Island

Thursday 2 September 2010

Island Meters

The meters on this page show the amount of electricity everyone on the Isles of Scilly is using in real-time. At this geographic scale, seasonal and daily changes in the weather tend to have the biggest effects on demand. No readings can be taken if the link to the mainland is broken.

Western Power

This film explains how electricity is supplied to the Isles of Scilly, via an undersea electric cable, which links the islands to the UK's National Grid. A small power station on the islands can provide an emergency back-up supply, and keep the lights on, should this link be broken for any reason. E-Day is very grateful to Western Power Distribution for their help with making this film and providing live electricity demand data for the Isles of Scilly.

The Scillonians

Real-time demand

This meter compares the amount of electricity being used by the entire population of the Isles of Scilly now (green needle) and at same time yesterday (red needle).

In the winter, the Isles of Scilly needs about 4 Megawatts (MW) of electricity to keep the lights on during periods of peak demand.

The back-up power station located on the islands can produce up to 3.5MW of electricity when it is needed.

Cumulative demand

This meter compares the total amount of electricity that everyone on the Isles of Scilly has used since midnight this morning, with the equivalent period yesterday.

The undersea electric cable linking the islands to the National Grid provides about 4 MW of electricity at any one moment in time and 4 MWh of electricity every hour.

1 MW equals 1000 kilowatts (kW).

1 MWh equals 1000 kWh.

Demand Curves

The red curve in this graph shows how the demand for electricity on the Isles of Scilly went up and down over the course of yesterday. The green curve shows today's demand curve.

Electricity CO2 Emissions

This meter shows you an estimate of the number of kilograms of carbon dioxide (CO2) the Isles of Scilly's electricity sector has emitted since midnight this morning.

Electricity Bill

This meter shows you an estimate of the Electricity Bill for the Isles of Scilly since midnight this morning.