follow wind, and shut down and start up quickly. That makes them much better for the grid in terms of relaibility (fewer blackouts and brown outs) than a steam powered retrofit.