Posted By: Ed DaviesMy point, though, was that I have no idea how the harm for small particulates should be evaluated but my guess would be that just looking at the mass would be rather naïve

Sorry for the belated response; I would guess that it's more likely to correlate better with the surface area of the particles. My guess is based on nano studies I did a few years ago - start perhaps with work by the likes of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_Israelachvili if you're interested.

But the most recent example I saw yesterday whilst doing some garden planning: https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?PID=620 explains about the importance of surface area of particles in clay soils.

So the similar masses of PM10 and PM 2.5 is a bit worrying then.

"The contribution from the category covering combustion in the residential, public, commercial & agricultural sectors has increased over recent years and peaked in 2013 at 51 kilotonnes PM 10 and 50 kilotonnes PM 2.5 . In 2014 there was reduced fuel demand in the domestic sector but consumption increased again in 2015 and estimated emissions from residential, public, commercial combustion were 48 kilotonnes for PM 10 and 47 kilotonnes for PM 2.5.Most of the emissions from residential, public, commercial combustion in these last 3 years – 79 per cent for both pollutants - are from the use of wood as a domestic fuel."

Do we really need another thing to make Apple users more smug.

I have added a few more rough-as-a-badger's-beard numbers to the page, and I hope to speak to people who actually know some detail over the next week.

This was merely an interesting thought that popped into my head which I wanted to write down and share.

Partly provoked by you, Ed!

Rgds

Damon

At present the grid gets a lot of its stability from stored high pressure steam in large boilers (coal and nuke) driving turbines with frequency dependent regulators control the flow of the steam. We are at the risk of losing this, so require other short term (minutes) frequency dependent regulator method….

If the grid was more self regulating on the demand site, it would be possible to put more renewable on the grid without being as concerned about how the renewable are controlled. A lot of this work is more about enabling renewable to be added to the generation mix, than it is about reducing current CO2 output, from the current generators.

However we have lots of diesel generators that operator at the times of high peak, so reducing the highest peaks do have a direct benefit. For example a lot of hospitals are now paid to run their emergency generators at peak times, so they take less from the grid – much better for my washing machine to delay the wash.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/mar/13/uk-households-unnecessary-power-capacity-energy-climate-intelligence-unit-report

“The ECIU said that reserves could be more affordably secured through energy storage, greater interconnectivity with Europe and smart technology to help reduce demand from big energy users at crunch times.”

And (many) small users?

From

Posted By: Ed Davieshttps://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/mar/13/uk-households-unnecessary-power-capacity-energy-climate-intelligence-unit-report

"The margin was 6.6% last winter, prompting a Lords committee last month to call for it to be boosted to 10%.
The National Grid defended the reserve scheme as a cost-effective insurance policy, and added that the winters had been mild.
But Marshall said the standby scheme was about coping during dark, windless cold snaps, so temperatures across the season were not key."