Welcome to a clean green Australia where we gave up coal to move to diesel.
Back to the future. Diesel’s prototype engine circa 1892.
Channel Ten news tonight discusses the sudden surge in demand for diesel generators
Homes and businesses are so afraid of blackouts in Australia that some retailers are selling four times as many generators as normal. Mygenerator.com.au reports a 425% increase year on year. The strongest growth has been in South Australia, Victoria and western Sydney.
According to Channel Ten, Energy companies across Australia have sent letters to their customers to warn customers to be prepared in case there is a blackout. But one company says it’s just a precaution they are required to do every year. (Does anyone ever remember getting a letter like that?)
Once, the renewables industry just wanted “certainty” for business (as in certainty of taxpayer funded subsidies). Now “certainty” means a diesel generator.
h/t Dave B
Guess what is coming. A major new tax on Diesel fuel along with having to have ration coupons and CO2 mitigation credits to purchase it. Blank out that this step was made necessary by the previously massive irrational actions of the Government.
The Government simply cannot permit all those people doing all those things without proper permission from the all knowing and eternally benevolent Government. That you need electricity to stay alive and comfortable is not an acceptable excuse. If you don’t or can’t obtain permission but use Diesel fuel to produce electricity anyway, your property will be confiscated and distributed to people who can show they have received permission but who were not able to buy an “adequate” Diesel Generator.
You thought 1984, Brave New World, and Atlas Shrugged were nothing but made up stories about bad times? Surprise! They were scripts for coming events. Only the names of people, places, and Government policies were changed to protect the guilty.
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Hope somebody adds the cost of the new generators / fuel / automated starting systems to the imposed cost of “renewables” on the average household. It isn’t the posted cost that gets you with Green Energy. It’s all the costs hidden in rebates, taxes, and all those systems suddenly needed because renewables just aren’t reliable.
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“It’s just a precaution they are required to do every year.” Probably a new requirement.
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It’s comments like that, that caused me to stop watching the news. (Yes I watched the linked the news item until that comment, “swear words” and turned it off).
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That would be the ‘precautionary principle’, which is what got us into this mess in the first place.
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Well the real total cost depends on how disaster tolerant one wants to be. I can imagine some people using solar panels plus battery backup plus diesel engine backup for the backup. Of course only the rich will be able to afford all this. The rest of us can go jump according to our politicians. The fact that we are discussing all this is clearly evident of a major failure of catastrophic proportions on the part of both major parties.
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– you can add the Greens (that totalitarian mob) to that.
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Of course. I was just focusing on the two major parties but you are right, the Greens should be included as we would never want them to become a major party. If they ever did (not likely of course) I’d definitely be leaving the country.
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Where would you go?
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I rather live in NZ or even the USA (certain parts only) at the moment rather than in a country where the people would be stupid enough to consider giving the Greens the status of a major party. If that happened it would prove Australians would have lost it completely and it would not be a comfortable place to live in even if the Greens were not in government. However, it’s not going to happen (I hope) so I won’t have to worry about moving. It’s more of a hypothetical. Australia is still one of the best if not the best place to be at the moment. It may not be for too long but only time will tell.
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I don’t think you would want to live in NZ where your vote is irrelevant and the politicians make up the rules as they go along. Until we abolish MMP we will not have proper governance.
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What’s MMP?
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Grant, isn’t that the same here as well? Our vote is irrelevant. Our democracy was stolen from us a number of decades of ago when they changed the law to override the constitution so that they can instigate in law whatever they like, regardless of which major party is in power. It’s complicated but that’s what has happened under both major parties. We no longer live under a democracy. A citizens initiated referendum type of democracy would be nice but that will never happen here while we have the likes of the LNP or ALP in power. So the first order of business is to stop voting for them and vote for AC to see if things will change for the better.
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Bobl asked:
MMP = Mixed Member Proportional.
It’s a form of proportional representation.
Total number of seats in the house is 120, and there are 71 electorates.
Every elector has two votes.
Vote One is the electorate vote which is used to determine who represents your electorate in Parliament.
The candidate with the most votes in any electorate wins that electorate.
Vote Two is the Party Vote, given to which of the political parties you favour.
Wannabe MPs can choose to stand for an electorate, or be a List MP.
The number of List MPs allowed each party depends on their proportion of the List Vote. Five percent or over or winning an electorate, to get more MPs. The exercise is to build a house where each party is represented by roughly their proportion of the vote.
Seems to work: the resulting government is usually sufficiently crippled to not be able to do anything too stupid, although that hasn’t worked all the time.
Present government is made up of Labour, The Greens(scary) and New Zealand First.
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DISASTER tolerant? What disasters that impact electricity generation have necessitated a 400% growth in personal diesel generator purchases? Are you experiencing ice storms that impact the distribution of electricity? Are you experiencing overwhelming forest fires that have taken down the distribution network? What disasters have brought on all these brown and blackouts – how is this even tolerable in a ‘first world’ such as Aus? ponderous man, ponderous
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No wonder Big Oil supports renewables.
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Big Oil is just another investor. In the short run we are the mugs for refusing to invest in these Ponzi subsidy collection schemes. You have to start wondering if we are still mugs in the long run, because our wisdom may not save us from the eventual wipeout.
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Pretty smart going with diesel over gasoline (petrol) due to storage life of the fuel and safety concerns. I’m curious how long you are able to store diesel in the warm AU climate?
I feel fortunate to have our 5500watt gasoline generator and I consider having a generator mandatory. Ours saved us for three days when a straight-line wind knocked trees into multiple power lines. It has saved us several times in the winter months due to power outages caused by freezing rain and ice buildup on power lines.
I do store gasoline for up to two years with stabilizers and a cool, dark storage building. To store gasoline long term, It is essential that you start with non-oxygenated (premium) fuel.
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Diesel should be good for at least a year if it’s stored correctly; especially “dry” so that water cannot wreak havoc with fuel systems. All standby generators should be run periodically; every 3 months or so for small units. Schedule a “burn” for about a quarter of a tankful, 4 times a year.
Gasoline generators are less efficient and their fuel will also “age”.
Diesel generators OTOH are only just beginning to feature inverter technology, in part because the fuel savings are smaller than with gasoline. Inverter technology basically allows the generator to run at any speed to match the load while the inverter assures correct frequency and voltage(s).
There’s an obvious “niche” for battery, inverter and diesel generator combined power sets so that low loads can be sustained from battery (4kWh would probably do to sustain a quiet night); with the battery topped up periodically with generator runs or external supplies; or by using excess generating capacity at higher loads when external generation is insufficient. The inverter is a shared resource; nothing as wimpy as the 1400W or so toy in the Tesla PowerWail, but more like 8000W. Kickstarter, anyone? 😉
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A lot of people who don’t anything about how to properly store diesel[pdf from BP] are going to run into trouble. Guaranteed.
And how many people know that modern petrol has an effective “on the shelf” lifetime? I learnt that one years ago, the hard way! 🙂 The old leaded petrol (treated with tetra-ethyl lead) seemed to last forever in its tin. The modern ones are not so nice. I’ve had petrol filler caps glued shut … oops.
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For petrol/gas an additive octane booster is available that increases shelf life considerably.
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You might remember that 1970’s documentary by Alby Mangels called World Safari (It is still on youtube) Where he lands on a Pacific Island that had been abandoned by the US military in 1945. He opened up drums of mid 1940’s petrol and put into one of the stockpiled trucks of a similar vintage and drove it around for a few weeks as they salvaged as much as they could. So that old gas was good for decades of storage.
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They already exist – either in standalone battery/inverter/charger combi units to work in conjunction with an external generator, or with everything in one box. Here’s a couple of links, but there are many more firms getting into this market:
https://www.fischerpanda.co.uk/hyprid_power_solutions.html
http://www.energy-solutions.co.uk/off-grid
This technology actually makes good sense, as very few generators run at full load for any length of time, and modern inverter/chargers can easily deal with short term surge loads over and above the rating of the generator.
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Diesel generators would be less efficient like that than at part-load. Diesel cycle efficiency is typically near peak from 30% to 90% load and falls of sharply outside of that.
Matching the power output to the load is traditionally by quantity regulation to maintain a constant engine speed for synchronous 50Hz or 60Hz. That limits the power band. A variable-speed engine driving a quasi-DC generator, feeding into a modern inverter to get suitable AC power, provides a much wider band of output power for part-load and “over-load” power situations. Engine power is determined largely by the amount of air flowing through it; air-fuel ratios for combustion being limited to some degree, even in diesel engines.
I was “surprised” to see a relatively inefficient Perkins diesel being the basis of one of the above; burning up to 280 g/kWh. That’s not much better than one fuelled by petrol. 🙁 What good are laurels if you can’t rest on them? 🙁
Target should be 200 g/kWh with perhaps up to 220 for small displacement (around 1 litre) engines. Such puts the fuel-only electrical power generating costs at about 25 c/kWh (where excise exempt) here in Western Australia. Yes, we can marvel at the economies of scale delivering electrical power to the South West’s consumers at about that price, can’t we?
Perhaps if the average thermal efficiency of our generating plants wasn’t less than 25% … and more like 45% to 55% as with coal-fired, USC steam.
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The Government could tax diesel for non commercial use to uneconomical levels if diesel generator usage becomes widespread. As someone who lives off the grid without either solar or wind,I am considering the possibilty of replacing my 6KVA and 2.4 KVA petrol gensets with either LPG fuelled units for the next two years or so, when it is said that automotive LPG will be withdrawn from Australian service stations. During that time, i will look seriously into purchasing or building a wood gas producer to power a small car engine to power a belt driven genset as I have around 40 acres of forest on my property, and the Gov/greenies couldn’t stop me from using that resource unless they incarcerate me.
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And those grinning idiots Turnbull and Frydenburg will be telling us all is well. The RET must be destroyed before we have massive blackout on a regular basis. We also need to get rid of the American carpet bangers at AGL and the AEMO being foreigners that do not care what happens in Australia.
I have a Honda generator that will run the fridge and lights when the inevitable happens. Coleman dual fuel devices will be used to make coffee and meals.
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If the government abolished the RET they would reasonably have to compensate for losses on funds invested in RET subsidised renewables since the Al Gore/Clive Palmer RET was legislated, I have read $8 billion.
Had Tony Abbott been able to abolish it, he would not have had to pay such compensation, because he had from day one of the Carbon Tax declared that if elected he would abolish it. This was a realistic declaration, so investments made in the face of it were accepting the risk.
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Anyone who bases decisions on Government subsidies and their continuation deserves to go broke. Windmill owners should be no different.
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The government paying compensation? You gotta be kidding? They take away public rights with legislation every day without paying compensation, what makes you think they would start paying now?
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Desal or diesel either way these will in 100 years be ghostly relics of a time when the global population went collectively mad.
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Perhaps a Heston-esque character on a beach falling to his knees before a decaying TM2500 cries out,
“You maniacs! you greened it up! AH!, Damn you!, Gaia Damn you all to S.A!”
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I fear that mankind has been getting stupider as the centuries roll on. I have no hope that future historians will look upon this time as being very much different than their own time (and probably a whole lot saner).
Is that a scary thought?
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The devices are getting smarter and the people dumber. No need to think when a machine will think for you.
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Maybe not. The propaganda modern man has had to suffer has become huge, smarter and much harder to see through because is it far more constant and pervasive. Modern communications has a lot to answer for.
Most people are honest and it is not unreasonable for them to expect to be treated that way.
Beware their fury when they discover that honesty has been betrayed.
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Just watch the film ‘Idiocracy’ to get the reason why. That film is prophetic.
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I have a LPG Honda generator to go with a full oil tank for the central heating/hot water and several years supply of logs for the woodburner (and a few candles and camping stoves just in case). When you know the politicians in charge are idiots, it pays to make your own arrangements (this is in England, not SA).
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Plenty of camping and tradie options:
GenTrax 3.5KW REMOTE START PURE SINE WAVE PETROL INVERTER CAMPING GENERATOR
Twin Australian 15Amp Outlets; 12v Cigarette Adapter with Alligator Clamps; Built-In 5V USB Port
Powerful 4-Stroke Engine; Super Quiet: 58Db@7m; 5.5 Hours Continuous Running Time (Economy Mode)
7.5 Liter Fuel Capacity
The Cummins Onan 5.8kVA Gasoline Commercial Generator is able to power 2 air conditioners at once. Designed with an integrated housing design and an enclosed muffler for installation, this set is ideal for mobile applications such as Food Trucks or Caravans.
Fuel Petrol Hz 50hZ Watts 5800W
Voltage 230V Amps 25.2A
PETROL GENERATOR 6600W 3 PHASE WITH ELECTRIC START
1 x 3 Phase AU 400V/420V outlet; 1 x Standard single phase AU 230V/240V outlet
– 425cc 15HP Petrol single cylinder 4 stroke air cooled engine
– 12V/14Ah battery; Fuel capacity 25L
– Continuous operating 7 hours @ 75% load
Honda EU70is Generator
The EU70is has a maximum output of 7000W/240 volt AC, and is relatively lightweight for easy transportation (118kg).
The EU70 will run for up to 18 hours on a single tank of fuel which will help your back pocket.
FUEL (APPROX) 2.9 (litres/hr)
FUEL TANK CAPACITY (LITRES) 19.2
CONTINUOUS OPERATING HOURS 18*hr/6.5hr
AEG 5000W Portable Diesel Generator
This diesel-powered generator has a 10 horsepower single cylinder, air-cooled, 4-stroke engine with a DC start and cranks out 4,500 constant running watts of power.
Fuel tank capacity (L)11.5; Diesel Full load fuel consumption (litres/hour) 1.77
Operational volume (dB) 91
Of course most major businesses. buildings, hospitals etc have always invested in backup generators. But what an indictment of our pollies if we have to resort to home backup power.
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I have three petrol generators. Of course petrol is not as Green or polluting as diesel. Lower compression means it is quieter and does not output the nitrous oxides which turn into nitric acid.
Odd. Petrol and coal are unacceptable but diesel is the preferred option. Even the governments of Tasmania, Victoria and South Australia prefer diesel to coal. Diesel home generation is preferred by the greens adding to all the pollutants instead of clean, efficient mass supply from a remote location.
Now what is so great about diesel over coal? Lower CO2 , lower pollution perhaps? No, this hatred of CO2 is irrational and costing the people of Australia billions without any perceived benefit to us or anyone else on the planet and a lot of harm.
Politicians should never be in charge of energy. It is the new favorite attack on democracy for the united communists and socialists who control the EU, the UN, every council and most governments of Australia.
As for Turnbull, he is possibly the worse. How many billions for his idea to pump water up hill again?
Already triple the cost, we will have to pay foreign windmill owners of our windmills for the right to use our free wind to pump our own water uphill with our own $6Bn pumping station. We can pay them again on the way down. A perpetual money machine pumping cash out of Australia. Only a Goldmann Sachs banker would love this.
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Socialist Turnbull’s money pump will never run. It will be used once and turned off. We cannot afford to run it and it makes no commercial sense. Just like Labor’s desalination plants.
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Don’t forget higher particulate pollution from diesel, as anyone who has been to China can attest. And in Europe, diesel is responsible for many more deaths than global warming.
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London has been toying with banning private cars and diesel vehicles from this article in 2014. The possibility of a ban was raised again in 2016 and this changed to charging older cars and diesels this year. Government always seems to take the route of lightening citizens pockets, wallets and bank accounts.
Saving the Planet. Pay here.
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There was an interesting article about what would happen if a community needed to mass evacuate during an environmental disaster using electric cars – the upshot was that they wouldn’t get far because of the massive queues at the first recharging points – and emergency response vehicles, also electric, would be of little use once they had depleted their batteries as recharging and heading out for more work would be an issue.
Green lunacy.
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So far they have not been able to prove ant higher death rate from diesel ‘pollution’. Most of the particulate problems are from tire wear/scuffing and the wear particles from brake pads/linings exacerbated by the forced slowdown of city traffic – another green requirement.
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Actually Ivan, there are a number of papers about the problems of Diesel emissions – most of them focusing particulate pollution and Nitrous Oxides with both getting bad raps. Well maintained filters can reduce NO and particulates, but that is only the case in newer vehicles, and only if their filters are looked after and replaced as necessary.
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Like I have said before here on Joe’s blog the train wreck is now starting to arrive. Ten years ago I could never have imagined conversations about
generators (diesel or petrol) being necessary to just get by in Australia. I do have generator but it’s for camping. So we live in the 21st century
in a modern western country with all the perks (cheap food, a health system, less physical pollution, clean drinking water, and supposedly a reliable energy grid system) of a fossil fueled economy and now we have arrived at this point!!!!
How could this have possibly happened? Easy. Its been dumb science ignorant politicians and their bureaucrats in various Environment and Climate change Departments both state and federal.
Howard started the RET and Rudd and Co increased it. Now no one will do anything to abolish this nation destroying legislation especially Turnbull and Frydenberg. The best way to understand all this is to consider the economic circumstances (and the power and self interest) of these people. Shocking quarterly energy bills mean nothing to them; that’s how they can say these bills will be reduced by $100 in ten years time. What an unbelievable joke!!!! In ten years all of these very well off individuals will be sipping champagne in their well paid retirements. Meanwhile your average Joe will be reduced to energy poverty, which is already in the here and now, for thousands of Australians.
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I dont know how many times over the last year Ive had this exact same conversation. It is 2017 and I am even thinking, let alone talking about an alternative energy supply. What has become of us and how the hell did we let this happen?
Note this! Turdball was Howard’s environment minister when Howard was seduced by the dark side. Not only the RET but the rise of the Wentworth Group of concerned scientists infested the mind of Australias best pragmatist. The centenary drought made it harder for even a conservative politician to resist the petty immediacy of the mob.
I do not believe compensation is required to pay out the carpetbaggers. The tithe is only to generate power. Pay the carpetbaggers for a piece of paper to allow you to burn coal. Consumers to pay a guaranteed price for any green power generated…the problem will be digging out all the weaponised legislation from the RGR years that protect this organised theft.
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I am in the process of putting together a large horticultural project in SE Qld. There is no electricity connection to this property, for the privilege of getting a quote to connect I will have to pay $7,500.
I spoke to a neighboring property, who last year started a project and he also paid the $7,500 to be told that connection would be $250,000. He now has two diesel generators and with recent price increases this is actually cheaper, added to which the capital investment was 60% of the Energex quote.
Guess how my project will generate electricity! The exact opposite to what the renewable morons intend. The project will provide 100 full time jobs when stage 2 is completed. The local council have recently introduced a “development fee” which will add another $1.7 million to the cost of construction. If the crops were grown in the ground and not in a growing media as required in high tech hydroponic production this fee would not apply. Figure that one out. Any entrepreneurs out there willing to give me some advice?
My current feeling is you socialists go take a running jump at yourselves.
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The operation up the road from me in Niagara Canada use natural gas for their hydroponics – rather substantial operation going on there…and certainly no $250,000 hook ups
87M25RMR+7M (plug this number into Google maps)
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Thanks The Rick. No natural gas here I’m afraid so diesel it will have to be. The $250,000 ‘hook up’ fee is to me a little like wanting to hire a car and being told you need to buy it first. That infrastructure never belongs to the payer. The project looks very much like the current one we have, unlikely we will move on this second one. All the best for 2018.
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While the trend worldwide is moving towards more coal, we are moving towards less coal. I wonder if we have been selected to be an experiment as to how a nation can cope with more and more renewables while at the same time relying less and less, if at all on base load power, such as coal and nuclear. Alternatively, we could be a proving ground for new and developing technologies, such as battery systems. I can’t think of any other explanations why this is happening only to one country of any significance, namely Australia, especially given we have such a large supply of good quality coal, and the fact that the AGW “disease” is not unique to Australia.
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Not really. We rich and our politicians are dills and many people are gullible. Patsies for the world movement against democracy. How anyone can justify replacing coal power stations with diesel is beyond logic or science.
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Also we can build coal power stations. We have to import diesel engines and diesel itself. Spot the pattern. We are being impoverished by our own politicians, reduced to begging to overseas manufactured goods and energy, even though we like the Saudis are incredibly energy rich. There is a reason all manufacturing is being shut down, to make us dependent on energy poor countries who need our raw resources.
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You see the world is moving towards our coal, our gas, our uranium. They don’t want us using it.
We can use their refined diesel and an energy rich country becomes a mendicant state, dependent on diesel.
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There’s a possible hint as to the real reason why Australia is not following the trend of the rest of the world towards using more coal as well as more renewables. Perhaps the majority of Australia don’t care about what the two major parties are doing about the coal situation. In other words Australians by and large are clueless and/or stupid otherwise they would be recognising by now the high importance of the issue and both ON and AC would now be polling much higher than they already are, in particular AC, which to me is the only party that has Australia’s true interest uppermost in their mind as reflected in their policies. I suppose Australians are very slow thinkers and that would explain why AC is so slow gaining in popularity. Perhaps in time it will become as popular as the Greens and ON combined but I feel it will be far too late by then. They will have to pick up the pieces after the economic destruction of Australia if they ever became the leading party. There is also the slim hope that either Turnbull or Shorten surprisingly sees the light and decides to turn Australia around and follow the rest of the world by building new generation coal figured power stations to replace the aging old ones. I wonder though what would happen to the polls. If the party that announces that change in direction suffers a dip in the polls, it would prove that Australians are either clueless, stupid or both. If the opposite happens then it would prove they are not. It would really be nice if one of the two major parties did that just to see the reaction by the public.
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” aging old ones” This myth is part of the scam. When Hazelwood was closed, it was generating 95% of its design output. Even warmist Alan Kohler wrote that a power station is like a factory. It has no use by date. Hazelwood was sold on a 40 year lease and closed in perfect condition after twenty years.
The excuse is old. So knock down the Tower bridge, the Westgate bridge, even the Sydney Harbour Bridge, all well past their design life? The Eiffel Tower in Paris was a temporary structure built for the 1889 world’s fair and was to be demolished, like Mr Ferris’ wheel in Chicago in 1893. Nonsense. Maintenance is the key. AGL is deliberately destroying Liddell by refusing to maintain it. That is not aging. That is profiteering and vandalism of a state asset built by and for the people of NSW and sold for nothing.
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Nothing lasts forever,. All machinery and equipment eventually either have to be overhauled. The cost of which may or may not be more than replacement them with a new one. That’s what I mean bu “old”. If the existing plants can be kept going with regular overhaul and repair at a cost less than building a new one then that’s fine but I doubt that would be the situation indefinitely. Besides technological advancements make old equipment less efficient and thus one has to either retrofit an existing plant or building a new one from scratch, depending on which is less expensive to do. That’s economic common sense, which is rare these days.
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The World Bank won’t lend for any coal projects. There’s the problem.
China will.
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I have a perfect solution to all this nonsense. Anyone who votes for either LNP, ALP or Greens must have their electricity supply to their home cut off for a full day twice a week as a contribution to the cause of the “saving of the world from global warming” program.
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The problem is that it is true for Malcolm’s Green Liberals and Barnaby Joyce’s Green National Party.
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TdeF the Nats are against subsidies for renewables, they don’t believe in global warming.
‘The National Party has used its federal conference in Canberra to call on the Federal Government to eliminate subsidies for renewable energy.’
ABC
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I agree about the Nats in general but somehow I suspect their leader Joyce is two faced. He’s too often weak at the knees when confronted by Turnbull on the important issues. That’s another reason why I would never vote for LNP ever again. AC is a much better option.
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As far as I am aware the storage of flammable and combustible liquids requires a licence once the amount exceeds the small volumes exempt from licencing such as 5 litres for a motor mower etc. – at least it did when I worked as an Environmental Health Officer in Queensland and I enforced same.
There was a hidden “sting” in illegally storing flammable and combustible liquids at domestic properties – such unlicenced storage was illegal but more importantly constituted a breach of the disclosure requirements of insurance policies thus voiding any policy claim in the event of a fire even if the fuels had no role in the fire event.
People have had their policies voided in the past and lost everything for storing flammable and combustible liquids without the required licence and compliance with the safe storage requirements of the laws.
A 44 in the garage or elsewhere is a breach of the laws I enforced years ago – it is unlikely these laws have been repealed.
It is likely such laws are Australia wide and the quantities of diesel required to provide for any useful generator power will likely exceed any exemption limits at domestic premises.
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So there’s a choice between breaking the law and voiding insurance or freezing in the dark…
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When fuel is outlawed only outlaws will have fuel……
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Never heard of such a thing. This covers industrial uses.
https://www.festanks.com.au/blog/australian-fuel-storage-regulations/
There are plenty of links regarding farms, but I can’t find anything regarding domestic storage.
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The repeal of the Dangerous Goods Safety Management Act 2001 has resulted in the abolition of the flammable and combustible liquids (FCL) licences being run by local governments. This means that all FCL licences ceased to have effect on 31 December 2011.
The safe storage and handling of flammable and combustible liquids is now covered by requirements in Chapter 7.1 of the WHS Regulation (hazardous chemicals) which are regulated by WHSQ.
More…
https://www.worksafe.qld.gov.au/injury-prevention-safety/hazardous-chemicals/specific-hazardous-chemicals/flammable-and-combustible-liquids
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AS 1940:2017 (storage and handling of flammable and combustible liquids) is a new revision, not without controversy apparently. The standard is called up by the NCC (National Construction Code formerly BCA – Building Code Australia). Some of its provisions are retrospective. This is an “Oz only” standard, eg it does not (yet) apply in New Zealand. This is unfortunate, because NZ currently goes a bit further than Oz in handling the principle that “ignorance of the law is no excuse” and mandates that standards are to be freely accessible to all.
The current cost of AS 1940:2017 is $281 minimum. If your local council has a “commercial librarian” or there is a building certifier you can ask, you might be able to get round this problem. I will certainly be doing this in the new year. In the meantime, it may be that the tables in the standard that summarise storage requirements by volume have not been amended. If so, then the maximum volume flammable fuel storage on residential premises varies between 5 litres indoors to 250 litres outside, 3 metres separation or 1 hour fire resistance.
The other problem with diesel is the onshore available supply is very likely a lot less that 30 days, so the crack-pot solution of diesel generators replacing reliable power generation is not going to work.
Anyone got a design for a home-based distillation device for producing the stuff? I’m not being sarcastic. My grandmother used to do this 65 years ago. (But we weren’t allowed anywhere near the thing.)
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Martin,
I’ve found a summary of the changes for 2017 online; applicable to fuel terminals but I suspect indicative of changes for Minor Storage. Polymer storage tanks now permitted for minor storage, except construction sites.
Search of the interwebs may find a stray copy of an earlier edition of AS1940.
Universities used to have the full gamut of Australian Standards. Probably just digital nowadays. Alumni may have access to such resources.
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I have a tractor on my farm, which requires diesel oil. But, because it is not registered for on-road use, I have two (plastic) Jerry cans of diesel in the barn. I also have a petrol generator, for heating an lighting, for when the rural power fails, so I have two (plastic) cans of regular petrol, also in the barn.
Add to that, various cans of paint, and various chemicals (some inflammable), and we will look like the fourth of July, if anything goes amiss.
Do I care? Well yes, because I am quite fond of my barn, and would hate it to go pyrotechnic. But, will any of my neighbors care? Well, I doubt it, because the nearest is at least a mile away.
Bureaucrats need to get out more.
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AS1940-2005 Section 2 permits up to 250 litres in a single location physically separated from a residence. That’s in addition to what’s in the tank of a generator; or in a heating oil tank. [Might be further limited by council reg’s.]
200 litres is adequate for a month of domestic electrical power generation requirements and in winter, you can use the (liquid) cooling system from the generator to pre-heat your hot water. The cooled flue gas (<60°C), you can pump into your greenhouse.
You can store more fuel if the site is suitable and you e.g. need bunds to catch any leakage. Consider the long term storage of diesel (links to BP PDF), the potential need for “winter diesel” and match those limits to your application.
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More blackouts are now on the way,
In Sydney, in VIC. and S.A.,
As renewables fail,
We have four times the sale,
Of diesel generators today.
220
Where are Rudd and Gillard when we need them the most? They would be giving each household a free backup generator by now.
30
Actually, it would be a photograph of a free generator, but the thought was there.
20
full report requires payment:
19 Dec: Digital Journal: Press Release: Diesel Generator Market to 2023: Historical Analysis, Growth Rates, Generation, Investment Trends and Opportunities
Global Diesel Generator Market Information Report by Portability Type (Stationary Generator s and Portable Generator s), by Operation type (Standby power, Peak savings, Continuous power), by Power ratings (0-100 kVA, 350 kVA, 350-1000 kVA and above 1000 kVA), by End users (Industrial, Commercial and Residential) and by Regions – Global Forecast To 2023.
Prominent Players
Caterpillar Inc. (U.S.), Cummins Inc.(U.S.), Kohler Co.(U.S), Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. (Japan), Kirloskar Group (India), Briggs & Stratton (U.S), Wärtsilä (Finland), AKSA Power Generation (Turkey) and Yanmar Co., Ltd. (Japan). are some of the prominent players profiled in MRFR Analysis and are at the forefront of competition in the Global Diesel generator Market…
The Global Diesel Generator Market is a very dynamic market and is expected to witness high growth over the forecast period. The increased application of diesel generator across various sectors is majorly influenced by the growing demand for uninterrupted & reliable power supply…
As per the study conducted by Market Research Future, the global market for diesel generator is likely to grow at the CAGR of around 5%…
The growing demand for uninterrupted and reliable power supply has become a necessity in today’s world. So as to support this growing need, a reliable source of power generation is required. Diesel generator provide a continuous, prime and standby source of power generation at industrial, commercial and residential level…
The rising attention towards the renewable energy power generation is substantially gaining huge investment across the world. Renewable energy systems provide sustainable and low cost power generation, but with a fluctuating power output. So, a hybrid solution can be installed with the renewable energy system, to obtain a continuous power generation from renewable energy systems. Hybrid renewable energy systems mostly utilise diesel generators as power generating unit. These are brought into operations when there is huge fluctuation in power generation through renewable systems. The economic benefit of hybrid renewable energy systems, is higher than that of conventional power plants as they utilizes diesel generators, which supplies excess load and recharges the battery during overcasts. Recently, in May 2017, Aggreko signed a 10 year deal to provide solar-diesel hybrid power to Nevsun in Eritrea. Aggreko, Glasgow-based company will supply 22 MW of diesel and 7.5 MW of solar-generated power for the Nevsun’s copper and zinc operations…
The industrial end-user segment is expected to grow at the highest rate. The key driving factor will be favourable government policies for the growth of industries in various countries such as Mexico, China, Brazil, and India…
Among these regions, Asia Pacific is the largest market by size and is estimated to grow at the highest rate due to high demand for power products in China. China’s high economic growth rate has created increased demand for power generation equipment, such as diesel and gas generators, in the country. Along with this, new policy reforms in India that support the growth of industries have made the country a very lucrative market for OEM manufacturers. This is also likely to create a huge demand for generators in the region…ETC
http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/3601422
40
despite this:
18 Oct: EconomicTimesIndia: TNN: Pollution panel bans diesel gensets in Delhi till March 15
NEW DELHI: In a move that will impact marketplaces, housing societies and the upcoming wedding season, diesel generator sets were banned in the capital from Tuesday as the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) to improve Delhi’s air quality during the high-pollution winter months kicked in…
Announcing the measures, the Supreme Court-mandated Environment Pollution Control Authority (EPCA) clarified that the ban on diesel gensets was being implemented only in Delhi, as the rest of the NCR was yet to find suitable alternatives.
The ban won’t apply to “essential services” such as hospitals, mobile towers and Metro. However, generators can’t be used at weddings, housing societies and malls…
The full list of exemptions will be released on Wednesday by DPCC…
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/pollution-panel-bans-diesel-gensets-in-delhi-till-march-15/articleshow/61128208.cms
we have this:
21 Dec: EconomicTimesIndia: PTI: Mahindra keen to move towards high-powered diesel gensets
Mahindra Powerol, a unit of the Mahindra Group, today said it is in talks with a number of global and domestic players for a technology tie-up to launch high power diesel generator sets in 500 kVA and above category in the next two years.
The company is also looking to increase exports revenue of its generator business to 25 per cent in the next financial year from the existing around 16 per cent.
“We plan to roll out diesel generators in higher category of 500 kVA and above in the next two years. The industry is moving towards that segment. We are now working on that,” Mahindra & Mahindra Vice President (Retail and International Business-Powerol) Sanjay Jain told PTI here…
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/company/corporate-trends/mahindra-keen-to-move-towards-high-powered-diesel-gensets/articleshow/62195171.cms
40
22 Dec: UK Telegraph: Wood-burning stoves face crack down amid health warnings
By Steven Swinford and Victoria Ward
The traditional Christmas gathering around an open fire is under threat by a government investigation into whether the increasing popularity of wood-burning stoves and traditional open fires is damaging people’s health.
Michael Gove, the Environment Secretary, is to launch a consultation in the New Year which will examine pollutants caused by wet wood and smoky coal.
Its findings will feed into the Government’s clean air strategy, which is being published in the Autumn…
But it is feared that if his department backs tighter restrictions on the burning of wood in homes it will have a huge knock-on effect on families who have spend hundreds of pounds on the fashionable stoves.
Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, has suggested that people could be banned from using wood-burning stoves in highly polluted areas for part of the year. He said cracking down on the use of such stoves was important as road vehicles were responsible for only 50 per cent of pollution in London…
There are about 1.5m stoves in the UK and 200,000 are sold annually, with the appliances often marketed as a green form of home heating. However, there has been growing concern over their environmental impact. Researchers at King’s College London have found that wood-burning in the capital accounts for up to 31 per cent of the city’s particulate pollution, up from 10 per cent in the past…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/12/22/government-investigate-whether-wood-burning-stoves-damage-peoples/
a good idea?
23 Dec: UK Telegraph: Jillian Ambrose: Wind farms to keep whales safe with noise deterrents
The North Sea may soon be a safer place for whales as wind developers and oil drillers prepare to fit noise deterrent devices to offshore projects to keep the mammals out of harm’s way.
Research undertaken by Orsted, the wind developer formerly known as Dong Energy, and Norway’s Statoil has revealed that minke whales show “a clear response” to the underwater deterrent which could help to protect the North Atlantic species while reducing costs during construction.
The whales respond to the frequency of the device by avoiding the area and increasing their speed as they bypass the range of the device around the construction zone. Currently wind turbine builders need to employ workers to keep an eye out for whales and call for construction to pause if the animals venture too close to the work…
By increasing knowledge of how to safely keep whales at bay during construction the companies believe they can reduce the cost of building projects by avoiding lengthy delays and employing fewer people…
The offshore renewables joint industry programme – funded by Germany’s Innogy, Orsted and Statoil – carried out the study alongside green group the Carbon Trust. The deterrent has also been found to be effective with seals and dolphins…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/12/23/wind-farms-keep-whales-safe-noise-deterrents/
40
“keep whales at bay during construction”
So now it is OK for the environmentalist friendly green renewable industry to disrupt the migratory and feedingpaterns of whales?
80
It would seem so. I wish them good luck with that one.
10
Pity about the people who cannot afford a generator, or will the government supply a generator subsidy.
80
Well if Rudd/Gillard were still in power we all would be getting free backup generators by now with free fuel to boot. Let’s get them back. At least we can keep our aircons going while the country gets closer and closer to bankruptcy. Might as well enjoy it while we can.
51
Yes, you simply need to apply to the Generator General, or the general generator, or the generation rater, or … It will be fine on the night!
20
On the plus side, you can make diesel from coal.
50
Perhaps one day we can reverse the process of coal formation and turn them back into trees so that the Greens can be even more happy.
50
Isn’t that exactly what burning coal is doing?
30
Yes Greebo but that’s to easy and doesn’t cost much. Get with the program! Spend more. Spend more now. Spend more and be happy. Similar to what everyone is told to do in the movie THX1138: “Buy more. Buy more now. Buy more and be happy.”
10
Yes, you are creating diesel! There just has to be a Government Grant for that!
20
There is a website that claims to show the current no of bushfires in Australia:
http://myfirewatch.landgate.wa.gov.au/
I do not know if it has any credibility over there , but a disturbing number of fires appear to be close to
major conurbations – and the peak season has not arrived yet.
From the comments above many of the suburban and rural dwellings may have up to 250 liters of hydrocarbons stored on the property.
Does this present an enhanced risk to the emergency services (fire, medical, police) attending the fires?
50
Many bushfires may be undetected acts of arson and/or terrorism.
81
So is blowing up working power stations.
91
David Maddison –
heard this on the radio, but can’t find anything but the following online as yet:
25 Dec: West Australian Police: Media Release: Scrub Fires – Information Sought
Detectives from the Arson Squad’s Strike Force Vulcan are seeking the public’s assistance for information to assist with their investigation into a number of suspicious scrub fires that have occurred in several suburbs within the South East Metropolitan Policing District between Friday 1 December and today, Monday 25 December 2017.
The fires are believed to have started along bicycle and foot paths in below areas…
DETAILS
Detectives would like to speak to anyone who lives in the vicinity of the above areas who has seen any suspicious people, vehicles or activity in the area around the time of the fires.
Anyone with information regarding these fires is asked to call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or make a report online at http://www.crimestopperswa.com.au. Callers may remain anonymous if they wish.
Rewards of up to $50,000 are available for information that leads to the identification and conviction of an arsonist.
https://www.police.wa.gov.au/Media-Centre/Media-Releases/1872-Scrub-Fires–Information-Sought
30
Of course, but no more than gas bottles, gas lines, timber dwellings even gum trees next to houses. It is typical of governments to legislate against risk and then force you to take risks.
Can we please have our reliable, cheap, dependable coal power stations back?
What is the real reason they are being dismantled and even dynamited? To quote Tony Abbott, the only one publicly standing up to this destruction of our energy security, it is “socialism masequerading as environmentalism”
101
In the old days, when the state looked after our energy needs, it was never an issue.
Would you be happy if we returned to ‘a cradle to grave’ concept?
50
Yes, energy was an engineering need left to professional engineers like Sir John Monash. The political priorities were adequacy, reliability and distribution. The improvement in quality of life anazing.
Now that electricity is essential the issues are removing coal as an energy source and pleasing people overseas and making money.
110
Then the free enterprise model should be scrapped in favour of greater state control, but I fear there is no going back.
The people of NSW are not happy with Premier Gladys, going on a Sydney centric spending spree with monies received from the selling of poles and wires. She is behaving like a drunken sailor on leave.
Naturally I will practice civil disobedience at every election, if there is nobody to vote for, scribbling my displeasure across the ballot paper.
30
24 Dec: Washington Examiner: Boat owners have had enough of ethanol
by Chris Edmonston
(Chris Edmonston is vice president government affairs manager for BoatU.S., the nation’s largest organization of recreational boat owners, with over half a million dues-paying members)
Regardless of its original intent, the EPA’s Renewable Fuel Standard has been extremely costly since its inception more than a decade ago – and it’s only getting worse…
Ethanol, which has been billed as clean and green, is causing harm. The Sierra Club, for example, said recently that “it’s unconscionable” for the EPA to continue to ignore ethanol’s environmental costs. Boaters and anglers are true conservationists and like everyone else, we want clean air and water. But the continued reliance on corn ethanol to meet government mandates is moving our environment backward.
Environmental harm aside, there are the practical, physical impacts of the rising ethanol volumes in our fuel, which boaters are all too familiar with (not to mention motorcyclists, or anyone with a lawn mower, snowblower, chainsaw, or weed whacker). Older and small motors are at risk of serious, costly damage because of ethanol’s inherent corrosive nature.
You could even call it a marine motor’s kryptonite.
Ethanol attracts water by nature, and with a boat’s “open” fuel system that vents into the atmosphere, moisture from the surrounding humid air enters the tank and begins to condense inside tank walls. As the ethanol combines with this moisture over time – like when a boat is in storage over the winter, for example – this can lead to “phase separation.” The process leaves a corrosive ethanol composite at the bottom of the tank, capable of destroying the engine and/or fuel system parts. It can weaken some fiberglass fuel tanks and cause damage to the fuel system including carburetors and rubber gaskets.
The fact is, unless boaters go to great lengths and effort to prevent damage, ethanol will continue to corrode and can cause serious damage. Engines built prior to 1990 are especially susceptible…READ ON
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/boat-owners-have-had-enough-of-ethanol/article/2644264
50
I don’t see the problem. Just stop using fuel with Ethanol. Problem fixed. Or do boat people have a problem with normal fuel?
30
Well one of the problems is that fuel suppliers are allowed to blend up to 5% ethanol without telling you…
40
We use premium unleaded in our boat outboard motor and in lawnmowers, chainsaw etc.
40
You have an outboard motor that mows lawns, and chops down trees? I hope you have registered a patent on that.
It could be bigger that Black and Decker!
40
PeterS – the way I understand it, it is a mandatory additive for transportation fuels.
from the Washington Examiner: “The RFS ( Renewable Fuel Standard), a federal government ***mandate requiring largely corn ethanol be blended in the nation’s fuel supply, has been a complete fiasco for many including boat owners.”
US Dept of Energy: AFDC: Renewable Fuel Standard
The Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) is a federal program that requires transportation fuel sold in the United States to contain a minimum volume of renewable fuels.
The RFS originated with the Energy Policy Act of 2005 and was expanded and extended by the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA). The RFS requires renewable fuel to be blended into transportation fuel in increasing amounts each year, escalating to 36 billion gallons by 2022. Each renewable fuel category in the RFS program must emit lower levels of greenhouse gases (GHGs) relative to the petroleum fuel it replaces…
RFS Requirements
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administers the RFS program and establishes the volume requirements for each category based on EISA-legislated volumes and fuel availability. EPA tracks compliance through the Renewable Identification Number (RIN) system, which assigns a RIN to each gallon of renewable fuel…
Wikipedia: The first RFS, usually referred to as RFS1, required that 4 billion gallons of biofuel be used in 2006…
EISA was signed into law by President George W. Bush and the bill was overwhelmingly supported by members of congress from both parties…
the politics (easy to find articles using headline searches:
29 Nov: Fox News: Ron Paul: Why Trump must tackle the renewable fuel standard
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2017/11/29/ron-paul-why-trump-must-tackle-renewable-fuel-standard.html
1 Dec: CNBC: Trump disappoints fossil fuel proponents and Corn Belt base as EPA leaves biofuels program mostly unchanged
by Tom DiChristoher
On the campaign trail, then-candidate Trump vowed to protect the program, which is popular in the agricultural areas he mostly won over. But as a president championing fossil fuel development, Trump’s EPA floated the idea of scaling back the program earlier this year.
On Thursday, the EPA decided to require refiners to blend 19.29 billion gallons of renewable fuels in 2018, up from 19.28 billion gallons this year. The agency slightly upped the requirement for advanced biofuels, but left the conventional biofuels requirement for 2018 and the biodiesel mandate for 2019 unchanged.
The Renewable Fuel Association, a biofuels industry group, said it was pleased EPA didn’t scale back the levels, but argued the Renewable Fuel Standard needs to be a “forward-looking program” to drive investment in new technologies…
Scrapping the Renewable Fuel Standard is one of the priorities the Heartland Institute promoted at a recent conference in Houston held to celebrate and take stock of Trump’s energy agenda. That goal is shared by many in the industry…
30
Get Your Free “Carbon” credits here:
‘Free Carbon Offsets – Home’
http://www.freecarbonoffsets.com/
Print them out for yourself and send them to your friends and enemies, too, as New Year Presents.
41
Western Sydney? Business people need electricity reliability to grow their investment, especially the one in the garage.
40
And the one in the “green” house?
30
Remember this Comment from me four days back now (shown at this link) where I predicted (umm, pretty confidently) that power consumption on Christmas Day would be (way) lower than for any other day of the year.
That (again) proved to be the case, so, go and look at these two images, one for Christmas Day, and the second one for the previous Monday, (same day one week before) and I’ll show you some stats.
Load Curve Christmas Day 2017 (this is for all fossil fuels)
Load Curve 18Dec2017 (this also is for all fossil fuels)
I have used these two images to show you the difference in the shape of the load curves, as this is for almost mid Summer, and the Load Curves now look similar to that one for 18Dec2017, and you’ll immediately notice that the Load Curve for Christmas Day looks similar to a Winter Load Curve with two Peaks, one in the early AM, with a dip after that, and then a further Peak later in the Afternoon, early Evening.
Now while I have just used these two images to show you that shape difference, now look at the left side vertical axis showing total power and notice the difference.
The Base Load at 4AM is (Christmas Day) 16350MW compared to 18Dec when it was 18920MW, a full 2570MW lower.
The Peak on Christmas Day is at around 7PM, and it was 18750MW, while on the 18Dec, the Peak was at around 5PM, and was 30130MW, 11,380MW lower and that’s a huge amount of power. That’s eleven thousand plus MegaWatts lower.
However, of even more interest is that dip on Christmas Day, and a comparison at 2PM, Mid afternoon on both days, so the same time, and that shows Christmas Day with 17330MW, and the week before 29150MW, and that’s 11,820MW lower.
So, arguably, we have the single one day of the year when Residential power consumption is at its absolute highest, because all workplaces are shut down, and realistically, everyone is at home, so in all probability, in this Summer heat, those who have air conditioning have it turned on, and these two Load Curves forever dispel the theory that air conditioning units in private homes are what is causing those huge power peaks in Summer.
Consider also the lowering of power across the board. No work, no Industry, other than basic shifts at mines etc. No Commerce, and in all those tall buildings in cities, those big Units on the roof are just slowly cycling their compressors, because the building is nowhere near as hot inside as it is during the working week, and is now shut up, so it has nowhere near the internal heat, now a closed system.
Same with shopping Malls, huge power users, also shut up tight so again, nowhere near the internal heat. Same with Coles and Woolies, no customers opening and closing those doors to fridges and cold storage areas, so again, the compressors are all ‘having a bit of a rest’, not required to work anywhere near as hard as they usually do.
So, Industrial and Commercial power consumption way way down. The only thing UP is residential power consumption, and even that is realistically actually lower, and let me explain why.
Those who have air conditioning in their homes usually wait till they get home from work on working days, and when they arrive home and come inside and turn the ‘air’ on, the inside of the home is like an oven, and the compressors, and inverters now, but mainly the compressors, have to work overtime, all of them huge power consumers, working flat out for extended time to cool down from very hot.
On this one day, the ‘air’ gets turned on early in the (relative) cool of the morning, and in that manner, the inverters can carry over during the rest of the day, and the compressors hardly cycle at all, hence their power consumption is actually lower than trying to cool down a very hot home.
Either way, power consumption on this one hot day is humungously lower than it normally is, and it’s an easy thing to show you with those Load Curves.
At the Peak on Christmas Day, coal fired power was supplying almost 90% of that total power, and except for Victoria, all Units were operating at a derated level from their maximum generation.
And yet, people without any knowledge of what is actually happening can say whatever they like, and clueless believers nod their heads and call for the closure of power plants that are actually all that is keeping Australia running.
Tony.
150
Excellent info Tony.
Do you have any idea what the SA big battery is actually being used for at the moment ?
It appears to be just randomly pulsing 30MW for short bursts in fast succession, and similarily short charging pulses.
It cannot be doing much for capacity support , or voltage stabilisation, so i guess they are just playing the FCAS market ?
40
thanks for the info, TonyfromOz
50
a minor carbon scam, but worth noting as FakeNewsMSM isn’t reporting it:
14 Dec: Richmond News: Graeme Wood: Richmond man bilked millions from prospective immigrants: BCSC
Paul Oei is closely connected to politicians
PHOTO: Richmond fraudster Paul Oei gets out of a lamborghini with his wife, left, Loretta Lai, at the Sherman Armoury
A man who ingratiated himself within Richmond’s inner most political and social circles has been found to have committed fraud by the B.C. Securities Commission (BCSC)…
Oei not only appears to have had friendly relations with Peschisolido and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, he has donated money to the BC Liberals and a number of Richmond city councillors and Mayor Malcolm Brodie…
The BCSC notes that beginning in 2009, Oei solicited investments for two start-up recycling companies (which were to operate a recycling plant in the Fraser Valley): ***Cascade Renewable Carbon Corp. and Cascade Renewable Organic Fertilizer Corp. (known collectively as Cascade), through an indirect investment structure.
Canadian Manu acquired securities from Cascade and then sold them to investors. In most cases, the BCSC said the investors’ money went into the companies’ trust accounts. The money was then dispersed into six bank accounts of Canadian Manu and Oei…
According to BCSC Oei used his many political connections to paint a picture of a sound investment.
“Oei told (Investor C) that [Cascade] was developing an environmental project that was to turn waste into fertilizer and that the project had strong government support.”…ETC
http://www.richmond-news.com/news/richmond-man-bilked-millions-from-prospective-immigrants-bcsc-1.23122399
13 Dec: Straight.com: B.C. Securities Commission panel finds Paul Se Hui Oei committed $5-million fraud
by Charlie Smith
PHOTO: Paul Se Hui Oei greeted Justin Trudeau at the Richmond Chamber of Commerce in 2015
Last month, Oei was the subject of an unflattering article in the New York Times, which cited allegations that he spent investors’ money “on luxury cars, beauty pageants and donations to the British Columbia Liberal Party”…
Investors were told that their money would be invested in Cascade Renewable Organic Fertilizer Corp. in Abbotsford and Cascade Renewable Carbon Corp., which was going to compost waste materials in Port Coquitlam.
An investor who lived in Hangzhou, China, was not told that some of his funds would be used to pay commissions to find other investors. Nor was he informed that some of his money would cover legal fees to process the investment, donations, advertising, or funding beauty pageants.
There were similar stories from several other investors, including residents of Vancouver, in the ruling…
Counsel for the B.C. Securities Commission and the respondents will file submissions next month in advance of any penalties being imposed.
https://www.straight.com/news/1007331/bc-securities-commission-panel-finds-paul-se-hui-oei-committed-5-million-fraud
20
comment in moderation re: a minor carbon scam, but worth noting as FakeNewsMSM isn’t reporting it
20
haven’t excerpted the defenders:
25 Dec: Phys.org: AP: Philip Marcelo: Winds of worry: US fishermen fear forests of power turbines
In New Bedford, Massachusetts, the onetime whaling capital made famous in Herman Melville’s “Moby-Dick,” fishermen dread the possibility of navigating a forest of turbines as they make their way to the fishing grounds that have made it the nation’s most lucrative fishing port for 17 years running.
The state envisions hundreds of wind turbines spinning off the city’s shores in about a decade, enough to power more than 1 million homes.
“You ever see a radar picture of a wind farm? It’s just one big blob, basically,” said Eric Hansen, 56, a New Bedford scallop boat owner whose family has been in the business for generations. “Transit through it will be next to impossible, especially in heavy wind and fog.”
Off New York’s Long Island, an organization representing East Coast scallopers has sued the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to try to halt a proposal for a nearly 200-turbine wind farm. Commercial fishermen in Maryland’s Ocean City and North Carolina’s Outer Banks have also sounded the alarm about losing access to fishing grounds…
But while there haven’t been reports of fishing boats striking the turbines, about a dozen boats have reported trawls getting damaged by concrete structures covering undersea power cables, costing tens of thousands of dollars in equipment and lost fishing time, said Richard Fuka, president of the Rhode Island Fishermen’s Alliance.
U.S. fishermen also cast a worried glance at to Europe, where a range of restrictions have been imposed on fishing around the more than 3,500 turbines spinning off the shores of 10 different countries. U.S. officials and developers stress similar bans aren’t being considered stateside, except during construction…
In the U.K., navigation through wind farms remains challenging during bad weather, said Merlin Jackson, treasurer of the Thanet Fishermen’s Association.
There have been at least two minor cases of fishing boats hitting turbines, he said. Fishermen largely rely on turbine platform lights as guides, but they’re not always well maintained. The most persistent problem has been sea currents exposing buried power cables, prompting restrictions while they’re repaired, he said…
https://phys.org/news/2017-12-fishermen-forests-power-turbines.html
40
R.I.P. Professor Wenham:
26 Dec: SMH: Leading solar engineer Stuart Wenham dies at 60
by Pallavi Singhal
A leading Australian inventor of solar technology, and one of the world’s pioneers of renewable energy, has died at the age of 60.
Stuart Wenham, who invented groundbreaking technology that significantly increased the efficiency of solar panels while cutting their cost, died on Saturday from malignant melanoma.
Professor Wenham was the director of the Centre of Excellence for Advanced Photovoltaics and Photonics at the University of NSW and was awarded the British Institution of Engineering and Technology’s A.F. Harvey Engineering Prize in 2013…
Professor Wenham invented advanced “hydrogenation hydrogen passivation” technology – which uses lasers to control the charge state of hydrogen atoms in silicon wafers that are used in solar panels.
The technology is estimated to increase the amount of the sun’s energy that can be converted into electricity by commercial solar cells from up to 19 per cent to as much as 23 per cent…
A memorial service will be held for Professor Wenham on January 8, 2018, at UNSW’s Sir John Clancy Auditorium.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/leading-solar-engineer-stuart-wenham-dies-at-60-20171225-h09zxr.html
20
How tragicly ironic for someone who did so much for solar development, to die of a melonoma !
60 is far too young to die.
30
foolish me. I thought this headline meant Bloomberg was coming clean about the phony Chinese ETS. it isn’t until the final question that Bloomberg admits there won’t be any trading. lol.
25 Dec: Bloomberg: Why China’s Big Step on Carbon Isn’t Bigger Still
by Mathew Carr and Feifei Shen
PHOTO: CHINMEYS, SMOKE
1. How big a splash will China make?
Big, though not as big as it initially appeared. A year ago, authorities were considering a nationwide system that would force 7,000 companies to pay more attention to, and perhaps pay for, the pollution they produce. The program announced on Dec. 19 includes 1,700 companies, all in the power utility industry, and it’s not clear if the program will extend across the whole of China or just to nine provinces, said Sophie Lu, a researcher at Bloomberg New Energy Finance in Beijing. Limiting the effort to coal-fired power plants and other power generators gives a reprieve to two other industries thought to be under the gun, the cement industry and producers of aluminum and other non-ferrous metal producers. As initially outlined by Xi Jinping, China’s president, two years ago, the trading system would also include iron and steel, chemicals, building materials and paper production…
4. Will China’s entry affect carbon trading in other places?
Not yet, but it might. China’s push for its own market may embolden authorities in Europe and the U.S. to strengthen carbon markets that are up and running. That’s because China’s involvement lessens the chance of industries moving to China to get away from jurisdictions ***where carbon trading flourishes. More than a decade after carbon trading started in Europe, prices remain at less than half of the level that industry analysts say is needed to spur real change, which is 20 euros ($24) per ton…
5. When does China’s market begin operating?
The government has yet to say when trading will start…
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-25/why-china-s-big-step-on-carbon-isn-t-bigger-still-quicktake-q-a
***where carbon trading flourishes! WHERE WOULD THAT BE, BLOOMBERG?
30
25 Dec: AlbanyTimes-Union: New York officials publicly push against fossil fuels, while investing in them
By Chris Bragg
Since 2015, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has been in a pitched battle with ExxonMobil: The state’s top law enforcement official is probing whether the company lied to its investors concerning how climate change could harm the oil business.
It turns out that Schneiderman, in fact, is among those investors.
According to Schneiderman’s most recent financial disclosure form, for 2016, he owned between $50,000 to $75,000 in Vanguard Energy ETF. As of the end of November, ExxonMobil was the fund’s biggest holding, according to Vanguard’s website, followed by others giants such as Chevron, ConocoPhillips and Halliburton…
Several lawmakers who have signed onto a bill that would force Comptroller Tom DiNapoli to divest from the 200 oil and gas and coal companies with the largest reserves, themselves have investments in either those companies, or companies that are known serious polluters.
The issue of divestment has come to the fore because Gov. Andrew Cuomo called earlier this month for DiNapolli – ***the sole trustee of the state’s $201 billion pension fund – to stop all significant fossil fuel investments. DiNapoli has said he has no immediate plans to do so but would work with Cuomo on ways to contribute to the low-carbon economy…
Meanwhile, the state Senate sponsor of the bill to ban DiNapoli from investing in the 200 fossil fuel companies, Manhattan state Sen. Liz Krueger, has stock in one of the country’s biggest polluters.
The $75,000 to $100,000 investment is in Berkshire Hathaway, the multinational conglomerate holding company run by Warren Buffett. While the company has a wide range of holdings ranging from GEICO to Coca-Cola, environmentalists have slammed the company for allegedly fueling global warming.
For instance, in 2009, Buffett purchased Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad, the nation’s top hauler of coal. The Political Economy Research Institute found in 2016 that Berkshire was the sixth biggest air polluter – two spots ahead of Koch Industries.
In an interview, Krueger said she had been unaware of those activities – and that she would speak to her husband about possibly of selling the investment. At the same time, Krueger noted that the holding company is not on the list of the 200 gas or oil and coal companies from which she wants the state to divest. That list is based on a list called the Carbon Underground 200, which looks at available reserves.
Unlike Berkshire, these companies do not have diverse portfolios, she said, and therefore would be unable to get out of the oil and gas or coal businesses.
***Krueger also said there was a difference between a lawmaker’s private investments versus making public policy for state pension holders.
“I do not accept the argument my proposal hurts the New York State pension fund at all,” Krueger said, noting that it would touch only a small percent of overall pension fund investment…ETC
http://www.timesunion.com/news/article/New-York-officials-publicly-push-against-fossil-12451519.php
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26 Dec: Reuters: China urges miners to increase high-grade coal supplies for heating
by Muyu Xu and Ryan Woo
China has urged coal miners to increase high-grade coal supplies to ensure heating fuel for winter, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said in a statement on Tuesday.
The statement comes after the central government scaled back its plan earlier this month to convert northern cities to natural gas from coal for heating, because provinces across China had warned of gas shortages.
The NDRC asked miners to put more high-grade coal projects into operation “as soon as possible”.
Coal-fired power plants are also encouraged to increase their thermal coal stockpiles and upgrade their equipment to reduce emissions.
https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-china-pollution-coal/china-urges-miners-to-increase-high-grade-coal-supplies-for-heating-idUSKBN1EK0FU
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[…] to move to diesel. Homes and businesses are so afraid of blackouts in Australia that some retailers are selling four […]
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We need to get some facts circulating. On the AuBC radio one night I heard someone from the oil industry saying that if we ran all Au vehicles on LPG and stopped exporting LPG we’d still be running that number of vehicles in the year 2200 and that is without any tech improvements.
5-stroke motors with a hydrogen/oxygen supplement are still just research projects. We not trying to economise at the moment.
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